Congressman Richard J. Welch (R., Calif.) wanted to know why scarce steel was being used to build 30 merchant ships in U.S. yards for the Dutch Government. To this logical question he got a logical answer. Said the Maritime Commission's Vice Admiral Emery S. Land: when the ships are completed they will be assigned to the United Nations shipping pool and used for whatever service the pool considers necessary. Only after the pool is disbanded will the Dutch get their new ships.
The Dutch, whose prewar merchant fleet was the world's seventh largest (1,532 ships, 2,972,871 tons), had shown their...
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