226 The Ohio Journal of Science [Vol. XVI, No. 6, 



adequate munitions for our own defense "in sixty days" to 

 supply the "two million men who would spring to arms" as 

 we so often hear would happen in that undesired emergenc3^ 



It would be interesting to discuss in detail some of the 

 transient as well as probably permanent advances, where they 

 happen to be a matter of personal knowledge, if it were wise 

 to hand information to the assassins who lie in wait to hamper 

 some of them, for military reasons. It might be well, therefore, 

 to spend just a little time in emphasizing some general con- 

 siderations which are connected with this subject. 



There is little use in attempting to disguise the fact that the 

 present war is a struggle between the industrial chemical and 

 chemical engineering genius of the Central Powers and that 

 of the rest of the world. Quite irrespective of the war's origin, 

 aims, ideals or political circumstances, these are the cohorts 

 from which each side derives its power. 



When we consider the strategic position of the Central 

 Powers themselves, their capable education and training, their 

 system of government, which, no matter what we may think of 

 its selfish effect on the world as a whole, we must admit makes 

 for more effective concentration upon its own governmental 

 objectives, among which preparation for war is merely one of 

 its manifestations, when we take into account all these things it 

 must often appear to us that the greatest outstanding feature 

 of the past two years is the miracle of the Entente Powers 

 resistance to the terribly efficiently prepared onslaught of the 

 Central Powers. This resistance is due, to an extremely large 

 extent, to the efficiency of the chemists of the neutral and 

 Entente nations. The chemists of the Entente Powers and of 

 America have risen to the emergency as no chemists have ever 

 done before in the history of the world. Confronted at the 

 beginning of the war by antagonists whose munitions industry 

 for years had been developed for just such a contingency, 

 these chemists have in less than two years built up a rival 

 industry at least as strong. Plant after plant has sprung up of 

 such perfection of design and operation that one wonders how 

 the mind of man was capable of such engineering. Though the 

 speed with which these new and unexpected problems have been 

 solved may appear surprising, no one who is informed about 

 the progress and development of industrial chemistry in this 



