Evening star., 1950-06-12
Our State of Preparedness

There is nothing particularly surprising or
especially alarming, in General Omar N. BradleyS
assertion that the United States is in no shape
right now to fight major war The assertion
made last March to the Senate Appropriations
Committee during the course of testimony that
has Just been released-has merely underscored
fact that has been fairly obvious ever since the
American people and their Government, with
foolish overhastiness, went all-out in demobilizng
after VI Day.
Two factors, however, tend to argue against
the idea that our present state OF preparedness,
even though woefully inadequate in terms of
waging an immediate full-scale war, justifes
excessive worry. The first factor-conceivably
bit on the optimistic side-consists of evidence
indicating that the Soviet Union, despite It's
turbulence and its policy of indirect subversion
and aggression, is anything but anxious to
precipitate an armed conflict at this time or
within the next few years And the second
factor as explained by General Bradley and
other top members of our military establish
ment, is simply this That the United States,
both by itself and in concert with its Western
Allies is making substantial progress in building
up an integrated defensive system involving
weapons modern enough and forces large enough
"to prevent a disastrous attack"-a system, in
short aimed ID at discouraging the Russians
from launching such an attack and (2) at strlK-
ing back at them, in case they do launch it,
with sufficient retaliatory power to slow them
down while we mobilize totally.
Beyond that point" in General Bradley's
words, I'VE must rely on the tremendous power
of our industrial potential bur reserve forces,
our military education System-in fact what we
term our mobilization base-ultimately to win
war If it is thrust upon u.s." His own view, as
expressed in his March testimony, is that the
forces we are engaged In notwithstanding
that Congress continues to provide all the essen
tial funds requested now and in the years imme-
diately ahead-will be enough to attain victory
in the event that the Krenlin unleashes an
armed conflict This presupposes, of course that
success will be achieved in the current effort to
make Western Europe capable of holding its own
through the machinery of the Atlantic Pact and
the Mutual Defense Assistance Program. 1t
presupposes too, that there will be constant,
intelligent and farsighted planning to guarantee
that our own country and the nations OF the
free world as a whole will be able, if necessary,
to mobilize and integrate their Overwhelmingly
superior resources without delay
Assuming the satisfactory fulfillment of the
"ify" conditions involved in all this our present
preparedness may be said to be adequate.
Obviously, as peacetime democracy, we cannot
match the Russians plane for plane, tank for
tank or soldier for soldier. AS General George C..
Marshall has said, they can procure military
personnel and equipment at a rate of or 10
cents for every dollar laid out by us in the same
field, so that If we tried to keep up with them
in that sense, we would have to spend scores Of
billions annually and convert our country into
something like totalitarian armed camp. The
program outlined by Chairman Bradley of our
Joint Chiefs of staff represents a kind of golden
mean. If properly carried out it may well be
sufficient to stay the hand of Soviet aggression.