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WALL STREET JOURNAL - 11 JANUARY 1971 P-4

# Pentagon's Fiscal 1972 Budget

By RICHARD J. LEVINE

Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

WASHINGTON—The new Pentagon budget, in the final stages of preparation, is likely to anger Congressional defense critics publicly and to worry military men privately.

The reason: The budget for the fiscal year starting July 1 will call for higher spending after two years of cutbacks, but will provide smaller military forces.

As has been anticipated here for several months, the fiscal 1972 defense budget will be slightly larger than this year's. Although there's still some work to do, Pentagon insiders indicate that they expect fiscal 1972 defense spending to be between $75 billion and $76 billion, compared with a recently increased figure of $74.5 billion for the current year.

At the same time, however, these officials stress, inflation combined with higher pay pointing toward an all-volunteer armed force will dictate continued reductions in the size of the Army, Navy and Air Force. With U.S. forces withdrawing from Vietnam "there will be fewer men, divisions, ships and air wings" in fiscal 1972, says one Pentagon official. "We aren't going to get any more muscle" for the additional dollars spent.

Military manpower currently is 2.9 million and is expected to drop another 200,000 in the next six months. Officials anticipate that at the end of fiscal 1972—18 months from now—unformed strength will be down to 2.4 million men. Yet despite such cutbacks, manpower costs (the price of paying, feeding, clothing, housing and otherwise taking care of service-men and Pentagon civilians) will rise to 53% or 54% of the Pentagon budget next year, up from 49% in the current fiscal year.

"Hold the Line" on Purchasing

For defense contractors hurt by sharp cut-backs in Pentagon purchases in recent years, the new budget will mean that business won't worsen. On the other hand, the budget for fiscal 1972 doesn't indicate that a big turnaround in defense business is in sight. At best, says one defense planner, the new budget represents an attempt to "hold the line on purchasing power."

There will, however, be sizable increases in research and development. "The idea is not to get behind (the Russians) technologically," says an official who predicts that the R&D budget will rise about $800 million from this year's $7 billion.

Included in this jump will be increases for two new offensive nuclear weapons: The Air Force's B1 strategic bomber and the Navy's new long-range missile-firing submarine, known as ULMS.

The Pentagon is expected to request about $350 million for continued development of the B1, a North American Rockwell Corp. project. This year, Congress appropriated $75 million. Spending, using the past year's funds, is estimated at $180 million. For the ULM submarine, in an earlier stage than the B1 bomber, the Pentagon is likely to request a little over $100 million, up from the $44 million it received this year and the $10 million it got the year before.

The increases for bomber and submarine development work, a Pentagon official says, represent "orderly progress" and aren't "a crash program." At the Pentagon, the official line is that a decision on whether to produce these weapons is linked to the outcome of the

Strategic Arms Limitation Talks with the Soviets, currently in recess.

A SALT agreement "could make it unnecessary for us to proceed" with new offensive strategic weapons, Defense Secretary Laird has said repeatedly. Yet senior military men hint at the possibility that the ULMS and the B1 might be built eventually, even if there is a SALT agreement, simply as replacements for the aging B52 and the Polaris-Poseidon submarine. To do so would be extremely expensive, with the most modest estimates putting the cost of the program at about $10 million each.

While most public attention has been focused on new strategic weapons, Mr. Laird recently has placed increasing emphasis on the need to improve conventional forces as part of a "realistic deterrent." Modernization of conventional weapons suffered because of the Vietnam war, he asserts.

As a result, the new Pentagon budget will provide substantial funds for such projects as the Navy's F14 fighter and the Air Force's F15 fighter, as well as a new destroyer and attack-submarine program started by the Nixon Administration. Still, these programs are in relatively early stages and the heaviest funding years remain farther down the road.

Mr. Laird also has made clear that the coming year will see increased military aid for U.S. allies, especially in Asia, to enable them to assume increased defense responsibility as American manpower is withdrawn.

For his critics on Capitol Hill, Mr. Laird's budget will be a target for cutting both in committee and on the floor of the House and Senate. Sen. Proxmire, the Wisconsin Democrat and leading defense critic, already has fired the opening shots.

"No Excuse" for an Increase

Soon after the Pentagon boss gave the first firm indication in a November speech that defense spending would rise in fiscal 1972, Mr. Proxmire declared: "I expect to do all I can to cut military spending sharply in the coming year. . . . Unless the world situation changes dramatically there will be no excuse for an increased military budget."

Top Pentagon officials concede they have a tough political problem on their hands in defending an increased budget as the war in Asia winds down, but they aren't overly pessimistic. "We will be attacked because the budget will be up," says one insider. "All we can say is that the force structure will be down."

Moreover, Pentagon planners comment that although Congress has pared some military programs in recent years, the military hasn't lost a major project to Capitol Hill's budget cutters. "The basic support for defense is still there," argues a defense official.

Congress' $2.1 billion cut in the fiscal 1971 defense money bill will require reductions in the Pentagon's current-year spending of about $800 million. But two pay raises and an increase in military assistance funds means that total spending will be up some $2.7 billion from the Pentagon's original fiscal 1971 estimate of $71.8 billion, according to informed officials. In fiscal 1970, military spending was $77.8 billion and fiscal 1969 it reached $78.7 billion.

For senior military men, worried about what they refer to as growing Soviet military "capabilities," the fiscal 1972 Pentagon budget will undoubtedly be viewed as on the border line of acceptable risk.

BALTIMORE SUN 30 JAN 1971 (1F) p8

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# The Military Is Shrinking, But Defense Budget Rises

By CHARLES W. CORDRY

Washington Bureau of The Sun

Washington, Jan. 29—President Nixon's new defense budget increases military spending by $1.5 billion but slashes manpower by 375,000, thus cutting the forces to their 1961 level and indicating a steady withdrawal from the Vietnam conflict.

The defense-spending plan for the year starting next July 1, sent to Congress today, calls for an outlay of $76 billion compared with $74.5 billion in the current fiscal year. The administration's first defense budget a year ago asked for a lower amount compared to previous years.

## Inflation A Factor

It is no oddity that the forces are going down drastically in manpower while their cost is going up, defense officials said.

The chief reason is both routine pay increases and special benefits intended to make service more attractive and eventually make an all-volunteer force possible. Also, the cost of weapons suffers from inflation.

Of the total intended defense outlay for fiscal 1972, $3.6 billion is for civilian and military pay raises and inducements to volunteers. Without that item, the defense budget would be smaller than this year's.

Essentially, the military forces envisioned in the new Nixon budget are to be made up of combat formations—both nuclear and conventional—of approximately the same numbers and capabilities as those that will exist toward the end of this fiscal year.

This leveling-off process follows a series of reductions—mainly through withdrawals from Indochina and elsewhere in Asia—that shortly will leave the armed services at their pre-Vietnam strength.

Such is the effect of wage and price inflation, however, that the cost of maintaining these forces is 50 per cent greater than in 1964—up from $50.8 billion to $75 billion. (The further $1 billion in the new total is for foreign military assistance.)

The administration's contention, therefore, is that it is now waging America's fast-diminishing part of the war with what

amounts to a pre-war defense budget and what soon will be pre-war size forces.

The revised manpower figures revealed in the budget show that the forces will drop from a present level of 2,880,000 men to 2,699,000 by next June 30, and to 2,505,000 by June 30, 1972. That adds up to a reduction of about 1,000,000 men from the 1968 war-time peak and leaves the forces at the 1961 level.

## Down To 50,000

Implicit in these figures, defense authorities say, is the fact that by the summer of 1972 American forces in Vietnam will be down very close to the level envisioned as a continuing military assistance group—something on the order of 50,000 men or fewer—and some Air Force units with additional thousands.

Mr. Nixon's next budget holds a steady course on strategic nuclear arms, maintaining missile forces at present levels, slightly reducing the numbers of older bombers, and expanding research and development on a supersonic bomber and a longer-range submarine-based missile. The Safeguard anti-ballistic missile system is to be carried

forward at a "minimum" level of $1.3 billion with details to be spelled out later for Congress.

Limitation or reduction of strategic arms is the continuing goal of negotiation with the Russians, Mr. Nixon said, "but in the absence of an agreement we must proceed with planned improvements to assure the effectiveness of our strategic forces. In the field of conventional, or Soviet capability."

## Modern Weaponry Stressed

In the field of conventional, or general purpose, forces, the emphasis is on smaller but rapidly modernized formation—on making up for delays caused by the Vietnam war.

Contracting authority for shipbuilding, a grave concern in view of Soviet naval expansion, for example, is to be increased to $3.3 billion from this year's $2.5 billion.

The budget request is for 5 additional nuclear attack submarines, one nuclear-powered guided-missile frigate, seven of a new kind of destroyer, an oiler, 2 submarine tenders and 3 rescue and salvage vessels.

Six more missile submarines are to be converted to carry the multiple-warhead Poseidon rockets, and 2 guided-missile frigates and a survey ship are to be modernized.

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WASHINGTON POST 4 February 1971 P11

# Proxmire Hits Budget Of Military

From News Dispatches

Sen. William Proxmire (D-Wis.) said yesterday that any hopes for a federal fiscal dividend from the wind-down of the Vietnam war have been dashed by a rising Pentagon budget.

He also called top administration officials to Capitol Hill beginning Friday to defend their new economic game plan, about which he said he has grave doubts.

White House persuasion failed on another economic front yesterday when Rep. John W. Byrnes (Wis.), the No. 1 Republican on the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee, indicated he was unmoved by a pep talk on revenue sharing from President Nixon's aides.

"I would like to go along with the President ... I don't find myself in a comfortable position," Byrnes said. "But I can't accept the assumption that Uncle Sam can perform the miracle of the loaves and fishes."

Byrnes takes essentially the same stand against no-strings sharing of federal revenues with states and cities as does Ways and Means Chairman Wilbur D. Mills (D-Ark.). Byrnes said that revenue for the program simply isn't there, that economic growth won't provide the necessary surplus, and that the fiscal pressures on the federal gov-

ernment are just as great as on the lower levels.

He did say he would support, as does Mills, Mr. Nixon's proposal for converting $10 billion categorical grants-in-aid to block grants for general purposes that would give the states greater latitude in how the money is spent.

Byrnes had met privately with John D. Ehrlichman, Mr. Nixon's top adviser on domestic affairs, and other White House aides after they briefed the conference of all Republican House members.

Proxmire, chairman of the Joint Economic Committee, said, "I have read the President's Economic Report and must report that I cannot share the optimism reflected in that report."

"His program will not reduce unemployment quickly and sufficiently slow the sharp rate of inflation that afflicts us."

Proxmire's committee, which has already conducted six days of hearings on the state of the economy, will take testimony from the Council of Economic Advisers Friday, the Secretary of Treasury next Monday, and George P. Shultz, director of the Office of Management and Budget, on Tuesday.

U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT 8 FEBRUARY 1971

NIXON'S BLUEPRINT FOR DEFENSE

President Nixon's drive for drastic streamlining of the Government is now being aimed at the armed services.

If Congress goes along—and national-security considerations permit—the Nixon moves mean that:

* The number of men and women in the armed services will be reduced to 2.5 million—a drop of 1 million from the number in 1969.

* The draft will end—possibly by mid-summer of 1973—and the U.S. will be served by all-volunteer forces.

* Pay for servicemen will rise sharply—as much as 50 per cent for those in lower grades, where volunteers are counted on to replace draftees.

* More defense funds will be channeled into modernization, new weapons, and research and development.

**Rise in cost.** Those Administration goals were spelled out in two messages to Congress—one on plans for reforming the draft now and eventually ending it, the other on defense-spending needs for the fiscal year beginning July 1.

Total military spending, the budget message said, should rise 1.5 billion dollars, from 74.5 billion in the last fiscal year to 76 billion in the coming year. That is the first proposed increase in military spending under the Nixon Administration. At the same time, it is the smallest percentage of total federal spending to be devoted to defense since the 1959 budget.

Contributing to the increase were recommendations for pay raises, military aid to allies, modernization of weapons, planes and ships, research, and housing.

**On the draft—.** Mr. Nixon told Congress plainly that "no one knows precisely when we can end conscription." But to prepare for that day, the President asked for approval of a special 1.2-billion-dollar pay raise for the services, to be added to a 1.2-billion raise already in effect. That, he said, "would substantially reduce the present inequality in the pay of men and women serving in the armed forces."

In line with his optimism about ending the draft, Mr. Nixon asked Congress to authorize extension of Selective Service for only two years—from July 1, 1971, to July 1, 1973. Normally, Congress has extended induction authority for four-year periods.

To reform the draft now, Mr. Nixon sought legislation that would:

* Permit the phasing out of deferrals for undergraduate students and also the exemptions for minority students.

* Establish a "uniform national call."

This would be aimed at insuring equal draft liability throughout the country. At present, each draft board calls up whatever lottery numbers it needs to fill its quotas.

These two proposals were made to the last Congress but were not acted on. They are certain to face stiff opposition again.

Strong reservations have been expressed by influential members of Congress about the whole idea of ending the draft in favor of volunteer forces.

**Budget highlights.** Besides the special pay raise of 1.2 billion dollars aimed at ending the draft, the Nixon budget seeks 2.4 billion for other civilian and military-pay increases. Other highlights in the budget:

Navy. A request for 3.3 billion dollars for new ship construction is the highest since 1968. Included would be procurement of five high-speed nuclear attack submarines, seven antisubmarine destroyers—and one nuclear-powered guided-missile frigate.

**Research and development.** Total asked was 6.1 billion dollars, an increase over the current year of 900 million for new weapons. Funds were sought for continued development of the B-1 strategic bomber and the Undersea Long-Range Missile System. The conversion of Poseidon sea-based missiles and the Polaris III land-based missiles to use multiple warheads will continue.

**Vietnam costs.** No estimate on the cost of the war in the coming year was made public. But unofficial reports indicate spending will total between 10 and 14 billion dollars. That compares with a high of 28 billion in 1968-69, the peak year for Vietnam spending. Since coming to office, Mr. Nixon has declined to specify actual spending for the war, terming its secrecy necessary for national security.

**Manpower.** Continuing the cutbacks in military and civilian strength in the Nixon Administration, personnel decreases scheduled in the next year total 194,000 servicemen and 22,000 other employes. That would bring total military strength down to 2.5 million from today's level of 2.9 million and the 1969 figure of 3.5 million.

**Safeguard ABM.** The Safeguard anti-ballistic-missile (ABM) program is on the list to continue, with a total of $1,278,000,000 for fiscal 1972, compared with 1.3 billion dollars in the current fiscal year. Actual construction is to depend upon progress at the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) now being held periodically with Russia.

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WASHINGTON POST 27 February 1971 P12

Democrats Urge U.S.-Soviet Agreement
on ABMs

By Marilyn Berger

Washington Post Staff Writer

Democratic leaders yesterday urged the administration to conclude a pact with the Soviet Union limiting defensive strategic weapons as a first step toward a broader agreement.

The chairman of the Democratic Policy Council's Committee on Arms Control and Defense Policy, Paul C. Warnke, suggested that such a limit on antiballistic missiles (ABMs) "could be expressly conditioned on mutual restraint, and preferably a complete freeze on the further deployment of offensive missile systems while negotiations continue."

Warnke thus conceded the link between offensive and defensive systems that President Nixon emphasized in his State of the World message.

But, where the President clearly leaned toward rejecting, at least for now, the Soviet proposal to limit defensive weapons only, Warnke, speaking for the Democrats, urged acceptance with the aim of making the strategic arms talks "an instrument for mutual restraint."

The administration already has left itself room for maneuver on this issue while stressing what both the President, and his national security advisor Henry A. Kissinger, have called the "relationship" between offensive and defensive weapons.

Kissinger, in an interview on the CBS morning news yesterday, said the government was now considering whether any partial limitation makes it harder to get a more comprehensive agreement.

"These are the questions we are now studying in the government and will be discussing with the Soviet Union," said Kissinger, "I don't want to prejudge them in an interval between the two negotiations (sessions at SALT) and before we have reassembled with the Soviet Union."

The next SALT session is scheduled for March 15 in Vienna where U.S. officials have said they hope to get more details on the Soviet position, which has not been spelled out as clearly as Washington would wish.

Until the Russian position is fully ascertained informed officials considered it unlikely that the U.S. would shift its negotiating stance, which calls for an agreement that would cover both offensive and defensive weapons.

Both sides are, in effect, in a negotiating sequence in which neither has flatly turned down the other side's proposals.

Democratic leaders denounced the President's State of the World message as "180 pages of uninformative rhetoric... filled with unstinting self-praise, an absence of candor and a distortion of results." Warnke, at a press conference at the National Press Building, pronounced himself preplexed about the President's assertion that multiple warheads on U.S. missiles contributed to stability.

"I'm troubled by the statement that our MIRV's are stabilizing while their's (the Russian's) are destabilizing," Warnke said. "Both are destabilizing... both raise the possibility of a first strike."

He also hit at the President's reference to "strong So-

viet defensive forces." Said Warnke: "The only ABM defense of which there is any indication is the Galosh system (around Moscow). That was obsolete when construction began."

Warnke said that since the U.S. MIRV's were more advanced than Soviet multiple warheads "now is the time to bring about a freeze."

Following the press conference Warnke, who headed the Pentagon's International Security Affairs office in the Johnson administration, also expressed deep dismay with the President's brief reference in his foreign policy message to developing a means of selective nuclear response, which he said seemed based on the concept of a limited nuclear attack.

"By thus equating nuclear weapons with conventional weapons," Warnke said, "you make their use more plausible... This creates a climate in which nuclear weapons are thinkable... it lowers the nuclear threshold."

Administration officials, however, argue that instead of lowering the threshold, a capability for limited nuclear response raises the threshold and increases deterrence. They say it could prevent a situation in which the Russians can confront the United States with a choice between surrender and mass destruction on both sides.

The Democrats generally commended the administration's European policy, particularly the decision to maintain U.S. troop strength within the North Atlantic Alliance.

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WASHINGTON POST 11 March 1971 P1

# Moorer Cautions On Soviet A-Lead

By Michael Getler
Washington Post Staff Writer

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff warned Congress yesterday that the Soviet Union could gain nuclear superiority over the United States "within the next five or six years"—a situation to be "avoided at all costs."

"Aside from the military implications," Adm. Thomas H. Moorer told the House Armed Services Committee, Soviet superiority would destroy the confidence of this country's allies and weaken U.S. diplomacy "even were that superiority to have no practical effect on the outcome of an all-out nuclear exchange."

Despite the apparent slowdown in silo construction for the Soviet Union's three front-line ICBMs, Moorer estimated that force would continue to expand from its present 1,440 missiles to about 1,500 by mid-1971.

He also pointed to fresh evidence—now widely publicized—that the Kremlin has started building new silos for what may be still another ICBM. Furthermore, he raised the possibility that even one more variety of globe-spanning missile may be in the offing.

"There remains the possibility," Moorer said, "that the Soviets may develop and deploy a mobile ICBM" in the next several years.

Sen. Stuart Symington (D-Mo.) criticized the Pentagon's assessment and the airing of secret intelligence on the new Soviet missile silos on national television just before the defense budget went to Congress.

"Here we go again," said Symington in a Senate statement.

Among the inevitable signs of a Washington spring, he listed "proposed higher defense budgets and warnings of grave new dangers . . . because of new developments in Soviet weaponry."

Symington is a member of

the Senate Armed Services Committee along with Sen. Henry M. Jackson (D-Wash.). It was Jackson who revealed the new silo information on TV last Sunday.

"Last week," Symington said, "in a session secret to the point where no record was kept, the Senate Armed Services Committee was briefed about Soviet missile plans. This briefing included for the first time purported details of new Soviet missilery which was not known about when the Joint Atomic Energy Committee was briefed the previous week on the same subject by the same people."

In a possible swipe at Jackson, Symington said he was asked by reporters about this new Soviet threat last Sunday, but "based on the secrecy of the briefing, I avoided answering." He then asked that news stories following the TV show be printed in the Congressional Record.

On the estimates themselves, Symington said "one cannot fail to remember several comparable spring announcements of previous years—in the early 1950s those thousands of new long-range bombers the Soviets were going to build, but never built; in the late 1950s, those hundreds upon hundreds of long-range missiles the Soviets were going to build, but never built.

"As a result of these and other inaccurate intelligence reports," Symington claimed, "the American taxpayer is currently hearing the burden of tens of billions of dollars of additional weaponry we now know is not needed for his and our security."

NEW YORK POST 13 MARCH 71 (15)

## The Pentagon's Budget Offensive

125

Intoning the dark forebodings that seem traditional at defense budget hearings, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has solemnly warned Congress that a threatening Soviet nuclear superiority must be "avoided at all costs." He was apparently referring to the profits of doom.

The case made out by Admiral Thomas H. Moorer was admittedly somewhat speculative in that he anticipated a five- or six-year "lead time" for the alleged superiority. What is more, he argued—somewhat feebly, it seemed—that an increase in the Russian overkill capability would undermine U. S. diplomacy and intimidate Western allies.

But with a $76 billion Defense appropriations request pending, any alarmist testimony is apparently admissible, no matter how contrived and regardless of its effect on the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks.

Thus, the Pentagon's protests were still echoing yesterday as President Nixon handed chief disarmament negotiator Gerard C. Smith his sealed instructions for the Vienna conferences. We trust they contain something more than the conventional expressions of apprehension and panic-mongering of the kind embodied in the Moorer statement; real progress in disarmament depends on joint action by chiefs of state, not the Joint Chiefs of Staff. For the great question remains: how much overkill will ever be enough?

PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER 13 MARCH 1971 (25)

# U.S. Losing Arms Race?

By JAMES McCARTNEY
Of Our Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON.—Is the U. S. really falling behind in the strategic arms race with the Soviet Union?

The idea has been implied strongly in recent days by Pentagon reports that the Russians may be building a new and powerful missile system to present the U. S. with a serious new challenge.

But hard facts in testimony presented formally to Congress this week paint a somewhat different picture.

The testimony shows that the U. S. is still far ahead of the Soviets in key strategic categories — and in fact is currently deploying nuclear warheads at a rate three times as fast as the Soviets.

The Pentagon budget shows that the U. S. is plunging ahead with deployment of major new strategic systems on both land and sea — as well as continuing its anti-ballistic missile (ABM) program, which is a nuclear weapons defense system.

Headlines have been dominated by reports of what the Pentagon fears the Soviets might or could do — not by what they actually are known to have done.

Sen. Stuart Symington (D., Mo.) — a one-time secretary of the Air Force who is no novice in the field — says that the Pentagon is engaged in its annual spring campaign for a higher defense budget.

"Many new occurrences inevitably come with spring," he told the Senate with a way smile the other day, including "warnings of grave new dangers to this country because of new developments in Soviet weaponry."

Here's the way the strategic picture now shapes up in key categories according to testimony by Defense Secretary Melvin Laird and Adm. Thomas Moorer, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

This, in essence, is what the fine print says:

(1) —Deliverable nuclear warheads.

This is perhaps the most important category of all — and the U. S. has a huge lead which nobody thinks could be overcome in the next decade.

The U. S. had 4000 deliverable nuclear warheads at the end of 1970, compared to 1800 for the Soviets.

The Soviets are building — but the U. S. is building faster. The Soviets are expected to have 2000 by mid-1971 — the U. S. 4600.

U. S. growth is a result of the highly complex, little understood MIRV program in which multiple warheads are being installed on U. S. missiles, both land and sea based.

U. S. technology makes it possible to aim each of the warheads separately. The Russians still don't know how to do this and nobody is sure when they might learn.

(MIRV stands for multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicle.)

The U. S. has never said how many bombs it plans to build — but informed estimates have run from 10,000 to 15,000.

The Soviets continue to have an overall lead in "megatonnage" — meaning in explosive nuclear power. This is because of the immense power of their

huge, 25-megaton SS-9 missile, by far the most powerful in the world.

President Nixon told the New York Times in an interview this week that "the Soviets now have three times the missile strength of ourselves." The White House explained later that the President was referring to megatonnage. Precise figures are classified.

The U. S. chose voluntarily not to try to build such a big missile years ago because scientists felt the power would be wasted. The U. S. could still do it if it wished.

(2) —Land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles (IOBMs).

The Soviets have a numerical lead, but have halted or leveled off deployment recently in all major categories — including the SS-9 missile.

The Soviets now have 1440 land-based ICBMs while the U. S. has 1054 — a figure the U. S. has maintained, and considered adequate, for several years.

But figures on the numbers of missiles can be misleading. An important question is how many nuclear bombs each of the missiles can carry and how accurate they are.

In this field the U. S. is ahead. It is proceeding to deploy nuclear warheads on land-based missiles far more rapidly than the Soviets.

The new U. S. defense budget calls for a 42 percent increase in funds for the U. S. Minuteman III Missile program — the backbone of the U. S. land-based missile force.

The budget requests more than a half a billion dollars to build new Minuteman missiles with multiple nuclear warheads.

Defense Secretary Laird has said publicly that he has information that the Soviet Union is "going forward with the construction of a large missile system."

But he didn't pretend to know exactly what the Soviets are doing, beyond construction work on new missile silos, and he interpreted the Soviet program as indicating that they intend to maintain "parity" in strategic weapons, meaning equality.

(3) —Submarine-launched missiles (SLBMs).

The U. S. is far ahead in submarine-launched missiles with its virtually invulnerable fleet of 41 Polaris submarines and an on-going program to convert 31 of them to the much more powerful Poseidon.

The U. S. has 656 launchable missiles, compared to 350 for the Soviets.

The Soviets, however, are struggling to catch up. They are building submarines faster than anything else, and will deploy 50 new under-water missiles by the middle of this year.

Nevertheless, U. S. submarine technology is way ahead of that of the Soviets. Their submarines aren't nearly as effective. They still do not have a solid fuel missile and are operating with highly dangerous liquid fuel.

Laird said if the Soviets continue building at the current rate they would have a fleet comparable to the U. S. Polaris-Poseidon fleet by 1974.

But he and Adm. Moorer declined to point out that the U. S. Poseidon-building program will multiply the strength

this same period it involves added hundreds — in fact thousands — of nuclear warheads that can be separately aimed.

The Soviets haven't learned how to do this yet, and thus the U. S. has a huge margin in one of the most important parts of the strategic equation.

(4) —Strategic bombers.

The U. S. has a huge lead in bombers as well. It has 517 bombers and is adding to the force, while the Soviets have 195 and are cutting down.

The U. S. is also putting $371 million into developing a new bomber.

(5) —Anti-ballistic missiles (ABM).

The Soviets have deployed four ABM complexes around Moscow, but the Defense Department's official statements fail to note that they are considered outmoded and ineffective.

The U. S. is continuing to expand its Safeguard ABM system. It is building two sites and plans to build two more. The first elements would become operational in 1974. The effectiveness of the U. S. ABM is a matter of scientific dispute.

Over-all, Laird and Moorer put great emphasis on their fears of eventual Soviet capabilities.

Adm. Moorer said, for example, that he believed it is "fair to say that the over-all strategic balance, during the last five or six years, has drastically shifted in favor of the Soviet Union."

"Our comfortable lead has now all but vanished," he said, "and within the next five or six years we could actually find ourselves in a position of over-all strategic inferiority, certainly as far as numbers of offensive delivery vehicles and megatons, and air defense systems are concerned."

Sen. Symington, however, expressed skepticism.

"One cannot fall to remember several comparable spring announcements of previous years," he said, "... in the early 1950s those thousands of new long-range bombers the Soviets were going to build, but never built. In the late 1950s those hundreds upon hundreds of long-range missiles the Soviets were going to build, but never built ...

"As a result ... the American taxpayer is currently bearing the burden of tens of billions of dollars of additional weaponry we now know is not needed for his and our security."

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WASHINGTON POST 8 March 1971 P1

# Jackson Says Reds Deploy New ICBM

By Morton Mintz

Washington Post Staff Writer

Sen. Henry M. Jackson (D-Wash.) said yesterday that the Soviet Union, in an "ominous" development, is in the process of deploying "an advanced generation" of huge, new intercontinental ballistic missiles.

He said the new weapons are as "big or bigger" than the mammoth SS-9s and probably superior to them, "not necessarily in yield, but in quality."

The Defense Department, questioned about Jackson's statement, said it was "correct that we have detected some new ICBM construction in the Soviet Union."

A Pentagon spokesman, Jerry W. Friedheim, added, "We are not exactly sure what it is or what Soviet intentions are."

Jackson speculated on those intentions on "Face the Nation" (CBS, WTOP).

He was, he said, reasonably sure that the Russians will use "this huge buildup" not for a first strike against the United States but as a power base for taking "greater and greater international risks in the 1970s.

"This is the meaning of their buildup of strategic arms and of conventional surface forces, the buildup of their navy," Jackson continued.

The senator did not identify the source of his information about the new missiles. Neither did he give any direct response to a question about the numbers that may be deployed.

He said that a related "ominous" development involved the SS-9s, which "have leveled off at 305—around that figure."

Jackson said he was convinced that the reason for the leveling-off is the need to adapt the SS-9 for MIRVs, or Multiple Independently Targeted Re-entry Vehicles.

He said that it will come "as a shock to most Americans" that the Russians are deploying a new generation of offensive systems while indicating a contrary position by holding back on SS-9 deployment.

Last month, The Washing-

ton Post quoted well-informed U.S. officials as saying that, since last spring, the Russians had stopped work on a total of 18 new SS-9 silos. In a downward revision of earlier estimates, they said that the Soviet Union has 288 SS-9s, 278 of them now judged ready to fire.

A single SS-9 can carry three five-megaton nuclear warheads. The Pentagon has depicted it as the biggest threat to the survival of the U.S. Minuteman, the "second-strike" ICBMs. Pentagon officials have said that 420 SS-9s, each equipped with three warheads, could wipe out the entire force of 1,000 Minuteman missiles in a surprise attack.

President Nixon, in his press conference last week, said he was against any agreement with the Russians in the strategic arms limitation talks (SALT) that would be confined to defensive weapons alone.

Jackson said yesterday that the President on this... "I he wholeheartedly supports think our position is sound,

which calls for a limitation on offensive and defensive systems." The "further buildup in new offensive systems" by the Russians makes the need to limit such systems critical, he said.

Turning to other subjects, Jackson said the administration was guilty of "a terrible mishandling" of the news blackout on the invasion of Laos.

If there had to be such a blackout for security reasons, he said, it "made no sense at all" to impose it on the pre-Invasion phase, only to lift it on the eve of the invasion itself.

127

WASHINGTON POST, MARCH 8, 1973

# AF Seeking Billions
## For Bomber Defense

*Another in a series of periodic articles on major defense issues.*

By Michael Getler

Washington Post Staff Writer

The Air Force this week will try to persuade a rather dubious Congress that now is the time to begin spending a lot more money on defense against enemy bombers—even though the Russians haven't built any new heavy bombers in 10 years.

The only new Soviet attack plane that seems headed for production is a medium bomber judged too shortrange to reach the United States on anything but one-way missions, according to intelligence estimates.

The immediate forum for this presentation is the Senate Armed Services Preparedness Committee. Sen. John C. Stennis (D. Miss.) heads a special air defense subcommittee which is expected to hear Air Force generals testify in secret session this week.

While his subcommittee's findings will be highly influential on the lawmakers, the question of how much is enough for air defense—at a time when both super powers have thousands of nuclear-tipped ICBMs—goes to the heart of a larger question before Congress: How much of the defense dollar can safely go into domestic programs

Just as the supersonic transport has become a rallying point for environmentalists trying to stop the march of technology, the bomber defense issue this year will be a focal point for lawmakers trying to contain Pentagon spending.

Sen. Mark O. Hatfield (R.-Ore.) has said as much. This year he heads the Members of Congress for Peace Through Law, a bi-partisan group of 115 lawmakers who have taken on the Pentagon with some success in recent years.

"In this decade," Hatfield said, "when the Soviets are upgrading their missiles and not their aged bombers, a commitment to a new air defense system easily costing $6 billion seems totally unwarranted."

Yet the Air Force — with the backing of many senators and representatives — argues that bomber defense cannot be allowed to die as long as Russia keeps its relatively small force of 150 long-range

to show any interest at all in building new ones, even medium-range types.

### Air Force View

Money, politics, jobs, intelligence findings, war plans and guesses—all this and more are wrapped into the argument as the lawmakers try to decide if the $5 billion or more the Air Force wants to spend on modernizing air defense over the next six years is a justifiable investment.

A good starting point for understanding what is involved in this complex but significant debate is at Ft. Fisher, a back-up Intercept Control (BUIC) command post in the scrub-brush flatland along the Atlantic beaches outside Wilmington, N.C.

This Air Force BUIC base is one of a string of sites that ring the perimeter of the United States. Ft. Fischer is part of the $25 billion the United States has invested in building and operating bomber defenses since the 1950s. It is also one of those that has survived massive cutbacks of recent years.

