Milford chronicle., 1960-12-16
SeapOwer And Survival
BY Rear Admiral Chester Word


Navy, | find that / have little in
terest left in anything that doesn't
bear directly on the survival of
the United States.
The Navy does-it bears very
directly on survival. That's pretty
obvious, of course: As / write this
a naval weapons system has just
met the final operational tests and
proved out as best guaranty of
United States strategic survival in
this time period. Even in the Navy,
however, / don't believe we realize
the tremendous new life or death
Importance of seapower to national
survival. Qf we do, more of us
should do better than we do in
explaining the Navy to the Amer
lean public.) Nor do we realize the
magnitude or the imminence of the
threat of Communist conquest. |
don't believe we ourselves fully
understand the new importance of
the state of readiness" of naval.
forces. ] don't believe we appreci-
ate the fact that new developments
have added new dimensions to the
traditional mission Of the Navy.
1.-The mission of the Navy" we
used to say" is to win wars-not
merely to fight them" When we
said that, we had said it all; and
we said it with a dip ride in
naval power and victories at sea
over a period of nearly two cent
uries.
All of that was changed by the
blast-off of Sputnik. heralding the
marriage of hydrogen warheads to
Russian intercontinental ballistic
missiles. The Communist Conspir-
acy had acquired new and truly
global weapons to accomplish
their plan of global destruction of
free nations. They propose to con-.
quer the world. Only the United
States-leading NATO, SEATO, and
CENTO-has the power to block
their conquest
So why don't they strike us?l
They threaten us often enough
on Berlin, on the Congo, on Cuba
Khrushchev tells us that the Mon
roe Doctrine is dead now-so dead
that, in the insulting language he
now dares to direct to the United
States, il "stinks" Why don't they
launch a Pearl Harbor-type attack
with an all-out hydrogen holo-
caust?
Deterrance is the Answer: and
advanced sea-power is the answer
to deterrence. Can you explain
this to civilians? To your own
family? Do you? Can you make.
them understand that the reason
the Navy builds carrier aircraft
and PoIsris missiles to carry null
ti-megaton warheads is not to kill
millions CT Communists-bu to
save the lives of millions of Amer
leans? If we keep our country
sufficiently strong we need suffer
neither war nor surrender.
There is no defense against in
tercontinental ballistic missiles
the blast-off button is pushed. Be-
cause no defense is possible, we
have to shift to a new concept. The
problem, if we want to save our
people, our cities and our indust-
ries from devastation, is to
deter them from pushing that
button. The only thing that will
deter them-Communists b i n g
what they are-is to their belief
that our retaliatory strikes would
destroy their system, Their people
3 they consider expendable-eYen hy
the millions; but they regard their
Communist system as sacred and
will not expose it to fatal damage.
Warheads and delivery vehicles
we may have in quantities, suffi-
cient to destroy all of Russia ten
times over. Will that deter Com
munist strike against our coun-
try? Up until now, it has. SAC
has been powerful deterrent;
and it still is right now; but will
il continue to be sufficient-in even
the near future?
Absolutely not. If our power to
strike back depands upon weapons
systems which are vulnerable to
intercontinental ballistic missiles.
we will lose our deterrent as
Communist missile power increas-
es. What we have before Com
munist ICBM strike will be com
pletely irrelevant. It's only what
we will have left surviving, to
strike back with, that counts to-
ward deterrence. Bombers de-
pendent upon fixed, soft bases are
increasingly vulnerable to ICBMs
so also are our own ICBM's them
selves on fixed and soft bases;
even ICBM's in hardened but still
fixed bases are to a lesser degree
vulnerable. Our mobile, land based
ICBM missiles-when we get them
will stand a much better chance
OF surviving; but their mobility
may be seriously restricted in the
post strike environment of coun-
try devasted by H-rockets. What,
then, can we rely on? In one word,
but representing weapons-mix
as versatile as it is powerful: sea-
power.
The invulnerability of the in
strumentS of seapower to destruct-
ion by ICBMs because of their
unrestricted and sustained mobil-
ity, the sure survival of naval
weapons to strike back; these are
the capabilities which impose the
tremendous new responsibilities
for life or death of our country on
the Navy.
1t used to be. even very few
years ago, that winning the war
at sea would save our country and
our people from devastation. Vic
tory at sea can now come too late
tn ava-t the new threat to scores