Detroit's Rebirth as the "Arsenal for America's Future"
In past posts I have touched on this issue. Given the current crisis facing the automobile industry it becomes more pertinent today than ever. For those who have previously read my general argumentation on the subject, my apologies.
On December 29, 1940. Nazi Germany had conquered much of Europe and was mortally threatening Britain, the last frontline holdout of democracy. On that day, in one of his venerable fireside chats, Franklin Roosevelt highlighted the phrase that America would become the "Arsenal of Democracy," wiping away any sense of complacency from a then isolationist America. It was a symbolic call to arms. He called on Americans to become the "spearhead of resistance to world conquest." He focused on the then "splendid cooperation between the government and industry and labor" and "how important the manufacture of weapons and vehicles is to being strong as a nation."
FDR then continued in words whose sense of urgency could be applicable to our current enslavement to fossil fuels and the accelerating threat of global warming: "Emphatically we must get these weapons to them, get them to them in sufficient volume and quickly enough, so that we and our children will be saved the agony and suffering of war which others have to had to endure."
That was then and this is now. Then in 1940, almost overnight, Detroit, the city that became metaphorically the "Arsenal of Democracy," the "Arsenal for America's Future," in close cooperation with the Washington of that era, changed from being the world's most important builder of passenger cars and vehicles to building the tanks and motorized equipment and armaments that carried this nation and its "greatest generation" to ultimate victory.
As destiny called upon the "greatest generation," so too it beckons to us. 9/11 taught us that we live in a dangerous and unstable world, and that the ongoing risks to our environment, our economy, our national security and to our self respect cry out for definitive action. Our addiction to driving fossil fuel burning, carbon emission spewing cars have turned them into the wardens of our self imposed imprisonment. It is an imprisonment that we must escape before we become the vassals of the oil producers and our children choke on despoiled and poisoned air.
Our politicians tell us there is no silver bullet. The oil industry tells us that our consumption of oil will continue to grow exponentially (check out ExxonMobil CEO Tillerson's prediction that world oil consumption will reach 116 million barrels a day by 2030, up from 86 million today, reported in this Sunday's New York Times "Green is for Sissies"). This administration has slumbered away on this issue for eight years, content on the riches being visited upon their cronies in the oil industry both here and abroad.
Well, they are wrong! Renault Nissan, and California-based Project Better Place, are working together with the governments of Israel and Denmark to make their countries oil independent. Israel aims for oil independence by 2020 while Denmark has already signed on to implement the operational elements of this major electric car initiative.
In broad outline, Renault Nissan will build cars powered by lithium-ion batteries running purely on electricity and delivering performance on par with a 1.6 liter gas engine. These electric car models will become available as of 2011. A key component will be the preparation and development of a national infrastructure to access electric power. "Project Better Place" will arrange for the installation of 500,000 charging hook-ups throughout Israel. It is estimated electric power charging costs will be highly competitive with the current price of gasoline, a competitive advantage that will only improve as the price of oil escalates.
Denmark plans to provide the power supply for electric cars with wind power. Israel is planning huge mirrors in the Negev Desert to capture the solar energy needed for its electric cars. With an extensive grid of plug-in locations there will be ample access to efficient and reasonably rapid charge-up facilities.
Will it work? Yes, the cars here described will be limited in size and range (about 120 miles). But since when has evolving greater size and broader scale been an American limitation? Conceptually, it sets the broad outline of what could be replicated here.
This especially now in full knowledge of what we have learned about OPEC and the oil industry over the last few years. That they will extort from us the maximum that they possibly can. With the price of oil receding from its current highs, OPEC is already plotting to stem the fall by cutting production and you can bet your bottom dollar, if we still have one, that once they can, they will push the price of oil back to $147/barrel and to whatever even higher levels they can achieve. We have learned it is madness to depend on them as suppliers of what is still a crucial raw material, and to tie our economy and our future to their mercies.
Detroit and the American auto industry's business is at the lowest ebb in years, with U.S.-based automakers share of their home market dropping to only 48% of cars sold. What a boon it would be to have a renaissance of our historic "Detroit Arsenal," with our government and the automobile industry working together once again on a program critical to the nation's well-being. Together, to begin replacing our gas guzzling toxic spewing cars with their electric-powered counterparts on a massive national scale, bringing us back to the spirit of FDR and the "greatest generation"!
Certainly, it is a program that will be fought tooth and nail by the oil industry and those indentured to them. Our new administration, in one bold stroke, can show we have a presidency no longer beholden and besotted by oil interests and no longer a pawn of the powerful oil lobby and its army of K Street lobbyists.
At this moment of crisis for Detroit and the nation, let us all work together to make Detroit once more the "Arsenal for America's Future."
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This arsenal of democracy BS is an old military as make-work, the less efficient equivalent to the New Deal's CCC. The idea is to put people to work on behalf of the government making things that do not compete in the marketplace. As we all know, the central government has used unemployment as a method to fight inflation and, therefore, to use the manufacture of military hardware to increase employment only compounds the denial of private wealth to ordinary citizens.