The big white balloon—the radar built to warn of approaching Russian bombers—stands out against the backdrop of pines in the distance. Inside a low, brick building are the computers, telephones and teletypes which would send up American fighters to intercept Russian bombers hopefully before they could reach the mainland.

Reflecting on the bomber defense cutbacks, the BUIC base commander, Air Force Col. Robert L. Embrey says "We can only go so far. We need something to build on. If we go ahead and shut everything up and the Russians do come in with a new bomber we're in a hell of a position."

"I just can't see," he says, "how a trillion dollar economy can't afford to know what's going on above its borders."

### Pentagon's View, Too

The same view prevails some 340 miles away from Ft. Fischer in the offices of Air Force generals in the Pentagon.

Yet, more Ft. Fischers are not the answer. Nor are the Army's 1950-style Nike-Hercules antiaircraft missiles, 80 batteries of which rimmed the

Army, which has been closing these batteries down for the past three years as too costly and ineffective, last week announced another big reduction which will leave only about 40 sites still operational.

What is needed for the 1970s, the Air Force says, is a new kind of air defense—one which essentially takes Ft. Fischer's radars off the ground and puts them inside airplanes. Such airborne radar planes—called Airborne Warning and Control systems, or AWACS—could look down from above to detect enemy bombers which try to fly under the warning beams of today's land-based radars.

The Air Force is recommending putting 42 AWACS airplanes on guard—a $2.7 billion venture.

Other parts of the new bomber defense the Air Force wants to build include at least two new land-based radars which can see over the horizon because their beams bounce back and forth between the surface of the Earth and a reflective layer in the atmosphere. It will cost $322 million to build and operate those radars for 10 years.

Also, the Air Force wants to replace its aging F-106 intercept aircraft with something new—probably versions of the Air Force F-15 or Navy F-14 fighters under development. About $2 billion is envisioned for the new interceptors.

This total of $5 billion could go higher if the Army decides to replace its dwindling Nike-Hercules batteries with a new missile now on the drawing board.

U.S. intelligence chiefs last week briefed the Stennis subcommittee on what they thought the Russians had in mind for their bombers.

Defense Secretary Melvin R. Laird has acknowledged that even the Russian medium bomber force is thinning out, with some 700 of these twin-engine planes still in service. That is about two-thirds of what the Soviets had in 1963.

While the Intelligence community believes these planes are targeted for Red China and NATO, the Air Force has raised the possibility that the new medium-range plane, with swing wings, could be used to attack the United States, possibly landing in Cuba rather than trying to make the long trip back across the North Pole. It has been observed recently refueling in flight.

But if the Soviet Union were really intending to build an anti-U.S. bomber force, there is general agreement that it would be building either bigger bombers or new

new swing-wing planes.

There is no evidence of such an effort at this time, according to informed sources. Therefore, the old cry of "the Russians are coming" will not by itself be enough to carry the air defense argument on Capitol Hill, observers there believe.

This year's debate, the first in a long time over air defense, will hinge on more sophisticated—and harder to grasp—arguments.

Interviews with backers and opponents show these as the conflicting points.

Pro: 123

* The Soviet Union is still exhibiting interest in bombers as it builds its technological base for its own triad of weaponry — aircraft, missiles and submarines. Air Force leaders, in making this point, state that the Pentagon's Whiz Kids — civilian systems analysts who worked for former Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara—have been proved wrong in predicting Russia would retire its intercontinental bombers altogether.

* Bomber defense, just like missiles at the ready in underground silos, must be regarded as part of the American arsenal to deter war. Money spent on air defense thus cannot be considered wasted. The whole idea was to discourage an attack in the first place.

* Even if the Soviet Union does abandon bombers altogether, the United States must keep up an air defense against the day other nations—including Red China and Marxist regimes in South America — might have planes which could sneak over our borders.

One top air defense strategist, in making that point, said: "We've got to be able to protect our airspace; to know what's flying toward and over our borders, and to knock it down if necessary."

"The type and size of those defenses," he continued, "are indeed legitimate questions. But we just can't drop them. What we ought to be saying is this: we need air defense for the next 50 years; now let's figure out the best way to go about it."

Congress has the choices of eliminating air defense as obsolete in the missile age; embarking on a slow and modest improvement program, or moving quickly into full-scale construction.

Con:

* Bomber defense is the Air

129

Force's horse cavalry in the
missile age. The generals will
not give it up until Congress
forces them into it.

* So much devastation
would be caused by Soviet
ICBMs that the bomber toll
becomes insignificant, playing
little if any role in the balance
of power.

The only reasons the Rus-
sians keep their big bombers
is to keep the Pentagon spend-
ing money and because they
too. have "bomber generals."

But, says one strategist, "the
USSR bomber generals have
less clout than ours because
they haven't gotten a new
heavy bomber approved."

* A decision to expand
bomber defense might eventu-
ally give the Pentagon a fact
in the door to argue for a na-
tionwide missile defense as
well.

* The mad momentum of
weaponry means that the So-
viet Union will match a mod-
ern air defense with a modern
bomber. With the present inef-
fective American air defense,
Kremlin hawks cannot make a
good case for building new
strategic bombers.

"The ultimate effect of our
commitment to a new air de-
fense system," Hatfield said
on that point, "could be a So-
viet commitment to a new
strategic bomber, making the
present non-existent threat be-
come real—and thus continu-
ing this cycle of the arms
race."

* AWACS and other gad-
etry the Air Force wants is an-
other manifestation of what
former Defense Secretary
McNamara used to call "hard-
ware happy" tendencies.
There is no promise, critics
contend, that AWACS will
fare any better technically
once in flight than its trouble-
some predecessors.

* With the SALT talks still
promising, now would be the
worst time to embark on an
expensive new air defense.

* American intelligence and
military leaders have a history
of over-reacting to the alleged
Soviet bomber threat. Con-
gress this time must prevent
another "Tushino" reaction
and use the money instead for
real problems on the domestic
front—not imagined threats.

That criticism stems from
the Soviet Aviation Day show
at the Tushino airfield outside
Moscow in July, 1955. To the
astonishment of American ob-
servers watching the show,
waves of four-engine bombers
they had never seen before

swept past the reviewing
stands. There seemed to be far
more planes in the sky that
day than American intelli-
gence knew about.

Reacting to Tushino, former
Defense Secretary Nell H.
McElroy told Congress that it
now looked as though the So-
viet Union could have as many
as 700 of the big jet bombers
by 1959. The rush to spend $23
million on a bomber defense
was on.

As it turned out, the Soviets
built only a fraction of that
number, turning quietly in-
stead to continent-spanning
bellicose missiles.

## Reception Charged

Former CIA Director Allen
Dulles later theorized that the
Soviets had kept telling the
same formation past the re-
taining stand in a deliberate
deception of the West.

Soviet specialists Arnold L.
Hurelick and Myron Rush, in
their book "Strategic Power
and Soviet Foreign Policy,"
credit the Russians with a
"great political success" at
Tushino, one which "must
have impressed the Soviet
leaders with the strong tend-
ency of the West to exagger-
ate the USSR's strategic capa-
bility and to incline toward
pessimism in estimating the
strategic balance."

The United States built
hundreds of radars across the
top and middle of Canada and
around the United States to
warn of a bomber attack. The
USAF Air Defense Command
got some 1,500 interceptors
and the Army its Nike anti-
bomber missiles. Radar-laden
ships and planes cruised off
shore while still more radars
were roofed off the coast on
"Texas Towers."

To control all this, more
than two dozen SAGE com-
mand posts were built, each
one with two of the world's
largest computers. It was be-
fore the age of the transistor,
and each computer had 55,000
electron tubes. The computers
needed as much air condition-
ing as it takes to keep 27
homes cool just to stop their
electronic brain from burning
up.

The ICBM, however, quickly
made it all obsolete. The
SAGE centers were all above
ground and easy targets for
enemy missiles. Without the
computers, the radars and the
interceptors would be vir-
tually blind.

To complicate the problem
for the Russians two alternate
BUIC command posts were
also built for each SAGE cen-

ter, but these, too, were above
ground and not safe from at-
tack as the Soviet ICBM
force multiplied.

The U.S. radars couldn't
see bombers' sneaking in
under their beams at low
level. And the distance they
could look out to sea was less
than the range of air-to-sur-
face missiles introduced in the
early 1960s that Russian bomb-
ers could fire at defenses to
blust a path into the U.S.
mainland.

Today, only about a third of
those defense remain. The in-
terceptor force is down to
fewer than 450 planes and
most of them are Air National
Guard.

## Shutdown Told

There are only seven SAGE
and 14 back-up command posts
left. Scores of radars have
been shut down, including al-
most half of the most impor-
tant—the DEW Line—across
the top of Canada.

A Soviet bomber, once past
that line, would find nothing
able to spot and keep track of
him until he was less than an
hour's flying time from Mon-
tana.

Under the new plan, the Air
Force contends it will all be
different.

"We agree," says one officer,
"that a leak-proof defense is
just too expensive. What we
want is some coverage all
around; enough to make it im-
possible for the Russians to
move their bombers our way,
either before or after a missile
attack, without alerting our re-
talatory force."

If the Air Force gets a go-
head, work will start next year
on the two over-the-horizon ra-
dars that will guard the sea
approaches to the United
States from the northeast and
northwest.

These radars work by car-
coming powerful electronic
beams between the ionosphere
and the ground, enabling them
to detect enemy planes at any
altitude while still several
hours away.

A third radar may eventu-
ally be built to look over the
North Pole, but scientists have
not been able to cope with
the electronic mayhem caused
by the aurora borealis, or
northern lights. Until then,
the DEW line will stay in serv-

ice.

Building a fourth radar to
look south is also a possibility
if Air Force public relation
men can handle the expected
complaints of interference
from TV stations in Mexico.

Once these ground radars
spot a raid, the AWACS
planes, modified Boeing 707
airliners with huge saucer-like
radars on top, would scramble
into the air to escape missile
attack and guide the intercep-
tors into the path of the on-
coming bombers.

The skeptics remains unim-
pressed with this "new" plan.

Some feel that the AWACS
planes may turn out to be vul-
nerable to the same kind of ra-
dar-busting missiles that U.S.
pilots fire at North Vietnam-
ese SAM sites.

Others are less confident
that the Air Force that
AWACS will be able to
achieve a traditionally elusive
goal of bomber defense; de-
signing a radar that can look
down from the air and pick
out enemy planes hugging the
ground below on a radar scope
that is cluttered from signals
bounced back from the land it-
self. Flight tests with the
radar installed are scheduled
to begin a year from now.

"The Russians may have the
right answer to air defense,"
one strategist says. "Lots of
radars (one estimate places
the number at 8,000), well
placed and too numerous to
knock out. Not many comput-
ers to keep the generals happy
but lots of skilled operators
with 39-cent grease pencils."

133

Russian Might and America's

PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER 14 MARCH 1971 (19)

# Whose Arms Have More Power?

By PAUL GRIMES

Of The Bulletin Staff

Roth cautious optimism and stern warnings have emerged from Washington in recent days on the comparative military strength of the United States and the Soviet Union.

Roth President Nixon and Defense Secretary Melvin R. Laird reported to Congress that the Russians have slowed the pace of their missile deployment.

Roth, however, cautioned that the significance is not clear and that the U. S. Safeguard anti-b ballistic missile (ABM) program should be continued.

CONSIDERABLE CONCERN was aroused last week by the disclosure by Sen. Henry M. Jackson (D-Wash) that the Russians are deploying "an advanced generation" of new intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM's). The Pentagon

quickly confirmed that "we have detected some new ICBM construction" but that "we are not exactly sure what it is or what Soviet intentions are."

Three days later, however, Adm. Thomas H. Moorer, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned that the Russians would gain nuclear superiority over the United States "within the next five or six years"—a situation, he said, to be "avoided at all costs."

In this setting, the Administration appeared hawkish in making its defense requests for the next fiscal year, which begins July 1. This posture was heightened by the lack of progress in Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) between the United States and the Soviet Union, and by reports that Communist China may have begun flight-testing an ICBM.

Laird proposed that work start on a Safeguard system at Whitman Air Force Base in Missouri, the third of four ABM sites approved by Congress last year. Work already is underway at Minuteman bases in North Dakota and Montana.

But the Administration is requesting authority to switch the fourth ABM site from Warren Air Force Base in Wyoming to Washington, D. C. The switch would be made, however, only if no agreement is reached with the Russians at SALT that would limit ABMs to Washington and Moscow.

LAIRD ALSO proposed development of a new bomber and a missile-carrying submarine. He announced a five-year defense strategy of "realistic deterrence" to prevent wars.

But to Sen. Stuart Symington (D-Mo), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, many of the Administration's warnings appeared designated simply to get more money out of Congress and might not necessarily be valid.

"Here we go again," Symington said.

This Bulletin Spotlight examines some of the available data on U. S. and Soviet military strength and what it means.

PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER 3/14/71 (19)

## Ours and Theirs

The following chart shows, according to the best available information, how the armed forces of the United States and the Soviet Union compare:

<table><thead><tr><th>Item</th><th>United States</th><th>Soviet Union</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Servicemen</td><td>2,860,589</td><td>3,305,000</td></tr><tr><td>Divisions</td><td>17</td><td>100</td></tr><tr><td>Defense budget</td><td>$71.8 billion</td><td>$51.7 billion</td></tr><tr><td>Tactical aircraft</td><td>4,600</td><td>4,000</td></tr><tr><td>Air-defense fighters</td><td>650</td><td>3,300</td></tr><tr><td>ICBM launchers</td><td>1,054</td><td>1,440</td></tr><tr><td>Polaris-type missile launchers</td><td>656</td><td>350</td></tr><tr><td>Polaris-type submarines</td><td>41</td><td>17</td></tr><tr><td>Long-range bombers</td><td>552</td><td>150</td></tr><tr><td>Hydrogen bombs</td><td>4,000</td><td>1,800</td></tr></tbody></table>

The details follow. Their source is "Toward a Strategic Arms Limitation Agreement," by Herbert Scoville Jr., for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Land-based ICBMs—The U. S. has 1,000 Minuteman and 3 larger Titan missiles deployed in silos hardened to survive pressures of several hundred pounds per square inch. The Minuteman can carry a thermonuclear warhead in the megaton class and the Titan one in the multimegaton class.

Of the operational Soviet ICBMs, more than 900 are small

## The Change in U.S. Forces

The following chart shows how U. S. conventional armed forces have changed in the last decade (figures are for June 30, except in 1971):

<table><thead><tr><th></th><th>1960</th><th>1965</th><th>1968</th><th>1969</th><th>Latest 1971</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Men in service</td><td>2,476,435</td><td>2,655,389</td><td>3,547,902</td><td>3,460,162</td><td>2,860,589</td></tr><tr><td>Men in Vietnam</td><td>650</td><td>65,000</td><td>535,000</td><td>539,000</td><td>322,200</td></tr><tr><td>Army divisions</td><td>14</td><td>16</td><td>19</td><td>19%</td><td>14</td></tr><tr><td>Marine divisions</td><td>3</td><td>3</td><td>4</td><td>4</td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>Navy ships</td><td>813</td><td>880</td><td>932</td><td>934</td><td>720</td></tr><tr><td>Budget for conventional forces<br>(in billions of dollars)</td><td>18</td><td>17.6</td><td>30.5</td><td>30.6</td><td>27.8</td></tr></tbody></table>

SS-11s, 276 are SS-9s and the remainder are older missiles and SS-13s. Most are deployed in single silos that are hardened and dispersed.

Submarine-Launched Ballistic Missiles — Each of the 41 U. S. Polaris submarines is equipped with 16 ballistic missiles of ranges greater than 1,500 miles. More than half the subs are kept continuously on station in a position to launch a retaliatory attack. Some of the existing missiles, such as the Polaris A-3s, contain three warheads (not MIRVs), each with a yield in the hundreds of kilotons. Others hold single warheads with a yield of about one megaton,

The Soviet submarine missile program has lagged behind that of the United States.

8-F

EDITORIALS

LOUISVILLE COURIER-JOURNAL

16 MARCH 1971 (19)

ABM argument
springs old
leaks again

THE PENTAGON is polishing up the latest chapter in its long-running ABM soap opera, and from all indications this year's version is going to be depressingly like last year's. Not that this means much. Each year the script seems corner than that of the previous year, but each year it manages to get the money out of Congress, which, as far as the missile men are concerned, is what counts.

Two years ago, when the anti-ballistic missile was being urged by the President and Defense Secretary Laird, it was billed as a necessary defense against developing Chinese attack missiles. Secretary Laird admitted that it would provide only a "thin" defense which would have little effect against such Russian nuclear missiles as the SS-9, but insisted that it would be able to knock down any missiles launched by China within the next decade. Why China would launch an attack on a country with enough missiles to blast every foot of its territory five times over was not explained.

By this time last year the argument had switched. The SS-9, Mr. Laird declared, was being produced as a first-strike weapon, aimed at our cities. Furthermore, the Russians were ringing their cities with ABMs to defend them against our missiles, so we had to ring our cities with ABMs to defend them against the SS-9. If the Russians could hit us without the danger of being hit, they might be tempted to launch a first strike.

*It's that season again*

Last August the pitch shifted again. This time the ABM was needed not as a deterrent to Chinese madness or Russian sneak attack, but as a dove of peace. We needed the ABM, said Mr. Laird, as a "bargaining chip" at the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT). For

example, he said, if we had a chain of ABMs, we could offer to give up our ABMs if the Russians would give up theirs. (He never did explain where this would leave the mad Chinese with their missiles.)

But now money-voting time again approaches, and suddenly the capital is aquiver with reports of—what else?—the SS-9. The Pentagon has been leaking the usual scare reports, and Senator Henry Jackson, the Pentagon's Democratic doom-crier, has warned television listeners of a "new generation" of SS-9s being deployed by the Russians, obviously designed to zap the U.S. and calling for more, bigger and better ABM placements.

Senator Stuart Symington protested that the Jackson warning was (1) an unethical release of confidential information given the Senate Armed Services Committee by CIA director Richard Helms, and (2) an exaggeration of what Helms had actually said. A Pentagon clarification has since tended to support Senator Symington's view. The Russians do seem to be building some new missile silos. Secretary Laird now says, but it is not clear what type of missile they are built to house. And, Mr. Laird admits, there is no evidence that the Russians have resumed the missile-building pace which they slowed last fall.

Nevertheless, both Mr. Laird and his assorted uniformed and congressional spokesmen insist on more ABMs, this time as a missile for all reasons—to counter the Chinese missiles, to discourage attack by the Russians, and to use as a bargaining point in the SALT talks, reopening yesterday. And this is where the argument starts springing leaks. For Mr. Laird has admitted that the Chinese have neither cause nor capacity for attacking us. He has admitted that the ABM could not really fend off the Soviet MIRV-headed SS-9s if the Russians lost their minds and launched an attack that could only lead to the destruction of their own land and probably of the world.

And, finally, the Pentagon has not yet explained how the ABM is to be used as a bargaining chip. The Russians offered at the last SALT session to limit or eliminate defensive nuclear weapons if the U.S. would; and we wouldn't unless offensive weapons were covered, too.

Well, Mr. Nixon's search for a "grand settlement" is an inspiring concept. But if the Soviets are willing for the moment to discard only defensive weapons, why not accept the opportunity for a beginning? Or must we forever go on building our stacks of chips, as both we and the Soviets have done since Hiroshima, until the weight and cost of the burden bankrupts us?

131

THE NEW REPUBLIC - 20 MARCH 1971 (17)

Senator Jackson's Latest Alarm

Wolf at the Pentagon Door

132

by Ronald L. Tammen

Responsibility for national defense rests, of course, as much with Congress as with the military establishment. Congress, however, has not only neglected its responsibilities but has misused its power to review military programs. Not many years ago, certain weapons systems came out of Congress with more funds than DoD had optimistically requested. One is even tempted to say, more than they knew what to do with, but that would contradict a rule of bureaucracies. Perhaps lulled by congressional laxity, the public comfortably accepted the direction and size of the military establishment. In part, this acceptance can be attributed to a decline in keen investigative reporting. In part, it was a by-product of our confidence in American technology.

The Department of Defense is the largest single-unit bureaucracy in the world and, as with any bureaucracy, it responds to criticism in kind, engages in extreme forms of self-protection, expands whenever possible, generates work without authorization, and erects a protective wall around itself. With changes in Administration coming rather frequently, there is little on-going control over the bureaucracy; it bends but never breaks. Built-in bureaucratic inertia so regulates routine business that inefficiency becomes routine. Only in time of crisis can the organization shake loose. This tendency to respond effectively only in emergencies has led to an uneven weapon acquisition process. The Pentagon has done what comes natural; it tried to fill in the lows—the times when foreign threats did not seem alarming—in order to sustain a high level of weapon acquisition.

To borrow the basic concept of the free enterprise system, the Pentagon needs stimulation to work effectively. It needs competition with end-goals. But external competition, i.e. the international threat, is precisely what has been absent for most of the past decade. In a very real sense, the Pentagon has been too effective, and as a consequence has been forced to develop new methods for wringing the money it wants out of the Executive and the Congress.

Throughout the 1950s and most of the 1960s, the United States enjoyed unparalleled strategic superiority. Granted, Sputnik and the "missile gap" threw scares into the public and the military alike, yet in strict statistical measures, there was no real strategic threat to this country. This presented Defense planners with a distressing dilemma. How do you request more funds to augment an already overpowering military force? Several techniques were found. First, exaggerate the threat. This was not necessarily a deliberate decision. In certain cases, prolonged exposure to the military environment produced a particular mentality which generated perceptions of potential threats in larger-than-life forms. Mirror imaging and face value acceptance of some Soviet statements also contributed to this exaggeration. In addition, it is the normal inclination of defense planners to guard against all possible threats, even when unsubstantiated, and this encouraged a conservative analytical approach as represented by the "greater-than-expected" technique of assessing enemy capabilities.

On the other hand, occasionally this exaggeration was deliberate. A little inter-Service rivalry can go a long way toward producing a specific threat evaluation to fit a desired level of funding. For years, the Air Force held out against the Army, Navy, CIA and NSA over the question of the number of Soviet long-range

bombers. They used the technique of taking a footnote to the National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs) on USSR strategic capabilities and intentions. In public and private discussions, the Air Force would cite their larger Service footnotes, instead of the consensus of the other intelligence agencies. This in turn provided the basis for Air Force requests for advanced air defense systems like SAGE, Nike-Hercules and now AWACS, as well as for new strategic bombers.

With the end of the 1960s, and the realization that the Soviet Union was approaching parity with the US in terms of strategic missile launchers, the competitive spirit was rekindled at the International level. However, a new problem faced the Pentagon—credibility. It hasn't solved it. After repeated cries of "wolf," traditional calls to arms are failing to evoke immediate congressional panic. For years, just prior to the military authorization and appropriations votes, lead stories appeared in newspapers warning of impending and aggressive Soviet military moves. The SS-9 scare emerged in time for the ABM authorization debate of 1970. The rumor of a Soviet submarine base in Cuba coincided with the 1970 appropriations bill, and now Senator Henry Jackson (D, Wash.) has aired his version of new "ominous developments." According to this Presidential aspirant, the Soviets have started deploying a large follow-on to the SS-9 ICBM, a fact that should "shock" us. As in previous leaks of this kind, his story is built upon sketchy information. Neither the Pentagon nor the Administration has echoed Jackson's alarm. The Soviets apparently have begun construction of some type of new or modified silos, but this alone does not support the assertion that the USSR is initiating a "huge build-up." The tone and timing of Jackson's statement are strikingly similar to John F. Kennedy's illusory missile-gap of 1960. These Soviet missile activities are subject to many different interpretations. It will be some time before intelligence analysts reach any firm conclusions. Focusing on the worst possible interpretation, exaggerating and even distorting facts, serves only to foster hysteria. The seriousness of the problem demands the highest responsibility. In the long run, this selective release of classified material to reinforce budgetary requests or to enhance political reputations will undermine public confidence in the Pentagon and in Congress.

What, then, are the lessons that Congress and DoD can learn from recent experience? First, if meaningful agreements are reached at SALT, we must beware that internal competition is not again substituted for the foreign threat and defense spending retained at inflated levels. Second, DoD must start playing it straight with Congress by explaining just how foreign threats are computed. And third, the Office of the Secretary of Defense must not be afraid to make hard allocative decisions, even though they may adversely affect one of the three Services. We can no longer afford to feed the Army, Navy and Air Force at $20 billion each a year. Someone has to, in Pentagonese, bite the bullet. And when that happens, it is quite possible that the Air Force will be the branch that feels the pain. Gradually, liberals and conservatives alike are reaching toward some sort of tacit understanding that the nation's deterrent is most effective when moved to sea. If Congress and the Executive continue to move in this direction, then the previous interagency Service battles will seem diminutive by comparison. It is not hard to forecast a real showdown between the Navy and Air Force over the spoils of strategic systems.

RONALD L. TAMMEN is a consultant on military spending to a group of 25 United States senators and representatives.

WASHINGTON POST, MARCH 22, 1971

# Air War on Hill: 3. Planes for 1 Job?

133

One of a series of periodic articles on major defense issues.

By Michael Getler

Washington Post Staff Writer

The Pentagon is pressing ahead with development of three different kinds of warplanes to carry out what some influential lawmakers view as essentially the same mission.

The mission is close air support—knocking out enemy troops, tanks and guns locked in combat with U.S. ground forces at close range.

At stake is the future of three aircraft:

* The Army's Cheyenne helicopter gunship—packed with electronic gadgetry, anti-tank missiles and machine guns.

* The Air Force's AX—a simple, rugged fixed-wing plane that carries tons of ordnance.

* The Marine Corps' British-built Harrier—a swivel engine jet that can take off and land almost like a helicopter.

To buy all three planes—about 1,000 aircraft all told —would cost the taxpayer's $4 billion to $5 billion over the next few years.

But if the skeptics in Congress are successful in canceling one or two as unnecessary duplication, as much as $2 billion could be saved.

The Pentagon argues that all three are needed.

The possibility that congressional flak will down at least one of them has sharpened combat between the three services who want to fly them—especially between the Army and Air Force. It has also led to a fight between advocates of fixed wing attack planes and backers of helicopter gunships.

What troubles many legislators is a feeling that Congress is being asked to back too many costly, overlapping projects simply because the Pentagon may be taking the easy way out.

Critics charge that the Defense Department itself has failed to come to grips thus far with the very complicated question of how best to do close air support, leaving the decision to the individual services and thereby insuring a proliferation of different aircraft.

This is compounded, they claim, by the Pentagon's un-

solve the bitter dispute between the Army and Air Force on basic responsibility—who is responsible for providing air cover to the infantryman and tanker?

Many lawmakers are caught between the fear of military waste and fear of jeopardizing troop safety. They complain that they and their staffs can be easily overwhelmed by the complex inter-service tactical disputes and swamped by tons of statistics on helicopter/fixed-wing loss ratios in Vietnam which can be manipulated to make any point either service wants.

"We're going to hold the Pentagon's feet to the fire to get the best possible solution to these alternatives," says Rep. George H. Mahon (D-Tex.), chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.

"What we want," he said in an interview, "is to compel the Defense Department to do the hard analytical job."

Mahon's committee, in October, raised serious doubts about supporting three planes "designed to perform essentially the same function." Similar doubts were raised in the full Senate. Armed Services Committee, and in that group's research subcommittee.

Mahon has asked Laird to supply both an analysis and a recommendation "on the aircraft best suited to meet the close air support need" in time for the fiscal 1972 budget hearings now under way. Late last month a working group, headed by Deputy Defense Secretary David Packard, was formed by the services and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Mahon has been promised his report by about June 1.

But Senate Armed Services Committee chairman John C. Stennis (D-Miss.) says Secretary of Defense Melvin R. Laird's defense report to Congress early this month makes it pretty clear that the Pentagon has already made up its mind that it wants all three planes. Nevertheless, says Stennis, "a Congressional decision has got to be made, too, before any production is ordered, and I'm a great believer in getting all the facts and costs first. We may need all these planes, and we may not."

To get the facts, Stennis last week ordered a special investigating subcommittee, headed by Sen. Howard W. Cannon (D-Nev.), to look into the entire situation.

with closed hearings likely to begin late in April.

Last July, Stennis's full committee backed the AX, knocked out money for Cheyenne, and suggested to the Secretary of Defense that after 20 years it might be a good idea to review the roles and missions assigned to the Air Force and the Army.

Congressional staffers say the issue is also clouded by a feeling on the part of some legislators that keeping Cheyenne going is somehow linked to a Pentagon master plan to help keep afloat financially, beleaguered Lockheed Aircraft Corp., the craft's manufacturer.

Army and Defense officials vigorously deny that implication, claiming that even if Lockheed did go under they would expect to continue the project there under new management.

The Vietnam war also is now shaping the debate, creating a new set of problems for Cheyenne. That — and these other developments—assure bumpy flying for the helicopter before it is approved for production:

* In the U.S.-backed Laos incursion, helicopter losses—including Huey and Cobra gunships—have been heavy and well publicized. The Army makes a strong case for keeping these losses in perspective to the thousands of missions flown, the objectives and the alternative of a "tree by tree" push through Laos. Nevertheless, the big toll has fortified the arguments of those who say even more modern choppers could not survive in the face of massive Warsaw Pact anti-aircraft fire in Europe where Cheyenne is meant to operate.

* A Cheyenne fire power demonstration early last month at Yuma, Ariz., before a high-powered Congressional audience was less than a success, as Pentagon officials concede. Only one of two TOW anti-tank missiles fired hit the target and the craft's 30mm machine gun was thrown off target by a bug in the electronic control hook-up.

* This year's "defense budget now before Congress shows no more money requested for Cheyenne research and development. Yet the Pentagon's actual plan—even though it is not written down in the Fiscal 1972 budget—is to commit almost $100 million to cure the troubles that caused the

tional production in 1969.

Pentagon officials explain that they will ask Congress for authority to "reprogram" about $63 million in previously approved production funds for Cheyenne—money left stranded after the initial cancellation. Another $17 million lies in the Cheyenne research account from last year.

But the blank space in the budget has already stirred the chief antagonist of the Pentagon and Lockheed, Sen. William Proxmire (D-Wis.)

In a March 16 letter to Stennis, Proxmire urged that the reprogramming route be turned down and the regular budget process used instead. He told Stennis the whole Senate should have a chance to vote on the money actually needed this year.

Promire has also asked to expand his views before the Cannon subcommittee.

The Army wants to buy at least 375 Cheyenne helicopters, which run between $3.5 million to $3.5 million each. Cheyenne production, under the current plan, would start in the fiscal year beginning in July, 1972, about two years ahead of AX.

Is Cheyenne worth all that money? The Army says yes; Chairman Thomas J. McIntyre (D-N.H.) of the Senate Armed Services Research Subcommittee is among the influential lawmakers who doubt it. Here are the main arguments for and against.

**Pro:**

* Cheyenne—the first helicopter ever designed from the start for maximum firepower—promises to be an unsurpassed tank killer, popping up from behind trees and hills to make quick strikes. The 16 anti-tank missiles and Gatling-type machine guns on each Cheyenne—with the whole fire system aimed by the most accurate devices ever put in a helicopter—will be deadly, the Army says. Other electronics equipment will enable it to fight in bad weather and at night.

* Unlike fixed-wing support planes which at best passed over friendly troops in a whoosh and try to hit the enemy around them, the Cheyenne could hover in the sky and fire away in all directions with sustained accuracy. The fact that the Cheyenne's rotor blades are solidly fixed to the center post of the ship, instead of hinged, eliminates the vibra-

U. S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT - 22 MARCH 1971 (16)

# MEANING OF LATEST SHIFT IN U.S. DEFENSE

135

## TODAY'S UNEASY BALANCE OF ARMED MIGHT

Military forces, as of mid-1971, made public by Defense Secretary Laird—

NUCLEAR WEAPONS.

<table><thead><tr><th>U.S.</th><th></th><th>RUSSIA</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>1,054</td><td>Land-based intercontinental missiles</td><td>1,500</td></tr><tr><td>656</td><td>Submarine-based missiles</td><td>400</td></tr><tr><td>569</td><td>Long-range bombers</td><td>175-195</td></tr><tr><td>4,600</td><td>Nuclear warheads and bombs</td><td>2,000</td></tr><tr><td>0</td><td>Anti-ballistic-missile launchers</td><td>64</td></tr><tr><td>92</td><td>Nuclear-powered submarines</td><td>87</td></tr></tbody></table>

CONVENTIONAL FORCES

<table><thead><tr><th>U.S.</th><th></th><th>RUSSIA</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>2,700,000</td><td>Manpower under arms</td><td>2,200,000</td></tr><tr><td>599</td><td>Fighter-interceptors</td><td>3,000-3,300</td></tr><tr><td>4,020</td><td>Tactical aircraft</td><td>5,000</td></tr><tr><td>325</td><td>Major surface ships</td><td>215</td></tr><tr><td>50</td><td>Non-nuclear submarines</td><td>264</td></tr><tr><td>1,135</td><td>Antiaircraft-missile launchers</td><td>10,000</td></tr></tbody></table>

A lid on spending for new weapons ... cut-backs in armed forces ... more reliance on allies for their own defense ... These plans lie at the heart of the strategy for the coming decade, unveiled on March 9 by Defense chief Laird. Officials concede this approach contains some risks in the face of a continuing build-up of military might by Russia and Red China.

