Evening star., 1945-10-19
War Secretary Seen
ExtoIIinq MonopoIies

EAVOHIH9 NiOHOPOHSS
His Testimony on Single Defense
Need Is FalIacious, Says Writer
BY Dapid Laurence
Paradoxes are not novel In Washing
ton but every now and then they emerge
with surprising contradictions. Thus at
the moment Capitol Hill is buxzing with
demands that surplus properties be not
sold to big companies and that nonop-
olies be discouraged Yet in the COM
mittee rooms Of Congress ut the same
time there are hearings in which ons
OF President Truman's own cabinet sec
retaries Is extolling the virtues OF mo-
nopoly and big business and is urging
that its pattern be copied In the ham
ding Of the War and Navy Depart
ments.
1T win be said, suppose" testified
Secretary Of War Patterson before the
Senate Military Affairs Committee,
that no man can handle the Job of
secretary Of the armed forces because
OF its size and complexity. 1t will be
said that the organization will be too
big. too unwieldly and too diversified in
its problems to operate effectively. The
argument is not impressive. In the In
dustrial world, experience has proved
otherwise"
But has 1t? How many Of the i'm
petuously organized mergers OF 1929
proved successful in an administrative
sense? What did Congress itself say
about the pyramided operations of utili-
ties and their top layers of holding
companies? Mr.. Patterson further out
lines his idea of operations and 1t ap-
pears to resemble that of the holding
company. He says:
AN overall organization confines
itself more firmly to policy decisions
and delegates more extensively the op-
Grating functions. Size is a relative
thing"
Ase-Old Argument.
This is the age-old argument in favor
OF monopoly, namely, that in bigness
there is efficiency and that in large sized
companies there is better service. This
is debatable point because this country
has witnessed a rapid growth of spe-
cialized stores and specialized factories
that compete successfully with their
bigger rivals. But what is not likely to
be denied from experience Is that large
sized corporations with the holding
company type of overall organization
| get farther and farther away from
actual operations. and policies become
more and more the source of friction
between the policy -making level and
those who have the responsibility Of
executing the policies.
Mr.. Patterson's testimony indicates
another fallacy. The Secretary OF War
and the Secretary of the Navy actually
do not make the policies OF either of
their departments. They appear, to be
sure, before congressional committees
and ask for appropriations, but the re-
sponsibility for the kind of Army or
the kind Of Navy the United States has
is not civilian affair. 1t stems from
the Army and Navy stats themselves.
1t has been contended, moreover, that
the two major services compete with
each other and it is surprising to find
Gen. Marshall, who ought to know his
Washington better, calling attention to
the fact that the Navy recently offered
its program of appropriations without
consulting the Army-as If this was
wrong procedure. Certainly the fact
that the Navy wants ships for what it
believes is an adequate naval purpose
has nothing to do with the reasons why
the Army may feel it needs tanks or
heavy artillery or airplanes.
Would Intensity Rivalry
Also If 1t be assumed that In the fu-
ture Congress is going to confine the
armed services to a single lump-sum
budget, the day of deterioration of
strength in our armed services is not
far off. If some civilian secretary is 60
ing to decide that he would rather spend
an appropriation of one service rather
than another, the United States may ex-
pect to witness some real interserviee
lobbying, political pressure and perhaps
the most trying squabbles in all the his
tory of our armed services, with friction
and interservice rivalry intensified in
stead of diminished
The suggested device of an assistant
secretary to look out for the Navy while
an Army man, who never has had any
experience or background in naval war
fare. makes the top decisions on an over
all basis will break down rather than
build up morale in the Navy and the
same would be true In the Army if
Navy-minded man were given complete
authority at the top
The Army and Navy are designated
in the Constitution as separate and it is
mystery why high Army officers and
the air force officers have suddenly
combined to carry on such a determined
effort to get control of the entire armed
service setup for themselves. Small
wonder that the Navy is opposed to the
change and suspects that this is but one
way to deprive the Navy of its organi-
zation which it has maintained for years.
The Navy would have won the war in
the Pacific much sooner If it had been
given the men and the supplies sub
ject which also should be investigated In
order to determine how much compre.
hension of naval warfare our high Army
and air forces had in 1942 and ls43
when the Navy was pleading for planes
and supplies to carry the war against
Japan.