It is bad enough to maintain the world's most expensive military but that military, expensive for the sake of being expensive, is not only less effective than it should be -- since the point of the expense is not for the most effective military -- it encourages foreign adventures. As Madeline Albright said, what good is a big army if you can't use it. The easy resort to war preempts efforts of cooperation and mutual advantage.
Spend those trillions on energy, infrastructure, states, unemployed, facing foreclosure.
Order a trillion dollars in Wind turbines to install
200 GW !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (600GW nameplate)
Don't ya think that would jump start the economy?
Cover appropriate roofs with a trillion dollars worth of Solar Cells:
Generate an Average of 125-500 GW !!!!!
Electricity sells for roughly 1$ per Watt per year.
100 to 500B$ per year.
10 or as little as 2 years. Only Maintenance cost, from then on for 20-40 years.
ROI of 100% to 500% over 20 years
Electric cars may be the way to go. The problem is not that the US is dependent on foreign oil; it's that it's dependent on oil itself. There's no way American oil companies & refineries are going to sell oil & gas more cheaply on the American market, even if all their supplies come from inside the US, if they can get more on the international market.
Most of the talk on the failure of the US auto industry had been focused on the UAW. Is it true that the German and Japanese auto makers have unions in their home countries?
Detroit has to do a much better job, from top to bottom yet to bash union workers against non-union American produced cars is not comparing like items. One thing that would help automakers and be a long-term solution would be universal health care. Then the automakers could reduce their cost.
Hellooooo. . . . . the "government and auto industry working together"? Let's not forget the UAW.
What a winning combination.
UAW...those 3 letters are responsible for the decline of the auto industry. If Detroit wants to survive then stop giving in to their every demand. A bailout will delay the inevitable and won't change a thing. It will continue to let people get paid to sit in the cafeteria all day.
I've got three letters for you that have a lot more to do with the failure of the big three to stay afloat: SUV
Toyota and Nissan rely heavily on trucks and suvs in their product mixes
Can you say Tundra, Sequoia, Highlander, Titan, Armada?
Car makers build what their customers want to buy. US car buyers were largely uninterested in small cars. As the cars started shrinking in the 80's - so too did the market shift away from cars and into trucks, vans and SUVs
management makes the diceisions on products, designs, marketing, quality and so on. management signed those union contracts.
Japanese auto workers make similar wages to US ones, Europeans usually make higher wages.
The japanese govt subsidizestjheir automakers r&d, the european govts fund health care and retirements. Two huge costs that put detroit at a competitive disadvantage.
The UAW is not the only problem. Big 3 Bean counters have been dictating what they can design and build for years. And the Executives were only interested in short term profit not long term stability.
There is plenty of blame to go around. Now the question is would you like a smaller piece of pie every day or would you like a bigger piece Once?
Yep -- it's all the UAW's fault. Management, R & D, Finance, and Planning among the Big Three have been stellar and forward-thinking every step of the way. Consistently they have been outsmarting, out-innovating, and out-designing the Asian car makers for decades now. Darn that UAW!
Now that we're socializing the banks, Detroit, and Health Care....let's take it one more step and socialize Big Oil and all the energy companies. Our problems are solved.
Note to Ford Motor....Is your Pinto on fire?
I applaud your inclusion of a sound solution to this problem: re-focusing the auto industry in this nation to manufacture cars that do not run on gasoline. You offer great examples of automakers who are leading this charge in other nations. I can't believe that Israel's goal is to be completely oil independent by 2020. It seems impossible, but then again, change always does. How long do you think that big oil companies like Exxon Mobile and BP will win the fight?
You also point out, rightly in my opinion, that the cars currently being produced are not conducive to an American landscape. For example, just this past weekend I made the drive to San Francisco from Los Angeles. This drive would require at least three full charges of an electric battery powered vehicle. However, you point out that these cars should not be looked at as reasons not to go ahead with production. After all, it is a starting point from which our auto industries can build upon.
This is a problem with a definite solution. I only hope that Detroit comes to its senses before it's too late.
Thank you for your insightful post. I welcome your feedback- http://www.blemmon.blogspot.com
Those kind of drives won't be great for electric cars until rapid-recharge batteries are widely available. Altair-nano claims to have them now, but who knows for sure?
What you could be doing is, with a fraction of the money you'll save at the pump by driving electric locally, rent a CNG vehicle for these kind of trips from an eco-friendly rent-a-car. It also saves the value of your own car by keeping the long road trip miles off of its odometer.
