The Wilmington morning star., 1946-01-12
TODAY and TOMORROW
ON THE ART OF SECRECY
BY WALTER LIPPMANN

by WALTER
ON THE ART OF SECRECY
The President in Washington and
the Secretary of State in London
have to take time out to- convince
Mr.. Vandenberg and some OF the
other Senators that they were not
about to give away state secret.
This bit of news ought to be well
coined as showing that even in
these tragic times the comic spirit
has not deserted us. For SUI. ely
this is the first time in history
that a government ever walked
to the center of the worlds stage,
turned all the spotlights on itself,
and in the loudest possible voice
promised it's own representatives
that it would keep deep dark
secret.
It was done, Of course, in order
to reassure Senator Vandenberg.
But why, one wonders, did the
Senator. if he is really interested
in keeping a secret, arrange it so
that he had to be treasured with
the maximum publicity?xHe could
quite as well have discussed his
misgivings privately with Mr..
Byrnes. For surely the silliest way
to 60 about keeping secret is to
advertise it.
If we are really going in for
keeping secrets, We shall have to
study the art of keeping secrets.
It is an art that in our fortunate
past we, never had to learn; we
were not a military power nor a
world power, and so we had no
important secrets that we wished
to keep. Before the war and dur
ing it we did have things that il
was really important to keep
secret. The most valuable of these
things is not now a secret, thanks
chiefly to the Pearl Harbor inves-
tigating committee, namely that
we had cracked the Japanese and
German codes, and were highly
adept at cracking any code.
But during the war we managed
to keep this secret from our enc.
mics, and the advantage it gave us
was enormous. Yet it was good
luck more than our own care that
the secret was kept. The japanese
intelligence was not smart enough
to realize that the code was cracked
even though evidence, quite suffi
cient to tip them off, was published
in this country early in the war
That sort Of luck cannot be relied
upon. - ~
But this incident is worth think
ing about, particularly now tina
we have adopted the policy O.
keeping the secret of the atomic
bomb. The Japanese were no
smart enough to realize we hae
cracked their code though the es
sential clew had been published
Now a true system Of secrecy
should be one that keeps the es
sential clew, not from the genera
public, not from ordinary govern
ment officials, not from the gene
rails and the admirals, not from
a poor intelligence service like
the Japanese, but from the one
smart man somewhere who if hi
gets that clew will get the secret
The secret has to be kept not from
Watson but from Sherlock Holmes
and the most elaborate precau
tons are useless if they do no
deceive Sherlock Holmes.
do not know how much oul
enemies knew about our manufac
turing the atomic bomb, or how
much friendly governments knew
or now know about it. But of one
thing Senator Vandenberg anc
others may be sure-whoever i.
smart enough to have penetrated
our secret is smart enough moi
to let us realize that he has pene
trated it. Foreign government.
will do exactly what General Mar
shall tries to do about the codes;
they will keep it ultra-secret that
they have got the secret, or any
clew to it.
Now this Is just what the very
people are not doing who are most
concerned about the secrecy Of
the bomb. They have forgotten
that Sherlock Holmes and moi
Watson is the man they have tc
worry about. In this field the
Sherlock Holmeses are men Of
science, men used to detecting and
weighing and reasoning from bits
OF evidence that ordinary men
would not understand and would
not notice. So the question is not
whether Mr.. Molotov, for example.
can get the secret from Mr.. Byrnes
the question is whether any sci
enlist anywhere can smell it out.
II this scientist is working for
foreign government, he will not
let us know how much he knows.
He will tell his government what
ne needs to know, and what are
the tell-tale clews that their agents
should look for. It is against
this man, whom we must imagine
as being every bit as learned and
as astute as the best men we have.
that those who mean to keep the
secret have to match their wits.