Evening star., 1949-03-22
Jealous Enthusiasts
OF Air Power Seen
Misleading People
Propaganda Declared
Endonserine Future
Of American Defense
By David Laurence

Gen. Omar Bradley, Chief OF
Staff of the United States Army
and perhaps the. greatest military
strategist in the world today. has
told Congress that a strategic air
force and the atomic bomb can
not be relied on to defend the
United States.
This simple statement would
not have been thought necessary
If the American people were not
in process of being misled and
confused as to the true state of
their defenses and the manner in
which the next war will be fought
if it comes in the, immediate
future.
A propaganda is being carried
on by jealous enthusiasts Of air
power which is giving millions of
people the impression that air
planes, flying from the United
States as a base and carrying the
atomic bomb. will win the next
war in a matter of weeks.
In all fairness, it must be said
that nobody high up in the armed
services or in any branch of it
believes any such thing. But on
the fringe Of the debate are re-
tired officers and propagandists
who honestly think that most OF
the money usually allocated to
ground armies or to the Navy
ought to be spent on more planes.
Unfortunately. such thinking
does a disservice to the real po-
tentialities of airpower and tends
to weaken the branches of the
armed services which must sup
port aerial warfare or else air
power is itself impotent.
Buck Rogers Philosophy.
Much of the misunderstanding
is due to the fancifulness Of the
Buck Rogers" philosophy in re-
lation to future wars. Thus, air.
planes can fly across oceans and
around the world by refueling,
but sustained day-in-and-day-
out bombing on that basis is still
too expensive in raw materials
and manpower to accomplish. 1t
Is not feasible to send across the
ocean and back 1000 long-range
bombers every five or six hours
every day for weeks and months
at time and to load them with
bombs for each mission. Sus-
tanned bombing from bases nearer
the target and protected by rela-
lively short-range fighter planes
is still much less expensive and is
far more certain of achieving OBJ
jectives, whether such planes are
launched from fixed or floating
bases.
In the first place, while no Off
eial information has ever been
divulged as to the number of
atomic bombs that have actually
been manufactured, it is public
knowledge that the United States
after an expenditure Of nearly
$4,000, 100000 used less than half
dozen bombs one for a
test in New Mexico. two over
Japan and two at Bikini. If a
lot more have been made since
the war. this fact has not been
revealed. but the amount Of
money appropriated annually for
atomic warfare doesn't indicate
that very much is being spent,
relatively speaking, for quantity
production of atomic bombs. even
II this Is as yet feasible.
The big point about the atomic
bomb problem is that 1t costs q
good deal Of money to make them
and that for a long while they
will not be so plentiful that
squadrons of planes can take of
from America, all loaded with
atomic bombs, and fly to Europe
followed by another and another
group of planes doing the same
thing every few hours.
Picture Given by ZeaIots.
Yet this is the picture of air
power which the American people
are being given by Zealots who
think Congress will not authorize
enough money for air power.
Congress is air-minded. There is
not the remotest chance that air
power will be neglected. The
Navy has been transformed so
that it operates with air power as
the spearhead of its plans and
operating techniques. The Army
works with tactical air power,
which is today the eyes Of o.
ground army. Strategic bombing
of factories and plants by an air
force devoted solely to that pur-
pose is accepted now as an in
tegral and explicit part of our
national strategy and is written
down in terms that are fully COM !
prehensible.
Problems of how to assign
duties to each service have been
settled at the top level by the
Joint Chiefs of Staff Some diff
ferences of opinion still exist as
to whether the Navy should carry
on any long grange bombing from
the decks of aircraft carriers or
whether this method of attack
shall be abandoned altogether be-
cause the Air Force says. it is
unnecessary. For the safety Of
the United States. it is not so
important how many blows are
struck at the enemy from this or
that direction. but that as many
blows be struck from as many
directions as possible at the same
time.
There remains much work to be
done in eliminating duplication in
buying, in ground facilities and
in transportation. but these are
only incidental to problems OF
logistics and strategy and present
no insuperable difficulty. 1t is on
broad strategy that the Nation is
being told-and Congress is being
urged to believe-that one air