For the third time in two decades, Americans are being told there is to be a major shift in fundamental defense strategy for the nation.

The new concept is designed to last through the 1970s, placing less reliance on any heavy, fresh build-up of American arms, with the intention of demanding more help from allies.

Secretary of Defense Melvin R. Laird, unveiling the Pentagon master plan in a 191-page message to Congress on March 9, labeled the policy "realistic deterrence."

In practical terms, Mr. Laird's blueprint stresses:

* U. S. nuclear missiles continuing to be the primary deterrence against global war-but with no new arsenal of offensive nuclear forces planned. Instead, improvements in quality are emphasized.

* A hold-down on money for new weapons of all kinds, based on a defense-spending ceiling of less than 7 per cent of the nation's gross national product.

* Manpower cuts to the lowest level since 1961, calling for an all-volunteer armed force of 2.5 million men-down 1 million from the Vietnam peak.

* Reduction of conventional combat forces below the pre-Vietnam level.

* A modest addition to the Safeguard anti-ballistic-missile system.

* Strengthening allied forces with more billions in military aid so they can take over a larger part of the responsibility for regional defense.

Mr. Laird himself is the chief architect of realistic deterrence, which he describes as steering "a prudent middle course between two policy extremes-world policeman or new isolationism."

The Laird plan succeeds the "flexible response" policy of the Kennedy-Johnson period, which in turn succeeded President Eisenhower's strategy of "massive retaliation."

The Defense chief explained the difference between earlier strategies and realistic deterrence in these words:

"Those who would dismiss it as a mere continuation of past policies in new packaging would be quite mistaken. Past policy was responsive and reactive. Our new policy is positive and active. The old policy focused on containment and accommodation. The new strategy emphasizes measured, meaningful involvement and vigorous negotiation from a position of strength."

Mr. Laird conceded some "risk" is attached to the Nixon Administration's determination to hold down defense spending, which is pegged at 76 billion dollars for the year ending June, 1972. Speaking mainly of Russia's military program, Mr. Laird told Congress: "The threats we face around the world continue to increase, not diminish."

On March 10, Adm. Thomas H. Moorer, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, went further, reporting that the U. S. holds but a slim lead in strategic strength and must maintain it "at all costs" if the U. S. is to avoid becoming a second-rate power within five or six years. He added:

"I believe it is fair to say that the over-all strategic balance, during the last five or six years, has shifted drastically in favor of the Soviet Union."

In the massive document outlining defense needs over the

next several years, these highlights emerged:

**The Russian threat.** The Soviet Union by midyear will possess 1,500 intercontinental ballistic missiles able to reach the U. S. This country has 1,054 land-based ICBM's. If this rate of increase remains steady, the Russians could have 1,900 ICBM's by the mid-1970s.

"This force, alone, would be more than enough to destroy all U. S. cities of any substantial size," Mr. Laird reported. He also pointed out that practically all of the U. S. population lies within range of the growing Soviet submarine-missile force.

The Russians are also actively developing a new anti-ballistic-missile system, in addition to four complexes that protect Moscow.

Though reporting an apparent slowdown in the deployment of Russian ICBM's to Congress on March 9, Mr. Laird one day later disclosed in a TV interview there was now firm evidence the Russians are rushing construction of an upgraded missile system. Mr. Laird informed Congress of the implications of these trends were not clear.

The Defense Secretary revealed that Russia's force of missile-launching submarines had grown to 17 in operation, and 15 more are being assembled or fitted out. Two years ago the Soviets had four of these subs in operation.

The Soviets probably have no multiple warheads yet that can be flown independently to targets, but the Russians have been testing multiple warheads since 1968. Mr. Laird also told of Russian activity in developing a new "swing wing" bomber which other officials say is capable of reaching the U. S. with refueling. This is in addition to the present force of nearly 200 long-range bombers.

**Red China's progress.** Made public was the report that a "reduced-range test" of an ICBM may have been attained by the Communist Chinese last year and that progress toward achieving an ICBM capable of reaching the continental U. S. is continuing on the mainland.

Pentagon officials later confirmed that a test flight of several thousand miles took place entirely within China in 1970. Mr. Laird said Red China could be expected to deploy its initial force of operational ICBM's between 1973 and 1975.

Also, within the last year China may have deployed its first medium-range, nuclear-tipped missiles, which would be a danger to Russian and Asian population centers but not to the U. S.

The Defense Secretary, describing China as the principal military threat in Asia, expressed doubt, nevertheless, that Peking has the capability of waging war on more than one front at a time. He stressed that it was unlikely that Red China's supply problems, and its border dispute with the Russians, would permit Peking to engage in widespread warfare unless there was no effort to interdict its lines of communications and smash its military capability.

**Middle East situation.** Mr. Laird cautioned once again that the immediate peril in the Middle East—a war between Arab states and Israel—could involve the Soviet Union and the U. S. if it got out of hand.

In numbers, the combined military forces of the Arab countries involved—Egypt, Syria, and possibly Jordan—and Iraq—remain far greater than the Israeli forces. The Defense chief reported: "As before the June, 1967, war, however, the qualitative superiority of the Israeli armed forces offsets the numerical difference."

**Vietnam and Southeast Asia.** About half of the entire North Vietnamese Army is now deployed in South Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, Mr. Laird disclosed. He placed the over-all enemy strength inside South Vietnam itself at 240,000. North Vietnamese soldiers, Viet Cong and guerrillas.

Communist strength in Cambodia was estimated at more than 55,000. In Laos, the number was given as 145,000 North Vietnamese and Pathet Lao.

Congress was told that the South Vietnamese armed forces were "progressing on or ahead of schedule."

**Future U. S. defenses.** While military salaries and spending for research have gone up this year, there has been no appreciable change in strategic-force spending. "We continue to believe," Mr. Laird said, "that hard decisions may have to be made in this area in the coming months, and I, will not hesitate to recommend additional effort should the threat or developments ... warrant."

The Pentagon chief asked Congress for 1.6 billion dollars to convert more than half the 1,000-missile Minuteman force to multiple warheads and to mount multiple-warhead Poseidon missiles in submarines.

An additional 1.3 billion dollars was sought to continue building three sites of the Safeguard anti-ballistic-missile defense, and start construction on a fourth, as described elsewhere on this page.

Looking ahead to possible new weapons if arms-control talks with the Russians fail, Mr. Laird told Congress the budget contains 110 millions for preliminary work on a new long-range, submarine-launched missile system (ULMS) and 370 millions for work on an advanced bomber called the B-1.

Mr. Laird also urged a stepped-up program of research and development totaling nearly 8 billion dollars. Purpose: to keep the U. S. from being taken up short by a dramatic Soviet breakthrough in weapons.

**Aid to allies.** "Soviet and Communist Chinese aid to North Vietnam, North Korea, and the Warsaw Pact countries clearly increases the military threat which we and our allies must face," Mr. Laird reported.

Best estimates, he said, are that military aid among Communist countries approximated 15 billion dollars in the 1955-1970 period; with more than 85 per cent provided by the Soviet Union. The largest portion, he said, went to North Vietnam. Non-Communist countries received another 8 billion in military aid in the same period.

The Defense Secretary emphasized the success of U.S. strategy in the 1970s will depend heavily on continued aid by America to its allies.

"The better equipped our friends and allies are to provide for their own security, the more firm will be our own security," Mr. Laird said. "This is because the probability of war and of U. S. involvement in war will be lowered."

Mr. Laird indicated no change in present strength of U.S. forces in Europe but noted: "Military manpower is more costly for the U. S. than for any of our allies, and the differential probably will grow as we move toward an all-volunteer force."

Defense officials added that the U. S. will continue to maintain its 300,000-man force in Europe, but that NATO Allies have been served notice they must prepare themselves against any but nuclear war.

1969

By JOHN W. FINNEY
Special to The New York Times

WASHINGTON, March 25—
Hubert H. Humphrey, in his
first major speech since re-
lying to the Senate, urged
the Nixon Administration today
to seek an agreement limiting
antiballistic missile systems as
the first step toward a compre-
hensive strategic arms agree-
ment with the Soviet Union.

The Minnesota Democrat criticized the 'Administration for assuming an "all-or-nothing position" in the strategic arms talks with the Soviet Union by insisting that any agreement must include both offensive and defensive weapons.

Along with his speech criti-
cizing the Administration ap-
proach to the arms talks, Sena-
tor Humphrey introduced a
sense-of-the-Senate resolution
calling upon the President to
propose a ban or limit on ABM
defensive systems "as the first
step toward achieving a more
comprehensive agreement on
both defensive and offensive
weapons."

Under Mr. Humphrey's pro-
posal, the mutual freeze on
ABM systems would be of
limited duration and linked to
subsequent success in negotiat-
ing a limitation on offensive
weapons.

While the ABM limitation
as being negotiated, he pro-
posed that the United States
and the Soviet Union enter into
a mutaual moratorium on the
deployment of new offensive
and defensive weapons and on
the testing of multiple missile
warheads known as MIRV's
(multiple independently tar-
getable re-entry vehicles).

This moratorium would be
dependent upon both sides de-
monstrating "comparable self-
restraint," with the United
States suspending deployment
of the Safeguard ABM system
and MIRV warheads for the
Minuteman intercontinental mi-
siles, and the Soviet Union sus-
pending deployment of its land-
based intercontinental missiles
and testing of MIRV warheads.

Contending that mutual
restraint in weapon deploy-
ment has become an "essential
ingredient for success of the
arms limitation talks, Senator
Humphrey said:

"President Nixon must be
willing to take some risks for
peace in the way his predeces-
sors, Presidents Eisenhower an
Kennedy, did to achieve a nu-
clear test ban treaty."

He noted that both previous
presidents had laid the ground-
work for the treaty by uni-
terially stopping nuclear test-
ing in anticipation of a com-
mensurate response on testing
by the Soviet Union.

SST and War Stands

To Senator Humphrey, the
long speech marked his debut
as an active Senator, and to
many of his colleagues, further

confirmation that the 1968
Democratic Presidential candi-
date was once again a possible
contender for the Presidential
nomination.

After two months of unusual
reticence in the Senate wings,
Senator Humphrey has stepped
forward onto the front stage
in a manner that has con-
vinced many of his close col-
leagues that he is interested in
running for the Presidency
again and is trying to reshape
his political image.

He broke yesterday with or-
ganized labor — and sided with
the younger faction of the
party in the Senate — in vot-
ing against the supersonic
transport. He also presided
over a meeting of the Demo-
cratic National Committee's
policy council that adopted a
resolution urging Congressional
action to force a complete
troop withdrawal from Viet-
nam by the end of 1971.

And then with his first major
Senate speech today, he sought
to re-establish his role as a
spokesman on disarmament th
dates to his earlier days in the
Senate when he was chairman
of the disarmament subcommit-
tee of the Senate Foreign Re-
lations Committee.

With his disarmament speech,
Senator Humphrey, at least
momentarily, may have up-
staged a potential Presidential
rival, Senator Edmund S. Muski
of Maine, who has yet to take
advantage of his new platform
as chairman of the disarma-
ment subcommittee.

The Muskie subcommittee
will have closed-door briefings
next week on the arms limita-
tion talks and the Soviet stra-
tegic threat. Beyond that, the
Maine Democrat is tentatively
considering open hearings in
May on the Administration's
proposal to expand the Safe-
guard ABM system.

Seated in his Senate office
behind a desk that he apolo-
getically noted was scarred
from previous Senatorial ser-
vice, Mr. Humphrey said he
had withheld his Senate speak-
ing debut until now because
"I did not want to do much
specifying and publicizing un-
til I was ready."

But he said he intended to
speak out hereafter on both
foreign and domestic issues.
While emphasizing that he is

not ready to join some of his
fellow liberal Democrats in urg-
ing cuts in the defense budget,
he admits that he is changing
his views on foreign policy,
such as on Vietnam. He sees the
nation going through a period
of devising "a whole new for-
eign policy," just as it was do-
ing in 1949 when he first came
to the Senate and the ground-
work was laid for the Cold
War policy of containment of
Communism.

NEW YORK TIMES

26 MARCH 71p13

HUMPHREY URGES
LIMITS ON ABM'S

Criticizes 'All or Nothing'
Attitude in Arms Talks

137

NEW YORK TIMES

29 MARCH 71 p9

# A MISSILE FREEZE URGED BY JACKSON

## Senator Calls for One-Year Halt by U.S. and Soviet

By TAD SZULC

Special to The New York Times

WASHINGTON, March 28— Senator Henry M. Jackson proposed today a one-year agreement with the Soviet Union freezing the deployment of most land-based missiles. He said this would "arrest the decline in the security" of the United States nuclear deterrent.

The Washington Democrat, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee who has been mentioned as a potential Presidential candidate, called for an immediate agreement that would halt the deployment of United States Minuteman III missiles with multiple warheads, as well as the deployment and construction of new Soviet intercontinental missiles and launchers and installation of antiballistic systems defending population centers.

Appearing on "Issues and Answers," a radio and television program of the American Broadcasting Company, Senator Jackson announced that he would outline his proposal in a speech to the Senate tomorrow.

He said such an agreement was necessary because the Soviet had started building "a massive system that involves the deployment of an ICBM [inter-continental ballistic missile] force that exceeds 25 megatons."

## Earlier Disclosure

It was Senator Jackson who disclosed three weeks ago that the United States had detected the new Soviet construction effort. This was later confirmed by the Defense Department.

Today, he said, "The Russians have an ability this year —and this is what is ominous—to deploy between 60 and 70 of such huge SS-9 type missiles."

"If they should deploy 70 of such missiles," he said, "they would have a capability this year alone of adding more megatonnage, or destructive power than we have in our entire current land-based Minutemen ICBM system."

On Feb. 25, President Nixon said in his State of the World Message that the growth of Soviet strategic forces "leads inescapably to profound questions concerning the threats we will face in the future, and the adequacy of our current strategic forces to meet the requirements of our security."

Mr. Nixon stressed that during 1970 the Soviet Union had further increased its lead over the United States in the deployment of intercontinental missiles. At the end of last year he said, the Soviet Union had 1,440 ICM's and the United States 1,054.

Senator Jackson's appeal for a freeze came amid growing concern over the new Soviet strategic arms programs and the apparent stalemate at the talks in Vienna on bombing strategic arms.

## Humphrey Asks Moratorium

In a major Senate speech last Thursday, Senator Hubert H. Humphrey, Minnesota Democrat, another potential Presidential candidate, introduced a resolution calling for a mutual moratorium on deployments of offensive and defensive weapons and MIRV testing while the U. S. and the Soviet Union negotiated a ban on antiballistic systems.

Senator Humphrey criticized the Administration for insulating on a comprehensive agreement with Moscow on both offensive and defensive weapons, and suggested that an antiballistic accord come first.

The Senate disarmament subcommittee, headed by Senator Edmund S. Muskie of Maine, the leading Democratic Presidential contender, is scheduled to start closed door briefings this week on the status of the Arms Limitation Talks and the Soviet threat.

During his television appearance, Senator Jackson said that in the talks with the Russians, resumed in Vienna on March 15, "the real problem that we face is that, the Russians appear to be going ahead on an unabated basis with a very large offensive land-based system."

He said the new Soviet activities "would put into serious question the credibility of our second-strike force" and that "if the Russians continue to deploy these huge offensive systems we will have to take another look at our whole deterrent posture" and "at the need for more offensive systems."

138

139

U. S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT - 5 APRIL 1971

# "U.S. SUPERIORITY HAS ENDED"

A hard-hitting report on the state of U. S. defenses, drawn up by leading private citizens, is starting to attract notice in Washington. The warning: This country had better wake up, lest it become a second-rate power.

Following is full text of the official summary of a 35-page statement submitted to the President and the Secretary of Defense on "The Shifting Balance of Military Power":

The converging trends. The convergence of a number of trends indicates a significant shifting of the strategic military balance against the United States and in favor of the Soviet Union. These trends include:

1. The growing Soviet superiority in intercontinental ballistic missiles.

2. The Soviet commitment of greater resources than the U. S. to strategic offensive and defensive weapons, with the continued deployment thereof,

3. The possibility that present U. S. technological superiority will be lost to the Soviet Union,

4. The convincing evidence that the Soviet Union seeks a pre-emptive first-strike capability,

5. The rapidly expanding Soviet naval capability, and

6. The mounting hostility of segments of the public toward the military, the defense establishment and "the military-industrial complex" without due recognition that sustained irresponsible criticism could undermine and weaken the only forces which provide security for the U. S.

A second-rate power. If these observable trends continue, the U. S. will become a second-rate power incapable of assuring the future security and freedom of its people. Neither the facts concerning these trends nor the ultimate danger is generally understood by the public, which for the most part remains uninformed and hence apathetic.

A Soviet world order. Since World War II, a degree of world order has been maintained by the dominance of U. S. strategic military strength. This American-preserved world order is now disintegrating as doubts arise as to our will and strength to preserve it.

There is reason to believe that the Soviet Union envisions a new era which it will dominate, employing superior military power and the threat of its use to achieve long-cherished political, economic and even military objectives.

The end of U. S. superiority. In a dramatic shift in the balance of power, largely unnoticed by the public, the quarter century of clear U. S. strategic superiority has ended.

The Soviet Union has moved significantly ahead of the United States in ICBM's—the principal weapons system of the nuclear age. The U. S. retains, for the time being, a substantial edge in the smaller, short-range SLBM's launched from Polaris submarines. Yet the Soviet Union has a major submarine-construction program which by 1973-74 could nullify this advantage. The U. S. subsonic B-52 bomber force still outnumbers the Soviet strategic bombers by a 3-to-1 margin, but both nations recognize the relatively obsolete character of this weapons system.

There are, of course, other elements in the equation of strategic military power. In some of these—such as MIRV [multiple, independently targeted re-entry vehicle] and Poseidon—the U. S. is ahead of the Soviet Union. In others, such as strategic defense against missiles—ABM's—and against bomber attack, the Soviets are significantly ahead.

But however one may view the balancing, no informed person now denies that the period of clear U. S. superiority has ended. The Soviet SS-9 ICBM force alone is capable of delivering a megatonnage of nuclear warheads several times greater than that of the entire U. S. force of ICBM's and submarine-launched ballistic missiles.

A Soviet first-strike capability. Our planners in the '60s assumed that if both superpowers had an adequate retaliatory capability, neither would prepare for or risk a first strike.

The evidence is now reasonably conclusive that the Soviet Union, rejecting this assumption, is deploying strategic-weapons systems designed for a first-strike capability.

This evidence includes:

* The continued Soviet production and deployment of ICBM's after having attained a clear numerical and megatonnage advantage,

* The emphasis on SS-9s designed as counterforce weapons capable of destroying U. S. hardened missile silos,

* The development of MRV [multiple re-entry vehicle]—with warheads also designed as counterforce weapons—and of MIRV by 1971-72.

140

* The development of a fractional-orbital missile which significantly minimizes warning time,

* The construction of a Y-class atomic-powered-submarine SLBM-launching fleet capable, with no effective warning, of destroying our national command centers and much of our B-52 bomber force, and

* The continued Soviet emphasis on strategic-defense systems against both missiles and bombers—an emphasis without parallel in this country.

The characteristics of these offensive and defensive-weapons systems which the Soviets continue to expand are consistent only with a pre-emptive-strike capability. Such a weapons mix and volume are not required for effective retaliation.

A challenging Soviet Navy. The Soviet Navy, modern and rapidly expanding, is now challenging U. S. naval superiority in every category except aircraft carriers. This Soviet naval build-up is a major element in the shifting balance of military power.

Retreat from the threat of the '70s. The situation which our country faces is without precedent. As we enter the '70s, the strategy of American superiority has given way to the concept of deterrence by maintaining an assured retaliatory capability. But there is no longer any certainty that our nuclear deterrent will remain credible to a Soviet Union which apparently seeks a pre-emptive-strike capability and which is moving rapidly into the role of the world's dominant military power. Red China, bitterly hostile to the U. S., also is acquiring a significant ICBM capability.

It is not too much to say that in the '70s neither the vital interests of the U. S. nor the lives and freedom of its citizens will be secure. Yet many of our most influential citizens respond to this unprecedented national peril not by a renewed determination to assure an adequate national defense but rather by demands for further curtailment of defense measures which can only increase the peril.

Cutback in defense spending. Although the President has submitted for fiscal year 1971 a "bare bones" defense budget reflecting the largest single cutback since the Korean War, public and political pressures are mounting for even more-drastic reductions.

As U. S. defense spending goes down, the trend of spending by the Soviet Union continues steadily upward. Its total military funding about equals that of the U. S., although its gross national product is barely half that of this country. The mix of Soviet spending is especially meaningful. Without the drain of a Vietnam war or public pressures to curtail defense funding, Soviet expenditures in dollar equivalents on strategic offensive and defensive weapons significantly exceed those of the U. S.

Threat to technological superiority. U. S. qualitative superiority in weapons due to its advanced technology has afforded a decisive advantage over the past years. This advantage is now being eroded away as the U. S. falls behind the Soviet Union in the support of research and development and in the training of scientists and engineers.

There is an ever-present risk of disastrous technological surprise in major weaponry where an open society is in competition with a closed Communist society. We are neglecting, by inadequate support and planning, to minimize this risk.

Negotiations-trap or opportunity? Since the end of World War II, repeated attempts have been made by the U. S. to negotiate limitations on the arms race. Negotiations for sound, enforceable limitations should be continued, and hopes are

now high for the success of the current strategic-arms-limitation talks. But the total experience of negotiating with Communist nations suggests the utmost caution and the need for the most-critical analysis of the possible consequences of any proposed terms. Not only is the security of this country at stake but it is possible that a limitations agreement as to strategic weapons could have the effect of neutralizing the U. S. as a strategic power, leaving the Soviet Union and Red China relatively free to employ their superior tactical capabilities wherever this seems advantageous.

Hostility toward the military. At this critical time when the balance of military power is shifting, it is uniquely unfortunate that public hostility toward national defense and the military is at an unprecedented level.

This attitude reflects a broad spectrum of opinion-from honest pacifists and dissenters over Southeast Asia to New Leftist revolutionaries. But the base is sufficiently broad and the voices supporting various aspects of it sufficiently powerful to have a profoundly adverse effect upon almost every aspect of national defense.

In a democracy, national defense suffers when there is inadequate public understanding and support. It may be fatally undermined when a significant segment of public opinion is not merely negative but irresponsibly hostile.

A viable national strategy. Unless the American people wish to accept irrevocably the status of a second-rate power-with all of the probable consequences-the only viable national strategy is to regain and retain a clearly superior strategic capability. This can be accomplished by reversing the trends identified above and by eschewing agreements which freeze the U. S. into a second-rate status.

The margin of our over-all strategic strength must be sufficient to convince the most reckless aggressor that even after a surprise first strike the capability to retaliate will in fact survive and be adequate to impose unacceptable destruction on the aggressor nation. This course of action is not compatible with continued negotiations for arms limitations. Indeed, it will significantly enhance the chances of negotiations being genuinely fruitful without constituting a trap.

The consequences of second-rate status. Basic Communist dogma contemplates the employment, over such time spans as may be necessary, of the entire arsenal of pressures against the U. S. as the strongest democratic power. Despite discord among Communist states there has been no amelioration of this doctrinal goal.

Throughout the past quarter century when the Soviet Union was relatively weak strategically, it precipitated or supported crisis upon crisis-directly or through puppets and satellites-designed to extend its influence and to create disarray within the U. S. and the free world.

It is irrational to think with the balance of military power shifting in its favor, that the policies of the Soviet Union will be less hostile, disruptive and imperialistic. The consequences of being second rate, even if national survival is not threatened, could be seriously detrimental to the most vital diplomatic and economic interests of this country.

Weakness-the gravest threat to peace. The road to peace has never been through appeasement, unilateral disarmament or negotiation from weakness. The entire recorded history of mankind is precisely to the contrary.

Among the great nations only the strong survive. Weakness of the U. S.-of its military capability and its will-could be the gravest threat to the peace of the world.

WASHINGTON POST APRIL 1971 P-1

## Arms Critics Hopeful on Budget Battle

One of a series of articles
on major defense issues.

By George C. Wilson

Washington Post Staff Writer

Today is mobilization day for a motley political army that intends to fight the well-organized ranks of the Pentagon soon on the issue of military spending.

Sounding the call in a fifth-floor committee room in the New Senate Office Building will be Sen. William Proxmire (D-Wis.), a politician fresh from what looked like another hopeless battle, the downing of the supersonic transport.

Proxmire, like it or not—and he talks more like “or not”—this year is the Senate’s leader of the anti-Pentagon forces. No more one-man search-and-destroy missions for him. Events have pushed this Senate loner into a leadership role.

"Who else was there?" asked an arms control lobbyist working on the mobilization.

It was Proxmire, the lobbyist explained, who took on military programs like the C-5A before it was deemed politically safe and then racked up a stunning 71 per cent of the state vote in winning reelection to the Senate in 1970.

It was Proxmire who came close last year to getting the Senate to impose a money ceiling on the Pentagon's annual budget.

And it was Proxmire, after shouting down the well for so long about the jolly of spending millions on the supersonic transport, who suddenly found himself this year riding a crest of public rebellion over the plane. He won that one after so many years of defeats on other budget-cutting amendments.

Also, this year he is co-chairman of the military subcommittee of the Members of Congress for Peace Through Law.

The group is a loose, bipartisan alliance trying to work its will on the Defense Department by challenging specific weapons and policies. The other chairman is Rep. Ogden R. Reid (R-N.Y.).

Not that all this gives Proxmire instant popularity in the Senate or even admixture to the inner circle. It doesn't. But it is why Proxmire will be the senator addressing the Coalition on National Priorities and Military Policy today—a group the Pentagon must worry about.

The coalition, founded by 20 national organizations

the outside while Proxmire and his allies work on fellow lawmakers from the inside, is—to quote the brochure—"a coordinating body for national religious, peace, liberal, labor and scientific organizations which seek to reverse the militarization of America's policies and resources."

Former Democratic Sen. Joseph S. Clark of Pennsylvania is chairman of the coalition's executive committee. That committee also includes representatives of SANE, the National Education Association and the United Auto Workers. This year for the first time coalition spokesmen got an opportunity to testify before the House Armed Services Committee, and they are seeking the same kind of audience with the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Proxmire, in his speech to the coalition today, will declare that it is high time for the Pentagon to stop pre-tending the Russians are 10 feet tall and to adjust the military budget to their real size. The senator also will describe part of the Pentagon's chamber of horrors, including the main battle tank, in arguing that forced reforms would make the military stronger, not weaker.

### Far From New

This line is far from new—especially from Proxmire. But the anti-Pentagon forces believe more people will listen to them this year and then act—as they did on the SST. These are the reasons arms control lobbyists give for their optimism about cutting military spending in 1971:

* Credibility gap. The Vietnam War has worn down the credibility of everybody in the Defense Department—civilian secretaries and military generals alike. Their claims for "must" weapons and manpower levels are thus apt to run into heavy congressional resistance, especially in the Senate.

* New Faces. Sen. Allen J. Ellender (D-La.) is the new chairman of the Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, succeeding the late Sen. Richard B. Russell (D-Ga.). Ellender will be harder on military spending than Russell—and more skeptical about the Pentagon picture of the Communist threat.

Also, the House Armed Services Committee has a slightly more critical membership with the departure of the late Rep. L. Mendel Rivers (D-S.C.) and the addi

* Economy. The only way to obtain money for domestic programs without aggravating inflation further is to take it out of the Pentagon budget. However, even this year's optimists do concede that the troubled economy makes military base closings—with the accompanying loss of jobs—unpopular politically.

* New Senate coalition. The SST vote showed the viability of a political coalition of the liberals and conservative budget cutters. Voting against the plane on March 24 were such liberals as Sens. Frank Church (D-Idaho), Thomas F. Eagleton (D-Mo.), Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), Edward W. Brooke (R-Mass.) and Clifford P. Case (R-N.J.) along with such conservatives as Sens. Harry F. Byrd Jr. (D-Va.), Sam J. Ervin Jr. (D-N.C.), Clifford P. Hansen (R-Wyo.), Len B. Jordan (R-Idaho) and Jack Miller (R-Iowa).

Arms control lobbyists believe such a Senate coalition could be organized to control Pentagon spending, once waste is dramatically proved. Already there is an effort under way by disarrangement lobbyists to enlist environment leaders who fought the SST in the anti-Pentagon movement. It is admitted that this will be a gradual process. But the SST is described as a heartening victory for changed priorities—with the prospect of adding thrust to the arms control effort before long.

* Early start. The mobilization against military spending is off to a much earlier start this year than in past years and promises to be better organized. The Members of Congress for Peace Through Law hope to increase the impact of this year's posture statement by releasing it a chapter at a time, with each chapter analyzing a specific Pentagon program. It is hoped that Sen. Charles McC. Mathias Jr. (R-Md.) will spearhead with Proxmire the Senate drive to cut the defense budget.

### No Easy Victory

While those reasons are cited as the basis for optimism, the arms control lobbyists do not pretend an easy victory is in sight. This year as in past years, Pentagon programs the Senate recommends killing most likely will be revived in the House.

"But the battle will be joined across a wider front," said one leader of the coalition of national organizations. He argued that the antibalistic missile debate of

hard, exhausted the Senate without coming to grips with the broader question of how to put the Pentagon on a shorter leash. While weapons programs can be stopped in the Senate, he said, "too many foreign commitments" are the magic words in the House.

While the ADM and other specific weapons projects will be attacked in the Senate again this year, Proxmire said he hopes to keep amendments on them to a minimum. His idea is to attack the Pentagon's most questionable programs, one after the other, without voting on individual amendments to reduce or cancel them.

The debate would amount to building the case for one really big amendment—now posing a dollar ceiling on the Defense Department. This would avoid forcing the uncertain politicians in Congress to out-expert the generals and admirals in ruling them on such things as tanks and aircraft carriers. The Pentagon would restructure itself within the imposed dollar ceiling.

The amount Proxmire has in mind for the ceiling is between $66 billion and $70 billion, or from $10 billion to $6 billion less than the $76 billion the Pentagon intends to spend in Fiscal 1972.

Defense Secretary Melvin R. Laird has predicted that there will be no close votes on Pentagon programs this year. But Proxmire sees it differently.

"The main thing that is different this year," Proxmire said in an interview, "is that the President is increasing the defense budget compared to the decreases of Fiscal 1970 and 1971. "We're getting down to marginal expenditures in Vietnam as we get out. Therefore, there ought to be cut."

Also, he said the Nixon administration's proclamations of having enough forces to fight a big war and one little on the 1½ war policy compared to the Johnson administration's 2½ war policy should mean that little money is needed now to

143

WASHINGTON POST - 19 APRIL 1971

1½-War Capability in Doubt

145

Defense Costs Peril Strategy

By Michael Getler

Washington Post Staff Writer

The Nixon administration, which reduced the Kennedy-Johnson goal of military capability for 2½ simul-taneous wars to 1½, is now confronted with the possibil-ity that soaring costs may price the country out of even this less ambitious goal.

Thus, in only the second year of the decade, the major American military strategy for the 1970s is in doubt.

"If present trends continue," says one high-ranking official, "the conclusion is inescapable: the 1½ war strategy will be right out the window."

The trends include:

* Increasing Manpower costs—pay and benefits for American servicemen. Government studies show that manpower costs will consume 65 per cent of the $90 billion projected for the defense budget by 1975. These costs are rising even as the administration is pushing for an all-volunteer army.

* Weapons cost that continue to defy original estimates by large margins. What many planners fear is that these costs are becoming so high that the military—increasingly challenged by lawmakers and taxpayers—simply may not be able to buy enough ships, planes and tanks during peacetime to be able, if necessary, to fight and win a large-scale conventional war.

The price of a single tank is ten times what it was in World War II. The latest Air Force and Navy fighter planes will cost 100 times more than their Korean War ancestors. Navy shipbuilding costs, according to an administration budget specialist, "have gone completely out of sight."

## Defense Planners

Furthermore, a number of top defense planners feel the services have reached a point of diminishing returns in building costly, sophisticated weapons.

Attention must be turned, they stress, to simpler, cheaper weapons that can be bought in large enough quantities to keep the United States from simply being outgunned. "We've got

to stop using $15 million airplanes to try and knock out $3,000 trucks," as one planer puts it.

But officials are not at all certain that service habits can be changed, nor that the Laird-Packard regime at the Pentagon is willing to force them to change.

Officially, the Nixon-Laird strategy of realistic deterrence" calls for enough nuclear arms to deter an all-out nuclear war with the Russians, plus enough conventional forces to fight a major non-nuclear war in either Europe or Asia while contending with a smaller outbreak somewhere else at the same time.