Re-focusing the domestic auto industry on manufacturing cars that don't run on gasoline doesn't in any way mean they'll start making money. The problem with GM is their business model. They don't make money selling autos because of the high legacy costs. They only make money selling SUVs and trucks.
good case to be made for national health care and get US mfrs out of the health care providing business
I am glad to see someone writing who does more than lambaste either lawmakers, the auto industry, or our dependence on foreign oil. This problem is a complex one, and it is even further compounded by our current economic situation. However, I couldn't agree more with your position that instead of running around as if the sky is falling, why can't we as a nation work towards an auto industry that is at the forefront of manufacturing clean, green, and energy efficient vehicles? As FDR stated, and as you quote in your post, now is the time for America to once again "become the spearhead against world conquest". Although, in today's terms, I would argue as you have that 'world conquest' should be replaced with conquest by OPEC. Nations like Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Iran, and Venezuela are acutely aware of the dependence America has on "black gold" and even go so far as to set their yearly budgets pegged on the price of oil! Granted, this substance is their chief export, so this is somewhat understandable. However, when the consortium of OPEC countries holds emergency meetings to determine how to get the price of oil back up in order to make a larger profit, we as a nation need to pay much closer attention.
What were really arguing about here is centuries old. The industrial North vs. the agregariate South. It's fascinating to see how senators line up on this issue: democrats in the north and on the coasts are in favor of helping the auto industry, republicans in the south and west are not. It's the Civil War all over again.
Thank God we elected Obama to sort this out. I'm appalled that there's a region of our country that's willing, heck even encouraging, the failure of another. If you remember basic Civil War history, you'll note that Lincoln fought to keep this country together and welcomed the South back to heal our country and unify us indefinately. And now, we have the South encouraging the North's demise, despite the grave consequences to all. Unbelievable! And tragic to boot.
Re-read that history. The South was not welcomed back. The South still pays for its loss in the War for Southern Independence. I agree that it was Lincoln's intent to heal the country. Unfortunately, he was assassinated and Mr. Johnston was not that keen on healing, but in punishment instead.
Oh it could be done alright. But since Media is owned by big oil and the war machine, good luck. These kings of industry are no patriotic to the U.S. of A like they were back in 1941. If they were, we wouldn't have had NAFTA, which basically whored our resources away. My grandfather worked as a Pratt & Whitney engineer at the old Chevrolet Plant in St. Louis and always talked about the intense sense of purpose that job had. I was very proud of him. Government needs to sieze big oil by the throat and demand they sponsor the car industry to tool up, not only for cars that make sense, but for wind turbines, solar panels and what ever else can be made on line with programmable robots (which they have now). It could be done, but it would have to be such an aggressive move that the Republicans would cry that the Government was being taken at gunpoint in a Democratic Coup. Good. (S on) Round up that Army of Lobbyists and put them in Gitmo, if they complain. (Sarcasm off).
You seem to place more power in the oil industry than is there. Oil companies provide a product. That product, among many products, is gasoline to run automobiles. How would the government seizing "big oil" by the throat accomplish your goals? How would that force the auto companies produce more fuel efficient and "green" automobiles that the public would be willing to purchase?
Full disclosure: I worked for nearly 30 years in the oil industry. I drive a new Mustang GT which gets better mileage than many cars on the road, and it fun to drive. I do not want to purchase a Prius or the like until they are cost efficient and can travel for 400 miles at 80 mph.
The government "tooling up" the auto industry won't save GM from bankruptcy. The company loses money like a sieve. Where does the idea about the "media" being owned by "big oil and war machine" come from and what does that have to do with GM, Ford, and Chrysler losing so much money?
American auto makers always paid employees whatever their unions demanded. Many former workers are now supplemented by big pensions plus top healthcare benefits. Now that the auto industry is almost broke the government is asked to help pick up the cost of those benefits. But it is not fair for the American taxpayer to be forced to shoulder the responsibilities of a mismanaged auto industry.
Henry Ford's original Model T was electric - the oil companies talked him into making it gas powered. GM (Saturn) had a great electric car out in the early 90s and junked them in the desert. See the great documentary on this called "Who Killed the Electric Car?" http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0489037/ - watch the trailer.
Why not let the oil companies bail out the car companies, since they are reaping record profits?
That's incorrect, I think -- actually from what I've read, the original automobile ran on ethanol alcohol. All the same, there was market pressure certainly to switch to gasoline, especially since this coincides with Prohibition, which of course made large scale production of ethanol problematic in the legal sense (it's the same sort of alcohol that you find in beer and liquor).
You are spot on about the electric car fiasco, however.
New management, drastic pay cuts for UAW, smaller affordable cars. Problem solved.
Lost amidst the auto exec & union bashing are the prospects of the research and development employees. Where are those with engineering, science and technical educations and experience supposed to find employment? If foreign companies are depended upon to supply our country's automotive demand, there may well be jobs for line workers in plants here in the U.S. but you can be sure that the engineering and research activities will be conducted overseas and will not utilize our engineers, scientists, amd technical staff. Rightfully so, too, since foreign companies have the support of of their governments for research and development. Why should those funds benefit anyone other than their native sons and daughters? Unfortunately, our government does not see fit to work with our manufacturing community to push our scientific gains forward and to put America back on top as an industry and science leader.
There exists a group of educated and experienced individuals more than capable and ready to move forward on fuel efficient, American built vehicles as well as other energy efficient products which are needed to take us on the road to energy independance. Too many of these individuals are on the unemployment line with more soon to follow. The issue of raising the standards for math and science in our schools. What's the point? Where are those of us who have pursued educations in science, engineering and technology supposed to find employment?
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