Life Underground Episode 13 - The Wartime Commodity

Life Underground Episode 13

“The Wartime Commodity”

This program contains content that might not be suitable for all listeners, including depictions of combat.

There’s a refrain you often hear about Butte, Montana. They say Butte’s copper electrified the world and won two world wars. As Fritz Daily might put it, “if it wasn’t for Butte, we could be having this conversation in Japanese or German.” But what does it take to win a war, and how did Butte contribute to that? I’m Clark Grant and this is Life Underground. Today we hear stories from Butte men who fought these wars that were made possible by Butte copper. Today’s show starts with the Korean War and works back to the Pacific Theater in World War II.

There is a quote I like by William Butler Yeats: “Why should we honor those that die upon the field of battle? A man may show as reckless a courage in entering into the abyss of himself.”

War is something I’ve contemplated since I was a child. My father did two tours in Vietnam, and it defined him in one way or another for the rest of life, for better and for worse. His dad fought in Korea. My mom’s dad fought in WWII, all her brothers fought in wars and two of my three brothers were in the military. As a child, I dreaded the thought of war. I feared I would get there and be found out as a coward, because I really didn’t want to kill anybody. And at the end of the day, that’s really what makes a war, a willingness to kill. One group annihilating another group, or dying while trying.

Growing up around all these men who knew what war was all about, it was never glorified for me. I think some of the most outspoken anti-war people I’ve ever met were the veterans in my own family, men who gave their mind and body to the cause, only to feel betrayed by their government on down the line, when VA hospitals proved insufficient and they had to really fight to get what little benefits were offered to them.

That’s why I’m excited to present these stories today, stories of combat from men who lived it, to paint a truer picture of what it takes to fight wars, and the toll it takes on the people who do the fighting. Throughout the Verdigris Project, I have been fortunate to speak with these elder members of the Butte community who have made Butte what it is, and the stories they share often move me to tears. These three men on today’s show also took part in a global effort to establish American dominance on land and sea across the world. When people say that copper from Butte electrified the world and won two world wars, they mean that raw materials from Butte were made into weapons that this country used against Japan, Germany and other countries. But who were the people operating those weapons, and how did the war affect those people who took part in it all? That’s today on Life Underground.

We start off today with Dick Skates, who grew up in Harlowtown, Montana.

[Dick Skates]

It didn’t take long for Dick Skates to leave the home after getting out of high school. Like many people of his time, he went to work young.

[Dick Skates]

Dick had some interesting training in the Navy that would later allow him to better cope with the horrors of combat in Korea.

[Dick Skates]

This is Life Underground, and we’re listening to Dick Skates tell the story of his time in the military leading up to and during the Korean War. Dick left Texas and went to work in another Navy hospital in Long Beach, California, where he worked in another mental ward for 11 months. He then ended up working in the mental ward in Camp Pendleton in California, and was just three months away from getting out when the Korean War broke out. He was extended for another year of service in June of 1950. Dick says things really accelerated and before he knew it, he was on his way to war.

[Dick Skates]

After fleeing from Chinese forces at the Battle of the Chosin Reservoir, or as the Chinese call it, the Battle of the Ch'ongch'on River, Dick Skates and the troops he was with had another 35 miles to go to the ocean before they could finally escape to safety.

[Dick Skates]

Dick Skates made it out of the Battle of the Chosin Reservoir alive, but after a couple weeks of rest, the fighting would begin again.

[Dick Skates]

The fighting went on, but soon enough Dick Skates would be rotated out and come back to Butte.

[Dick Skates]

Throughout our conversation with Dick Skates, he was hesitant to go too deeply into some topics, and there were some points in the interview where memories clearly struck nerve, moving Dick to tears in an instant. Still, he pressed on and kept sharing his stories with us. Dick touched on this earlier, but the Korean War is often referred to as the forgotten war. I asked him why that is the case, and if he would be willing to elaborate a bit more on the war, and how it affected him.

[Dick Skates]

This is Life Underground, and that was Dick Skates, speaking about his time in the Korean War. That’s our episode today, hearing stories of war from three Butte men who fought overseas. Since Butte copper has contributed so much to war efforts for the last century, I thought it would be useful to look closely at what it takes to fight a war, and what the people go through who do that fighting. When we come back, we hear from one of Butte’s few surviving World War 2 veterans, Louis Loushin. Stay tuned.

We heard a little bit from Louis Loushin on a previous episode of Life Underground, from when Louis was a hoisting engineer in the mines of Butte. But that was after he had returned from war in the Pacific Theater of World War 2, where Louis had a lot of experience in combat atop the highest point of one of the biggest ships the Navy ever built. In the spirit of understanding the importance of Butte’s copper production in the global theaters of war throughout the last century, we hear from Louis about his time in combat, beginning with his training.

[Louis Loushin]

Those guns that Louis Loushin is describing were the 16’’ Mark 7 armament for all Iowa-class battleships. The barrels were 68 feet long, and the whole thing, including the breech, weighed 268,000 lbs. As Louis said, the USS Iowa had nine of them. The projectiles that these guns shot could go over 20 miles and weighed up to 2700 lbs themselves.

[Louis Loushin]

Sitting atop the highest perch on the USS Iowa during World War 2, Louis Loushin had one of the rarest views of sea battles of any person serving in the Navy.

[Louis Loushin]

We asked Louis if he ever considered Butte’s contribution to the war while he was over there fighting.

[Louis Loushin]

Louis Loushin’s World War 2 experiences demonstrate first hand just how much firepower it takes to fight a war. In an now-unimaginable period of spending for the United States, World War 2 cost taxpayers a staggering $4.1T dollars. At the peak of the war, there were 12.2 people employed in military service, with 37% of GDP going to the war effort. It’s estimated that the US produced 41B rounds of ammunition, each of which had brass components, an alloy of copper and zinc. The US also made 12.5M rifles, over 300,000 aircraft, 100,000 tanks, 27 aircraft carriers and 10 battleships. Mining was deemed an essential industry during the war and as the largest producer of copper on the continent at the time, Butte was essential to the war too. In the first world war, US mines contributed 77% of the world’s copper, and 31% of US production was from Butte.

So mining and war go hand in hand, but the cost of the war measured in dollars or total bullets manufactured doesn’t account for the human toll. The national World War 2 Museum estimates that 15M people died in military action in the war, with 2M of those in Japan alone. Civilian deaths are estimated at 45M, but it could be double that depending on the source. Butte’s role in that is, for some, a noble endeavor. But pride in the annihilation of another people is a dangerous path to more war and more incalculable losses. We can be proud of Butte and proud of the mining history, but we must not forget that war is never just, and is often but another revenue stream for the companies that produce the materials and munitions governments use to make war. With that in mind, let’s remember these stories and the people who tell them.

I’m Clark Grant and I thank you for listening to another episode of Life Underground.

[credits]

Sources:

https://online.norwich.edu/academic-programs/resources/cost-us-wars-then-and-now

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/16-inch/50-caliber_Mark_7_gun

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armament_of_the_Iowa-class_battleship

http://roadstothegreatwar-ww1.blogspot.com/2013/11/on-homefront-butte-montana-copper-mines.html

https://digitalcommons.mtech.edu/copper_commando/59/