Thus the "1½ war" tag.

But interviews with a number of the most experienced civilian defense planners and budget experts in government reveal widespread doubt that even these scaled-down goals can be fully met.

For one thing, a number of those interviewed expressed a fear that the sea-power-oriented Nixon administration may be cutting back the number and readiness of Army combat divisions to a dangerously low level to help achieve the politically popular goal of an all-volunteer Army and to help pay for ever more expensive hardware, mostly for the Navy and some for the Air Force.

"The Army," says one administration insider, "is taking it in the neck," both within the administration and in votes by the Joint Chiefs of Staff where Navy strength predominates.

The administration already plans to cut the Army down to 13½ divisions by 1972, three fewer than the Army had before the Vietnam build-up in 1964.

## First Sacrifice

And, planners worry that if the fiscal crunch gets worse, Army readiness will be the first sacrifice, without anybody really being aware of it except the Army. "They may still have 13½ divisions on paper," says one source, "but they won't be fully manned and equipped."

Yet, many defense analysts view the Army as the most important element of American military power for the most likely battles that lie ahead.

Defense planners are also

of an answer to this question: "Who," one official asked, "is looking after the real national interest in defense?"

The individual services, officials say, still cling to the glossiest, most costly versions of traditional weapons at the expense of new ideas and less glamorous but important projects. Without stronger civilian control, they say, the services cannot be expected to overcome today's fierce competition for money within and between each branch in such a way that the country winds up with a properly balanced arsenal.

Defense Secretary Melvin R. Laird is given high marks as a driving force within the administration to end the war. But when it comes to challenging service priorities, the defense chief is viewed mostly as a referee rather than as a tough overseer of military shopping lists.

"The secretary has got to play a stronger role than he has," says one official, "but

he'll probably settle for getting out of Vietnam for his four years. He's the Clark Clifford of the Nixon administration."

"If the Secretary of Defense does his job correctly," another official adds, "he can't be well liked by the military. But until I see him take on a major project that the service wants, 'participatory management' (Laird's term for giving the services a bigger say in defense decision-making) merely means cutting up the pie."

Some planners complain that scarce resources are being added and taken away "on a 33½ per cent each basis." If the defense budget goes up again next year, as is likely, "every dab of the extra resources in the Air Force will go for the B-1 bomber and into carriers in the Navy," says one experienced planner. "But maybe more should go into Minute-man or ULMS (the successor to the Polaris submarines), or small, fast patrol boats. Nobody else is making the trade-offs."

If present trends continue, says one planner half

CONTINUED NEXT PAGE

April 19, 1971

The Washington Post

Chart shows rise in weapons costs since World War II.

BALTIMORE SUN 18 April 1971 P3 (19)

143

# 2 Pentagon Critics Hope SST
Coalition Will Cut Military's Budget

BY ASTERO PIETILA

Two supporters of reductions in military spending said yesterday they hope the same congressional coalition that defeated the supersonic transport will be maintained to divert funds away from the Pentagon.

During a seminar here, Stanford Gottlieb, executive director of SANE, a peace group, and Representative Paul S. Sarbanes (D. 4th) said the only way to cut arm spending is to continue this "unlikely coalition" of liberals and fiscal conservatives.

"That's exactly what we have to do as was shown in our victory over SST," Mr. Gottlieb told an approving audience of about 200 in the seminar "From War to Peace" held at City College.

He added that, although Senate leaders such as George McGovern (D., S.D.), a presidential hopeful and anti-war liberal, and Harry F. Byrd, Jr. (independent Democrat, Va.), a fiscal conservative, disagree on how any funds diverted from military use should be spent, both agree that cuts in the arms budgets are necessary.

Mr. Sarbanes warned in his speech, however, that the approaching 1972 presidential campaign might alter whatever conditions there are for such co-operation between liberals and conservatives on Capitol Hill.

He said that if the nation's present unemployment situation is not improved by campaign time, President Nixon might decide to increase military spending to produce more jobs.

"It's the easiest thing in the world to boost military expenditures," the freshman congressman from Baltimore city said, adding that "we may well see the 1972 counterpart of the 1960 nissile gap."

Mr. Sarbanes said he saw indications of that kind of strategy in the recently published reports by Pentagon spokesmen that the strategic capacity of the Soviet Union was surpassing that of the United States.

He said, therefore, that a return to full employment was

"terribly important" so that joblessness could not be used as an excuse for military spending.

Yesterday's day-long seminar in Baltimore was the first area conference of the Coalition on National Priorities and Military Policy.

The group, whose members include such liberals as Senators McGovern, Edward M. Kennedy (D., Mass.) and William S. Proxmire (D., Wis.), is planning a nationwide congress later this year.

Youthful activists who have crowded earlier peace meetings were almost totally absent from yesterday's seminar, which consisted of a series of discussions on the economics of war and peace by 10 experts. They included John Stark, staff director of the Joint Economic Committee of Congress.

The Baltimore conference was arranged by the coalition and co-sponsored by 28 other organizations.

They included the Afro-American Labor Council, Activists, Inc., Americans for Democratic Action, the American Friends Service Committee, Baltimore

Ethical Society, Baltimore Teachers Union, the Board of Christian Social Concern of the United Methodist Church, Business Executives Move for Vietnam Peace, Community Action Agency, the Delta Sigma Theta sorority.

Also, Fellowship of Reconciliation, Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance, League of Women Voters (Baltimore city and county), Maryland Conference on Social Welfare, Maryland Student-Citizen Coalition, Maryland Veterans for Peace, Baltimore Urban Coalition, the United Auto Workers, (Region 3).

Other sponsors were the Maryland chapter of the National Association of Social Workers, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the First District New Democratic Club, the Second and Fifth district New Democratic coalitions, the Northwest Baltimore Corporation, SANE, the Social Action Committee of the First Unitarian Church and the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.

AVIATION WEEK & SPACE TECHNOLOGY - 19 APRIL 1971 (21)

# $3-Billion Cut Expected in Defense Requests

149

By Donald C. Winston

Washington-Major attack on the Defense Dept. $78.7-billion Fiscal 1972 budget request opened in Congress last week, setting the stage for cuts expected to exceed $3 billion—and possibly reaching double that figure—by the time the legislative process is complete late this year.

As in previous sessions, the conclusive debate will take place in the Senate in midsummer. But new factors at work in both House and Senate this session have greatly complicated the task of Defense Dept. officials in selling their programs to Congress. As a result, the fate of several major weapon systems at this time is highly uncertain.

The new factors include:

* Decline of the Southeast Asia war as a prime political issue, essentially ending the distinction between "hawks" and "doves" in matters concerning the military in general. Strong opposition to a particular major weapon system no longer carries an automatic "dove" label. This truth will become more evident as established "hawks" increasingly question the economics and strategic importance of some of these systems.

* Defeat of the supersonic transport last month (AW&ST Mar. 29, p. 14) by a coalition of liberals and conservatives. The political strength demonstrated in that vote will show enough cohesiveness to influence future votes on major military procurement, with liberals opposing the programs because they are defense-oriented and conservatives in opposition because they are expensive.

* Continuation of a high level of unemployment against a background of inflation. This combination is encouraging anti-defense spending forces to advocate a "shift of priorities" to civilian spending, which they claim will create more jobs while contributing less to inflation.

Evidence of the depth to which the move to chop Defense Dept. spending has moved is seen in the action of Sen. John C. Stennis (D.-Miss.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, who last week ordered the General Accounting Office to investigate the Navy/Grumman F-14 fighter contract.

The Stennis move followed by a month an order by Rep. George H. Mahon (D.-Tex.), chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, for a staff report on relative capabilities of the F-14 and the Air Force/McDonnell Douglas F-15 fighters (AW&ST Mar. 8, p. 188).

The GAO investigation into F-14 was triggered by what Sen. Stennis called "concern over recent reports of cost increases" in the program. He said he is aware of "some contractual implications on cost for varying quantities and abnormal economic variation."

Earlier, Sen. Stennis had served warning on Defense Dept. officials that his committee will examine each proposed weapon system in great detail before approving funds for Fiscal 1972 (AW&ST Mar. 15, p. 15). The committee will concentrate its efforts on aircraft and missiles.

Last session, the House and Senate Armed Services Committees convinced Defense Secretary Melvin R. Laird of the political necessity of reducing the scope of the Safeguard anti-ballistic missile system in order to get it passed by Congress. The same "friends of the Pentagon" in Congress this session are expected to conduct a similar survey of the mood of their colleagues and may recommend even sharper cutbacks, in Safeguard as well as other programs, for the same reasons.

Example of the strategy expected to emerge in coming months on the part of anti-Defense Dept. forces was given by Sen. William Proxmire (D.-Wis.), who last week attacked the Fiscal 1972 program on the premise that because it is too costly it will weaken the U.S. economically and, ultimately, militarily.

The Proxmire attack was timed for maximum impact, when Congress was out of session and full attention could be gained because there were few other legislators at work. The choice of timing also made reply difficult, with several key committee leaders out of town.

Sen. Proxmire, fresh from his victory as leader of the anti-supersonic transport forces, is a long-time opponent of major Defense Dept. weapon programs. In the past, his attacks have dwelled almost exclusively on waste in defense spending, but this session he has shifted emphasis to military reform.

Sen. Proxmire declared, "through more prudent policies and through military reform, we can provide a more than adequate defense for the U.S. for far less money. In fact, if we continue to squander our treasure for obsolete or unworkable weapons as we have done in the past, we will weaken ourselves militarily and economically."

He said that $4 billion could be cut from what he described as an $18-billion annual expenditure for strategic weapons and still provide by Fiscal 1975 approximately 19 times the nuclear force "needed to inflict an unacceptable level of damage on the Soviet Union or to destroy 30% of her population and 76% of her industry."

Sen. Proxmire accused the Defense Dept. of spending more money each year than Congress has authorized. The figures he presented, however, included military construction expenditures but not military construction authorizations.

He explained that the unequal comparisons were given to demonstrate that "the Pentagon has suffered only the most minute or marginal cut" in recent years.

U.S. defense planners were also cajoled for failure to exercise "some self-restraint" in light of what Sen. Proxmire declared was a "decision by the Russians not to deploy the SS-9" intercontinental ballistic missile. According to U.S. officials, approximately 240 SS-9 Scarp missiles have been deployed in the Soviet Union, and numerous tests have been performed with them (AW&ST Mar. 8, p. 27).

Sen. Proxmire's declaration that the Defense Dept. regularly spends more than Congress authorizes, and that the Soviets have not deployed the SS-9, immediately stood out as a warning that the upcoming debate will not be fought squarely on the facts.

Of current major weapon systems, only the Lockheed Poseidon underwater-launched ballistic missile received full endorsement from Sen. Proxmire, who similarly approved further research on the underwater long-range missile system (ULMS), the Poseidon follow-on. Weapons strongly opposed by Sen. Proxmire include:

* North American B-1 bomber. "The B-1 cannot be justified by its mission," he declared. "Present aircraft with standoff weapons can adequately perform the same mission."

* Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS). Sen. Proxmire said that neither the Russians nor the Chinese possess a credible bomber threat, and that the system cannot be justified on the basis of general tactical usefulness. "This system has every appearance of being a major boondoggle," he said.

* Attack aircraft carriers. He said that carriers "are sitting ducks for modern missiles" and that the Navy's existing carrier fleet is inefficiently utilized.

* Main Battle Tank 70. "We need a new tank. But we don't need this one," Sen. Proxmire declared.

PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER 25 APRIL 1971

# Why Pentagon Faces

## A New War Over

150

## Soaring Arms Costs

By JAMES McCARTNEY

Of Our Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON.

IN 1963 the Navy started work on a new torpedo, the Mark 48. It estimated the cost for the project at $720 million.

Today the price tag has skyrocketed to $3.9 billion—a rise of 600 percent.

Torpedoes would now cost a million dollars each. They used to cost $38,000.

But the Navy still doesn't have a Mark 48 torpedo. Eight years and a half a billion dollars of expenditures since the program began, the new torpedo still doesn't work.

To cap it all off, a group of congressional critics of defense spending, including 30 U. S. senators, is asking whether the new torpedo is needed at all in today's warfare.

They're suggesting that the Mark 48 may already be obsolete.

The story of the Mark 48 is simply Exhibit A" in the coming battle here

over President Nixon's $76 billion defense budget.

"It's been the worst managed program of them all," says one congressional defense expert.

The same kinds of questions are being raised about many another multibillion dollar weapons system.

—Why are costs rising so dramatically?

—Are many expensive programs really needed?

Costs of major weapons programs for which Nixon is requesting money have increased by more than $10 billion over original estimates.

The price for one fighter plane went up by $1.5 billion in three years. The cost for a fleet of destroyers tripled. The price for another plane doubled.

Defense Secretary Melvin Laird has acknowledged the problem.

"When we assumed office in 1969," he says, "we had to face up to a number of problems and breakdowns in the weapons acquisition process that had developed over the years.

Nearly every new weapons system turning out to be substantially more than estimated when the system was first authorized. Furthermore, a great many of the new weapons did not work as well as predicted, reliability too often was poor, and maintenance costs were excessive."

Laird has made a number of management changes in the Pentagon to try to solve the problems and has more in mind.

The amount of money involved is as follows:

At least 13 major weapons systems under consideration would involve total expenditures of $3 billion or more each —and many of them substantially more.

Fighter planes come in fleets priced at more than $8 billion, destroyers at $4 billion, nuclear frigates at $5 billion. Nothing is cheap.

Technical and management problems abound in virtually every category. Days of years are common, cost rises the norm.

The budget supports six different anti-submarine warfare programs — all designed essentially to do the same thing. The total cost of the six: $23.3 billion.

It contains support money for three different kinds of close support aircraft —all designed to do the same thing. The cost of the three: $4 to $5 billion.

Other targets for defense critics:

—The budget proposes more than a half-billion dollars for carrier-based fighter planes designed for anti-submarine warfare of which a congressional study said: "Evidence available indicates that we have no need for the aircraft."

Costs of this program—the so-called S-3A—have grown from an initial estimate of $1.7 billion to almost $3 billion.

The cost per plane in the initial order now figures at $28 million each. The U. S. has been paying $3 to $5 million for F-4 Phantom jets, the backbone of today's fighter fleet.

Some critics believe a better, more effective plane could be built for half, or even a third of the price.

MCCARTNEY

### Threefold Increase

—The budget asks another half a billion dollars for Navy destroyers which critics charge may be of only "marginal" value.

The ships were originally estimated to cost $34 million each, just four years ago. The price tag today has risen to $111 million a piece.

The total program, according to the General Accounting Office, will cost, at least $4.1 billion.

—It asks $1.5 billion for two separate fighter plane programs which top defense experts in congress fear duplicate one another. They question seriously whether both are needed.

A secret study made by the House Appropriations Committee also questions whether either one will be able to handle modern Russian planes.

One program—the Navy's F-14 carrier-based fighter—has a total price tag of $8.2 billion, according to current official estimates, but a well-informed expert says "God only knows what it will cost."

The other planes—the Air Force's F-15
land-based fighter, would cost the ton

payers $8.1 billion.

Cost estimates for both have increased —the Navy's by a minimum of $400 million in just two years, the Air Force's by a cool billion.

—The budget asks $87 million for a new "main battle tank" the Army has been seeking to develop for eight years, with little success.

Research and development costs have grown by 525 percent above original estimates.

The Defense Department is worried about the tank's cost. It says it is now trying to come up with a cheap, or "au-stere" version, to hold down expenses. Estimated price per tank of the "au-stere" version: $600,000.

### 115-Member Group

Some experts say the Defense Department is dreaming. They estimate the tank is going to cost $1 million a copy.

They ask whether the tank is needed at all in an age of strategic, intercontinental war.

Congressional critics say that a million dollar tank could be knocked out by a $5000 anti-tank weapon.

Questions about these programs, and others, are coming from a new congressional group called Members of Congress for Peace Through Law.

The group includes 115 members of Congress in both parties. Thirty are senators.

Top men are Sens. Mark Hatfield (R., Ore.) and William Proxmire (D., Wis.).

Their intention is to challenge major items in the defense budget in a series of special studies which they plan to make public in the weeks and months to come.

Nothing will be sacred.

The outspoken Sen. Proxmire sounded an opening gun in the campaign just recently with a speech on the Senate floor.

"Until we cut spending for unneeded or duplicate weapons, for excessive gold-plating, for redundant bases, and for ex-travagant logistic and supply purposes," he said, "the military safety of this nation will decline. ...

"If we persist in buying weapons which are so sophisticated they do not work, if we continue to follow practices through which the price of weapons routinely exceed their projected costs by 50 to 100 percent, if we persevere in a system whereby weapons and supplies are regularly delivered late, if we continue to cut our combat forces while adding to the logistic tail . . . the security of this country will suffer."

### 'Mess on Hands'

Defense Department officials, while not accepting Proxmire's arguments, do not deny there are serious problems.

Deputy Defense Secretary David Packard says: "We've got a mess on our hands."

Defense Secretary Laird says: "We have a tremendous cost growth problem."

The Pentagon's effort to sell six separate multi-billion dollar weapons programs designed to fight Russian submarines is the most expensive—and perhaps the most questionable—package in this year's $76 billion defense budget, ac-

cording to budgetary critics on Capitol
Hill.

There can be little question about the
growing Soviet submarine threat.

Laird says submarines are "the fast-
est growing element" of Soviet strategic
power.

The question, however, is whether all
of the U. S. anti-sub programs are need-
ed.

"The anti-submarine warfare program is out of control," says Sen. Proxmire. "The military," he says, "is merely building everything it can think of as an anti-sub weapon.

"Someone has to bang some heads to-
gether and bring order out of chaos in
this field."

Yet there is a bonafide fear of Soviet
submarine strength.

The critics want the Pentagon and the
Navy to decide on a basic anti-submarine
strategy and to stick with it. They fear
the Navy is currently buying anything
that sounds like it might work—and the
cost be hanged.

Among the other big question marks
in defense policy are the future of the
manned bomber and the future of the
aircraft carrier.

Both involve literally incalculable
sums of money not just billions, but
tens of billions.

Both were basic weapons in World War
II. The Pentagon is battling to keep both
in the U. S. arsenal.

To opponents they are mastodons,
creatures of an earlier era—the possible
equivalent for the U. S. military of the
French Maginot Line.

To proponents they are vital to the de-
fense of the nation. The carrier makes
it possible to wage mobile war at sea,
far from U. S. shores—the bomber can
be controlled by man, preventing a
“computerized” war.

This year, Sen. George McGovern (D.,
S. D.), an avowed candidate for the
White House, plans a showdown battle
in the Senate over an Air Force drive
for the largest sums ever sought for the
bomber, the B-1.

He'll seek to junk the program, alto-
gether on grounds that it is not neces-
sary at all—and if it were, the proposed
model is too fancy, "gold-plated" and of
poor design.

"The B-1." McGovern says, "has the
potential for being the costliest single
weapons system ever developed by this
country."

The Pentagon is asking $370 million
for continued research on the bomber—
a five-fold increase over last year's ap-
propriation.

Cost rises have already been a prob-
lem.

The General Accounting Office reports
that the total cost of the program is now
estimated at $10.5 billion—an increase
of $1.5 billion from original estimates,
and the plane is still in the research
stage.

Sen. Thomas McIntyre (D., N. H.). a
leading Senate expert on the plane who
has favored continued research, has es-
timated the total cost "might well be
$20 billion."

He has said the cost per plane could
run to $50 million a copy. Some Senate
critics of the program have said it could
go to $60 million a copy. No U. S. plane
has ever cost nearly as much.

Critics charge the bomber would be
extremely vulnerable.

The future of the aircraft carrier in-
volves a completely different kind of
question.

First of all, on the surface of it, there
shouldn't be a battle over carriers this
year. The Pentagon has not asked for
money to build a new carrier in this
year's budget.

It has asked only for $164 million to
pay for unexpected cost increases for
two nuclear carriers now under con-
struction.

range of Navy programs involving many
billions of dollars—planes, escort chips,
torpedoes, missiles.

And Defense Secretary Laird has said
that a new nuclear carrier will be need-
ed. Funds will probably be asked next
year or the year after.

The fact is, as Adm. Thomas H. Moor-
er, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
has put it, "the U. S. Navy general pur-
pose forces are built around attack car-
riers . . ."

If you have carriers you must have
planes to fly from them. submarines to
protect them, destroyers and frigates to
escort them, missiles to defend them, as
well as many other support weapons.

The Navy's budget this year is heavily
laden with multibillion-dollar programs
which tie in with a carrier-dominated
Navy.

The Navy now has 16 attack carriers
and three antisubmarine warfare car-
riers. The Soviets have no carriers.

No other country has built carriers in
more than a decade.

Critics of the carrier in Congress say
the carrier is outmoded—and far too
costly for what you get out of it.

They say that it costs $1.4 billion to-
day to build a single carrier task force.

With 16 task forces, the price indeed
comes high—in fact, it's 40 percent of
the Navy's total budget.

A congressional study on carriers con-
cluded: "Since the cost for constructing
new nuclear carriers is prohibitively
high, no new nuclear carrier should be
constructed.

"Moreover, the number of carriers on
active duty should be reduced to 10 or
12 as soon as practical."

On the whole, the study said, carrier
task forces are "both wasteful and in-
effective."

Other Programs

But the future of the aircraft carrier
lurks in the background of a whole

151

152

BULLETIN OF THE ATOMIC SCIENTISTS May 1971 (6)

Letter from Washington

RONALD L. TAMMEN

# NEW STRATEGY, NEW THREATS
## The Fiscal 1972 Military Budget

Arguments justifying the 1972 Military Budget break down into five major categories: the increased Soviet threat; high unemployment in the aerospace community; our overseas commitments; the SALT talks; and the so-called triple deterrent — land-based missiles, bombers and submarines. Ronald Tammen looks closely at the Budget with the expert's eye: He spent several years with the Central Intelligence Agency in a weapons-related field and is now consultant on military affairs to a bipartisan group of 105 Senators and Congressmen, affiliated under the name of Members of Congress for Peace through Law. He is advisor to the Military Spending Committee, headed by Senator William Proxmire.

The President has submitted an $50.2 billion military budget to Congress and his Secretary of Defense has attempted to justify this figure in the annual Defense Report. This combination of offensive firepower traditionally has overcome Congressional opposition to military spending. During the last few years, however, these documents have lost their immutable qualities. Both are now subject to intensive scrutiny and their flaws are illuminated in and out of Congress.

This year, the key to increased budget appropriations is the enunciation of a "new" deterrence strategy coupled with the specter of increased military threats. As for the

latter, the release of apparently alarming intelligence information to justify new budget requests is a long-standing technique at DOD. The same officials who complain bitterly about security leaks in November feel it appropriate to reveal highly classified data in March to insure Congressional appreciation of military needs. The Services recognize that the intelligence-budgetary relationship is the most important linkage in national security planning and they are adept at exploiting it.

The United States will be responding to the Soviet and Chinese threat with an across-the-board increase in military systems. The 12 programs listed in the table alone will cost,

by conservative estimates, over $60 billion to complete. This is not the "rock bottom," transitional budget the Secretary of Defense defended in 1970. Nor does it mesh with his testimony this year that the United States does not have to begin building a series of new weapons. Once again, it appears we will hedge against all conceivable threats, regardless of how remote, on the premise that our security depends upon assuming the "worst possible" case. Former Secretary Robert McNamara, who publicly committed DOD to this philosophy, recognized that it also can lead to a misreading of intentions and with that, unnecessary provocation (December 1967 Bulletin).

Last year, the Administration argued that without Safeguard we would be forced to augment our offensive forces. This year, with Safeguard, the Defense Report clearly states that the B-1 strategic bomber and the Underseas Long-range Missile System (ULMS) are the "most significant of our ongoing long-range developments." It never has been an either-or choice between offensive and defensive systems. From

the beginning it has been both. Congress only acts as a minor irritant to the timing of these programs. Questions of the critical force-mix are considered too sensitive for close examination. For example, a remarkable coalition is forming behind the ULMS concept. Liberals and conservatives both find the long-range, deep-diving submarine force appealing. Yet, there has been extraordinarily little public analysis of this system, even though it could cost more than the ABM and determine our deterrent strategy for the 1980s.

The Fiscal Year 1972 Defense Report is based upon a strategy called "realistic deterrence." In a defensively worded introduction, Defense Secretary Laird claimed that it was a new strategy rather than "a mere continuation of past policies in new packaging." It has three components: sufficient strength, partnership and negotiation. The key variable is "sufficiency" as defined by the President in the State of the World Address:

> Sufficiency means the maintenance of forces adequate to prevent us and our allies from being coerced.

The Secretary of Defense isolated four criteria of sufficiency before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: assured destruction, crisis stability, damage equivalence and defense against small or accidental launches. While these seemingly are more quantifiable, they include no mechanism for establishing arms levels. Indeed, damage equivalence is an open-ended invitation to continue the arms race.

Secretary Laird was perfectly correct in his anticipated criticism of "realistic deterrence." Sufficiency, partnership and negotiation comprise no new theoretical breakthrough. They appear to be exactly what he warns us against — new labeling for old material. Perhaps the truth-in-packaging laws should be extended to cover national security policy.

The Department of Defense obviously is concerned about the technological challenge of the Soviets. The Soviet research, development, test and engineering (RDT&E) budget is stated to be growing in the 10 to 13 per cent range each year while that of the United States holds

constant. These figures may be accurate and a cause for concern, but they are also puzzling. First, do they consider the technological base? Second, how are they computed? When intelligence analysts cannot agree on major observable Soviet programs, how can we confidently estimate Soviet R&D which occurs inside bureaucracies and laboratories?

One encouraging characteristic of the Defense Report is its free discussion of force levels and the one-and-a-half war philosophy, defined as the capacity to fight one major war and a holding war elsewhere. The Administration legitimately argues that forces-in-being never did match the old two-and-a-half war level — a major war on two fronts and a holding action elsewhere — and that we are now adjusting to a more rational policy. This introduces a note of realism, but it also confirms the suspicion that policies are always the servants of force levels, never the master.

The President's proposed budget produced ripples of approval in the aerospace community: It has been interpreted as a quiet go-ahead signal for almost every new system. Thus, there is a distinct feeling that the industry has bottomed-out. Even if Congress trims the budget, outlays probably will continue to increase as a result of previously appropriated funds. The aerospace companies have shown no interest in production for nonmilitary purposes; they would prefer to remain patient and specialized. Only successful SALT negotiations could disrupt this confidence in future weapon acquisition.

The Congressional reaction to the new budget has been surprisingly subdued considering that candidates for the 1972 Presidential election are already campaigning. Undoubtedly, controversies will surface as the House and Senate Armed Service Committees hold hearings and the military critics take aim on specific programs. House Armed Services Chairman F. Edward Hebert has made his position quite clear: We should approve everything the Pentagon requests.

The general feeling in Washington, as reflected in the press, is that military spending will fare better this year than last. That is,

Congress will not continue to pare away the budget. Analysts point to the defeat of all individual weapon amendments during the Ninety-first Congress as an indicator that this technique is not viable. They also suggest that the ABM vote of 1970 took the flame out of the budget-cutter's fire, leaving only some smoldering coals of discontent. There is room for optimism, however. Standing Committees, particularly the Senate and House Appropriations Committees, have taken over where individual Congressmen left off, and there is every indication that they are prepared to deal responsibly with the new budget.

Most likely there will be an attempt to put a ceiling on DOD expenditures similar to the Proxmire-Mathias amendment of last summer. This type of amendment has appeal to conservatives as being fiscally responsible in times of massive federal budget growth. Senators and Congressmen from defense-oriented states also are more likely to support a general ceiling than specific cut-backs which reverberate back home. In addition, it does not directly criticize the work of the Standing Committees. And, of course, there is considerable popular sentiment in both parties that a certain amount of military spending is wasted.

Regardless of Congressional action, some factors remain constant. Henry Kissinger once documented just how much the military budget process was determined by cyclical internal politics:

> Budgetary pressures compound the inherent conservatism of the military and end in subordinating doctrine to the battle for appropriations. . . . In order to create a favorable climate for their budgetary requests, the services tend to emphasize the most ominous aspects of the United States security problem. . . . A vicious circle is thereby set up: the more terrible we paint Soviet capabilities, the more we confirm our predilection for an all-out strategy.

Today, the strategic relationship has changed considerably, but the internal politics look all to familiar. One need only reread the systems in the table and recall how similar are the three Service budgets to agree with Mr. Kissinger about the dynamics of defense appropriations.

153

WASHINGTON POST 4 MAY 1971 PAGE 6

155

# Arms Spending Critics Open Fire Today on New Bomber

A bipartisan coalition of congressional doves seeking to cut Pentagon spending will open fire today on the Air Force's $11.1 billion plan to build a new fleet of jet bombers.

Their attack comes on the heels of a report by the General Accounting Office—details of which have just been disclosed—that pointedly criticizes Defense Department handling of the plane's development over the last four years.

The GAO report virtually invites Congress to consider changes in the project, which holds the Air Force's top priority.

At issue is the future of the B-1 bomber, a swing-wing, supersonic jet which the Air Force wants as a successor to the B-52 when the older planes are forced into retirement around 1980.

In the Air Force view, a fleet of about 240 B-1s is needed to keep intact the U.S. triad of nuclear deterrents—bombers, land-based missiles and missile-firing submarines —into the 1980s and 90s.

The project, however, has run into mounting-cost troubles despite recent Air Force efforts to scale down expenses. It is also being increasingly challenged on strategy grounds by Capitol Hill foes. Congressional critics are raising fresh doubts whether a new bomber is needed in the missile age, and, if one is actually needed, whether a plane different from and less expensive then the B-1 can do the job.

The GAO report documents the rise in B-1 cost estimates from about $8.8 billion in June, 1969, to $10.1 billion a year later.

It also chastises top civilian officials in both past and present regimes at the Pentagon for letting development proved before deciding how the plane was supposed to carry out its mission. In addition it charges that Pentagon leaders withheld cost information on official reports until new cost

reductions could be included.

By Sept. 30, 1970, the cost to complete the project had escalated again to $11.4 billion, according to official Defense figures. But the latest report—as of Dec. 30, 1970 and not yet made public—shows a drop to about $11.1 billion, reflecting self-administered cuts by the Air Force.

The GAO report indicated that the estimated price per plane had jumped from $35 million to $41 million between mid-1969 and mid-1970. However, the B-1 project director, Maj. Gen. Douglas T. Nelson, last month provided an even later assessment to a congressional committee in closed hearings.

Nelson, trying to take inflation into account, estimated that by 1978, when the first B-1 is supposed to enter service, each plane would cost about $45 million. That figure, he also explained, includes a share of the $2.6 billion the Air Force estimates it will cost to develop and test the plane.

The government auditors chided Defense Secretary Melvin R. Laird and Deputy Defense Secretary David Packard—though not by name—for failure to submit an official report to Congress as required on June 30, 1970. At that time, GAO said, the real cost of the B-1 project was estimated at $10.8 billion, but an Air Force cost-cutting drive was under way which ended in September and wound up cutting about $750 million out of the project.

These savings were credited retroactively to the June 30 report, keeping the cost figure presented to Congress at $10.1 billion.

Congress gave its first important approval to the B-1 in 1970. GAO claimed this tactic essentially subverted the use-

fulness of these reports, which are intended as a comparative reference so that cost problems can be spotted quickly.

The GAO report does not discuss the pros and cons of whether a new bomber is needed or if the proposed B-1 is the best candidate. But it notes that the present program is still in the early stages with "less than four percent" of the total cost committed through the end of the current fiscal year.

The accountants were more blunt about what Congress should look into, suggesting that lawmakers investigate the impact of the recent Air Force cutbacks on the plane's performance.

In effect, the Air Force got it both ways from GAO. The agency charted the growing cost of the project on one hand, and then obliquely criticized Pentagon management for sacrificing performance in the plane in an effort to hold the cost down.

The GAO report is equally critical of the effort to develop the SRAM missile to go aboard the B-1 and help it get through thick Soviet air defenses. The report says that missile costs have almost tripled since 1965 estimates and that production was ordered last June before its required performance was demonstrated in flight tests.

Today, the Members of Congress for Peace Through Law, a coalition of 117 lawmakers, will open its annual critique on defense spending with the B-1 as the first target.

This year, the group will attempt to tackle about a dozen controversial defense projects with a string of reports released one at a time rather than in one big salvo as has been the case for the past two years.

BALTIMORE SUN 5 May 1971 P5

# Budget's Foes In Congress Assault Bomber

By GENE OISHI

Washington Bureau of The Sun

Washington, May 4—Congressional critics of defense spending began their annual assault on the military budget today with an attack on the Air Force's supersonic B-1 bomber, which they said is already obsolete though not yet fully developed.

A report on the bomber was released today by Senator George S. McGovern (D., S.D.) and Representative John F. Seiberling (D., Ohio) in behalf of Members of Congress For Peace Through Law, a 115-member bipartisan organization.

