Three months ago Mr. Hoover, the United States Food Commissioner, who is noW practically America’s Food Dictator, declared With appalling frankness that
"As far as America’s food resources are concerned, the problem of feeding the Allied European Army is the Biblical problem of feeding the five thousand on five loaves without the miraculous element.”
These are not the hysterical utterances of an excited politician, but of an eminently, gualified food expert who has dll possible sources of information at his disposal. In view Df this imminent world famine, Mr. Hoover recommended that America should agree io release a bushel of American wvheat from the New York elevators
For every Bushel of Australian Wheat which could be landed at San Francisco.
Mere than that, he publicly declared, was impossible in view of the actual shortage of grain, both in North and South America.
The American Government promptly agreed to this suggestion, but for some utterly inexplicable reason our Australian “Win-the-War” Government HAS NOT* RISEN TO THE SITUATION. They do not seem to recognise that the world’s food crisis means a desperate situation for the Allied armies, and that every hour wasted is an hour irretrievably lost in the matter of sending to the Front the one absolutely indispensable Reinforcement”—FOOD. >
The following plain facts, which cannot possibly be either explained away or clouded ty rhetoric, show clearly how the situation stands as far as Australia is concerned.
To equip a transport carrying troops from Australia to Europe means sacrificing five tons of dead weight cargo space for each man carried. This is the absolute minimum, consistent with any reasonable provision for health and sanitation, on hoard a transport .which has to carry troops half round the world. As a matter of historical fact so lar our own transport service has provided more space per man than the above minimum estimate. _
A wheat ship could easily make two trips to San Francisco whilst a transport made one trip to Europe, therefore to send one additional conscript soldier to the Front wo jnust sacrifice the chance of sending away TEN TONS OF WHEAT.
One pound of wheat ground into wheatmeal flour would mean a ration which would put an able-bodied man beyond the possibility of starvation for one day. With very little extra in the way of other things it would form an ample ration, as wheat in itself 3» a perfect food, and contains ail the elements necessary to sustain human life in full ■vigor. Taking these figures as a basis, the sending of one conscript soldier from Australia means depriving the Allied armies of ONE DAY’S FOOD FOR 22,400 MEN, or, in round figures, A YEAR’S SUPPLY OF FOOD FOR SIXTY SOLDIERS.
Using a 10,000 ton ship, which could carry wheat t© San Francisco, to carry conscripts to Europe, means depriving our allies of a year’s supply of food for sixty thousand men.
If we use twenty 10,000 ton ships to send the additional 40,000 troops which, according our politicians, could be obtained in Australia by conscription, we should be depriving ihe Allied armies and our own troops at the Front (who, according to Mr. Hoover, can only be saved from famine by Australian wheat) of a supply of food equal to one year’s ¡ration for ono million two hundred thousand men. .
AUSTRALIA IS THE ONLY COUNTRY IN THE WHOLE WORLD WHICH HAS A gVRPLUS OF WHEAT, and therefore the only country in the whole group of th* AIM«» which can save the situation and defeat the greatest of all enemies-—Hunger. ■
Authorised by P. C. Evans, Macdonell House, Pitt-sireet. Sydney, on behalf cf the - 4 No-Conscrlption Council Campaign Committee.
Worker Print; St. Andrew’s Place, Sydney, £Ovet
ONE CONSCRIPT EQUALS FIVE TONS OF WHEATS,
To equip a transport earn ing: troops from Australia to Europe means sacrifie in* five tons of dead-we1eht carra*' space for each man carried. This Is the absolute minimum, consistent with health and sanitation, on board a transport which has to earn troops halt round the world. And this only shows a space equal to a six-foot cube for all purposes, a wheat »hip could easily make two trips to San Francisco whilst a transport made one trip to ttoropa. Thensorcv to send one additional conscript soldier to the front, we must sacrifice the chance of tendixtt
ZSN TONS OF WHKATi