Milford chronicle., 1948-04-16

THE WAY SOME Of the fire-eating COM
mentatOrs sound off these days, all hope for
peace has been abandoned and the only Ques-
tion yet to be answered is when the shooting
war will start. But such expressions are def
nitely misleading. The attitude in the best
informed circles is one of realistic grimnesS,
but not of unrelieVed pessimism. The feel
ing still remains that peace can be secured
and maintained, and some of the top minds
of the country are dealing with the ways and
means on a seven-day-a-week basis.
Obviously, the work in behalf of peace
has two phases. First, there is the diplO-
matte phase-the effort of the State Depart
ment and other civilian agencies to lay the
groundwork for an eventual agreement with
the Soviet Union and the nations within her
orbit, and to cement the Western powers.
The principles underlying this effort are
pretty well agreed upon for the present. The
European Recovery Plan is the most mo-
mentOus step taken thus far.
Second, there is the military phase-the
feeling that we must back up dollars and
supplies with sufficient military prepared
ness to make belligerents wary of tackling
us. When it comes to this, there is world
of honest disagreement as to how it can best
be done.
Unless the international situation takes
a serious turn for the worse, universal mill
tary training has almost no chance to win
Congressional approval. The draft has a
much better chance, but if it is approved it
will be on a severely limited and temporary
basis. A program which is almost sure to be
approved, on the other hand, calls for swift
and extensive enlargement of our air arm.
A short time ago, the Presidents Air
Policy Commission, which was made up of a
number of well known civilians in thenfelds
of law, education, journalism, finance and
manufacturing, made an exhaustive report
called Survival in the Air Age" It's expli-
cit recommendations are likely to be the
framework on which plan for military air
development will be built
First of all, the report assumes that other
nations may have the planes and missiles
capable OF delivering a sustained attack on
the United States mainland by the end of
1852. 1t then reasons that, by that time, we
must increase our Air Force to a minimum
regular establishment of 70 groups with
$3.50 tirst-line planes, an Air National
Guard OF II groups with 1922 first-line
craft, and an adequately equipped Air Re-
serve OF "a groups. 1t says that the Navy
Air Arm is sufficient in size, but that it must
have ample funds for the constant replace
ment OF O0sOlescent planes. 1t estimates that
all this will require an increase in the Air
Force budget from its present So, $50, 600, 900
to $4,15O,OOO,OOO for the current year, and
$5,450,0O0,OOO for 1949.
Next, it points out that strong aircraft
industry is essential-we can't obtain the
planes unless there are going plants capable
OF producing them at the desired speed. AS
OF now, the military services are buvinp
2l,OOO,OOO pounds of airframe weight an
nually. 1t believes that this should be in
creased by 100000 pounds for 1913 and
by another 100000 pounds next year. It
urges that procurement be planned as far in
advance as possible, and that orders call for
the gradual delivery of planes over a 5-year
period. This would make for stability in the
manufacturing end, which hasn't known