"To Enhance ... Glamour"

Mr. McGovern said the new bomber would cost more than $47 billion—four times the Air Force's estimate—and that its only purpose is "to enhance the excitement for strategic bomber pilots and the glamour of the Air Force recruiting programs".

The Air Force estimates the cost of the project at $11.1 billion and says the new bomber is needed to replace the aging B-52 fleet, which will go out of service around 1980.

Congress appropriated $100 million for developing the plane in fiscal 1970 and an equal amount for the current fiscal year. For fiscal 1972 the Defense Department has asked for $370 million.

The McGovern-Seiberling report recommended that only $20 million be appropriated this year to finish up outstanding contracts and to redesign the aircraft.

## Not Supersonic

While not conceding that a new manned bomber was needed. Mr. McGovern and Mr. Seiberling said that, if one were developed, it need not be supersonic.

Mr. Seiberling called the B-1 "a weapon system in search of a mission." because, he asserted, even with its supersonic capability it could not penetrate the air defenses of a technologically advanced nation such as the Soviet Union.

A more useful strategic supplement to the U.S. missile force, they said, would be an aircraft armed with air-to-ground missiles crusing outside the range of an enemy's air defense system.

Such an aircraft, because it need not be supersonic, they said, could be developed a much lower cost.

## Air Force Insistence

The insistence of the Air Force that the B-1 be supersonic, they said, has added 10 percent to its cost.

The McGovern-Seiberling report estimated the cost of the B-1 bomber itself at $20.2 billion. But it said that the new bomber inevitably would require a new

tanker to replace the KC-135 now used for in-flight refueling of the subsonic B-52. This would add another $20 billion to the project cost, the report said.

The Air Force has said that B-1 would be compatible with the KC-135 and only minor modifications would be required.

## General Quoted

But the McGovern-Seiberling report quoted Gen. Bruce K. Holloway, commander of the Strategic Air Command, as writing in the Armed Forces Journal last June, "We need a new tanker no matter what kind of bombers we have."

Senator William E. Proxmire (D., Wis., chairman of the military spending committee of Members of Congress For Peace

Through Law, said no decision has been made as to whether the group would engage in a floor fight specifically to block the B-1.

A case will be made against several weapons systems, which the group feels are unnecessary or undesirable, leading to a fiscal effort to make an across-the-board cut in the proposed $76 billion defense budget. Mr. Proxmire said.

## Failed Last Year

A similar strategy failed last year, although the pressures generated by the group might have contributed to a more intense scrutiny of the defense budget by the armed services committees.

The panels made several cuts, including a curtailment of the

Safeguard anti-ballistic missile system and the elimination of a third nuclear-powered aircraft carrier.

Senator Proxmire's committee has scheduled a series of weekly press conferences through the next two months, each devoted to a different weapon or facet of the defense budget.

Next in line are the F-14 and F-15 fighters, the ABM, multi-warheaded missiles, troops in Europe, anti-submarine warfare, military manpower, tactical nuclear weapons, Pentagon public relations, underground nuclear testing, foreign weapon sales, conversion of defense industry to civilian purposes, general purpose force, and the strategic arms limitation talks.

156

WASHINGTON POST 12 MAY 1971 PAGE 8

157

# Pentagon Critics Seek $7 Billion Budget Cut

By George C. Wilson

Washington Post Staff Writer

Pentagon critics in Congress will try to cut the defense spending budget by "about $7 billion" this year, Sen. William Proxmire (D-Wis.) said yesterday.

He is chairman of the defense panel of the Members of Congress for Peace Through Law—a bipartisan group conducting a systematic campaign to trim military spending.

Imposing a ceiling on Pentagon spending in Fiscal 1972 represents a change in tactics. Critics in past years concentrated on knocking specific weapons programs out of the Pentagon budget.

While declaring that there may again be some amendments of that kind this year, Proxmire told a news conference that the prime target of the group he leads is a Congressionally dictated budgetary ceiling.

He stopped short of predicting victory for the ceiling amendment. But he noted that a similar amendment came within 11 votes of passing the Senate last year. The outlook for such an amendment is generally considered dimmer in the more hawkish House.

If such a ceiling were imposed, the Pentagon could not absorb congressional cuts by turning to leftover funds and other accounts—a procedure Proxmire said he wants to stop.

What he considers to be the Pentagon's Fiscal 1972 spending figure, his aides said, is the $74,975,000,000 shown on page 86 of President Nixon's budget book: That total covers almost everything except military assistance to foreign nations.

Thus, the intent is to get spending for the fiscal year beginning this July 1 down to about $68 billion. Proxmire said that the ceiling would be proposed as an amendment to a Senate bill—perhaps the draft extension measure now being debated.

## Cancellation Sought

The forum for Proxmire's remarks was a press conference

calling for cancellation of the Navy's F-14 fighter on the grounds that the plane and its expensive Phoenix missile system could neither adequately protect the fleet nor combat Soviet aircraft in dog fights.

The Grumman Aerospace Corp. of Bethpage, L.I., is the manufacturer of the F-14. Its first test plane crashed. The F-14 is running at a cost of about $1 million more than the original estimate of $11.5 million for each aircraft, according to Pentagon sources.

Sen. Vance Hartke (D-Ind.) and Rep. Jonathan B. Bingham (D-N.Y.)—the latter from Grumman's home state—presented the Members of Congress for Peace Through Law report. The report made these assertions:

* The cost and delivery date of the F14A are uncertain and Congress therefore should refuse to appropriate the $806 million requested in the Pentagon's Fiscal 1972 budget for 48 planes.

* The six Phoenix missiles that each F-14 would carry for knocking down enemy aircraft would cost from $200,000 to $300,000 each. Yet the missiles would have to be dumped in situation in which the F-14 would need to maneuver in an aerial duel with another fighter. Laying out that much money for missiles to fight Soviet bombers that have not materialized amounts to a weapon which "offers minimal dependable security payoffs at extremely high cost... The sooner we abandon it (Phoenix) the better."

* The F-14 without the Phoenix air-to-air missile looms as a second-best air superiority fighter. Therefore, an advanced version of the F-4 Phantom promises to "be superior to the F-14B and C" models. Money from the F-14 cancellation should go instead into the F-4. The Air Force F-15 fighter project should be continued.

* A fighter beyond the F-15,

which could handle the Soviet MiG-23 should be developed. The emphasis in this new plane should be on the single mission of air combat. Costs should be kept below that of the F-14 and F-15.

The Mansfield Amendment:

161

No

By JOHN J. McCLOY

The sudden reappearance of the Mansfield Resolution in its present form constitutes one of the vagaries of American politics which from time to time confound our allies and shock those responsible for the conduct of foreign policy in this country.

It is difficult to think of any single piece of legislation which embodies so many potentially disastrous consequences at this particular stage of history as this amendment to the draft act. Government officials, past and present, who were engaged in the formulation of our defense and foreign policy after the close of World War II when NATO was organized, the Marshall Plan put into operation and the Atlantic partnership formed, are just about unanimous in their belief that the passage of this amendment at this time could seriously and adversely affect the existing balance of power, profoundly impair our relations with our allies and diminish the security of the country.

Let us examine the situation that the United States is facing. We have been witnessing a substantial increase in the nuclear potential of the Soviet Union which is, in certain of its forms, grossly disturbing. It is an increase coincides in time with a marked expansion of Soviet naval strength, as well as Soviet naval presence in the wider seas, most noticeably in the Mediterranean, which constitutes the southern flank of NATO and Western Europe. The amendment comes at a time when, as a result of the Czechoslovak invasion, there are more Soviet divisions deployed farther west than at any time since the close of World War II. It comes at a time when doubts as to the credibility of the American deterrent have been growing in Europe not only because of the increased Soviet nuclear and military power but also by reason of the apparent malaise of spirit and will which the Vietnam war, the demonstrations, the violence and the lack of community and individual responsibility in this country seem to have induced. It comes at a time when the actual balance-of-payments costs of maintaining our NATO troops are, I believe, at their lowest stage in history.

One frequently hears the argument that the threat of a Soviet land attack which induced the original stationing of our troops in Europe no longer exists. This ignores both reality and history. The fact is the troops were faced there for very much the same reasons that their presence is now so vital a factor in the balance of power. If anything, the political need which was the primary cause for placing the troops in Europe is perhaps greater now than it was then.

Those troops represented and still represent the real earnest of our

Yes

By DAVID P. CALLEO

WASHINGTON—Senator Mansfield's proposal has been treated as an aberration by a normally balanced and solid politician. But with hindsight, it is Mr. Mansfield who is likely to appear the statesman and his opponents irresponsible. For there is an excellent case to be made for a substantial reduction in American forces in Europe.

The United States is seriously overextended throughout the world. The signs of domestic strain are rather obvious, the pressures for a reduction

NATO commitment. They did restore Western confidence; they did discourage probing adventures; they did create a sense of security behind which the forces of economic rehabilitation could go to work and they did keep the peace. Today the presence of those troops actually constitutes deterrents to hostile adventures against the Free World.

The Mansfield move comes at a time when we are in the midst of negotiations to remove the dangerous leverages the Soviets are so tempted to apply from time to time on Berlin. If the Soviets see this significant reduction in American forces, one can confidently predict that their attitudes on Berlin will stiffen.

There is another argument which needs to be disposed of and it runs somewhat along these lines:

> Who can say we need 300-, 400- or 500-thousand men stationed in Europe? Would not 100,000 or 200,000, or maybe even 50,000, serve the same purpose? All we really need is a symbol of our presence to create the deterrent.

To those who say that the presence of our troops in NATO simply extends the aspects of the cold war, precisely because it does confirm and solidify the alliance, I would reply that perhaps at another period in history the Alliance in its present convincing nature would be unnecessary and unproductive, but it is vital now. While it functions in full vigor, it contributes to the damping down of the cold war. For the present and the measurable future, it is the best guarantee that I can conceive of for the maintenance of the peace and the integrity of our free civilization.

A united Europe in solid partnership with the United States is essential and every effort to solidify that partnership should be exerted and every effort to dilute it should be resisted. The psychological effect of the passage of the Mansfield amendment, even if it only passed the Senate, could be profound, and this is a risk to which the security of the nation and the continuity of our foreign policy should not be subjected.

John J. McClory was U.S. High Commissioner for Germany 1949-52.

of military spending compelling. To avoid a disastrous collapse of our whole world position, our foreign policy must develop a sense of priority and measure. We must stop trying to do things for others that they can much better do for themselves. We should, therefore, devolve our swollen responsibilities for security wherever other countries are rich and stable enough to assume them. There is no serious reason why the major nations of Western Europe cannot take over from us the primary responsibility for their own defense, especially conventional defense. It would not be the end of the alliance, but its rejuvenation. Britain, France and Germany have nearly 1,400,000 men under arms. If they believe these forces inadequate, they have ample resources to raise more.

Under the circumstances, to argue that we should wait for "balanced and mutual force reductions" is to miss the point entirely. What is needed is an unbalanced and unilateral reduction of America's excessive share in Western Europe's ground defense. Above all, there is needed a fundamental reform of NATO's structure to place the primary responsibility for organizing European defense upon the European states themselves.

It is quite understandable that many European politicians prefer us to continue the heavy outlay for their defense. But even if they were willing to pay much more of the real cost, why should we? Why should American youth be turned into condottieri for a prosperous Western Europe?

Ironically, the heaviest cost falls upon Europe's future. It is in Europe's best interest, and our own, that the European states build among themselves a solid military coalition before negotiations for a definitive European settlement. By doggedly insisting that the Europeans should rely primarily on us, instead of each other, we are subsidizing European disunity and adventurism. Indeed, our dollar deficit, caused in considerable degree by NATO's costs over the years, now threatens the whole structure of that economic community which is Europe's best hope for the future.

This week will doubtless see a fine and heartening display of old faces and old slogans. Old comrades will refight the battles of yesteryear. Threats will be contained, cowardly isolationists squelched, and our world responsibilities manfully shouldered. But when all the flags are put away, it should be painfully obvious that nostalgia for great accomplishments in the past is a poor substitute for a foreign policy. Senator Mansfield, at least, has acted with imagination, courage and common sense. It is a pity these qualities have become so rare elsewhere in the American Government.

David P. Calleo is professor of European Studies at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.

WASHINGTON ROLL

20 May 1971 P1

# 61-36 Vote Key Victory For Nixon

By Spencer Rich

Washington Post Staff Writer

Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield's challenge to the Nixon administration on U.S. troop levels in Europe was defeated by a 25-vote margin in the Senate yesterday.

On a roll call vote of 61 to 36, the Senate beat back the Montana Democrat's proposal to require the President to slash the 300,000-man U.S. contingent in Europe to 150,000 by Dec. 31.

The outcome was an important administration victory. Its spokesmen had argued that making such a cut by legislative fiat, instead of through negotiation with America's allies, would undermine confidence in U.S. intentions to defend Europe. They also contended that a unilateral U.S. cut would remove any Soviet incentive to negotiate a mutual reduction of forces in Central Europe.

On the final vote, all but five Republicans rallied behind the administration. Many Democrats split with Mansfield because of the mandatory nature of the cutback:

Although the Mansfield amendment lost, the number of votes it received constituted what many called a "strong signal" to the administration of sentiment in favor of forcing the European allies to assume greater responsibility for their own defense.

Mansfield argued that with the cold war waning, with the Soviet Union needing to strengthen its rear against China and desirous of reducing its own costly military burdens, it is time for the financially hard-pressed United States to shift a much larger share of the NATO burden to Europe.

Mansfield said after the vote that he had been trying for years to help bring about a reduction in U.S. NATO forces, but until he forced the issue in the Senate there had been "no hint of an understanding

from downtown or overseas."

Now, as a result of his offering an amendment for a mandatory troop cut, "this matter has come to the attention of the administration, it has come to the attention of our NATO allies, it has come to the attention of the people ... sometimes it takes a sledgehammer to make an impression."

Most Senate observers believe that the decisive factor in the defeat of the Mansfield proposal was last week's call by Soviet Party Chairman Leonid Brezhnev for negotiations for a mutual reduction of forces in Central Europe. This undercut Mansfield by allowing the administration to argue that passage of the mandatory troop slash would leave the administration little to bargain with at the negotiating table.

When Mansfield first introduced his proposal in a form which, if passed, would have had the force of law, it appeared to have a chance of passage. There was widespread feeling in the Senate that Europe should contribute more toward its own defense, especially when the dollar was under attack in European currency markets. But the Brezhnev proposal, made three days later and heavily emphasized by the administration in its lobbying against the Mansfield proposal, apparently sealed the issue.

Although Mansfield lost yesterday, he has said he will offer his amendment again if troop reduction talks produce no changes. Mansfield has told reporters that by forcing the issue to the Senate floor, he has already achieved one major goal: To make clear both to the administration and to the allies that there is serious pressure in the United States for a cut.

Before turning back Mansfield's proposal, which was offered as an amendment to the pending two-year draft-extension bill, the Senate rejected a series of softer, administration-opposed compromise amendments.

* By a roll call of 63 to 26, the Senate defeated a modified version of the Mansfield amendment, proposed by Sen. Gaylord Nelson (D-Wis.) which Mansfield said would be acceptable to him. Instead of a cut to 150,000 by Dec. 31 of this year, the Nelson com-

promise called for a cut to 250,000 by June 30, 1972, to 200,000 a year later, and 150,000 by June 30, 1974. It further provided that should the Warsaw Pact nations and NATO start negotiations for a mutual arms reduction before Dec. 31, 1971, the first of the scheduled reductions would be held in abeyance, leaving two years to negotiate before any cuts had to be made.

Some senators voted against this proposal because they wanted a clear test vote on the original Mansfield language. Others called it an absurdity. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Stennis (D-Miss.) said, "We would be putting it into the hands of the Soviets to force us to withdraw 50,000 troops a year by their simply refusing to start negotiations. . . . I don't think we could give them a better advantage."

* By an 81-to-13 vote, the Senate defeated an amendment sponsored by Sens. Birch Bayh (D-Ind.), William Saxbe (R-Ohio) and Abraham A. Ribicoff (D-Conn.) cutting U.S. forces in Europe back to 150,000 by the end of 1972 unless the allies agreed to pay $325 million more a year of U.S. costs for NATO.

* By a 73-to-24 roll call, the Senate defeated a proposal by Sen. Charles McC. Mathias Jr. (R-Md.) requesting the President to start negotiations with the Warsaw Pact for mutual arms reductions and with the allies for a reduction of the U.S. share of the NATO burden.

* By an 81 to 15 vote, the Senate turned down a compromise proposal by Frank Church (D-Idaho) to limit the mandatory reduction to 500,000 men instead of three times mandatory reduction to 50,000 U.S. troops in Europe. Mansfield backers who felt 50,000 reduction was too small united with administration supporters to kill the Church compromise.

162

WALL STREET JOURNAL - 3 MAY 1971 P-1

# Soaring Bomber: Costs Are Rising For Some B1, a Secret Report Says

By JERRY LANDAER

WASHINGTON — Congressional critics of military spending are getting fresh ammunition for challenging one of the Pentagon's biggest, costliest and most cherished projects: the fast new B1 intercontinental bomber.

Since Defense Secretary Melvin Laird cashed the go-ahead for development by North American Rockwell Corp., the cost of this replacement for the aging B52 has begun to take off. Congress is being told in a secret report.

In just one year, according to this report by the General Accounting Office, Pentagon projections of the cost of developing and producing the bomber jumped from $35 million for each bomber to $41 million. Even this increase tends to understate the price problem, the auditors add, because it fails to allow for any erosion in the buying power of procurement dollars in years to come.

At the same time, the GAO report emphasizes that the Pentagon has taken strong cost-cutting measures, but the report claims these efficiencies are resulting in delays and poor quality: the target date for the first deliveries has been delayed from 1976 to 1979. The GAO, while finding the cost still mounting, questions whether the changes have gone too far and imperiled the B1's ability to carry out its mission of providing speedy, long-range nuclear striking power.

In a second report, the GAO warns of a smaller but steeper cost climb affecting the B1 project. The price of nuclear-tipped short-range attack missiles (SRAMs) intended as the bomber's main armament is approaching $1 million per missile, up from an estimate of $235,000 in 1975.

## Trouble on Capitol Hill

Furthermore, the agency contends, Boeing Co. got approval to start SRAM production before test missiles were properly flying, despite Secretary Laird's earlier promise to stop the costly practice of buying weapons not thoroughly tested in advance.

Taken together, these findings spell deeper trouble for the B1 project on Capitol Hill. It now is apparent that the cost of procuring and equipping one bomber will easily exceed $50 million—for each B1 will carry 10 to 20 SRAMs; moreover, there are expensive extras, including SRAM warheads and bomber-defense missiles. A study by the Office of Management and Budget estimates a B1 may end up costing $30 million. And the $10 billion-plus price tag originally set for the 240 planes in the entire B1 project is beginning to seem hopelessly out of date.

Tomorrow a group of congressional critics of military spending, including Democratic Sens. William Proxmire of Wisconsin and George McGovern of South Dakota, will issue an analysis of the B1 as the opening round in their 1971 flight to trim the military budget. Later on, these economy-bent andish minded legislators will strive to cut the $375 million appropriation requested for the B1 project in the fiscal year starting July 1. Last year the critics managed tolop $25 million from the Pentagon's $100 million request.

Indeed, the GAO report invites Congress to review the venture. Noting that the Pentagon's cost-cutting efforts have altered the plane's capabilities and its delivery date, the report suggests that Congress should explore the effects "on the ability of the B1 to perform its intended mission." So far less than 5% of the projected funds have been committed, the report observes, and "thus options are available to Congress affecting the future and direction of this program."

## "Were They Feeding Us a Line?"

The delay, cost and other considerations may well sharpen congressional doubts about

whether the B1 is needed at all.

"How can you defer a program for three years without affecting security?" asks Peter Stockton, an assistant for military matters to Democratic Rep. William Moorhead of Pennsylvania and other lawmakers. "What happened to this Soviet threat we had to meet? Or were they feeding us a line in the first place?"

A. Ernest Fitzgerald, the former Air Force cost analyst whose job was abolished after he testified about C5A overruns, labels the B1 "an even bigger boondoggle," and he claims the contract was awarded "to make jobs for Southern California."

The GAO report makes no such assertions, but it is highly critical of the SRAM missile project in particular. The agency says "performance specifications initially set forth for the SRAM propulsion system haven't been achieved" despite an extra $266 million spent for research and development.

The agency also asserts that the project has defied a Laird "fly before we buy" pledge. On April 1, 1969, the Secretary told the House Armed Services Committee that "procurement of operational missiles should be deferred until the test program conclusively demonstrates that they will work as intended."

## Two Flunks

But the GAO study says the SRAM was put into production six months before the scheduled completion of flight tests. The missile flunked two of four tests after the production go-ahead last January.

During development, the GAO says, Boeing substituted a less powerful missile motor in 16 test launches because production models weren't available, and then it "extrapolated" the results, "making many significant adjustments." (The Air Force says this testing procedure wasn't unusual.) The company also developed a roll maneuver to prevent stalling of the missile after launch from bombers flying at low heights to elude radar. Twelve successful tests of the roll maneuver were performed—but none at the low altitude.

"In our opinion," the report to Congress concludes, "test-flight results through December 1970 didn't conclusively demonstrate that SRAM will work as intended."

One underlying source of controversy on the bomber project is the special management method Mr. Laird is applying to it—the attempts to nip cost overruns by sacrificing certain performance features and letting the B1's development slide behind schedule.

"By making cost the pacing item"—that is by putting dollars first—the Laird management team "seems to be setting a new trend in Defense Department weapons system acquisition," the General Accounting Office observes. "Cost appears to be the controlling factor while performance degradation and schedule slips will be accepted to stay within established cost parameters."

Even before awarding a $1.35 billion development contract to North American Rockwell last June, Mr. Laird scrapped a requirement that the B1 be able to sustain supersonic speed at sea level. Later, Air Force generals accepted—or were required to accept—some reduction in payload, navigational accuracy and engine thrust. Moreover, "additional trade-offs between cost and technical performance characteristics are still in the offing," the GAO predicts.

As now envisioned, the redesigned B1 requires more runway to take off and presumably more time to scramble into action in response to an emergency alert. The complex electronics pack controlling communications, bomb delivery, bomber-defense missiles and penetration aids has been revised, one general says, "to provide for an initial package about

one-half the size of that originally planned."

Secretary Laird's supporters claim that changes won't endanger the bomber's capability to survive attack and get off in time to defend State of Soviet defenses, if necessary. Republican Sen. Barry Goldwater of Arizona, for one, tends Mr. Laird is merely stripping away "to have" features, and Gen. James Ferguson, former chief of the Air Force Systems Command, welcomes the Laird approach as "one that returns to good business-management practices."

"In the past we've attempted to achieve performance regardless of cost," Gen. Ferguson has explained. "Today we're asking ourselves whether that last 5% or that last 10% really worth what it costs."

## What About Inflation?

The 34-month delay in first deliveries to 1975 from 1976 means that late-model B52s, not less than nine years old even today, must be kept in service far into the 1980s if the U.S. intends to keep long-range bombers for deterring attack. Gen. John D. Ryan, Air Force chief of staff, told the Senate Armed Services Committee last year that B52s "may no longer be viable deterrent . . . in the 1978-80 time period."

There has been still another money-saving retrenchment in the B1 project. Last February the Air Force decided it could get along with three instead of five test planes and with 27 instead of 41 test engines.

Nonetheless, it seems unlikely that cost growth above the present $10.1 billion estimate for developing and producing the bomber fleet can be stopped altogether. For that Pentagon estimate assumes that a dollar spent in 1980 will buy no less hardware than in 1970.

It's true the estimate does include a special allowance of $411 million to cover the expected effect of inflation on anticipated spending for research, development and testing through 1978. But, according to the GAO, it doesn't project even a dollar's worth of inflation for actual purchases of planes; Mr. Laird has assured Congress that "allowances for inflationary increases in cost will be included in future estimates" for all weapons.

Indeed, the cost estimate actually stood at $10.8 billion, up $2 billion in one year, when Mr. Laird awarded the development contract in early June 1970. This estimate was never publicized because the Air Force delayed issuing figures until the results of a Laird-ordered cost-cutting exercise known as Project Focus were known.

## Project Focus

Project Focus ended in September, and it lopped $752 million from the $10.8 billion estimate. Then, in violation of Defense Department directive 7000.3, the GAO says, the secretary's bookkeepers credited these savings retroactively, holding the bomber's first-year cost growth to $1.3 billion instead of $2 billion.

In any case, North American isn't facing the kind of inflation-fueled financial risk that Lockheed Aircraft Corp. undertook in developing the cargo-carrying C5A, nor is the contractor gambling its corporate future, as Lockheed did, on the validity of optimistic price proposals.

According to the GAO, the target price in North American's $1.35 billion contract is $316 million below government projections of development costs; similarly, General Electric Co.'s target price for developing the B1's engine is $129 million below government estimates. But unlike "total package procurement," which pushed Lockheed to the brink of bankruptcy, North American is working under a cost-plus-incentive fee contract that imposes no ceiling on the government's payments.

164

As a matter of fact, the U.S. is
widening the missile gap

By HERBERT SCOVILLE, Jr.

As the first salvo in the campaign to obtain larger appropriations this year for strategic weapons systems, Senator Henry Jackson (D., Wash.) announced March 7 that the Soviets were deploying a new generation of offensive missiles which could be as large or larger than their SS-9's. He submitted that this could be the missile for MIRV's (multiple, independently targetable, reentry vehicles) which the Russians were developing as a first strike weapon against the U.S. Minuteman. This initial announcement was quickly followed by a statement from Admiral Thomas Mocerer, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, that the Soviets had begun a new ICBM silo construction program. However, the admiral considerably softened Senator Jackson's warning by adding "... we do not know what these silos are intended for."

The admiral's statement and other releases have made it clear that the Soviets have not developed or tested a new missile for those launchers. Indeed, Senator Jackson later admitted that there is no direct evidence that the Soviets have flight-tested a new missile, and that it would probably be 18 months before such missiles were emplaced. Nevertheless, reference to new Soviet construction was made frequently in the course of the recent hearings before the Armed Services Committee, and on April 21 Secretary of Defense Melvyn Laird told the American Newspaper Publishers Association that "this new ICBM construction effort, coupled with additional momentum in the strategic defensive area ... must be of major concern."

Finally on April 27 he secretary announced that the Soviets had recommended ABM deployment with advanced hardware, after a lull of more than three years.

Parallel to this scare campaign about large Soviet missiles, there have been renewed attempts to raise fears about another missile gap. Ger. (Bruce K.) Loway, commander of Strategic Air Command, has been reported as deploing the growing Soviet strategic superiority. The Defense Department on March 11 released a report written six months earlier by a rump group of the Blue Ribbon Defense Panel, whose charter was to study DOD organization, not policy.

This document grossly exaggerated Soviet capabilities. downgraded U.S. deterrent strength, called for increased military expenditures to prevent the U.S. from becoming a second-class power, and summoned us to regain and retain a clearly superior strategic capability.

In view of the competing needs for funds and resources to cope with our internal problems, it is important to analyze calmly the validity of all these claims and avoid being panicked into unnecessary spending on new and more dangerous weapons. The renewed deployment of additional Soviet ICBM launchers, particularly for new large missiles is, of course, a step in the wrong direction.

At the same time, however, the Russian SS-11 small-missile program appears to have leveled off and the rate of new silo construction for even the large ICBM's (SS-9's or bigger) has actually decreased in recent years.

## 50 New Launchers

Previous to 1969, the Soviets were said to have been building 50 to 60 SS-9 silos per year. But as of August, 1969, no new construction was observed until May, 1970, when about 20 new starts were reported. This past winter, the Defense Department announced that construction on some of these new silos may have been suspended and that the program had leveled off below 300.

The new large-silo construction is currently reported to be limited to several tens of launchers. Thus, it would appear that at the most, during the past 21 months, the Soviets have initiated construction on about 50 new large launchers, a considerable reduction from previous years and far below the level predicted by Secretary Laird in 1969 in his original justification for the Safeguard ABM program.

At this rate of construction it would not be until 1975/76 that the U.S.S.R. would have the 420 operational missiles which Secretary Laird postulated would be required, with three MIRV's on each, to threaten our Minuteman force. While the program could accelerate faster than the rate of the last two years, it would be almost impossible for the 420 to be achieved before 1974, the date originally predicted....

The U.S. strategic weapons program has been pursued during the past few years at an augmented pace and, if anything, a "missile gap" is rapidly developing in our favor. Secretary Laird himself points out in this year's posture statement that between December 30, 1970, and mid-1971, our offensive strategic nuclear weapons will increase from 4,000 to 4,600, while the Soviets' during the same period will only increase from 1,800 to 2,000, an addition of €00 for the U.S. as compared to 200 for the U.S.S.R. Furthermore, this rapid U.S. acceleration is only the beginning of a vast program; during the next five years U.S. missile warheads will increase to more than 7,000 as we place MIRV's on our Minuteman III ICBM's and Poseidon submarine missiles.

## Big Megatonnage Outdated

This buildup cannot be discounted by saying that the number of warheads is not as important as megatonnage. Each of these MIRV warheads has an explosive force at least several times that of the explosions which destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In the early Sixties, virtually all U.S. authorities reached the conclusion that our security would be enhanced by substituting multiple small bombs for a very high yield single weapon in our B-52 loads, 64 hardened Minuteman missiles in lieu of the larger Titans, and by MIRV's with lower yields in place of single bigger warheads. Senator Jackson, in hearings of the Senate Armed

Services Committee, confirmed that he had endorsed this concept. Megatonnage has long been outdated as a critical measure of relative strength.

How can one say that a missile gap in favor of the Soviet Union is developing when the U.S. is adding to its warheads at the rate of 1,200 per year, while the present rise in Soviet warhead strength is no more than 400 per year? While the Russian program certainly has strong momentum, so does ours. In time, of course, the Soviet MIRV program could approach and even surpass our present one, but the Russians are, at a minimum, several years behind us in this area.

## New Increases Unjustified

It is this long-range and as yet unrealized Soviet potential that poses the true risk to our security and demonstrates the recklessness and tragedy of our failure to negotiate seriously a limitation of MIRV's at the SALT talks. President Nixon's refusal to negotiate an "Attn only" limitation as a first stage of arms limitation agreement may now have reaped its harvest with the resumption of Russian ABM deployment, making agreement in this area and perhaps others more difficult than before. Arms limitation is still much the best but most neglected way of protecting U.S. security and avoiding the panicky over-responsiveness which seems always to be the trademark of an unrestricted arms race, and of the annual military budget debate.

In sum, U.S. strategic programs have long been under way to cope with three far beyond those envisioned by any of these recent alarms about new Soviet weapons, and none of these alarms justifies new increases in U.S. strategic forces.

165

WALL STREET JOURNAL 10 JUNE 1971

163

# Lockheed Rescue Seems Headed for Trouble
In Congress; Packard's Backing Lukewarm

By FRED L. ZIMMERMAN

WASHINGTON—The Nixon administration's proposal to guarantee loans to Lockheed Aircraft Corp. faces a close vote in the Senate Banking Committee, presaging serious trouble for the plan in Congress.

Interviews with committee members and staff aides suggest that at present on the 15-man committee there probably are five solid votes for the plan, five solid votes against it, and five undecided.

Yesterday, Deputy Defense Secretary David Packard gave only lukewarm support to the proposal to guarantee up to $250 million of loans to Lockheed. Overall, his testimony probably did the proposal more harm than good, as it probably will provide the plan's opponents with material for use in the Senate floor debate.

Following Mr. Packard's testimony, an aide to one committee member who opposes the plan said he is "much more optimistic" than before that the proposal will be killed outright in the committee.

Before the panel began its hearings Monday, it had been generally assumed that the loan-guarantee bill would be cleared for Senate floor action by a lopsided margin. Since then, however, it has become evident that the plan has fewer friends on the committee than had been thought.

## Some Republicans May Defect

Some of the committee's seven Republican members may reject the party line and vote against the proposal. The most likely Republican dissenters, according to committee sources, are Sens. Robert Taft of Ohio, William Roth of Delaware, Edward Brooke of Massachusetts, and Robert Packwood of Oregon.

Sen. Roth said following yesterday's hearing that "to be perfectly honest, I'm a long way from making up my mind" about how to vote on the bill. Sens. Roth, Taft, and Packwood have expressed misgivings about the plan in their questioning of witnesses.

Sen. Roth, while declining to say what effect the Deputy Defense Secretary's testimony might have on the committee, agreed with the assessment of others that Mr. Packard's support had been unenthusiastic.

An aide to Sen. William Proxmire (D., Wis.), the plan's leading opponent, was blunter. "Packard's testimony could sink the whole thing," he said.

The aide said Mr. Packard's testimony contained two statements particularly damaging to the loan-guarantee proposal. One was the disclosure that the Defense Department estimates Lockheed will need to sell "substantially over 300 aircraft" to break even on its TriStar

airbus. Lockheed has told the committee that the break-even point will be reached with sales of between 195 and 205 aircraft. Lockheed currently has firm orders for 103 aircraft.

