The Preparedness Debate
MANDELBAUM, MICHAEL
The Preparedness Debate National Defense By James Fallows Random House. 221 pp. $12.95. Reviewed by Michael Mandelbaum Associate Professor of Government, Harvard; author, "The Nuclear...
...As was true 25 years ago, however, the challenges to existing practices are coming from the military and their supporters...
...The United States is considering sinking many billions of dollars into this intercontinental ballistic system, with its elaborate network of shelters and runways to be gouged out of the Southwestern desert...
...His is not another installment of the argument the Vietnam War provoked...
...Advancement up the bureaucratic ladder is their supreme ambition, and anything that might slow one's promotion, even honesty, is brushed aside...
...From this perspective, Fallows recognizes that the Vietnam War was partly a legacy of the defense debate of the 1950s, as was the strategy of nuclear deterrence that has on the whole proved successful for two decades...
...Our defense dollars will have to go further in the present decade than in the one just ended...
...Now a comparable national discussion is gathering momentum...
...Finally, Fallows takes a hard look at our Armed Forces and finds the composition of both the officer corps and the enlisted ranks wanting...
...interests around the world...
...Witness the five successive prime time one-hour programs presented last month by CBS News entitled, The Defense of the United States...
...armed preparedness got under way among academic and professional specialists in military matters...
...Critics of the Eisenhower strategy charged that America's nuclear arsenal was not properly designed and deployed, that it was vulnerable to a preemptive Soviet strike...
...In his view, procurement suffers from an undue emphasis on technical sophistication...
...author, "The Nuclear Revolution: International Politics Before and After Hiroshima" Some 25 years ago, a debate about U.S...
...His National Defense illuminates a new discussion that could have equally far-reaching consequences...
...Yetin aerial combat, this can result in a serious disadvantage, for greater numbers can often outgun over-refined weapons...
...In addition, the fancier the aircraft the harder it is to maintain, and the less practice pilots are likely to get flying it...
...The debate in the '50s was sparked by the growth of Soviet power, by the USSR's newly acquired potential for a surprise nuclear attack against the U .S...
...In the immediate future, Fallows demonstrates in a brief, elegant section at the beginning of the book, there will be no money available for huge increases in military or any other kind of spending...
...Too many officers consider the military a career rather than a calling, he believes...
...Fallows does not question the need for maintaining American military strength...
...that made preventive measures necessary...
...The higher the top speed of an airplane and the more advanced its electronic gear, he notes, the costlier it becomes and the fewer units wecanafford...
...Two issues were dominant in the late '50s...
...They also warned that the Communists' attack on South Korea and 1954 victory in Indochina revealed the danger of relying exclusively on nuclear weapons to secure U.S...
...But along with other practitioners of strategic planning, Fallows doubts the arguments advanced to justify the investment—the ability of Soviet missiles to knock out existing conventional U.S...
...And three of them are lucidly explored by James Fallows in National Defense, the best single introduction to the new debate...
...The current concerns about our preparedness revolve around economics...
...As for the men and women they therefore inadequately lead, most of them come from the lower strata of society...
...at defense policy, not foreign policy...
...In the interest of fairness, and of drawing on the skills of middle-class Americans, who are almost entirely unrepresented in today's Army, Fallows calls for a return of the draft...
...It was necessary to be prepared to fight with massed modem forces in Europe, they argued, and to be ready to wage "unconventional" battles in the jungles and fields of Asia and Africa...
...sites, and the Kremlin's penchant for recklessness...
...The situation is similar, says Fallows, in the case of tanks, rifles or ships: Gadgetry for its own sake is a positive hindrance to effectiveness in combat...
...Before long it engaged the public at large, ultimately becoming an important aspect of the 1960 Presidential election and helping to shape the defense policies of the Kennedy Administration...
...His criticism is directed at methods, not goals...
...Fallows focuses first on the weapons we buy...
...Today the points at issue are somewhat different...
...Another chapter of National Defense is devoted to an examination of the Pentagon's assumptions about strategic nuclear forces, particularly the MX missile...
Vol. 64 • July 1981 • No. 14
