A Fateful Fight That Boosted Military-Industrial Complex
This article is for subscribers only.
June 7 (Bloomberg) -- You don’t hear much about the battleof the Machine Tool Reserve anymore, and that’s a shame. Foughtinside the Beltway in the mid-1950s, it was a defining tussleover the nature of postwar national defense.
On one side were Harry Truman and Charles E. “ElectricCharlie” Wilson, the ex-head of General Electric. On the otherwere Dwight Eisenhower and Charles E. “Engine Charlie” Wilson,the ex-head of General Motors. The former wanted to stockpileindustrial equipment and raw materials that could be used tojumpstart arms production in the event of war. The latter wantedto stockpile the arms themselves, continuously replacing andupgrading them even in times of peace.