re: #120 ckkatz

This reminds me of a story my Uncle told me.

He was a navigator in a bomber during World War 2 in the Pacific. After the war as the US was demobilizing, he was stationed on a Pacific Island.

He was talking about one of his work details. Which involved pushing jeeps and other vehicles over a cliff, thus destroying them.

I of course was a bit upset that all these perfectly functional vehicles were being destroyed rather than being brought back to the US for civilian use.

He pointed out that the US Government was not in the business of competing with private businesses. The private businesses had no way of successfully competing against the federal government.

Additionally, the economy and employment were better off manufacturing new vehicles rather than shuttering factories because of a glut of military vehicles released into the country.

In addition there is the calculation of the cost (in manpower and transport) to move the equipment back to the USA (or other market) that has to be exceeded by the sale (or scrap) value of the equipment. And the Pacific islands are pretty far from any reasonable market. And probably too expensive for a non-government contractor to come and get the equipment.

In comparison I think a lot of USA WW2 equipment where there were markets (China, Japan, India, etc.) went into civilian use and probably at bargain prices.