    14

    devices and factory equipment were putting the new contraptions to work.

    Now  many nations were able to turn out the inexpensive fabrics that had

    once been an indispensable British export.  As a consequence, the demand

    for British cloth was in a nosedive.

    There was an enthusiastic clamor for a whole new species of products,

    but these were not commodities Britain made.  They were the tempting new

    goods churned out by Germany's chemical industry and the delightful

    electrical devices made by both the Germans and Americans.  Britain, the

    great exporter, found her stores flooded with inexpensive goods from

    overseas.  Native British industries, still clinging to old-fashioned products,

    were in decline.

    British authors raced to the presses with self-help books that told

    distressed English industrialists and managers how to reorganize their

    factories along foreign lines.  One of these tomes bore a title that testified to

    just how ubiquitous the Teutonic imports had become.  Its name: Made In

    Germany.

    Meanwhile, Germany's exports tripled from 1890 to 1913.  And its

    share of world manufacturing grew so mighty that it finally passed Eng-

    land's.   By 1913, the German companies Siemens and AEG would dominate

    the European electrical industry, employing an awesome 142,000 workers.

    German chemical giants like Bayer and Hoechst would produce 90% of the

    world's industrial dyes.

    On the other side of the Atlantic, another power was rising.  America

    was vigorously grasping the new technologies of electricity and steel.  In

    1902, just one American entrepreneur--Andrew Carnegie--produced more

    steel than all the factories of England combined.

    Until 1870,  Britain had been without question the strongest nation on

    the earth, yet she had spent the least on military hardware.  From 1815 to

    1865, a minuscule 3% of her GNP had gone into military budgets.  Her

      Meanwhile, all those foreigners who had purchased British steam

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