Evening star., 1953-05-08
Officials Deny Asking
For Closed Session
On Foreign Aid Bill

VII VIVIt TAW I'LL
A minor mystery developed to-
day over why the Senate For
eign Relations Committee went
into closed session to question
Treasury Secretary Humphrey
and Mutual Security Director
Stassen on the new $5.8 billion
foreign aid authorization.
Chairman Wiley was informed
last night by a member of the
committee staff that the officials
had requested a closed session.
When they arrived at the Cap /
itol today. however. both Mr..
Humphrey and Mr.. Stassen said
they had made no request.
Mr.. Stassen added, however,
that one of the subjects on
which he was bringing the COM
mittee additional information
was the $3.50 million item in the
new bill to be used at the Presi-
dents discretion in providing
friendly countries with special
weapons"
Wilson Questioned.
Meanwhile. Defense Secretary
Wilson was questioned by mem
bers of the House Foreign At |
fairs Committee in a similar
atmosphere of deep secrecy. A
nnp1oT%oiffao enoLaepooo told ,a
porters that the sessions will
continue to be closed purely on
the grounds of security"
Mr.. Wilson's replies to ques-
tions by committee members. he
said, were so highly classified
that none of them could be re-
vealed.
1t appeared. however. that the
Secretary covered much the same
ground as yesterday before the
Senate group. A statement was /
released saying that the COM
mittee questioned Mr.. Wilson ION !
the fiscal status of funds previ- |
ouSly voted for the foreign aid |
program" and the use of these |
funds in the program in the COM
ing year.
Scrutinizing Program.
According to the statement,
Mr.. Wilson assured the commit
tee that his assistants were
"scrutinizing all parts of the pro-
gram for which money has been
appropriated. but not yet obli- |
gated" In his testimony before |
the Senate committee yesterday.
Mr.. Wilson disclosed that actual |
expenditures for arms aid to |
friendly countries would be in |
creased to SIS billion in the COM
ing year.
The nature of the weapons
has not been discussed in open
session. beyond the explanation
they are mot atomic. Existing
law prohibits the transfer of
atomic weapons.
In this connection, Senate !
Majority Leader Taft said that |
unless present military and for !
eisn aid plans are altered, the |
Eisenhower administration may /
pay out more in its first fiscal |
year than the Truman regime |
did in its last.
Have $81 Billion Now.
This could easily result from
the fact that, no matter how !
much the Republicans cut new |
appropriations, they start the |
1854 bookkeeping year on July l |
with $81 billion already avail
able in unSpent balances from |
past appropriations, largely for |
defense. Weapons ordered q !
year or two ago will be coming |
off the assembly line in the /
months ahead.
The Republicans are discover
ing that they will have a hard
time balancing the budget until
most of this backlog of past
dpp1Op1 ldLlOIlS 1ldS DCCAA OPCAAC'
Mr.. Humphrey told Congress a
few days ago that the way to
do this is to hold down new
authorizations, so that the back
log will shrink a year from now. !
Threat Played Down.
Both Senate and House COM
mittees were getting back to close
consideration of the aid bill after
several days of testimony on the
problem of emergency aid to
Southeast Asia to meet threats
of new Communist aggression
there. The star witness at yes
terday's sessions was Gen. Omar
Bradley, chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff. who played
down the urgency of the threat
in his testimony before the Sem
ate group.
James C. Dunn. newly ap-
pointed Ambassador to Madrid,