Evening star., 1945-06-15
War and the Future

If the war in Europe were not over,
If our Allied forces were landing in
France now instead of year earlier,
the chances are that the continental
United States would begin feeling
the direct impact of Nazi explosives
some time next fall or winter.
Evidence of this is being discovered
on all sides in vanquished Germany.
At the time of We day the Luftwaffe
apparently was close to perfecting a
giant jet bomber capable of nonstop
raiding flights back and forth across
the Atlantic. More than that. ac-
cording to our Army ordnance ex-
perts, German military scientists
had blueprinted a W. rocket in the
expectation of having it ready in
quantity for use against our East
Coast cities beginning next Novem-
ber.
The "ifs" and NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS."
of war are things for beaten enemy
to brood over and for historians to
contemplate. They are also worth
the attention of the victors-espe-
cially so in this case because they
give us SOLDERING preview of the
shape of things to come if the world
fails to build an enduring peace. The
W. rocket is enough in itself to dis
credit completely any one who would
argue that a nation can find security
in isolation. AS employed against
Britain this weapon of incredible
speed was only in the first stage of
its development but it caused wide
spread death and destruction. AS
planned for use against the United
States, its range. just before Ger
many's downfall. had been increased
to 5000 miles by the blueprinters,
and little imagination is needed to
visualize how it can be improved
upon in the decades ahead
Military science, of course, has not
reached point where air weapons
piloted and unpiloted-can win wars
all by themselves. Despite our pro-
longed and massive aerial offensive
in which whole cities were virtually
destroyed, our ground forces had to
cut loose with tremendous fire power
before the Nazis went down. In
eleven months of fighting up to We
day our American troops alone used
more than billion rounds of small
arms ammunition against the Ger
mans. plus about 100000 bazooka
projectiles. 4.S5000O hand grenades
and 4S,300,000 artillery shells. Simi-
larly, on Okinawa. our Army and
Navy guns have unleashed we'll over
100000 tons of shells. the concen-
trated fire of our bombers and
fighter planes being insufficient to
shatter the Japanese If mankind
should blunder tragically into a
third world war, there would prob
ably still be vast amount OF such
action as this, despite things
like long-range rockets, but the ter
rible wreckage that has rained from
the skies in these past few years
would be multiplied many times
over. We are in an age, in short,
when the fantastic becomes the real
and when 1t is possible-potentially
at least-to send a load of death and
devastation to New York or Wash
ington simply by pressing a button
somewhere in Europe.
There are so many wonders i'm
plicit in the future-so many Won
ders whose effects can be good or
evil-that for the United States, no
less than for other countries, two
things are now imperative: First,
constant, well-integrated and gen.
erously financed research and exper-
iment in military science, and sec
ond, international cooperation of
the most earnest and enlightened
kind. War in the Goth century has
grown to be far too frightful to per-
NIT any degree of complacency
either in being prepared for it or in
organizing internationally to pre-
vent it. There is no grimmer or
more obvious fact in the world today.