Evening star., 1951-10-10
Stories
Make Europeans Ask
Why Rush Arning!'

Why Rush Arnning!'
By WiIIiom N. Stonemon
Foreign Correspondent Of The sior and
the chieoso Daily News
PARIS. Oct. l0.-Persistent
American announcements about
incredible new weapons far more
terrible than the A-bomb" have
had the inevitable reaction in
Western Europe.
'If the United States can ami
hilate the Russians with cheap
weapons of mass destruction then
what Is the use of our breaking
our necks trying to raise new
armies and manufacturing a lot
of obsolete weapons such as field
guns and tanks"
It has already been suggested.
by one outstanding French COR
respondent at Ottawa, that the
United States may be willing to
relax Its insistent demands for q
greater defense effort by the
countries Of Western Europe.
Must Undo Damage.
It Is now clearly up to the
American Government to undo
the damage caused by its super
weapon" talk by restating some
elementary facts of life to its
partners in the North Atlantic
treaty organization.
!. Experience has shown that
the A-bomb cannot prevent the
Russians or their satellites from
undertaking limited but danger
GUS operations: The civil war in
Greece, the coup d'etat in Czecho-
slovakia, the operations in Indo-
China. Burma and Malaga, and
finally the war in Korea are ex-
amples of nibbling operations
which cannot be handled by the
threat Of atomic warfare.
Large, well-equipped land, air
and sea forces are the only means
OF preventing or liquidating such
Soviet operations.
2. Both the A-bomb and other
terrible new weapons may serve
as effective deterrents to war for
a time-until the Soviet Union can
them or produce other
weapons Of equal violence. Then
the threat of retaliation will serve
to neutraliZe our threat.
3. It is impossible to imagine
any weapons which would alone
be adequate to prevent the Rus
sian and satellite masses from
overrunning Central Europe.
Super weapons can be of tre-
mendous use in deterring the
Soviet Union from undertaking a
general war-even when 1t has
Isuper-weapons of its own. They
can also be Of vital Importance in
the eventual defeat Of the enemy.
III war starts. But the war would
be lost. for all practical purposes.
Iif it was won at the expense of
vast destruction throughout West
lern Europe and only after the
Russians had swarmed over the
Landscape.
Must Have Massed Forces.
4. The thing that will really
stop the Russians, no matter how
many A-bombs they may develop
lis the realization that they can'i
score an easy win anywhere.
The thing that viii prevent
them from having an easy win Ii
an adequate counter-mass o1
infantry. tanks and planes ready
| to fight, at the drop of the hat.
The danger is foreseen here in
Paris that the United States itself
may forget some Of these lessons
lin its exhuberance at possessing
1.-THE new weapons which have re.
Gently been advertised so widely
1t may come to think its owr
infantry is superfluous.
American officers at Allied head.
quarters have thoroughly fright
lened their Western European col
leagues by harping on the fact
that you can't expect Congress
| to maintain American troops ir
C,,~o,&e forax,a,. -
Although never Is a long day the
defense of Western Europe today
centers on the presence Of Ameri.
can troops here and 1t will con.
tinue as far as one can see, Il
depend on active physical partici'
patton of American forces.
The United States is the onl!
lcountry with the power and th'
Authority to direct the European
team.
No European army or any othel
|combination that one can toda!
conceive will make it possible tt
maintain Western European
solidarity and safely withou
lAmerican divisions.