Washington-U.S.A.

...the members of Congress who are interested in the details of the defense program tend to divide themselves into coteries of defenders for one or the other of the services...

...The issues that have been raised by Symington...

...If the Soviet Union threatens, for example, to march into West Berlin the United States must be prepared to back up its tough talk with retaliatory power...

...So the nation drifts along from one Congressional committee investigation of the defense program to another without anyone ever really making the sustained effort that is necessary to close the dangerous gaps in the defense and missile programs...

...Representative Carl Vinson (D.-Ga...

...In a world as precariously balanced between East and West as is today's world, there can be no bluff...

...But when all the politics is squeezed out of the debate over the missile gap and the deterrent gap, critics of the Administration's defense policies still can make an excellent case for their contention that a balanced budget has been given priority over an adequate defense program...

...Then, too, there are advocates of manned aircraft vs...

...A former Secretary of the Air Force with Presidential ambitions has been unable to mobilize his attack on the Administration's military preconceptions...

...The staff of the Central Intelligence Agency could be doubled and the Government still would not have precise knowledge of Soviet military capabilities...

...But it is not enough for American intelligence experts to know what the Soviet Union can do...

...The basic question that has not been answered to the satisfaction of the Administration's critics is whether the United States has the power to deter a Soviet attack...

...Some of the waste is inevitable in an always changing program like defense where new weapons and equipment are constantly being developed...

...The most disturbing aspect of the Administrations defense program is the decision to place an arbitrary ceiling on defense expenditures...

...The Administration and its critics are in general agreement that there is a missile gap and that there will be one for at least two more years...

...The American radar installations which now ring the Soviet Union can detect the launching of missiles and air maneuvers...

...Johnson and indeed some of the Administration's own generals are questions that have disturbed many thoughtful persons on Capitol Hill as well as across the Potomac in the Pentagon and down in Foggy Bottom in the State Department...

...The Administration argues that it has enough B-52 bombers in the Strategic Air Command (SAC) to carry out a massive and atomic retaliation should the Russians attack America or one of its allies...

...We may of course be lucky and survive the period of the next two years when the missile gap will be at its most dangerous, but then again we may not continue to lead the charmed life of the Eisenhower Administration...

...There are some persons engaged in the defense program, both in and out of uniform, who can do no wrong in the collective eyes of Capitol Hill...

...When Wernher von Braun appeared before a House committee one morning recently, he got the sycophant kind of red-carpet treatment that Congress has heretofore deemed worthy only of testimony from J. Edgar Hoover...

...Some ceiling, of course, has to be placed over defense expenditures...

...Senator Symington, the first Secretary of the Air Force, is still an Air Force man with an excellent pipeline to that service...

...The difficulty with the whole debate over missile and deterrent gaps is that the facts of Soviet military might are not precisely known and that in the last analysis much depends on the evaluation of intentions as well as capabilities...

...Nor is the Army without its defenders in Congress...

...missile proponents, submariners ready to do battle with Congressmen who want more aircraft carriers...

...Despite all of the hooting from the Democrats and other Administration critics at Secretary Gates' discussion of Soviet intentions, this is obviously a matter which must enter into any realistic intelligence estimate...

...The members of the Senate and House Armed Services Committees and the military appropriations subcommittees of both houses could and ought to exercise a great deal more control over the direction of military spending...

...General Thomas S. Power, the chief of SAC, thinks that his command can do the job if it is given more money so it can keep some of its planes constantly in the air during emergencies...

...We will probably never know exactly what the Russians will do, and we must hope that they will never know our capabilities down to the last bomber or missile either...

...chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, is known on Capitol Hill as Admiral Vinson...

...And that power must not only be available before the Soviet act of aggression, but some of the power must remain intact after a Russian attack on the United States...

...By Julius Duscha Eisenhower's Military Prestige Cuts Political Mileage of Missile Gap Issue THE CURRENT flap over the missile gap began a month ago and apparently is going to continue until November...

...However wrong the President may be about missiles and deterrents—and there are many qualified military experts in the capital who believe that he is grievously mistaken—the Democrats are going to find it extremely difficult to convince voters that the General in the White House doesn't know beans about either armaments or Russian intentions...

...Soviet defense capabilities must be measured against such other demands on the Russian economy as consumer goods and farm machinery...

...There is tremendous waste in the Pentagon and in American defense installations throughout the world...

...The trouble is that however much the Democrats may be displeased with the Administration's defense and space programs, they are unwilling themselves to advocate the tax increases that an adequate defense program demands...

...Most of the Administration's critics would like to see SAC voted more money, but they are still not convinced that even a reinforced SAC would close the deterrent gap...

...The opposition party also continues to grope for ways to dramatize not only the deterrent gap but also the lag in the American space program...

...What we are striving for in our own intelligence estimates is a reasonably accurate determination of what the Soviet Union can do as well as what it is doing...

...The choice of weapons that a Senator or Representative makes is usually dictated by the kind of establishments in his state...

...There is probably little political mileage in the attack that the Democrats have mounted against President Eisenhower's military judgment...

...The Soviet Union is not so likely to attack or even to provoke the West if it knows that the effective military power of the free world cannot be knocked out in a single swift series of attacks...

...Rather, the criterion has been a balanced budget...

...Here is an area where Congress could do much more than it has ever even attempted to do in the past...

...Almost anyone who knows his way around the Pentagon freely admits that the military wastes an astounding amount of money...

...Indeed, it is unfortunate that the missile gap has become a political issue closely identified with the Presidential aspirations of two Democratic hopefuls—Senator Stuart Symington of Missouri and Senator Lyndon Johnson of Texas...

...A man who became President of the United States because he was adjudged one of America's greatest soldiers has neglected the nation's military needs so he could balance the budget...

...But once Secretary of Defense Thomas Gates has conceded that the Soviet Union does have a greater missile capability than the United States has for the present, he does not go on to admit a deterrent gap...

...So there must be a ceiling...

...Information about Soviet productive capacities is gathered from a variety of sources including Russian newspapers, books and scientific publications...

...But the waste is always in the work being done by some other general, some other command, some other service...

...If the Armed Services Committees would equip themselves as well as a modern army does it would be possible for Congress to judge with a greater degree of accuracy what the rival services and the competing programs within each service need...

...Congressmen who have tried to inform themselves on the defense program have been unable to make themselves heard above the hero worship for the President-General...

...Some of the waste is inherent in any establishment as large and as complex as the Defense Department...

...The debate over the missile and deterrent gaps abounds with ironies...

...Admiral Hyman G. Rickover also intimidates Congressmen as easily as he frightens young ensigns...

...As it is...

...The ceiling has never been dictated by defense needs...

...What we are seeking in our defense program are enough atomic-equipped planes and missiles to deter the Russians from attacking us or our allies...

...Von Braun may be good, but it is unlikely that he is above informed criticism...