The British government, which has conditioned its continued support of the TriStar's RB211 engines on U.S. government guarantees for Lockheed loans, is scheduled to meet today to consider the implications of the situation in Congress.

## "Corporate Ballouts"

Under questioning by Sen. Proxmire, Mr. Packard also said that if he thought the loan-guarantee bill would be used as a precedent for "corporate ballouts" in the future, he would oppose it.

"If we look at this as a specific, single case," said the Pentagon official, "then there's some justification for it. But it is very important that we don't establish it as a long-term precedent."

Sen. Proxmire replied that "once you do something like this in Congress, no matter what you say or feel in your heart, it becomes a precedent."

At the start of yesterday's hearing, the Deputy Secretary told the committee in a prepared statement that without the loan guarantee he doesn't believe Lockheed can avoid bankruptcy. "Substantial unemployment would be the immediate result," he said, adding that the defense industry and the airlines would suffer financial losses. "The loan guarantee has very little risk for the government, in my view, and should be supported."

Mr. Packard emphasized, however, that he regarded the issue as an economic rather than defense matter. "Our defense programs would be less troublesome if the company survives," he said, "but it isn't an absolute disaster if it goes the other way."

Sen. Proxmire asked Mr. Packard if, in view of Lockheed's financial troubles, he had ever felt any "pressure from the White House or the Treasury" to award the company additional defense contracts.

Mr. Packard, who is the Pentagon's chief procurement officer, paused and then replied: "Not that I recall."

Sen. Proxmire asked if Mr. Packard was unable to state unequivocally that there hadn't been any such pressure. Mr. Packard replied: "I don't recall any case in which they have had any pressure on any specific Lockheed one."

Then Sen. Proxmire asked if anyone at the White House or Treasury had ever "contacted" Mr. Packard, asking "about the possibility" of favoring Lockheed.

Mr. Packard responded: "I think my friends at the White House have learned by now it doesn't do any good to ask me to do something in terms of awarding contracts. I will say that categorically and I will tell them."

170

Columnists Disputed

PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER 12 JUNE 1971 (17)

# Defense Budget CAN Be Safely Cut

By JOSEPH S. CLARK

Columnists Rowland Evans and Robert Novak wrote a column that appeared in Thursday's Inquirer in which they were critical of the Coalition on National Priorities and Military Policy for its lobbying efforts in cutting U. S. Defense spending. Following is a reply by former Sen. Joseph S. Clark, chairman of the coalition:

> In their recent column "The Anti-Defense Lobby," Rowland Evans and Robert Novak take the Coalition on National Priorities and Military Policy, of which I am chairman, to task for advocating a substantial cut in annual defense spending. They suggest that we are advocating such cuts in the defense budget "without regard to national security dangers."

Nothing could be farther from the truth. Aping Pentagon propaganda, their column raises false fears about our national security much as little children are frightened by the dark at the top of the stairs.

The coalition is neither pacifist nor an "anti-defense lobby." The more than 60 religious, farm, environmental, educational and labor organizations which are associated with coalition activities know very well that adequate national security must be maintained until such time as comprehensive arms control and disarmament agreements can be negotiated with the Russians but we believe that we should meet real and not imagined threats to our country.

Moreover, we are convinced that the continued neglect of our domestic needs is already posing a greater threat to our national unity and security than anything looming from either Russia or China.

The Pentagon's "worst case philosophy" is utterly unrealistic. While we should not underestimate either Soviet or Chinese intentions, neither should we exaggerate their capabilities. There is nothing to indicate a greater threat to the United States from abroad than existed last year or the year before. Quite

the contrary, there are clear evidences of an international thaw.

Since the President has failed to do the job, the Congress should reorder spending priorities to meet human needs. It cannot do so without attacking military spending on a realistic basis. The coalition is convinced that, at a minimum, $12 billion can be cut from the military budget, advocated by Secretary Laird and the President without affecting our national security in the slightest.

Nor are we alone in this regard. The National Urban Coalition recently issued a carefully prepared blueprint for changing national priorities entitled "counter-budget." It advocates a cut of $16 billion in the 1972 fiscal year budget and total cuts of some $50 billion over the next five years.

Among those who presumably would come within Messrs. Evans' and Novak's description of "the anti-defense lobby" and who signed the counterbudget report are former Ambassador Sol Linowitz, chairman; Mrs. Bruce Benson, president of the League of Women Voters; His Eminence John Cardinal Dearden, archbishop of Detroit; John W. Gardner, chairman of Common Cause; Dorothy I. Haight, president, National Council of Negro Women, Inc.; Andrew Heiskell, chairman of Time, Inc.; John V. Lindsay, mayor of New York; James M. Roche, chairman of General Motors Corporation; David Rockefeller, chairman, Chase Manhattan Bank, and Leonard Woodcock, president of the United Auto Workers of America.

Clearly the judgment of these men and women must be assessed against that of Messrs. Evans and Novak and the military-industrial complex which they so gleefully support. One is reminded of a similar column they published on January 6, entitled "Defense Spending Uncuttable." We wonder who told them that. It just isn't so.

Nor is it true, as the columnists suggest, that specific facts respecting the Defense budget "are beyond the interest of the coalition." We have pinpointed exactly where specific reductions could be made but we are prepared to permit

the President as Commander-in-Chief and the Defense establishment to select where, within the over-all cut, specific savings should be made. Far from being a blunderbuss budget cut, we have advocated in testimony before both the House and the Senate Appropriations and Armed Services Committees the following specific savings:

> Eliminate the ABM, cease the deployment of MIRV, eliminate the B-1 bomber, eliminate the F-14 fleet defense aircraft, reform Pentagon procurement and development policies to eliminate the cost overruns which seem to be the rule and not the exception, get rid of at least one of the three offensive nuclear deterrents (land-based missiles, strategic bombers and submarine-based missiles), stop piling up overkill on top of overkill and get rid of obsolete expenditures such as those for air defense against strategic bombers.

> Superimposed on this, we advocate a cut of over-all military strength from the present level of around 2.6 million to a figure, at the end of the year, of no more than 2 million.

It is hard to take seriously the contention of the columnists that the conversion from arms spending for waste to wealth-creating spending to meet critical national priorities will cause in the end significant unemployment.

Messrs. Evans' and Novak's concept that Defense spending makes for prosperity reminds one of the lemmings who rush to their own destruction in the sea. There is no health in spending for waste when we have the ability to spend for wealth.

Unless the Pentagon and the President are intent on involving us in more Vietnam, this would save us a minimum of $6 billion without in any way affecting our ability to defend legitimate foreign policy objectives of the United States.

The coalition is mobilizing citizen efforts to cut the military budget, to move forward with arms control and disarmament and reorder our national priorities. Of course we are lobbying for these ends. We are proud, not ashamed of that fact. And as we move into the halls of Congress we are met every day by an able, sophisticated, knowledgeable lobby by civilians and officers in uniform stemming from the Pentagon but paid at taxpayers' expense who seem toestermine such otherwise and knowledgeable reporters as my friends Rowly Evans and Bob Novak.

171

NEW YORK TIMES

17 JUNE 71 Pg6

HOUSE VOTES HALT
IN FUNDING OF F-14

Awaits Study by Pentagon
of Plane's Excess Cost

By MARJORIE HUNTER

Special to The New York Times

WASHINGTON, June 16—The House voted today to halt funding of the Navy's F-14 swing-wing jet fighter, pending completion of a Pentagon study of the plane's excess cost.

The $801.1-million earmarked earlier for the F-14 was struck-en from a $21-billion military procurement bill upon the re-ommendation of Representative F. Edward Hebert of Louisiana, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee.

The House action was termed "very appropriate" by spokes-men for the Grumman Aircraft Corporation, manufacturer of the F-14.

Noting that the excess cost problem was being studied by Defense Department officials; spokesmen for Grumman said, "We have confidence in the wisdom of their reviews."

The House endorsed the Hebert recommendation to halt the F-14 funding by voice vote after only one token debate.

In a Dilemma

Representative Robert L. Leggett, Democrat of California, said he was "a little in a dilemma" as to why Grumman would applaud the cutoff of funds. He said he hoped it did not mean that Congress and the Pentagon were prepared to absorb the excess cost by allowing Grumman to renegotiate a new contract.

BALTIMORE SUN 16 June 1971 P1

Hebert Panel Moves To Cut Off F14 Funds

By ADAM CLYMER

Washington Bureau of The Sun

Washington, June 15—The House Armed Services Committee moved today to eliminate the trouble-ridden F14 fighter plane from the Navy's arsenal.

Representative F. Edward Hebert (D., La.) the committee's chairman, told the House that he would move tomorrow to delete the $806 million provided for the new fighter from the $21.8 billion military procurement bill.

Statement By Grumman

Later, the Grumman Aircraft Corporation said that it would consider "very appropriate" a congressional cutoff to further production funds for the F14 during the solution of cost problems.

"The company did not say why it would take this view. Some congressmen said the action would lead to a renegotiation of contracts to cut Grumman's costs.

Mr. Hebert, saying the committee supported him, unani- mized the House, but did not take any action.

problems" as reasons for reversing the stand the House took last month when it voted to include the amount requested by the administration for the new carrier-based fighter, which is intended to replace the F4 Panatom.

Rise In Cost

The chairman said that since the Defense Department itself was restudying the F14 program, after a crash last December of the first model of the new plane. A second plane has been flown successfully by Grumman, but the firm has advised the Navy that the total cost per plane may now go as much as $11.5 million above the current $11.3 million figure.

He said he had asked the Defense Department for the study before the House votes on the bill, but was told that it would not be ready. If it comes later, and persuades the Senate, he will be ready to reconsider the issue when the bill goes to consideration, he said.

Mr. Hebert's disclosure, hint-ed at last week, was the only major development in today's debate, which was punctuated

by quorum calls as Republicans sought to put off a vote on an amendment to set a Vietnam withdrawal date, which is scheduled for tomorrow.

Their strategy was to see that the amendment, which calls for withdrawal from Vietnam by December 31, did not come to a vote until after a similar measure is voted on—and presumably defeated—in the Senate.

Representative Gerald R. Ford (R., Mich.), the minority leader, told a meeting of House Republicans today that President Nixon would regard a vote for the amendment as a vote of "no confidence" in him. He indicated that the White House also opposed two milder Republican substitutes, conceived by their sponsors as pro-administration moves but apparently rejected by the administration anyway.

One of the sponsors of the December 31 deadline. Representative Lucien N. Nedzi (D., Mich.), predicted that the move would get the support of 150 of the 434 House members. He predicted that it would let unexpected support from conservative Southern Democrats.

3

U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT 21 JUNE 1971 (25)

# THE REAL PROBLEM-HOW TO CUT DEFENSE BILLIONS
## Inflation vs. Military Security

Pentagon's budget is in for
rough going this year—if crit-
ics have their way. Question
is: How much "give" is left
in the nation's defenses?

A showdown of far-reaching impor-
tance is building up in Washington
over U. S. defense spending.

At stake is a whole series of broad,
basic issues.

What kind of defense will the United
States have when the Vietnam war ends?
Is it safe to shift billions of dollars from
military to domestic programs? Can the
U. S. withdraw many of its forces that
now stand guard in Europe and Asia?
Is an all-volunteer force in the cards?

All of these decisions must be faced
by a Congress that includes many mem-
bers determined to make major cuts in
the Nixon Administration's proposed de-
fense budget of 76 billion dollars for the
fiscal year starting July 1.

With hearings by four committees
expected to wind up in mid-June, the
debate will switch to the floors of the
House and Senate—on the way to crucial
votes in both bodies.

There is no question about the de-
termination of many in Congress to cut
the Pentagon's budget, described by the
Administration as "bare bones." Power-
ful voices have varied that trims of 10
billion dollars or more will be sought.
Senator George McGovern of South Da-
kota, the first announced candidate for
the Democratic 72 presidential nomina-
tion, reflected that sentiment when he
declared that military outlays "could
probably be cut in half, including the
money that we would save by ending
the war in Vietnam."

Anti-Nixon forces say the incentive
to slash future arms spending has rarely
been greater. Peace groups want to force
an end to an unpopular shooting war.
Others are seeking a "peace dividend,"
by which more billions might be shifted
to popular domestic programs-antipollu-
tion, antipoverty, anticrime, welfare,
housing, transportation and the like. At
the same time, some Congressmen say
they sense a widespread emotional urge
to prune military spending, as a result of
growing animosity feeling and even of
neoisolationism in parts of the country.
The big challenge, as these Congress-
men see it now, is where to make deep-
est cuts without gutting the
nation's basic defenses.

At first glance the Admin-
istration's budget made big
reductions look easy to its
critics. The Pentagon proposes
to increase military spending
in the coming year, at a time
when manpower under arms
is on the cut back. the Viet-
nam war wound down further
and the number of air, sea
craft and combat units

increased at Defense
Admiral B. R. Laund's
order last week.

billions this year to 76 bil-
lions next.

However, the military's
share of spending, compared
to the over-all U. S. budget,
would decline considerably—
to its lowest level since 1950.
according to the Pentagon.
Defense would take 32.1 per
cent of the federal budget,
compared with 33.9 per cent
in fiscal 1971 and 38.4 per
cent in 1970. As a proportion of U.S.
gross national product, defense would
cost 6.8 per cent, down from 7.4 per
cent in 1971. Manpower reductions, un-
der the Laird budget, would bring the
number of men in uniform from 2.7 mil-
lion now to 2.5 million a year from now.

In 1968, it was more than 3.5 million.

Combat units would be pared further
back in the process, with fewer Army
divisions, tactical air wings and naval
warships than in the pre-Vietnam U. S.
forces. The cut in divisions is from
1975 at the war's peak to 1315 a year from
now. Total warships would be reduced
from 934 in 1968 to 658 in mid-1972.

With U. S. troop withdrawals from
Vietnam continuing at the present rate.
the direct cost of the Vietnam war
would go down by another 4 billions
under the proposed budget.

This is part of the so-called "peace
dividend."

Vietnam "savings," however, are more
than offset by the cost of new military
and civilian pay rises and the effects of
inflation—which will exceed the war sav-
ings by an estimated 1.5 billion dollars.

On top of that, the basic cost of the
new weapons that Mr. Laird deems nec-
essary is rising steadily, and this budget
is likely to be followed by one that
reaches 80 billion dollars in 1973, in
the Defense Secretary's view.

The key roadblock. As critics dis-
sect the current budget proposals in de-
fense hearings now going on, their search
for fruitful areas to cut runs repeatedly
into this roadblock:

Military payrolls, the biggest single
item in the budget, are rising at the
same time that military manpower is
being reduced.

Personnel costs, for example, in-
cluded a basic payroll of 13.1 billion
dollars in 1968, when there were 3.5
million men in uniform.

In 1972, with manpower to be cut to
2.5 million men, the military payroll
would not be down, but up-to 16
billions.

During this period, total pay and re-
lated costs of maintaining manpower are
scheduled to rise by 21 per cent. They
increase as a proportion of the total
defense budget from 42 to 52 per cent.
The reason: Five pay raises have been
granted during this ten-year period,
effective at intervals from July 1, 1968,
to Jan. 1, 1972 for both military men
and civilian defense employees.

These pay increases, since mid-1968,
among active duty men, would be about
$36 per cent in military
basic pay, and about $16 per cent in
their士

Pentagon to rise
pay by $1.5 billion
over current
level, with a
small increase

174

WASHINGTON STAR 24 JUNE 1971 (25) PAGE 2

175

# Effort to Cut Defense Budget
By 9% Is Planned in Senate

The next Senate challenge to
President Nixon's military poli-
cies was signaled today as the
fight over a draft-extension bill
wound down.

Sen. William Proxmire, D-Wis., the perennial critic of defense spending, held a news conference with Republican Sen. Charles McC. Mathias of Maryland to announce an attempt to cut the defense budget by 9 percent for fiscal year 1972.

Proxmire and Mathias will in-
trude their amendment early
next week when the Senate con-
siders a continuing resolution to
provide money for the Defense
Department after June 30, when
the fiscal year 1971 spending au-
thorization expires.

Celing of $68 Billion

Since the defense budget will
be considered in different seg-
ments over the next few months
in the Senate, the Pentagon
would be authorized to continue
spending at fiscal 1971 levels
while the new budget is pending.

But if Proxmire and Mathias
are successful, that temporary
authorization will place a ceiling
of $68 billion on Pentagon spend-
ing for fiscal 1972.

The administration has esti-
mated a 1972 defense budget of
$75 billion, not including $1.7
billion added by Congress for a
military pay raise.

"Moderate Cut"

"Our figure of $68 billion is a
modest and moderate cut which
can be absorbed on a timely
basis without, in any way, harm-
ing our military security." Prox-
mire said.

Last year a similar amend-
ment lost by 11 votes. But Prox-
mire said the mobilized lobbying
efforts to various labor, reli-
gious and peace groups give him
hope the ceiling can gain ap-
proval this year.

Mathias said that the United
States spent twice as much as
the Soviet Union on defense in
the 1960s, yet now Pentagon ex-
perts report that this country is
falling behind Soviet military
capabilities.

Mathias said money should not
be wasted on obsolete hardware
and such open-ended commit-
ments as the Vietnam war.

Proxmire pointed out that $68
billion is the amount Congress
appropriated in fiscal 1971
for the Pentagon though pay
raises later were added on.

But he said, "The Pentagon is
spending $7.4 billion," which he
said is $2.2 billion more than
Congress appropriated, after al-
lowing for authorized additional
pay raises.

BALTIMORE SUN

25 JUNE 71 p8

## Axes Sharpened
In Senate For
Defense Budget

Washington Bureau of The Sun

Washington, June 24 — Two
critics of defense spending. Sen-
ators Charles McC. Mathias, Jr.,
(R., Md.) and William E. Prox-
mire (D., Wis.) set the stage to-
day for a vote next week on
their proposal to cut the defense
budget by $8.7 billion.

Their proposal would set a
ceiling of $68 billion on defense
expenditures for fiscal 1972, be-
ginning July 1, compared to the
administration budget figure of
$76.7 billion.

Senator Proxmire said the
Pentagon ought to be able to
absorb the cut easily because
the winding down of the Viet-
nam war and reductions in mili-
tary manpower have produced
savings of $20 billion to $22 bil-
lion.

The Proxmire-Mathias pro-
posal will be offered as an
amendment to a resolution to
authorize the Defense Depart-
ment to continue spending at
current levels while Congress
completes work on the fiscal
1972 budget. The resolution is
scheduled to reach the Senate
floor early next week.

Last year, a similar Proxmire-
Mathias amendment to the mili-
tary authorization bill was de-
posed by a 42-to-31 vote.

WASHINGTON POST 24 JUNE 1971 PAGE 1

# Pentagon Urges F-14 Funding

By Michael Getler

Washington Post Staff Writer

Deputy Secretary of Defense David Packard set the stage yesterday for a showdown between the Navy, Congress and Grumman Aerospace Corp. over the fate of the Navy's F-14 fighter plane project, which has been afflicted with huge cost overruns.

After an intensive and often heated Pentagon review of the plane and its problems, Packard has asked Congress to go along with the project under the original contract with Grumman as "the best of the available alternatives."

Packard said he was "not completely satisfied with this approach," but argued that the Navy had "been unable to negotiate" with Grumman an acceptable alternative to the existing contract under which Grumman is committed to produce several hundred of the swinging-wing fighter-bombers at an already agreed-upon price.

In a letter to Sen. John C. Stennis (D-Miss.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Packard asked Congress to go along with the Navy's request for $806 million in this year's budget to continue buying the planes under the original contract.

In effect, Packard was telling Congress that the Pentagon was going to try to hold Grumman to its original agreement as the least costly way to cope with the plane's mounting financial troubles and the best way "to protect the government's interest."

Grumman, however declared in a letter to the Navy last March 31 that continued proof "on of the plane under the original contract "is commercially impractical."

The asthpage, N.Y., contract has aimed it will face "an economically unsound posture" if it must continue producing the F-14 under the original terms because other business has turned out to be far less than anticipated in the original contract as planned.

U.S. officials had no comment on the matter when they were asked by the press conference.

Last week, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Rep. T. Edward]-

said to strike the entire $806 million from this year's budget—which includes payment for 48 more planes—unless the Navy explains how it intends to solve the plane's cost problems.

The Navy originally wanted to buy 722 F-14s to help protect its aircraft carriers and escort attack planes to their targets. The original cost estimate was $11.5 million per plane. Now, however, the cost per plane has shot up to almost $15 million, according to Defense officials. The total cost for 700-plus planes and their equipment is also up from about $8.3 billion, to almost $11 billion.

Because of the rising costs, the currently planned purchase of the planes has been dropped to 313 aircraft, with only about 38 planes already paid for.

Should the Navy buy only 313, the total project cost would probably drop, but the cost per plane would probably rise as higher, say project source.

Packard has assured in another controversial military aircraft issue that Congress

The Navy's decision to buy 313 F-14s

sent another report to Congress that urged the legislators to back Pentagon plans to develop three separate aircraft for close air support of ground troops.

Packard sent a six-page report to Capitol Hill which he said was the initial phase of a study he had personally led after being asked for such a review by Congress.

Because of the review, Packard asked Congress to approve continued purchases of the British-built Harrier jet for the Marines, and continued development of the Cheyenne helicopter gunship for the Army and a new AX attack plane for the Air Force.

Collectively, the three projects should eventually involve production of more than 1,000 planes at a cost of more than $4 billion.

The Pentagon review, however, claims that all three planes "offer sufficiently different capabilities for our future forces to justify continuing all three programs at the present time."

In the past, several powerful committee chairmen in Congress have expressed the view that perhaps one or two of the planes could fulfill the role for all other services.

176

WASHINGTON POST 27 JUNE 1971 (28) PAGE 2

Defense Cut Seen Costing Jobs

By Edward K. Delong
United Press International

Defense Secretary Melvin R. Laird said yesterday a proposed $7-billion cut in military spending over the next 12 months would force him to slash defense personnel levels almost in half, eliminating up to 1.5 million military and civilian jobs.

Laird's comments in an interview marked the opening round in the Nixon administration's fight to block a proposal to limit the fiscal 1972 defense budget to $68 billion. Sens. William Proxmire (D-Wis.) and Charles McC. Mathias (R-Md.) said they would attempt to impose the limit early next week in Congress.

In the wide ranging interview, Laird also:

* Expressed hope for an agreement with the Soviet Union on both strategic arms limitations and mutual balanced ground troop reductions in Europe, followed by mutualaval force reductions and possibly by limitations of foreign military aid, "during the next few years."

* Clearly indicated that although he will step down as Defense Secretary at the end of President Nixon's first term, he would be willing to accept another cabinet post if Nixon is re-elected in 1972.

* Said a senate amendment to the draft extension bill, calling for U.S. troops to be out of Vietnam within nine months if all American prisoners of war are released, differs by only "a few months" from President Nixon's withdrawal timetable.

But he said the senate pro-
posal "closes down the negotia-
tion track in Paris." He said at
present he still has hopes the
Paris peace talks will provide
the quickest possible end to
the war.

* Reported a decline during the past six months in Vietcong and North Vietnamese terror attacks in South Vietnam. He said the South Vietnamese "are doing a reasonable job at this time" in keeping the countryside secure and he assessed Vietnamization progress as good.

Laird said although the Proxmire-Mathias amendment would decrease the administration's $75-billion defense budget by only $7 billion—to $68 billion—its real effect would be a $9-billion reduction because congress already had added a mandatory military pay raise almost $2 billion greater than the budget allowed for.

If Congress approves the
measure, Laird said, "we
would have to cancel, in the
contract area, around 40 per
cent of our existing contracts
and we would not be able to
place any new contracts.

"We would have to fire and
let go about a million employ-
ees—more like 1.5 million."

Laird said this would pres-
ent a reduction of almost 50
per cent in the manpower
level of 2.5 million military
personnel and 1.1 million civil-
ian employees now planned
for the end of fiscal 1972. He
said it would save the
Pentagon an estimated $3.5
billion.

Turning to world military
matters, Laird said "our plan-
ning for Vietnam is well in
hand and I have turned my at-
tention to planning beyond
Vietnam."

"Our hope (for the future) lies in entering into agreement with the Soviet Union during the next few years in the area of strategic arms limitations and in the area of mutual balance force reductions," he said.

"I believe the first area of reduction in strategic forces will be offensive weapons and planned defensive weapons. In mutual balanced force reductions, the greatest probability in the next year or so appears to lie in ground forces, and then perhaps in naval forces forward-based aircraft and missiles."

These are all areas in which
Soviet leaders have indicated
a willingness to negotiate. But
Laird carried the possibilities
a step further.

"As you go down the line,"
he said, "I think there is a pos-
sibility for agreement in levels
of military assistance."

Although Laird did not spell
it out, this indicated his hope
that the world's two superpow-
ers might in years to come be
able to halt the spiraling race
to build up the armed forces
of their allies, such as Israel
and Egypt or North and South
Vietnam.

But Laird said for the pres-
ent the United States must
maintain its military might as
part of base from which it can
negotiate. He, increasingly
cited specifically the aging
U.S. Navy as opposed to the
increasingly modern Russian
navy.

"I have no quesnon in my
mind that we are in a superior
position at this time (on the
high seas), but we are danger-
ously close to slipping away
from that position," he said.

"The concern that I have is
that we must go forward—un-
til we get these agreements
(on arms and troops limita-
tions) — with our moderniza-
tion program."

177

179

SAN DIEGO UNION 25 JULY 1971, (3 AUGUST)

# Weapons Price Overrides
Cost Taxpayers $11 Billion

By FRANK MACOMBER

Military-Aerospace Writer
Copley News Service

Weapons price-Overrides and down-right white elephants which don't perform as advertised have cost U.S. taxpayers more than $11 billion over the last 17 years.

For this money the nation's defenses received either a curtailed number of weapons to offset cost overrides or no weapons at all when the system failed to fulfill its intended mission.

The $11 billion-plus figure, computed by the General Accounting Office, congressional watchdog on government spending, is higher if you add dollars spent on some weapons projects launched and then abandoned after second-thought Pentagon decisions.

The Navy's new troubles with its Grumman-built F-14 swing-wing super-sonic carrier-based fighter — moth-balled at least temporarily by Congress until cost-Overrides can be explained — brings to mind the painfully long parade of cast-off weapons and the price tags attached to them.

Some of these by comparison ease the Navy's anguish over the F-14, sidetracked now because the cost of 710 planes suddenly has jumped $2 billion above the originally estimated price of $8.3 billion.

The white elephant syndrome can be laid at no door markd "Democrat" or "Republican." The Pentagon's functions changes little whether its boss in

the White House is of one political party or another. This is borne out by a Defense Department list of major projects cut back or abandoned since 1954.

Some but not all of the Pentagon's biggest dollar hangups came during the regime of Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara. He canceled the Skybolt long-range air-to-ground missile project after $440 million had been spent on the system.

McNamara abandoned the use of railway cars to give the Minuteman intercontinental ballistic missile a mobile and evasive system, after $400 million had been spent in planning and preliminary work.

At least $1.468 billion was spent to build two RS-70 supersonic bombers before one crashed in a mid-air collision and the project was crossed off by McNamara.

The Pentagon list itemizes 66 weapons projects on which more than $9 billion was spent before they were abandoned either as unnecessary, unworkable or useless. It is incomplete, however, and did not include all the Dyna-Soar funds. On the list are 19 aircraft programs and 28 missile development systems.

Not on the list is the $600 million the Navy reluctantly spent on the F-111B carrier fighter before it was deemed too heavy and was replaced by the now controversial F-14.

Missile systems, often named after mythical gods, birds and even Greek philosophers, have suffered high cas-

ualty rates in the past.

For example, among 10 Air Force missile projects canceled were: Navaho, which cost $670 million: Snark, $677.4 million: Rascal, $484 million, and the land-based Talos, $118 million, in addition to the mobile Minuteman.

A dozen scrubbed Navy missile projects, ranging in cost from $12.5 to $225 million, included Sparrows I and II: Regulus II; Petrel, Corvus, Eagle, Meteor, Rigel, Dove, Triton, Oriole and Typhon.

The Army, which has to battle constantly with the Air Force and Navy to get missiles it can call its own, lost six projects after nearly $400 million was spent to develop them.

The Pentagon list also carried Army tanks, trucks and an atomic mortar project and several electronic warfare systems canceled for one reason or another.

Not on the Pentagon list was the Air Force's Advent satellite project on which about $300 million was spent before it was transferred to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and a public corporation.

Dr. John S. Foster Jr., for many years now the Pentagon's chief adviser on weapons development and a renowned physicist, has tried to explain the white elephant parade in testimony before impatient congressional committees.

One of the heaviest pressures for new weapons, he says, is the constant fear of the Soviet Union and international communism.

Then there are industry's salesmen and lobbyists, often retired military officers, and scientists who bring their ideas to the Pentagon.

And, ironically, even some of the successful weapons which survive the long ordeal of testing are tagged with an "obsolescent" label before they can be fixed in place. Then the endless development process starts over again.

PHILADELPHIA BULLETIN
31 July 1971 P20

# Another Bid To Cut Arms Due in Fall

## Critics of Pentagon Foresee Reductions Of $4-6 Billion

By RAY MOSELEY

Bulletin Washington Bureau

Washington — Pentagon critics have been holding their fire since they suffered defeat last month on an attempt to trim President Nixon's defense budget. But the battle isn't over.

The critics, led by Sen. William Proxmire (D-Wis), are only bidding their time, still hopeful of at least a partial victory later this year.

Their goal was to cut President Nixon's $76.7 billion defense budget to $68 billion. They lost, 63 to 24, on a Senate vote June 29 and now concede they won't achieve the cut they had hoped for.

But they predict the Senate Appropriations Committee may cut $4-6 billion when it acts on the defense appropriations bill in September. They also expect that part of the reduction will be preserved when the bill finally clears both houses of Congress.

Proxmire and his supporters are, on the face of it, a collection of losers. In several years of trying, they have yet to win an important vote on the defense budget.

### Wins By Losing

But when the dust of battle settles down, they usually manage to salvage something from defeat.

Within a week or so after they lost a fight to kill the Air Force C-5A transport in 1969, for example, the Air Force reduced its order for the planes from 115 to 81.

They lost another fight against aircraft carriers, but none has been funded by the Navy since then.

Part of the explanation of how Proxmire succeeds while losing may be the embarrassment he has caused the Pentagon with his exposures of waste and mismanagement and his sharp questioning of the need for some expensive programs. Another factor is unduly high defense spending in a war-torn nation.

A particular difficulty for the Pentagon has been to justify a rising defense budget while Vietnam war costs are coming down. The Pentagon has blamed inflation and military and civilian pay raises, but Proxmire contends that is only a half truth.

Much of the money that was spent on the war has simply been shifted to questionable weapons programs instead of being passed on to the taxpayer as a "peace dividend," he says. This view seems to command greater support than the recent vote on Proxmire's budget amendment shows.

Sen. Allen J. Ellender (D-La), chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, regularly opposes Proxmire's efforts but then does some surgery of his own.

Two years ago his committee cut $6 billion from the Pentagon budget and Ellender said last month he has in mind "certain areas where I believe substantial cuts can be made" again.

### He Aims To Wait

So the Proxmire strategy at the moment is to wait and see what the committee does. If it outs the budget, he does not plan to introduce his own amendment again.

They believe the nation can have better defense for less money by reordering priorities.

180

181

WALL STREET JOURNAL 2 AUGUST 1971 P-4

Nixon Asks $112 Million for 12 More F-111s
Plus $183.8 Million for Expense Overruns

By a WALL STREET JOURNAL Staff Reporter

WASHINGTON—After years of steady set-backs, the troubled F-111 aircraft program has won a major victory: President Nixon wants Congress to vote extra money so the Air Force can buy 10 more planes.

The additional funds, obtained, will be used to buy "F" models of the controversial swing-wing jet, which has been subject to much criticism in recent years due to continual technical and cost problems. This would increase F-111F production to 82 aircraft, less than the 96 planes recently sought by the Air Force but more than the 70-plane order that budget problems made it finally accept.

The aircraft is manufactured by General Dynamics Corp. The additional 12 aircraft would increase total Air Force orders for F-111s to 543 planes of various types, including both fighter and bomber versions. This compares with the 1,388 planes that the service once hoped to acquire before the program's troubles began. In addition, Navy orders, since

canceled, were expected to raise total production to about 1,700 planes.

Altogether, Mr. Nixon asked Congress to approve another $295.8 million for the F-111 program. This includes $112 million for the 12 additional planes, plus $183.8 million for unexpected cost overruns which apparently have developed since the Defense Department budget was sent to Congress last February.

Not all this would require new money, however. The President's message said $58.7 million would be covered by transferring money from reserve funds of the Air Force, while another $32.6 million would be saved by canceling plans for a training device.

