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REF ID:A39305 

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1'7_f/1r/! 's·v 

• Bi Joseph and Stewart Alsop ~ 

l The Guided Missile Race 

' THE NATION'S highest he assesses ~----------------------------------1 the race for the shortages, no bombiqs. The 

policy-making body, the .Na·. IBM, he speaks with consider- Americab. obseSBion with setional SecuritJr Council, might able auUu>rity. He says very curit:Jr, he sm, is begiJinlq to 'f 

do well to call in a self-asser· flatly that as of today t'he dry up the immensely stimu. I' 

. tlve, highly opinionated, for- United States and the Sovi~t latinl free exchange of opln· · · mer German general called Union are about even in this ion which so impressed him 

':'. Walter Dornberger. race. He says almost as flatly when he first arrived here. · The Naitonal Security Coun· that the Russians are likely to But, he says judicially, the 

ell is currently "seized'' with take up to nine years to get American securitJr system still 

the problem ·of the intercon- an operational long range does not have the absolutely . tlnental ballistic missile. The missile into the air, with six par~ effect of the GesmM, aa it is known among years as a minimum, wJ!.ereas tapo. · · the knowledgeable, is the weap. we could do the job in five YET IN :MANY ways, he ·. on which will be capable of years !Jr conceiva.bly less. But says, it was t:asier to make JDis. , fi11ng half-way round the we will only ~m the race, Illes, even when the art was '· 

pbe, at supersonic speed, Dornberter believes, on cer- ·wholly unknown even under · ·, carrying a hydrogen warhead. tain condi~ons. . the bombs, than lt ls here. He 

: No one doubts that the IBM To explain these conditions, himlelf left. the Pentagon for · will one day be me.de, either he compares the past and the f,... of strangling in red tape • . in this country or in Rusiia. present. "Over there," he .says, "you 

1 The question before the NSC The first. V-2 hit London in coald\ get a decision made. It 

; ts ~hether to embark on a Septem~er, 1944. Churchill Wlf often wrong, but at least 

·•· mBJor and ultimately very and Eisenhower have both 1• knew where you stood. e~ dort, patterned on the written that the wbole course Nn you have to get 27 men 

•·' war-time Manhattan District, of the war would have been to make any decision, all g&n· to make sure that the IBM is changed if the weapon had er8la, all changing their jobs · made in this country first. been ready in quantity a few and their minds all the time." 

1 On this point, General Dorn· months earlier. Dornberger This country will only win · berger is worth listening to passionately believes that his the missiles race if the .essen· l simply because, more than beloved V·2 was unnecessarily tlal experimental part, at least, l any other man, he is the delayed by at least a fl&r for of the missile effort is taken 

l father of tlJe missile art. An three reasons. ' right out of the Pentagon, 

.~ fun:111t:r-~::ti:~o~! :mi: ONE WAS a dream of Adolf ~=:rf:1'anbe~;;:-1z~~t J: . . German General Staff to head Hitler, that the v-2 wou~d which the scientists and engi· ~ the w art i me Peenemunde n~ver reach England. This neers have the freedom to ex· 

1< Rocket Research Institute. It caused Hitler to lose all inter- periment without justifying 

; was at Peenemunde that the est in the weapon, so that their every move to "27 gen· ' V-2 supersonic missile, which essential materials had to be erals." Above all, aa in the •· 1 bombarded Britain in the last bootlegged to Peenemunde.. Manhattan District, one man • 

i montba of the war, was made. Another was the bitter poll· must be given the power to 

tical rivalry in the Nazi hlgh decide 

DORNBERGER talks in a, command. And the third rea· This.view of Dornberger's ls · heavy German accent, and son, by no means the last, was shared by the areat majority · with an absolute Teutonic as- the Nazi securitJr system. of the most distinguilhed 

: iurance. This dogmatism Domberger has described in American sctentlats. This, in· · · mJght be Jrritating 1n another an. interesting book he ~ deed is why the NSC is seized 

man, but in Dornberger it ls written how Gestapo Chief with' the problem. There ls 

' hnpressive. For as a technical Heinrich Himmler's flatfeet bitter resistance to a Manhat- • ! and engineering achievement, descended on Peenemunde in tan District effort-from the · the V-2 ls rated by some ex· .l'anuary, 1944. and arrested services which will lose em· 

perts ahead .of the atomic Dornberger's best ~el!, throw- pires, and :from the economiz- . · • bomb itself. Moreover; Dorn- ing the whole operation into ers since the effort will be 

1 berger knows our own missile chaos. The .. charge was that verY costly in the long run. 1 effort very much from the they were more interested Yet thP. stakes are hJgh. For, ~ 

: inside-he has been working in apace travel than in win· as General Dornberier told l · here on missiles ever since nlng the war." London very our intelllgence services l:n 

the end of the war, first for probably escaped total destruc- 19'5' the nation which first tthe Pentagon, more recently tio'n because of this-ludicrous fu.07 masters the new missile .~· 

for the Bell Aircraft Co. charge. · art will ''lead mankind into 

He has also had access to Here in this country, Dorn· the tuture." \ 

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