One of the things not quite clear in the USA/Australia relationship is the fact Australia actually paid cash for a huge amount of equipment in normal commercial sales outside Lend Lease.
A very large amount of stuff coming in to Australia was actually paid for unlike the British after the first 18 months. That is one of the reasons the deal could be finalised so quickly as the ledger balance was close to even.
Churchill's greatest feat of the war was to convince the unwilling Americans to give them stuff on time payment (Lend Lease). Britain was absolutely broke, they had turned all their gold reserves over to the Americans who demanded COD. They even tried to run roughshod over the Australians and Canadians to use their gold reserves on American shopping sprees for Britain but common sense prevailed.
Lang
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25-11-22, 07:36
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