Evening star., 1948-08-23
Spuutz on Survival


General Spaatz's valedictory report as
retiring Chief of Staff of the United
States Air Force is an eloquent recapi
tulation of the appeals and warnings he
and his colleagues have frequently ex
pressed in the past on the subject of
aviations relationship to the security OF
the Nation and the peace of the world
1t is document designed to keep the
American people awake to the fact that
they will be flirting with suicide If they
let themselves lag behind In the sky in
the revolutionary age of the atom and
supersonic fight.
In this connection, General SpaatZ
rightly deplores the dangerous senseless-
ness of our headlong rehabilitation di-
rectly after the defeat of the Axis. But
he does not waste too much time crying
over split milk. Instead, voicing the hope
that we have profited from that mistake
and warning that we must never let 1t
happen again, he declares himself salts
fled that the new 70-group program
constitutes blueprint promising to give
the United States "a stabilized peacetime
Air Force, prepared for any emergency
and Immediately capable of rapid expan-
sion" in the event of another war. His
view is that this developing AT power,
coupled with balancing power in our Army
and Navy, will serve our own and the
worlds security by making potential
aggresSors think twice about the SOLDERING
reality that any attack from them will
invite instant and massive retaliation
from us.
Observing that our industrial complex,
because of its geographical concentration,
is more vulnerable than Russia's to blows
from the sky the former Air Force chief
places particular emphasis on the stra-
tegic significance of "the cap OF the
world"-the Arctic region from the
Thirtieth Parallel to the North Pole"
Prior to the age of aviation, the area had
no military Importance, but now we must
deal with it as a potential menace offer
ing the shortest line of attack against
the heart of our machine civilization. In
General Spaatzs judgment, the defense
problem involved can be met "only to
limited degree" by the irepower of inter-
ceptor planes and anti-aircraft artillery.
Accordingly, the best way of countering
any threat from that quarter must be "in
the maintenance of striking -force-in-
being that could answer such aerial ag-
gression with a smashing retaliatory
attack"
The kind of striking power General
Spaatz and all other airmen have in mind
requires, as he says, that scientific
research and development be "a prime
function Of the peacetime Air Force"
Thus, although the conventional propel-
ler-driven plane probably will continue to
play vital role for many years to come,
the enormous potentialities of subsonic
and supersonic jet-propelled aircraft,
rockets, radar- ar-controlled guns, guided
missiles, ETC., must be exploited to the
full. For example, although it appears to
be much more distant than some over
excited headlines have suggested, General
Spaatz Is not wandering in a world of
silly fantasy when he refers to the work
now being done on a pilotless inter-
continental weapon capable of being fired
from this country to land with it's atomic
Warhead-after a flight of incredible
speed-on target 5000 miles away.
The advent of such a missile depends,
OF course, on first harnessing the atom
for propulsive fuel-an immensely difficult
project still in its infancy. But the posi-
bility, in terms of the next two decades,
Isl so real that the United States must
spare no effort to be ahead of other
nations-particularly Russian making
the most of it. This holds true for our
air power in all particulars. Until there
Is real peace in the world-a peace in
which every people can feel confident
enough to disarm-we must do our best
to be supreme in the sky. To do less, as
General Spaatz warns, would be simply to
ignore the demands of survival in an age
more dangerous than any heretofore in