Even so, this means the President wants an additional $219 million for Air Force aircraft procurement, most of it for the F-111. The only other new item is a $14.5 million request for the Air Force to buy 30 short-takeoff-and-landing aircraft for "combat test and evaluation in Southeast Asia." According to officials, the Air Force hasn't yet decided what type of planes it wants.

The new money request may run into a serious trouble in Congress, where many legislators already contend General Dynamics being overpaid for an aircraft that underperforms. According to past testimony by Pentagon officials, most models of the F-111 have failed to meet many key performance specifications listed in contracts, and final purchase prices are much higher than anticipated. The newest, or "F" model, however, does perform significantly better than earlier fighter versions, according to Air Force officials. For one thing, it has a more powerful engine than its predecessors, they explain.

Despite wanting $219 million extra for buying aircraft, Mr. Nixon's net request for additional defense funds totals only $111 million. He proposes to save $1 million by changes in the Naval shipbuilding program originally sent to Capitol Hill. His new plan seeks $51.6 million for a new class of patrol escort vessels, while it also deletes $52.6 million previously requested for rescue and salvage ships.

A much larger saving is scheduled for the Air Force Minuteman missile program. Because of deployment delays, Mr. Nixon notified Congress that the Pentagon plans to save $107 million. The delay may be in deploying multiple warheads although no detailed explanation was offered.

Navy Drops United Aircraft Engine Option; Move May Shake Up F14 and F15 Programs

WASHINGTON — The Navy won't exercise its present option to buy 58 advanced jet engines for its planned F14B fighter plane, the Defense Department announced. The engines are being developed by the Pratt & Whitney division of United Aircraft Corp.

The decision could cause major revisions of existing contracts for production and development of two large military aircraft programs, the F14 of Grumman Corp. and the F15 of McDonnell Douglas Corp. Both the advanced, or "B," models of the F14 and the F15 are scheduled to use the same Pratt & Whitney engine. However, the engine program has developed cost and technical problems.

The Pentagon declined to explain just why the Navy won't exercise its engine option. Neither would defense officials say whether any

future orders for the advanced-technology engine will be placed. According to Pentagon spokesman Jerry Friedheim, the engine program's future is being studied by a Pentagon committee headed by Deputy Defense Secretary David Packard. Mr. Friedheim didn't say when final decisions are expected but indicated both the Navy and the Air Force will file recommendations with Mr. Packard this week.

Original Navy plans called for purchase of only 67 F14A aircraft, which use an existing Pratt & Whitney engine. Then plans called for switching to the advanced version, which is both lighter weight and more powerful. Planes using this engine were to be known as the F14B.

Development problems, however, have caused the Navy to seek at least 301 F14As, because it wants the new planes in service as quickly as possible. Difficulties with the ad-

vanced jet could also cause a reduction in the total planned purchase of 722 Grumman planes.

Because the Navy won't exercise its existing option for 58 engines for delivery in the fiscal year starting next July 1, its contracts with Pratt & Whitney may have to be renegotiated. And because it is, so far, sharing development costs with the Air Force, which wants the same motor in its new F15 fighter, those contracts also may need to be revised if the Navy backs out of the program.

Mr. Friedheim declined to speculate about the outcome, but conceded the price per engine will probably increase if the total number of purchases is reduced due to changes in Navy plans. Navy officials earlier told Congress that failure to exercise the option for the first 58 motors would open the Pratt & Whitney contract for renegotiation.

WALL STREET JOURNAL

2 AUGUST 1971 P-5

182

# Defense Planners Want Aircraft Suppliers To Build More Modest-Priced Prototypes

By RICHARD J. LEVINE

The Pentagon's new ap-
proach to building warplanes, that could spur
radical changes in weapons-procurement prac-
tics, is about to get under way.

WASHINGTON The Pentagon's new ap-
proach to building warplanes, that could spur
radical changes in weapons-procurement prac-
tics, is about to get under way.

Essentially, the new program involves dol-
ing out relatively small amounts of money to a
number of defense contractors to build proto-
types, or flying models, of new planes well in
advance of Air Force needs. Under this proto-
type concept, the Defense Department would
give industry designers wide latitude to inno-
vate but wouldn't make any commitment to
production.

In fact, Pentagon planners stress there
would be little hesitation to cancel projects that
don't work out well-because they would in-
volve only tens of millions of dollars rather
than hundreds of millions or billions and be-
cause defense planners would have a variety of
planes to choose for production. For the past
decade or so, a small number of planes have
been developed at high cost. The result has
been tremendous built-in pressure to move the
programs into production even when they ex-
ceeded cost estimates and failed to meet per-
formance specifications, as happened with the
controversial F-111 fighter and the C5A cargo
plane.

The prototype concept is a pet project of
Duty Defense Secretary David Packard, the
Pentagon's procurement chief. He and other
enthusiastic officials, including Defense Chief
Melvin Laird, view it as a way of controlling
rising research and development costs while
recreating or preserving highly skilled air-
craft-design teams in the aerospace industry.

Today Air Force officials are scheduled to
seek Mr. Packard's approval of a number of
projects for "prototyping," including a fast,
lightweight fighter plane. The prototype con-
cept is "really go," says Alan Simon, assistant
director of defense research and engineering
for air warfare. "It's starting to catch on
across the board."

## Sold on the Concept

The Air Force is "absolutely" sold on the
concept. Mr. Simon says, and the Army and
Navy are "coming along." Defense-industry of-
ficials generally believe "it's a good idea," he
says, though they recognize that it won't solve
all their current economic problems.

Pentagon officials estimate that a compa-
nies prototype efforts could be sustained for
about $25 million annually. A project would
probably last two or three years.

The Pentagon's budget for the current fiscal
year doesn't contain any funds for prototype
work, but the Air Force is prepared to transfer
funds from other programs. Defense planners
estimate that somewhat less than $100 million
might be switched into the work this fiscal
year. Eventually, these officials envision put-
some $200 million a year into prototype
work.

If all goes smoothly, Pentagon planners ex-
pect the Air Force to ask companies to make
funds for the lightweight fighter project be-
fore the end of 1971. Another potential Air
Force prototype project is a short-takeoff-and-
dive transport plane.

Should the Air Force work prove successful,
the Air Force will achieve the approach could be
used to develop an array of weapons such as

wheeled combat vehicles. The concept would
make little sense, however, in developing a
new aircraft carrier or a new class of nuclear
submarines because of the gigantic cost in-
volved in such huge weapons systems. Nor
would the prototype approach be useful in de-
veloping a new weapon that is needed in a
hurry.

## Return to an Earlier Era

The Pentagon hopes the prototype approach
will have a special appeal to Congress, perhaps
easing criticism about cost overruns. When Mr.
Packard briefly mentioned the prototype con-
cept earlier this year before the House Appro-
priations Committee, Rep. Robert Sikes (D.,
Fla.) was interested. "This would be a very
important contribution and a necessary contri-
bution. . . . I would be most obliged if you
would tell us more what you are trying to do,"
the Congressman said.

Widespread use of the prototype concept at
the Pentagon would mark a return to an ear-
lier era. In the 1950s, aircraft companies de-
signed and developed a large number of new
planes, including the well-known F86, F105 and
F4 fighters and the A4 and A5 attack aircraft
as well as some that never went into produc-
tion. "We really had options in those days,"
one defense official recalls wistfully.

In the 1950s, the U.S. was turning out about
twice as many new prototypes as the Russians.
Today the situation is reversed, with the Sovi-
ets developing many more new warplanes than
American companies. After a plane's first
flight, the Russians often test the aircraft for
three or four years before making a production
decision.

"I must stress," says Mr. Packard, that the
prototype approach means "embarking on a
different way of doing business from the way
we have been doing it in recent years. It has
potential of providing significant gains but will
require philosophical changes in our procure-
ment policy."

## 'A Real Mess'

That prospect surely doesn't disturb Mr.
Packard, who has called the procurement sys-
tem of the 1960s "a real mess." When the pen-
tagon wants a new weapon "done right," he
says, "we have to take the project out of the

system." In the aerospace industry's integra-
tion, a small, competent design team working
with considerable freedom from usual Pent-
gon requirements is known as a "skunk
works."

The Pentagon hopes prototype jobs will pro-
duce more skunk works. With outbacks in de-
fense procurement and reliance on a few big
development projects, defense planners wor-
that the nation's technological base is Lein
jeopardized. In addition to saving money and
producing better airplanes, it's hoped that the
prototype approach will help companies put to-
gether—and keep together—highly qualified
teams of weapons designers and architects.
Then, says Mr. Simon, "if the world situation
worsens, we're already on first base."

In "prototyping," the Pentagon will issue
simple broad specifications for a weapons sys-
tems. One proposed set of specifications for a
prototype project runs 25 pages — two pages of
technical details and 23 on equal-opportunity
hiring requirements—versus specifications of
hundreds or thousands of pages in the past.
The prototype specifications are intended to
"design goals" rather than rigid contracts
requirements.

If a project is going poorly (rising costs,
technical problems), "we can cut it off at a
time," says a Pentagon official. "We're
committed. If we like it we'll buy it."

WALL STREET JOURNAL, AUGUST 5, 1971

WALL STREET JOURNAL 5 August 1971 P4

183

# Senate Panel's $21 Billion Weapons Bill Leaves Pentagon's Requests Nearly Intact

WASHINGTON — The Senate Armed Services Committee hardly touched the Pentagon's annual request for weapons money.

All the familiar hardware involved in past defense budget fights—the ABM, the C5A cargo jet, the B1 bomber, the F14 fighter—came out intact in the committee's $21 billion bill authorizing weapons procurement and research.

The House earlier had approved much the same shopping list in its $21.1 billion version of the bill.

The Senate committee chairman, John Stennis (D., Miss.,) said the measure will go to the Senate floor when Congress returns from summer recess in September. He predicted the bill will have "a rugged trip" in the Senate, though Pentagon critics this session have been less aggressive in attempting cuts than in the past two years.

One of the reductions made by the Senate panel was in funds for Lockheed Aircraft Corp.'s C5A cargo plane, but Sen. Stennis attributed this to savings made by Lockheed as production proceeds.

## Rejecting a Pentagon Request

Lockheed earlier had beer under heavy congressional fire for cost overruns on the C5A contract. "We just found that they've been doing a better job than heretofore," the Senator explained. The $72.2 million deleted by the committee, leaving a program total of $396.4 million for the current fiscal year, won't affect the company's rate of deliveries, he added.

But the Cheyenne helicopter, being developed by Lockheed, didn't fare any better in the Senate committee than it did in the House. Both bodies rejected the Pentagon request for $13.2 million for advance production engineering of the Cheyenne. Sen. Stennis said this still leaves the project with some research and development funds left over from prior years.

The Air Force this year wants to start spending sizable sums on development of the B-1 advanced strategic bomber, after years of debate over the need for the plane. Senate committee sources said the full request of $381 million was approved, in line with a similar go-ahead by the House. The B-1 is being developed by North American Rockwell Corp.

The Senate panel restored $801.6 million for Navy procurement of its embattled F-14 carrier-based fighter from Grumman Corp. The funds had been deleted by the House pending a Pentagon study of the plane's mechanical and financial problems. Deputy Defense Secretary David Packard since has told the Senators that the project should proceed, and the committee went along. It added a proviso that the money "must be sufficient for not less than 48 airplanes," Sen. Stennis said.

The Senator also reported the committee had approved the Air Force's full request for its F15 fighter, for which McDonnell Douglas Corp. is contractor. The committee also followed the House in providing an additional $112 million for the purchase of 12 more F-111 lighters made by General Dynamics Corp., an addition to the original budget that the administration now agrees with.

## Safeguard Funds Cut

A slippage in construction schedules, not a policy dispute, was given as the reason for the committee's cut of $161.4 million from funds for the Safeguard antiballistic missile, leaving a total of $1.1 billion.

Sen. Stennis said this would let the Army proceed with plans to install ABM defenses for Minuteman missiles at sites in Montana and North Dakota, and to prepare additional sites in Missouri and Wyoming.

However, the committee denied the Army's requested option to install ABMs in defense of Washington, D.C., as a substitute for the Wyoming Minuteman site. Sen. Stennis said the decision wasn't related to the strategic arms-limitation talks with the Russians.

The Senate committee voted $628 million for continued development of the MBT-70 tank by General Motors Corp., including construction of six prototype vehicles. But, as did the House, the committee said the Army couldn't proceed with advance production engineering for the tank, which has been criticized in Congress as being too fancy and expensive. With this installment of funds, "it's going to be fish or cut bait after this for the tank," Sen. Stennis warned.

## Harrier Funds Boosted

The committee continued its running argument with the House over who should produce the Marine Corps' short take-off Harrier jet fighter, currently made by Hawker Siddeley Group Ltd., in Britain. The House contends this is cheaper, but Sen. Stuart Symington (D., Mo.), and his committee allies want production transferred in stages to McDonnell Douglas in St. Louis. For the added expense of the transfer, the committee boosted the Harrier's funds by $23.7 million to $126 million.

The Navy's friends in both the House and Senate are competing to vote new ship-construction funds, but they can't yet agree on what vessels. The Senate panel added money for one more nuclear-powered attack submarine than the five approved by the House. The Senators, however, cut some of the money the House had voted for an extra submarine tender and they deleted House language intended to force the administration to commit funds for an unrequested nuclear-powered frigate.

DETROIT NEWS 10 AUGUST 1971 (17)

# Harriman chides military
on missiles

By GEORGE KENTERA

News Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON — During the Kennedy years, Ambassador Averill Harriman became known as The Crocodile "for his habit of abruptly biting off proposals which seemed to him stupid or irrelevant."

AVERELL HARRIMAN

Historian Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. so wrote in 1965 in his book, "A Thousand Days."

Now, six years later and at the age of 79. The Crocodile still has his teeth.

He bared them briefly yesterday, primarily at the U.S. military establishment, as the lead-off witness for three days of hearings by a subcommittee of the Joint Economic Committee.

But in the main, Harriman seemed to be optimistic about the future course of American-Soviet relations.

The subcommittee, which yesterday consisted only of Senator William Proxmire, Wisconsin Democrat, is seeking answers to the question, "Is the United States spending far more than it needs to defend itself against the military threat from the Soviet Union and mainland China?"

Harriman was the first witness because, presumably, he has seen almost everything.

He has been this country's leading Kremlin-watcher since his service in the 1943-46 period as ambassador to the Soviet Union; it is testimony to his expertise that he has served five presidents, most lately as President Nixon's personal representative at the Vietnam peace talks in Paris in 1969.

"I've got a certain feeling for the place (Moscow) and what goes on there," he said in 1963, after successfully negotiating a treaty for a limited nuclear test ban with Russia.

And he told Schlesinger, at a time when President Kennedy was considering him for a job, "Everyone worries about the things he knows best. Jack (Kennedy) knows the Senate better than anything else, so he worries about that. For just the same reason. I worry most about the Russians."

This worry resulted, in 1944, in his warning to President Roosevelt that Russia coveted Middle Europe and the Balkans — and if he has been wrong since then about the Soviets, no one is willing to say so.

Yesterday, it appeared that his worry, while substantial, might be slightly less intense.

"The Soviet Union remains a highly suspicious totalitarian state with aggressive influences," he said.

"Yet if we take the initiative, exercise patience and good judgment, I am more hopeful now than in the past that constructive agreements can be reached which will reduce the need for vast military expenditures and make progress toward a more stable world."

Harriman listed these instances of improvement:

* The possibility of a Communist take-over in Western Europe, once a real threat, "no longer exists."

* Negotiations are under way "which would end the threat" of the Soviet Union and East Germany against Communist-encompassed West Berlin, once a critical danger point of East-West tensions.

* With an agreement on Berlin and with the recent proposal by Leonid Brezhnev, general secretary of the Soviet Communist Party, for mutual reduction of forces in Central Europe, "negotiations on this subject can now, at last, take place."

* Gradually, the pressure by the Russian people for greater freedom will increase and "I do not believe the Kremlin will be able permanently to resist them."

Harriman said both Russia and the United States had escaped the arms race at an unusually high rate, the Russians with stepped-up deployment of intercontinental ballistic missiles and the testing of multiple warheads, the United States with development and deployment of its own multiple warheads.

"No wonder," he said, "the talks (strategic arms limitation talks with the Soviets) have taken so long and now only a limited agreement appear in sight and not a comprehensive one."

He criticized the Pentagon for provocative statements and the rush to install multiple warheads on missiles as harmful to disarmament talks.

Two other witnesses, Harvard professors Abram Bergson and Wassily Leontief, expressed the view that bilateral arms control and disarmament measures were desirable from the Soviet viewpoint.

But Prof. Bergson, after reviewing Soviet expenditures for military purposes, cautioned against the advice of some people who. He said, advocate a cut in U.S. defense spending well beyond any savings that might result from the progressive withdrawal in Vietnam.

He said he sees little support for such a view after looking at Soviet defense spending.

185

187

DETROIT NEWS 11 AUGUST 1971 (17)

Proxmire on B-1 bomber

WASHINGTON — The man who shot down a U.S. Air Force transport (SST) program is being charged with a much bigger act: the Air Force's B-1 bomber project, with an ultimate cost of $14 billion to $20 billion.

Other members of Congress may be on a mission, say an Senator. But Senator William Proxmire, a Wisconsin Democrat, is doggedly arguing that his hearings at which he is questioning the size and the specifics of the U.S. defense budget of $76 billion.

THE HEARINGS, which end today, have seen considerable criticism of the Defense Department and the military establishment, criticism sometimes spurred along by Proxmire's questioning of witnesses.

The department will get its chance to reply to a letter sent after Congress returns to work in September. Proxmire said yesterday, and not until a record of criticism for defense spending has been made.

Witnesses yesterday struck hard at the B-1 bomber project, which aims to give the air force what it has fervently sought for so long — a new fleet of manned, supersonic bombers to be operational by 1975, or later.

When one witness, Dr. George W. Rathiens, professor of political science at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a long-time expert in strategic armaments, suggested that some U.S. defense projects were "totally unceeded."

Proxmire asked for specifics and seemed pleased with what he got.

Rathiens first cited the B-1 program, which budgeted for $300 million in fiscal 1972, and went on to suggest the country could safely do without such projects as:

* The Safeguard anti-ballistic missile.

* The $100 million Undersea Long-Range Missile system, which calls for a revolutionary

submarine to deliver true intercontinental ballistic missile warheads.

* An anti-aircraft defense system.

Rathiens even suggested cutbacks in the anti-submarine warfare effort.

Proxmire was critical of the B-1 even before his hearings began.

Some time ago he horrified the flying generals, who see the new bomber as the savior of the Air Force, by suggesting that the old B-52s would be sufficient for U.S. aerial purposes if they were refitted as missile-launching planes.

NOR HAS HE had reason to be kind to the Air Force because of the affair of A. Ernest Fitzgerald.

Fitzgerald was a cost-efficiency expert for the Air Force in 1968 when he appeared before a subcommittee of Proxmire's Senate-House Economic Committee and blew the financial whistle on the Lockheed C-5A transport jet.

Cost overruns for the project, he testified, were such that the original contemplated cost of $3.2 billion had risen to $5.2 billion.

The Air Force shortly afterward fired Fitzgerald.

Fitzgerald now works as a consultant to the joint committee of which Proxmire is chairman. In announcing the hiring of Fitzgerald, Proxmire observed:

"We are determined to use his talents to bring the defense budget under control."

Much of the testimony of three witnesses yesterday centered around the question of whether the United States has military superiority over the Soviet Union.

Richard T. Davies, deputy assistant secretary of state for European affairs, thought the two superpowers were "about even" in military capabilities.

Rathiens disagreed sharply. The Soviets are ahead in one or two areas, he said, but in a large number the United States is "demonstrably two, three and sometimes five years ahead."

SPECIFICALLY, Bal 啥 mentioned radar technology, recent physical computer technology, military guidance systems and anti-submarine warheads.

Proxmire added its conviction that this country, led considerably in long-range bombers and in development and deployment of multiple-warhead missiles.

Another witness, Dr. Richard R. Nelson, a Yale economist who was formerly with the Rand Corp. and the President's Council of Economic Advisers, criticized the Defense Department for what he called its "cries of alarm" that Russia was outspending the United States in military research and development and that the American lead in that field was endangered.

Said Nelson:

"It took one generation of defense analysts to rid the military of the absurd notion that somehow the strategic balance or threat could be measured by ratios of bombers, or bombers plus missiles, or warheads, or yield.

"Are we now to adopt an even greater silliness by using the ratio of accumulated military research and development spending as an additional threat index? How absurd!

"I am deeply disturbed that people in the defense establishment really seem to believe this index is meaningful. I hope Congress is more sensible," Nelson concluded.

Rathiens said:

"I believe we have a significant lead over the Soviet Union in most areas of military technology and in many of the relevant sciences on which technology depends.

"At east as important is the fact that we have great advantages over the Soviet Union in terms of our system of incentives, in terms of management techniques and, perhaps most important of all, because we are an open society."

WASHINGTON POST - 12 AUGUST 1971 P-2

188

# Pentagon Is Planning to Order Cheap 'Hot Rod' Jet Fighters

By Michael Getler

Washington Post Staff Writer

The Defense Department, now developing the two most costly and sophisticated fighter planes ever built—the Navy F-14 and Air Force F-15—will soon begin work on another jet fighter which could become one of the cheapest and simplest ever built.

Within what Pentagon officials say could be a matter of days, a number of aircraft companies will be asked to begin developing proposals for the Air Force on building prototypes for an experimental, low-weight fighter plane.

At this point, officials stress that the project is purely experimental, part of a broad new Pentagon plan endorsed by Deputy Defense Secretary David Packard to see what kinds of new military hardware—that might eventually be needed—can be developed at low cost.

The fighter project will be the first of several to move ahead. Defense officials say that a successful program could have major implications for both U.S. and allied air forces.

A number of defense experts in and out of the Pentagon have expressed concern privately that the burgeoning costs of building planes like the F-14 and F-15 may prevent the military from buying enough planes to win future air battles.

These specialists believe that a hot rod-style fighter cheap enough to be produced, in large numbers is needed if planes like the F-14 and F-15—while possibly superior to enemy aircraft—are not to be swept from the skies simply because they are badly outnumbered.

A classified study made last fall for the House Appropriations Committee called attention to the similarities between the F-14 and F-15 and suggested that the Pentagon should consider shifting some of its attention to a cheaper plane.

The Navy's approved production plans for the F-14 have already been whittled

down by rising costs — estimated publicly by the Defense Department this week to be $12.7 million per plane and estimated privately by high defense officials to be $16 million per plane when $1.3 billion spent on research and development is included in the price projected for 301 aircraft.

The Air Force says its F-15, 700 of which it wants to buy, will cost less than $10 million apiece, but Defense officials also expect this to rise.

The experimental fighter the Air Force hopes to develop might cost less than $2.5 million each if it were mass produced, according to defense officials.

The plane would be stripped of fancy electronics and would rely on guns and Sidewinder missiles—the oldest, simplest and most reliable U.S. anti-air missile—for armament. It would weigh no more than 20,000 pounds, less than half the weight of the F-15 and only about a third that of the F-14.

The fighter would use the same new engine that will power the F-15, a factor which official say should hold down development costs. The new engine is also designed to be smokeless. Along with the plane's very small size, this is expected to make it harder for enemy pilots to spot the aircraft in the sky.

By early 1971, Pentagon officials say they hope to have selected one or two companies to build two prototypes each. Officials say the prototypes should be flying in about two years, and they estimate the total cost of the research project at less than $100 million. Less than $10 million will be needed this next year to get

started, they say.

While the experimental fighter project now has Packard's blessing, some implications of the program have stirred concern within the military.

The Air Force, though enthusiastic, is afraid that its critics might use the project to cut the number of F-15s the service feels it needs to counter the most advanced Soviet interceptors. The Navy has thus far chosen not to participate in the project.

Defense officials say the new plane could wind up "complementing, not replacing." the F-15. Officials also believe that a hot, cheap fighter could restore some of the overseas arms sales lost by the United States in recent years and could also help redress the balance of tactical airpower between NATO and Warsaw Pact forces.

With a less expensive plane in NATO inventories, backed up by the more sophisticated F-15s. U.S. defense planners feel the current numerical advantage of the Soviet bloc could be neutralized.

WASHINGTON POST (16)

15 AUG. 1971 P-1

Laird Links
Higher Budget
To Cost Rise

By Michael Getler

Washington Post Staff Writer

NORFOLK, Aug. 14—Defense Secretary Melvin R. Laird forecast today that military spending will probably rise to about $80 billion in the fiscal year that begins next July.

The amount is $2 billion to $3 billion more than the Pentagon expects to spend in the current fiscal year.

Laird indicated that major factors pushing the defense budget higher despite the winding down of the Vietnam war were continued inflation and the increased military pay and benefits needed to improve service life and help attract an all-volunteer force.

Defense officials traveling with the Secretary to a Navy ceremony here said the new fiscal 1973 defense budget would probably also include another increase of a few hundred million dollars in the amount the Pentagon spends for research and development of new weapons systems.

The current fiscal 1972 defense budget — still before Congress — includes an $800 million increase for new weapons research, an area where the Pentagon claims it is now being outspent by the Russians by about $3 billion annually.

Laird told newsmen accompanying him that "we all understand that there are other pressing priorities for the government". But he made clear that in his view, this is "not the time to have reductions as far as the defense establishment is concerned."

Citing administration attempts to negotiate a strategic arms limitation agreement with the Russians, the prospects for mutual East-West troop cuts in Europe and the recently opened dialogue with China, Laird said U.S. success in these negotiations was tied to maintenance of a strong military posture.

The Defense Secretary stressed that the funding dec

sions on the fiscal 1973 budget were not yet made.

He said that there were differences in the amount he was proposing and that he proposed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, which is not unusual.

Asked about the prospects for an $80 billion budget, Laird said "I certainly think in order to maintain our military strength a figure in that area is about right."

Elsewhere within the administration, officials of the President's Office of Management and Budget are pushing to hold defense expenditures down to this year's level of about $77 billion. On the other hand, the Joint Chiefs are pressing for a budget of about $83 billion that includes, among other things, a start on the Navy's twice delayed nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, CVAN-70.

Laird also said that he thought "we are over the roughest part" of the job cut-backs of the past two years associated with the winding down of the war effort.

The Secretary said that the 2.3 million workers dropped from the defense payroll and from related industry "unquestionably account for an important part" of the two-million increase in the national unemployment rolls since 1968.

But Laird added that he felt the American people were willing to do this as part of a warm peace settlement.

His comments on this point drew an immediate response from Sen. Vance Hartke (D-Ind.).

Hartke, interviewed by NBC News, called this "some more of the PR (public relations) talk from the White House and people like Secretary Laird."

"We are still spending about the same amount, and a little bit more, as a year ago on defense," Hartke said, "so when people tell me we've shifted from a war to a peace economy, they cannot show it in the dollars."

Laird spoke today aboard the aircraft carrier USS In-dependence at a ceremony that marked the transfer of Vice Adm. Gerald E. Miller from command of the U.S. Second Fleet in Norfolk to the Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean. The new Second Fleet commander is Vice Adm. Vincent P. de Poix.

In an airborne press conference en route to Norfolk, Laird also said that congressionally administered cuts of 50,000 men in the average strength of the Army for the current fiscal year will push the total number of men in the service by June, 1972, below the administration's planned level of 942,000 men.

The cuts could force the Army below 900,000 men at that time. Laird said.

To meet these demands, the Pentagon, while continuing to draft some new men, would also probably allow draftees near the end of their service

to get out 120 days early, he said.

Laird said he was opposed to the congressional order on the Army. The lawmakers, in making their recommendation earlier this year, said that the fiscal 1972 Army manpower levels were based on a Vietnam withdrawal rate that had already been exceeded by President Nixon.

Asked about how far Army strenght might drop the following year, Laird said he was "hopeful that he would not have to make substantial cuts in fiscal 1973."

The Army worried about getting enough volunteers, wants to keep its strength at mid-1973 to about 870,000 men.

189

WASHINGTON NEWS

16 August 1971 P21

Air defense
called 'leaky'

By MIKE MILLER

Scripps-Howard Staff Writer

The United States has slashed its air defense so deeply that Russian bombers could penetrate and roam the heartland of America virtually unchecked, top defense officials said in testimony to congress made public today.

Air Force and Army generals in air defense assignments told a Senate Armed Services Subcommittee millions of Americans could die in a Russian bomber attack under the leaky state of the existing defense network.

Despite their warnings, key subcommittee members and their staff investigators apparently remained unconvinced that the Soviet bomber threat at this time warrants a proposed massive modernization of air defenses over the next several years at a cost of about $5.7 billion.

"Our antibomber defense is outdated and of limited value," testified Gen. Seith J. McKee, commander of the North American air defense command. "We still have the same types of weapons that we had in the early 1960s ... in far fewer numbers."

Subcommittee staff members questioned the rationale of spending $5.7 billion for a tight bomber defense of U.S. cities when there is no protection for urban areas against Soviet intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) and the cities would be destroyed anyway in a full nuclear attack.

Members also noted conflicting intelligence estimates of the bomber threat by the Air Force and the Defense Intelligence Agency. While the Air Force predicts the Russians will deploy a new intercontinental bomber and increase the threat, DIA apparently believes the threat will decrease as older Soviet bombers are phased out.

Russia reportedly has 100 long range bombers, 50 of them configured as refueling tankers, and 700 medium range bombers. Gen. McKee said about 100 of the medium range bombers are equipped for midair refueling, indicating that they have a potential mission of attacking the United States.

The components of the modernized air defense system being proposed are:

* AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control System), a fleet of 42 planes with new radars capable of "looking down" and picking out low flying incoming bombers. AWACS also would serve as an airborne command post for aerial warfare if NORAD's ground headquarters were knocked out.

The testimony disclosed that AWACS has suffered a 30 per cent cost: overrun since last year, with estimates increasing from $2 billion to $2.6 billion.

* An over the horizon radar network to extend radar coverage farther from U.S. borders, providing greater warning time for the AWACS planes and fighter interceptors to take off. Cost: $16 million.

* A fleet of almost 200 advanced fighter interceptors planes probably an interceptor version of either the Navy's F-14 or Air Force's

F-15, planes now in the early stages of development. The new interceptor force would cost an estimated $1.4 billion.

* A force of advanced army anti-aircraft missiles dubbed Sam D to defend vital cities and installations. Estimated cost: $1.6 billion.

190

NEW YORK TIMES

9 SEPT 1971.p1

SENATE UNIT SAYS
COSTLIER WEAPONS
MAY CUT DEFENSE

By JOHN W. FINNEY

Special to The New York Times

WASHINGTON, Sept. 8 —

The Senate Armed Services Committee warned today that the Pentagon's reliance upon ever more costly weapons could imperil the national security by forcing dangerous reductions in the size of the military forces.

"If the geometric cost increase for weapons systems is not sharply reversed, then even significant increases in the defense budget may not insure the force levels required for our national security," the committee said.

The warning was contained in a committee report on legislation authorizing $21-billion in military research and procurement of new weapons. The military authorization bill, the focal point for the defense debates in the Senate in recent years, is scheduled to be considered by the Senate in the next few weeks.

For the normally pro-Pentagon Armed Services Committee, the warning represented a new line of criticism of Defense Department weapon procurement practices.

F-14 Cost Rise Cited

But in some ways the Senate committee found itself echoing the past complaints of Pentagon critics that the military services were relying on too costly and complex weapons rather than turning to development of simpler, more inexpensive weapons.

Today, for example, Senator William Proxmire, a leader of the Pentagon critics in the Senate, made public a General Accounting Office report estimating that the cost of the F-14 fighter being developed for the Navy by Grumman Aerospace Corporation has risen to $16.7-million a plane for the 313 aircraft scheduled to be produced. In March, 1971, the estimate was $11.5-million a plane for a production order of 722 aircraft.

The cost increases, according to the report, are attributable primarily to a decreased production order and higher-than-expected cost for the plane's fire-control system.

But Senator Proxmire in a statement said "The Navy is still concealing the full extent of the cost problem's with the plane. There's a good deal more yet to come."

Senator Proxmire announced that he would offer an amendment to the military authorization bill, which provides $800-million for the procurement of 48 F-14's. It would terminate the F-14 program and authorize the Navy to initiate development of a new lightweight fighter, similar to one recently undertaken by the Air Force.

Without singling out any specific weapons programs, the Senate committee complained that the Defense Department in some cases had produced "some weapons too complex to be effective," partly because of inadequate testing before production was ordered.

Basic Complaint on Trend

But the committee's more basic complaint was that "simple and reliable modern weapons have often been neglected in the pursuit of weapons of great technological complexity."

Within the last few years, the committee noted, the purchase cost of weapons systems has "increased by many times." While the panel said it was to be expected that a new fighter plane would cost "considerably more" than a World War II model, the committee found it "striking" that fighter aircraft now being developed for the mid-nineteen-seventies would cost five to six times more than comparable aircraft at the beginning of the nineteen-sixties.

