The Omaha guide., 1945-11-10
nA2 49, by ERIC HASS
-1I j. cA4. III. WEEKLY PEOPLE

Released by Calvin's News Service

The military mind is a wondrous thing! Once it
is set on something it stays set and not even the at
ON bomb can bulge it. Right now the military
mind is set on having the biggest, army, navy and
air force in the world, with a personnel recruited
via Prussian method of compulsory military train
ing. According to the distinguished atomic ply
sicist, DIR. j. r. Oppenheimer CDR. Oppenheimer
directed the atomic research at Los AlamOS, n. ND
one atomic raid on c%OngeSted United States centerS
could kill 100000 Americans. A single bomb of
improved design could transform New York City
and it's millions of inhabitants into an incandescent
pillar of gas in the wink of an eye All this the a.
Omic bomb can do, but there's one thing it can't d
That is, change the military mind.
. Before he died the late Admiral Mccain gave us
a snapshot of the military mind. Said Admiral Nc
Cain: "Give me the fast carrier forces and you can
have the atom bomb"
Chief of Staff General Marshall is another who
takes the alto mobmb in his stride. General Marsh
all wanted peacetime military conscription before
tic atom bohlD and he wants it now. Maybe the al
ON bomb COULD destroy all living things over a
great area. Maybe it could extermirate the train
ed with the unframed, and the brave with the faint
of heart. But this isn't going to alter General
Marshall's thinking. No stree! And General
Marshall has a retort too. "The fundamental re
quirements of conducting successful war have not
changed, y he pontificated to a House Committee.
Shades of MaginOt!
In his recent Biennial Report, the Chief of Staff
asked for universal military training. He was i'm
patent WIN JnOSe VINO oppose universal military
training. saying "They often seem to give undue
Importance to restrictions on our freedom of life"
NJ" Get it? When we were called upon to 60 to war,
we were told freedom Of life'' was everything,
that we value this freedom too highly, that we give
it ian undue Importance, = and that we would make
a good abrgain in exchanging it for what General
Marshall optimistically calls, Eat last a probability
of peace"
But General Marshall is right about one thing,
Compulsory military training does mean "%restric-
lions on our freedom of life Militarism always
was and always will be the deadly foe of democ-
racy. And to strengthen American militarism
through the adoption of peacetime CONSUMPTION is
to build a veritable fortress for race prejudice and
to make a five-star general of jim Grow! You
know it and know it, and the experience of miit-
airy race relations in the recent war has proved it.
Yes, the military mind is a wondrous thing. 1t
is an antediiuvian mind and it always fights the
next war according to the best strategy and tactics
used in the last. But it is not utterly without logic.
A conscript army may be useless in war but it still
has its place in capitalist society. 1t is still the
best device eyer invented to break strikes, hold the
working class down, and indoctrinate youth with
the national chauvinistic spirit. In Imperial Ger
many, military conscription was frankly regarded
for class rule.
The drive to impose peacetime military conscrip-
ton is now in full cry. Even before this column is
released President Truman will have put the full
power of the Administration behind it. Potent
capitalists forces and the plutOcratic press will al
so join the clamor. Against this reactionary array