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down, destroyed, or left unharvested by the invading and de- 

 fending armies. The net result of all these forces is a diminu- 

 tion in the world's production of food. 



War impedes the transportation of food and therefore af- 

 fects its availability. This may be even more important than 

 decreased production. For deficit areas this is as serious as 

 if production itself had stopped. Food is scarce in France al- 

 though it is abundant in Argentina and stocks accumulate, 

 with grain sometimes burned as fuel. The difficulties of trans- 

 portation thus further diminish the world's available food 

 supply, already diminished by declining production. Eng- 

 land shuts off Germany's food supply and in turn is blockaded 

 by Germany. The embattled countries do everything possible 

 to reduce the supplies of food available to the enemy. The 

 Germans destroy huge amounts of food en route to England 

 and to our fighting forces in other theaters of war. The Eng- 

 lish bomb the food dumps of Germany and destroy food in 

 transit. In the transportation of food from Germany to the 

 eastern front, large quantities are lost through sabotage and 

 spoilage. This is an old, old game. Food is indeed a weapon 

 of war. 



The work of both Allied and Axis army commissaries is 

 done under difficult conditions and, despite the best of plans, 

 is wasteful of food. War is the world's worst waster of food. 



So far as food production and consumption are concerned, 

 war is more than inefficient; it is chaotic. There are no de- 

 grees of efficiency; there are merely relative degrees of chaos. 



Civilians Get Left-overs 



There is truth in the old saying that "an army moves on 

 its stomach." Its stomach must be filled, and filled with a 

 better food than is eaten by the folks on the home front. The 

 German army gets the best of the food that is available. It 

 gets sausages if there are any. It gets the French wines and 



