I grew up in Detroit and heard my parents, grandparents and other family speak of the war production effort during WWII with great pride. The statistics for the industrial output during the war are mind boggling I witnessed the decline of industry in the states I have lived in - Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania since the 70's. Multiple factories in all the cities in the northeast and rust belt are closed. Here's my question - since the decline of heavy industry in the U.S., would we be capable of ramping up production in case we were ever involved in a major war again?
NAFTA, other trade agreements and tax policies have destroyed manufacturing here. Most of the essays and discussion about this revolve around labor and living wages. While that's a very valid discussion, I think there is another vitally important consequence of these policies - national security.
Since there are are lot of people at this site who are much more knowledgeable about business, industry and economics, I want to ask if this is a serious consideration in the formation of these trade policies and is it a legitimate national security concern. We rely on foreign sources for so much of our manufactured goods that I would guess even a disruption of the supply line would impede our defense capability.
I just wanted to put this up for discussion to see if anyone else worried about this and if my assumptions about our industrial base are correct.