Navy Ships

The Navy grew tremendously during Word War II. The Navy spent about $90.5 billion between July 1, 1940 and June 30, 1945 on ships ($29 billion), ordnance ($13.3 billion), Airplanes ($15 billion), yards and docks ($6.7 billion), supplies and salaries ($19.8 billion) and all other ($6 billion). Ship additios were 10 battleships, 18 large aircraft carriers, 9 small carriers, 110 escort carriers, 2 large cruisers, 10 heaqvy cruisers, 33 light cruisers, 358 destroyers, 504 destroyer escorts, 211 submarines, 82,028 landing craft, 27,000 torpedoes, half million depth charges, and 100,000 16-inch shells. The Navy had 1,800 airplanes on July 1, 1940 and over 40,000 of them on June 30, 1945, the difference from production being that many were sent to Allies. On July 1, 1940, the Navy had 15 stateside hospitals and 3 located overseas with a total of 6,000 beds, and 1 hospital ship with 500 beds. On June 30, 1945, it had 54 hospitals and 12 hospital ships with about 100,000 beds. During that 5-year period, the Navy procured 50 million sailor white caps, 30 million white trousers, 12 million blue trousers, 25 million shoes, 95 million pairs of cotton socks, 68 million pairs of woolen socks, 10 million blankets, 4.5 million pillows, 172 million handkerchiefs. Personnel in 1945 were 3.4 million officers and men. ^{Connery 3-4, 32}

The top priority after the Pearl Harbor attack was to repair the 19 damaged combat ships. Of the 9 battleships at Pearl, all were bombed and 5 were sunk. the Arizona and Oklahoma were beyond repair. The others were battle-ready by the summer of 1942. Meanwhile, German submarines (U-boats) were taking a severe toll of merchant ships in the Atlantic Ocean. Therefore, escort ships and subchasers had to be built. By May, 1942, coastal convoy and coastal defense had driven the German submarines into the mid-Atlantic and Caribbean. By the end of 1942, U-boats were no longer serious threats in the Caribbean. Escort carriers and destroyers began to escort merchant ships in the mid-Atlantic during 1943 to cut down losses. By the spring of 1944, the U-boat menace was brought under control. Landing craft were built to land troops and arms in North Africa, the Pacific Islands, and eventually, Europe. The battles of the Coral Sea and Midway that were fought largely between Japanese and American airplanes meant that more aircraft carriers had to be built. By the end of 1943, 50 aircraft carriers of all sizes joined the Fleet. ^{Connery 294-297} Below are summarized the results of Navy ship and arms production in World War II.

Navy Production, by type