Army Industrial College

The emergence of mass armies and industrialized technology gave added importance to the home front in 20th century warfare. Countries that could effectively organize their economic and manpower resources tended to enjoy the most success. The Army Industrial College was founded in 1924 in response to America's mobilization difficulties during [Page 57]World War I. Officers were taught planning skills for expanding the Army to wartime strength and converting the economy to military requirements. Many courses consisted of case studies that could be used during an actual conflict. The worst scenarios involved global wars in which the economy and the Army were expected to expand to more than 10 times their peacetime size.

In accordance with public sentiment, Pres. Woodrow Wilson kept the United States out of the war until April 1917. When the country finally entered the conflict, the British and French armies were on the brink of defeat. The Bolshevik Revolution had knocked Russia out of the war, which allowed the German Army to devote its full resources to the Western Front. The German Navy also intensified its submarine attacks on merchant ships supplying Britain and France. German political and military leaders knew that these tactics might provoke American intervention, but they expected the war to be finished before the United States could make a difference. The U.S. Army was pitifully small; most soldiers and officers had spent their careers policing the country's western frontier, engaging in skirmishes with Native Americans. Its last attempt at organizing an expeditionary force during the Spanish–American War was a disaster. The congressional investigation following this debacle prompted important reforms under Secretary of War Elihu Root, but the Army was still not prepared to expand to the size needed in 1917.

Beyond the question of force size, the other side of the mobilization process involved the transformation of industrial production from commercial goods to wartime products, a practice known as industrial reconversion. Factory lines had to be retooled for military needs and additional processes developed to support new technology. Although the U.S. economy was the world's largest, the size of the conflict inevitably required a tremendous expansion of the economy to support the growth of the U.S. military as well as allied materiel requirements and the continuing needs of those at the homefront. The scale of expansion could and did create acute problems in the allocation of resources, transportation and distribution schedules, and labor and material costs.

The Wilson administration borrowed from Progressive ideas on economic planning in creating the War Industries Board (WIB), headed by Wall Street financier Bernard Baruch, to manage the economic mobilization. The WIB took unprecedented control of the economy, to the degree that the phrase “wartime socialism” has been used to describe the period. Baruch enlisted the support of fellow businessmen to work with corporations having large government contracts. They helped to determine production priorities, coordinate access to transportation networks, and resolve any labor or material shortages. The WIB enjoyed varying success in all three areas but suffered some notable failures, too. The American Expeditionary Force experienced critical shortages during its first months in France that limited its combat effectiveness. The mobilization effort also had to overcome its share of mismanagement, bickering, and racketeering at home. To some extent, senior Army leaders hampered the board's efforts because of conflicting priorities and distrust of the civilians running it. The WIB also did not initially have enough authority to force corporations to comply with its wishes.

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