The cost of tanks, it noted, will increase more than fourfold in the 1962-1975 period. Citing ammunition costs, the committee observed that a burst of .50-caliber machine-gun fire, "our primary air-to-air munition until the end of the Korean War," cost about $20, but "we are now developing tactical air-to-air munitions costing several hundred thousand dollars per round — an increase by a factor of tens of thousands."

The committee noted that the avionics package (the control and communications equipment in some military aircraft weighs more than two tons and cost several million dollars.

"At over $1,000 per pound."

the report said, "this is about twice as costly as gold."

'No Easy Solutions'

The committee acknowledged that it had "no easy solutions" to the rising costs of modern weapons. But its basic point was that the military must turn to simpler, less costly weapons if the Defense Department is to have the funds to maintain adequate forces.

"The present trend of manpower and weapons' system costs means that we will soon see either striking increases in defense budgets, a sharp decline in force levels and readiness or reform of the weapon system development and procurement process," the report said.

"If defense budgets are to remain more or less constant, as now seems likely," it continued, then "the present development and procurement policies are no longer open to us. They only point to burdensome increases in defense spending, inadequate forces for defense, or to both of these unacceptable alternatives."

One suggestion by the committee was that the Defense Department develop alternative weapons programs for modernizing the armed forces. It said:

"At the present time, Department of Defense procedures are so structured that in each area there is only a single weapon system available to modernize the forces—and this system is often a very costly one. This means that Congress is faced with the decision of approving the procurement of that system or denying modern weapons to our armed forces."

The committee also suggested that "some of the more prosperous" of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies be required to pay part of the cost of developing and procuring weapons for United States forces that are likely to be committed to the defense of Western Europe.

Of the $30-billion in "general purpose" weapons being bought by the military, the committee estimated that $25-billion was related to NATO defenses.

192

193

The WALL STREET JOURNAL Staff Reporter

WASHINGTON — Armed with a report of further cost increases for the Navy's new F14 fighter plane, Sen. William Proxmire launched an attempt to kill the Grumman Corp. project.

As a first step, the Wisconsin Democrat re-
ported a report he had requested from the Gen-
eral Accounting Office on costs of the carrier-
ried fighter. The review by the GAO, Con-
gress' fiscal watchdog agency, showed the
Navy's current price tag for an F14 is $16.7
million, compared with $12.7 million quoted by
the Pentagon in August and $11.5 million
quoted by the Navy earlier in the year.

However, Mr. Proxmire accused the Navy of "still concealing the full extent of costs problems with the plane." The final price tag, he contended, is likely to be in the neighborhood of $20 million a plane.

Therefore, Mr. Proxmire said, he is drafting
amendments to this year's military procure-
ment bill that "would terminate the F14 pro-
gram" and authorize the Navy to start a new
lightweight fighter program.

Grumman officials declined comment.

Mr. Proxmire said he has asked Senate
Democratic Leader Mike Mansfield of Mont-
tana and Chairman John Stennis (D., Miss.) of
the Senate Armed Services Committee for help
in arranging a vote on his proposal before Oct.
1. That is the date by which the Navy is obli-
gated under the contract with Grumman to
order the next lot of 48 aircraft. The Pentagon
has said it plans to order the planes.

Large Termination Costs

As approved by the Senate Armed Services Committee, the defense procurement bill for fiscal 1972, which started July 1, contains $228 million for F14 research and development and $501.6 million for procurement of the 48 aircraft. Once these planes are ordered, Sen. Proxmire argued, "Any decision to cancel the program . . . could involve large termination costs to the government."

He added: "It would seem as though Grum-
man and the Navy have a surprise in store
after they have hoodwinked the Congress into
another $1 billion down payment on the F14
this fall—a rewritten contract which would no
doubt be negotiated" at the completion early
next year of a Navy cost study at Grumman.

It's likely that the Senate will vote on the
Proxmire F14-termination plan by Oct. 1. But
Mr. Proxmire's prospect of winning Senate ap-
proval appears rather dim.

In a detailed report issued yesterday on the
defense procurement bill, the Senate Armed
Services Committee said it was approving the
F14 funds with the "specific provision that not
less than 48" aircraft be purchased with the
money—despite the mounting cost problem.
The committee wants to make it very clear
that this isn't a magic solution. Nor does it re-
solve the potential cost problems for the F14
program."

"Maintain Integrity"

In the committee's view, purchase of an-
other 48 planes will "maintain integrity" of the
F14 program and better protect the taxpayer's
interest than "the costly alternative of break-
ing the contract."

The F14's cost woes first surfaced in April
with the disclosure of a letter from Grumman
in March informing the Pentagon it would be
"commercially impracticable" to build more
than the first 38 planes under its current con-
tract.

Until the cost flap, the Navy officially esti-
mated the cost of a 722-plane program, includ-
ing research and development, at $8.3 billion.
$11.5 million a plane. After the Grumman
then became public, Pentagon officials
tried saying total program costs were up
about $2 billion, or almost $3 million a plane.

Then last month, in discussing problems
with the engine, a Pentagon spokesman said
the F14 would cost $12.7 million apiece. (This
estimate was based on a 301-plane program,
with all the aircraft powered by existing en-
gine.) The earlier cost estimates for a 722-
plane program had assumed only the first 66
aircraft would carry existing engines, while the
reminder would be equipped with a more ex-

pensive, more powerful "advanced technology
engine.")

Yesterday, a Pentagon spokesman said the
$12.7 million price tag quoted last month hadn't
included research-and-development costs, al-
though the clear impression left with newsmen
at the time was that it did. The $16.7 million
figure contained in the GAO report is based on
a 313-plane program (including 12 research-
and-development models), all powered by the
existing, cheaper engine.

"Understates the Engine Costs"

Sen. Proxmire maintained yesterday that
this $16.7 million estimate "understates the en-
gine costs which lie ahead." Both the existing
"A" engine and the advanced "B" engine are
built by United Aircraft Corp.'s Pratt & Whit-
ney Aircraft Division.

While the more expensive "B" engine pro-
gram has been "cancelled for cost estimating
purposes," the Senator said, "it could be resur-
rected at any time." And he noted that "A" en-
gine costs are rising. According to the GAO re-
port, "the $1.9 million (a plane) included in the
current Navy estimate for two engines for each
airframe won't be sufficient."

Another reason the $16.7 million estimate
may turn out low, the Senator contended, is
that it assumes Grumman will produce the 313
planes under the existing contract—"despite
the insistence of Grumman officials that the
country won't bear the $367.4 million loss they
believe this would entail." While Grumman of-
ficials first indicated they wouldn't build the
coming lot of 48 aircraft under the current con-
tract, they subsequently told the Pentagon they
would produce them.

Grumman has blamed its cost problem on a
shrinking business base and unforeseen infla-
tion. In its study, the GAO said that "the re-
cent 90-day wage-and-price freeze and some
type of further controls may have an impact on
inflation."

Asked by Sen. Proxmire to determine how
great a loss Grumman could bear on the F14
without filing for bankruptcy, the GAO said it
was impossible to answer the question.

Not Published Until Yesterday

The Senate Armed Services Committee fin-
ished work Aug. 14 on its $21 billion bill autho-
rizing Pentagon research and hardware pro-
curement, but its detailed report on the mea-

sure wasn't published until yesterday. Chair-
man Stennis originally provided a summary of
decisions on such major weapons systems as
the Safeguard antiballistic missile, the C5A jet
transport and the B1 strategic bomber. The de-
tailed report, however, gave the first public in-
dication of committee-ordered cuts or deferrals
in procurement of other items.

The Navy requested, and the House has ap-
proved, $298 million to buy 36 P3C Orion anti-
submarine warfare patrol planes made by
Lockheed Aircraft Corp. The Senate committee
locked off $51 million, contending the purchase
of 12 fewer planes would allow a "smoother
production rate" beyond the current fiscal
year. It similarly deferred the purchase of
seven of the 19 Grumman-built EA6B radar-
fooling tactical planes the Navy had budgeted
for this year, a cut of $51 million. The commit-
tee also deferred "without prejudice" a $41
million Air Force request to buy 12 C130E tacti-
cal transport planes made by Lockheed. On the
other hand, a House-deleted Navy request for
$24 million to buy five jet transports from
McDonnell Douglas Corp. or Boeing Co. was
restored by the Senate committee.

Assuming these decisions are upheld by the
full Senate, they're still subject to reversal in
House-Senate conference bargaining on the
bill's final terms.

In a broader vein, the Armed Services Com-
mittee report gave the Pentagon a sober lec-
ture on the need to overcome "the high cost
and low effectiveness of new weapons sys-
tems." The report noted a Korean war-era
burst of aerial machine gun fire cost about $20.
compared with modern air-to-air munitions
"costing several hundred thousand dollars per
round." It said that cost overruns for the F-111
fighter and the C5A transport are partly re-
sponsible for a budget pinch that forced the Air
Force to cut this year's total procurement re-
quest to 188 planes of all types, the smallest
since 1934.

Higher pay for troops simultaneously is
pushing manpower costs toward two-thirds of
the entire defense budget, the committee said,
concluding on a sharp note of warning to Pen-
tagon hardware men:

> "The present trend of manpower and weap-
> ons system costs means that we will soon see
> either striking increases in defense budgets, a
> sharp decline in force levels and readiness, or
> reform of the weapon system development and
> procurement process. If defense budgets are to
> remain more or less constant, as now seems
> likely, and consume an ever smaller part of
> the nation's resources, the present develop-
> ment and procurement policies are no longer
> open to us."

WALL STREET JOURNAL 9 September 1971

Sen. Proxmire Bids to Kill the Navy's F14,
Puts Grumman Jet's Price at $20 Million

WASHINGTON POST 9 September 1971 P2

# GAO Says F-14 Cost Now at $16.7 Million

A General Accounting Of fice study of the Navy's finan cially-troubled F-14 fighter project shows that official cost estimates for the new swing- wing jet have now risen to $16.7 million per plane.

The GAO report was com pilled at the request of Sen. William Proxmire (D-Wis.), chairman of the Joint Eco nomic Committee and a per sistent critic of the F-14 pro gram.

Proxmire released the GAO report yesterday and also said he was "drafting amendments to the military authorization bill" now before Congress "which would terminate" the entire $5 billion plus F-14 proj ect.

Proxmire said he had writ ten to Senate majority leader Mike Mansfield (D-Mont.) and Armed Services Committee Chairman John C. Stennis (D-

Miss.) asking their help in ar ranging a vote of the $806 mil lion earmarked for the F-14 in this year's budget before Oct. 1. That is the date by which the Navy is obligated to place this year's order for 48 more planes with the manufacturer. Grumman Aerospace Corp., of Bethpage, N.Y.

Proxmire said his amend ment would also authorize the Navy to start work on a new low-cost lightweight fighter prototype similar to a project recently undertaken by the Air Force.

The Navy, however, has shown little interest in such a craft, and the Pentagon is ex pected to wage an all-out bat tle in Congress to keep the F- 14 program from being killed. The Navy says it needs the F- 14s to protect its aircraft car riers.

The $16.7 million per plane cost figure is based on Navy purchase of 313 F-14s over the next several years. Originally, the Navy had planned to buy 722 of the planes, but high

costs forced the service to scale down the purchase. The Navy, in March of this year, before the cost problems were made public, estimated that each of the 722 planes would cost $11.5 million.

The Washington Post, on

The GAO said that therer were "too many variables and unknowns" for it to pass judgment on Proxmire's esti mates that the price for the plane would eventually soar to $20 million a piece or more.

July 28. had reported that ris ing costs had pushed the price tag of the plane more than $16 million per copy. As recently as Aug. 10. Pentagon spokes men continued to claim that the cost was $12.7 million each.

Proxmire, in his statement issued yesterday, claimed that "the Navy is still concealing the full extent of the cost problems."

Proxmire, using the GAO analysis, claims that engine costs for the plane are already more than even the most re cent Navy estimates and that the $16.7 figure is based upon

Grumman producing all 313 planes under its existing con tract despite the company's earlier insistence that it could not bear the projected loss in volved.

194

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR - 11 SEPTEMBER 1971 (13)

# Navy's newest fighter faces big cost overrun

By George W. Ashworth

Staff correspondent of
The Christian Science Monitor

Washington

The Nixon administration is trying to come to grips with its first, and apparently huge, defense cost overrun.

At stake is the future of the Navy's newest fighter aircraft, the F-14, which the Navy plans to build to defend its aircraft carriers in the late 1970's and early 1980's.

Recent disclosures have indicated large cost increases on the aircraft. No one is at all sure whether there might not be more. F-14 may well prove to be the most expensive fighter plane built to date. Latest cost estimates, publicly agreed to by the Pentagon in the wake of a report by the General Accounting Office, put official estimates of the aircraft's costs at $16.7 million per copy.

As late as March, the Navy was contend ing that it would cost 11.5 million each, to buy 722 planes.

As late as August, the Pentagon was say- ing that $12.7 million each would be enough

to buy fewer planes. Now comes the $16.7 million figure when all research and devel- opment costs, and assorted odds and ends are taken into account.

The current first-line fighter in the Navy, the F-4 Phantom, costs roughly $4 million per copy.

The rise in Navy costs comes at a partic ularly unfortunate time for the Pentagon.

Release of the latest estimates coincided with the warning by the Senate Armed Services Committee that unless costs are brought under control, the choice between a sharp increase in defense budgets or "a sharp decline in force levels and readiness" will have to be made.

The warning may foreshadow things to come. In past years, the Pentagon's critics and supporters fell into relatively unchang- ing camps. Vietnam shook up the lines; con tinued problems and cost overruns are in danger of losing the Pentagon some of its former stalwart supporters on the Hill.

No one really wants to lay his prestige on the line in support of something the Penta- gon may be doing which could prove to be a debacle.

The Navy won approval to go ahead with the F-14 while the Air Force moved along

with the F-15, its new air superiority fight er. The services beat back suggestions that they might try again with the same plane, as was the case of the disastrous F-111 program. Instead, the craft will only share engines to save money.

Now, there are engine cost overruns, and the Navy is planning to buy the plane with a less powerful engine to save funds. And still costs soar.

Apparently, the F-14 is a good plane. That may help the Pentagon out as it tries to press ahead with the program. Not help- ing, however, are the allegations by critics that the F-14, with the lesser equipment, is not much of an improvement over the capabilities of existing, much cheaper craft.

So far, Defense Secretary Melvin R. Laird's people at the Pentagon have been touting their ability to come to grips with what now is euphemistically called "cost growth." Most of the problems now being coped with are traced, by those trying to make a political point, back to the Demo crats.

But the Republicans and their new team have nurtured the F-14 along. The new problems seem like those of old.

Congress Advised on Air Funds

By ORR KELLY
Star Staff Writer

Congress should cut off funds
only for the Army's Chey-
 helicopter program and cut
back on plans for the Marine
Corps' Harrier airplane while
vigorously supporting the Air
Force's AX attack plane, ac-
cording to a study by a group of
critics of Defense spending.

The report was made public at
a Capitol Hill press conference
yesterday by Sen. William Prox-
mire, D-Wis., Sen. Charles McC
Mathias, R-Md., and Rep. John
F. Seigerling, D-O., representing
the military spending committee
of the Members of Congress for
Peace through Law.

It is up to Congress to settle
the long-standing battle between
the Air Force and the Army
over the responsibility for close
support of ground troops since
the civilian leaders of the Penta-
gon have failed to resolve the
issue, they said.

Deputy Defense Secretary David Packard recently told Congress he favored continued work on all three of the aircraft, which are designed to perform similar functions, but in different ways. Packard said he was confident there was a sufficient confidence among the three to justify keeping all three alive.

But the MCPL report — one of
the most professional of nine
produced by the group — caus-
cially described the Cheyenne,
which would be built by Lock-
heed, as "a proven mistake with
inherent vulnerability and inac-
curacy that cannot be correct-
ed."

It was almost lavish in its
praise of the AX, however,
which is in the paper planning
stage. Two companies — North-
rop and Fairchild-Hilker — have
contracts for development of the
planes, and it is expected that
one of the two would get the
production contract.

The report said purchase of
the Harrier, which is a ready op-
erational in the Marine Corps.
would be cut off after the pur-
chase of another 30 planes from
the British manufacturer.

This would give the Corps 60
planes and permit the other
services to study the vertical
'airship' technology in practice.

If the services continue their
search for use of all three air-
plane reports said, the cost
would be more than $11.5 billion.

Proximire said two amend-
ments would be offered to carry
out the committee's recommen-
dation. One would cut the $23.7
million added to the military
program still by the Senate
Air and Services Committee to

establish a Harrier production
line in the United States.

The other, an amendment to
the Defense appropriations bill,
would strike all funds for the
Cheyenne.

WASHINGTON STAR

17 September 1971 P14

195

WALL STREET JOURNAL 10 September 1971 P7

Pentagon Asks $67.5 Million for Program
To Build Prototypes of Weapons, Aircraft

WASHINGTON—The Pentagon asked Con-
gress for $67.5 million to start its program of
building working test models of weapons before
mass production.

The new approach to military development
will involve doling out relatively small
amounts of money to several defense contrac-
tors to build "advanced development proto-
types" of aircraft and other weapons without
making any commitment to production.

The Pentagon's request for money to start
what it calls "prototyping" in fiscal 1972, which
began July 1, was expected. The project's chief
booster, Deputy Defense Secretary David
Packard, has been talking publicly about the
concept for several months.

Contractors will work toward general per-
formance goals laid down by the Pentagon
rather than toward detailed specifications. In
asking the Senate Armed Services Committee
for funding, Mr. Packard said he believes pro-
totyping will "help minimize" current procure-
ment difficulties, such as excessive reliance on
paper studies and too much simultaneous de-
velopment and production of new weapons.

"The underlying objective of our prototype
recommendation is to place more reliance on
the performance of hardware and less reliance
on paper analysis." Mr. Packard told the
panel. "We want to evaluate the feasibility and
utility of a new weapon to the extent possible
with the hardware demonstrations in advance

of production. We want to find out if things
work—not just if they look good on paper."

Mr. Packard specifically mentioned that the
prototype approach would be used to develop a
light-weight fighter plane for the Air Force.
Pentagon officials have said that a short-take-
off-and-landing transport plane would also be a
candidate for the prototype method and that
the approach could be used to develop a wide
array of weapons too.

The Pentagon's request for prototype funds
came just a day after new attention had been
focused on soaring weapons costs. On Wednes-
day, the Senate Armed Services Committee
warned that unless weapons costs were
brought under control, "even significant in-
creases in the defense budget may not ensure
the force levels required for our national secu-
rity."

Also on Wednesday, Sen. William Proximire
(D., Wis.) released a new government report
showing that the current cost estimate of the
Navy's new carrier-based F14 fighter is $16.7
million, up from a Pentagon estimate last
month of $12.7 million. Grumman Corp. is the
prime contractor for the F14.

At a news briefing yesterday, Pentagon
spokesman Jerry Friedheim confirmed the fig-
ures in the report made by the General Ac-
counting Office, Congress' fiscal watchdog
agency. In criticizing the F14 program and
calling for its termination on the basis of the
GAO report, Sen. Proximire praised the proto-
type approach and urged the Navy to use it to
begin work on a new light-weight fighter plane.

196

ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH

13 SEPTEMBER 1971 (17)

# Backfire, Overruns And The Budget

The subject of military appropriations, which in recent years has become increasingly controversial in Congress, has been made even more complicated by five recent developments which lawmakers should consider carefully before deciding how to allocate funds for defense-related research and development. We think the decisions relating to these matters will be of crucial importance, inasmuch as they not only will have profound consequences for the nation's strategic posture but also in that a wrong choice will mortgage vital resources to projects of dubious usefulness.

The five developments are these: (1) intelligence that the Soviet Union has successfully test-flown a swing-wing supersonic bomber; (2) reports that costs are soaring on the Navy's new F-14 fighter; (3) a highly unusual and significant warning from the Senate Armed Services Committee that a reliance on increasingly costly weapons may well jeopardize national security; (4) a request from the Pentagon that may presage a fundamental change in weapons development, and (5) the expected agreement between the United States and the USSR on a limitation on antiballistic missiles.

On the last of these, we have already made our position clear. A successful ABM agreement would make the further deployment of multiple warhead missiles irrelevant, since these weapons are intended to penetrate antimissile defenses. Irrelevant or not, the MIRV project would cost billions. Congress should place the program's funds in escrow, to be released only if the nation's security is jeopardized by Russian MIRV development.

The appearance of the Russian swing-wing bomber, the Backfire, may suggest that the USSR is returning to bomber development after years of concentrating on missiles. That, however, is far from certain. Each year the Soviets introduce a number of new weapons, many of which never go into production. In the case of Backfire, it could not be used against the United States except as a high-altitude bomber, a role that would be exceptionally vulnerable. Its true purpose, in fact, may be to stampede this country into a costly big bomber or bomber defense program.

Certainly, the Pentagon may be expected to

use Backfire as a bargaining lever for further development on the B-1 bomber. But Congress should resist the pressure. The ultimate cost for the B-1 system, including a new fleet of aerial tankers and short range airborne missiles, could cost as much as 75 billion dollars. With land and submarine-based missile forces which for the foreseeable future could destroy any adversary many times over, there is no conceivable excuse for such reckless spending.

The cost overrun on the F-14 may double the price of the aircraft. The General Accounting Office reports that the per plane cost of $11,500,000 announced by the Navy has risen to $16,700,000—and the true cost, some experts believe, may be as high as $20,000,000. Senator Proxmire says he will introduce an amendment to kill the F-14 program and such a measure appears well justified. A recent study by the Members of Congress for Peace Through Law contends that the fighter, already plagued by mechanical problems, will not even outperform the latest model of the F-4 Phantom.

The total cost of the F-14 program would be about 25 billion dollars and it is this sort of extravagance that has prompted not only the Armed Services Committee's warning but also the Defense Department's request to begin shifting its procurement policies on an experimental basis from a drawing-board-to-production method of contracting (the F-14 method) to a cheaper, prototype system. The latter would allow relatively small outlays to be spread among several contractors, each of which would produce a prototype of a weapon. The final choice would be based on the prototype's performance and would free the Government from long term, expensive commitments to systems that might not perform acceptably.

The prototype system is worth serious consideration, as would any change that might reduce weapon's costs. The Defense Department must look forward to a smaller percentage of the nation's budget, which in the past has been shamefully squandered at the expense of urgent social needs. It is not only frugal but it also is the course of prudence to make sure that defense dollars are used to buy national security instead of to subsidize wastefulness among military contractors.

WASHINGTON POST
19 SEPTEMBER 1971 (20)

Back to the Pentagon Budget

Debate will soon be getting under way in the Senate on the $21 billion military procurement bill and the conflict is bound to be intense. For even though this authorization for research, development, testing, evaluation and purchase of weapons systems does not come close to representing the bulk of annual defense outlays or that part of the $76 billion military budget most susceptible to cuts, the procurement bill does have a special relationship to defense policy as a whole. The R and D section of the bill, for instance, despite its relatively modest authorizations on an item by item basis, may be the breeding ground for new commitments to exotic, expensive and possibly destabilizing weapons systems. And the procurement — or purchase — section of the bill represents a series of incremental investments in and commitments to not just weapons systems but policy ideas. It provides funds for such controversial systems as the Safeguard ABM, "mirved" offensive missiles, and tactical aircraft such as the F-14 which is not only extremely expensive (the present estimate is $16.7 million per plane), but which also reflects some crucial and debatable assumptions about the nature of prospective conflict with the Soviet Union and about the future of the carrier force the F-14 is meant to protect.

The point is that those legislators of both parties who, over the past several years, have decided that the defense budget—and in particular this section of it—is the single best instrument at hand for asserting some influence over military policy are right. The implications of the way this money is apportioned and spent are enormous. Over time, they may lead to systems genuinely vital to our security—or they may lead to situations which are at once dangerous in themselves and yet dangerous to try to remedy or undo. (The mixed blessing of our 7,000 tactical nuclear weapons in Europe is an example.) But once you have established the critical relationship between money spent and policy made in these matters, there are any number of corollaries which in fact do not follow, even though they are easily and widely assumed. As the prospective dispute shapes up in the Senate between the budget cutters and budget defenders (or expanders, and by way of preliminary comment on the bill, it might be useful to enumerate some of these.

One is that more money for more weaponry automatically purchases more security. This is a view which overlooks the fact that funds put into certain strategic programs at certain times are likely to destabilize our nuclear relationship with the Russians in such a way as to enhance the threat of deadly war.

Standing the proposition on its head doesn't do any better. That is, the notion that vast cuts in military expenditures in and of themselves must lead to a more controllable and less ambitious military establishment and thus increase the prospects for peace is equally dubious. There are certain limits to reductions which, while shrinking the size and strength of the far-flung U.S. commitment of the moment, could leave us much too dependent on nuclear bluster, on early resort to a last resort there.

some new systems (the ABM for example) which are in a fairly early procurement stage and some prospective systems (the B-1 strategic bomber, the ULMS long-range missile-bearing submarine) which are in the R and D stage, in fact are requiring comparatively small outlays and are in any case systems still subject to elimination for one reason or another. The way in which these early commitments tend to take on an indestructible life of their own, however, and the fact that current outlays will be multiplied many times over should the systems be put into full effect, should be proof against ready acquiescence in this argument.

Finally, almost as treacherously beguiling an idea is that which emanates from many enthusiasts of arms control and disarmament, who foresee agreements between the United States and other nuclear powers as materially reducing not just the threat of war but also the level of our armaments and our expenditures on defense. Over the long run, this could prove true. But the partial test ban treaty of 1963, which preceded and in some ways provided the impetus for a renewed nuclear arms race (dependent upon underground testing, which was stepped up) should go a way to dispel such easy conclusions. So should the fact that certain kinds of arms agreements now being discussed could—whatever their other advantages—prove expensive in terms of compensatory efforts to improve weapons not within their purview and also in terms of costly measures required to assure that such an agreement was not violated to our sudden disadvantage—or disaster.

Sums alone, then, do not give in any way a reliable measure of the security offered by our military expenditures or of the direction in which our defense policies are taking us. The purpose of the Congressional critics and watchdogs of the Pentagon budget should therefore be principally to assert and enforce control over those expenditures—which means to put an end to the topsy-tumple growth of certain ill-considered weapons systems, to authorize and appropriate funds for missions that can be and have been rationalized in terms of a prudent and sensible overall posture. This, we are aware, is a nearly impossible chore—impossible at least without conceding inevitable imperfection and error. Still, Senator Stennis and his Committee, which cut the administration's original request by about $1 billion and which issued some stern and sensible directives to the Pentagon in so doing, seems to us to have made a commendable effort in this direction for fiscal '72.

We do not share all the Committee's conclusions. There are systems (such as the proposed new U.S. air defense) and individual items (a variety of tactical aircraft) that seem to us to require a much tougher look in the Senate. Still, we would caution against the random, disconnected cutting approach that has been favored by some of the military's critics. We will return to the specifics as the debate proceeds, especially to some of Sen. Proxy's worthy in our view) recommendations. But for now it seems enough to raise some cautionary questions about the merits of a money-is-good or money-is-bad approach to this measure. That approach could bring about results quite different from those desired by the senators who adopt it—and random attempts (especially at hacking) have demonstrably failed to work in the Senate in the

197

BALTIMORE EVENING SUN
20 SEPTEMBER 71 (26)

How Much for Defense?

That the Vietnam war has been eating up six dollars which could be used for nonmilitary purposes is widely recognized. That it has been draining money from other areas is a "normal" defense budget is less clearly acknowledged but nevertheless true. So a complete winding down of the war is simply not going to make available an annual $20 billion or so for purely peaceful purposes. Some of it will have to go into delayed weapons development, into deferred maintenance and perhaps into the higher cost of an entirely volunteer military establishment. But how much?

Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird offers an estimate that is so shocking as to be almost incomprehensible. Next year, he says, when American involvement in Vietnam will have been drastically reduced, we will nevertheless see an actual rise in the defense budget to approximately $80 from its current level of $76 billion. Why? Because, says Mr. Laird, the Soviet Union has been expanding its own military expenditures at such a rapid rate. Less than $80 billion will not permit the United States to remain "No. 1 militarily."

If the Secretary of Defense is implying that long-term security depends upon a tit-for-a-tit relationship to the Soviet forces, this is a disconcerting departure from established policy. In the age of nuclear weapons, the goal has been to maintain enough force to deter rather than to match or to exceed numerically what the potential enemy has. And this is true not only of landbased missiles but of nuclear submarines and conventional forces. The figure of a little over a thousand intercontinental missiles has long been considered a sufficient deterrent, even as the number of similar Soviet missiles has risen. NATO has never commanded anything like the number of troops available to the Warsaw Pact nations, but for over two decades it has performed its deterrent role satisfactorily.

Mr. Laird insists that once Congress realizes the extent of "Soviet expansion" talk about defense cuts will be "something of the past." We do not believe it. And we do not believe that Congress will conclude that the defense budget must actually rise as the war winds down. Congress, we think, will be determined to measure the defense needs in terms of how much is required to insure the peace, not to balance off each weapons system and nuclear submarine.

198

WASHINGTON POST - 21 SEPTEMBER 1971 P-6

Proxmire Hits C-5A Safety Margin

From News Dispatches

Sen. William Proxmire (D-Wis.), chairman of the congressional Joint Economic Committee, said yesterday that the safety margin of the giant C-5A cargo plane was dangerously inadequate although costs had doubled.

He accused the Air Force of withholding from Congress information on the increased costs.

Following reports of a wing crack in one of the aircraft, the senator again called for the recall of all C-5A aircraft — the world's biggest plane — already delivered to the Air Force.

Proxmire, in a statement issued here, said the C-5A program was now expected to cost $4.9 billion, an increase of $300 million over the figures of a year ago.

"Taking into account that the program has been reduced from 120 planes to 81, we find an overrun of $2.2 billion," he said.

"On a unit basis, the costs have risen from $28 million originally estimated for each C-5A to $60 million, an increase of over 100 per cent," Proxmire added.

"What is most disturbing about this case is the fact that the Air Force has repeatedly concealed the truth about the C-5A cost overruns from Congress and the public.

"The disclosure that another C-5A wing has cracked and failed to meet ground tests indicates that neither Lockheed nor the Air Force has yet been able to solve this fundamental structural problem.

"The fact that the wing failed under stress of 130 per cent of design load when the Air Force equipment is for 150 per cent of design load shows that the margin of safety in this plane is dangerously inadequate.

"I repeat my suggestion that Lockheed be required to recall the C-5As already delivered to the Air Force. Obviously, if this structural problem still hasn't been corrected the Air Force is flying a deficient, unsafe aircraft," he said.

An Air Force spokesman said Monday that the Air Force was considering a final reaction was that he was sure that none of the planes now flying the C-5A

had any tears, noting that the wing crack had come at 30 per cent more than the wing stress the plane would ever be required to undergo. He conceded that Lockheed's contract did call for 50 per cent more ability to withstand stress than the maximum that would be allowed and said he thought Lockheed would be asked to make good.

The Air Force did reply in detail to allegations over the weekend by Proxmire that the service has been trying to hide at least $1.3 billion in development costs for the B-1 bomber development program with a "deceptive public relations gimmick."

The spokesman replied that Proxmire was attacking a routine, traditional procedure involving the crediting of the cost of the later prototypes of a new plane to the production of operational airplanes rather

than to the development program.

The reason, the spokesman said, is that the last prototypes are routinely turned over to line units and considered to be the first regular production models.

In the case of the B-1, the spokesman said, it was always planned that prototypes No. 4, 5, 6 and 7 would eventually be turned over to the Strategic Air Command as operational planes.

This accounts for most of the $1.3 billion Proxmire is talking about, he said, adding that the only change in the last nine months that he knew of was a $55 million savings because it was decided that fewer prototypes would be needed before the plane becomes operational.

Proxmire said the Air Force used the "gimmick" when it suggests that the B-1 bomber development program is a 'Fly Before You Buy' project which will cost only $2.7 billion to complete.

"In reality, B-1 development will cost more than $4 billion, and the Air Force intends to buy the plane long before development, work and flight tests have been finished," he said in a statement Saturday.

He said the Air Force has portrayed the B-1 as a three-prototype development program on which no production decision will be made until 1975 and until the prototypes have been flight tested.

What the Air Force neglects to mention is that there will be no avionics systems or weapons on these planes when they are tested, and that after the tests are completed, it will be necessary to build four more planes for use in development tests." Proxmire said.

199

WASHINGTON POST 23 September 1971 P7

Senate Defeats Efforts to Cut Funds for B-1 Bomber

200

B. Spencer Rich

Washington Post Staff Writer

The Senate yesterday opened an expected month-long debate on the $21 billion defense procurement authorization by rejecting a move to eliminate almost all the funds for development of the B-1 bomber.

Sen. George S. McGovern (D-S.D.), with the support of Sen. William Proxmire (D-Wis.), argued that the Senate should cut the research and development funds from $370 million to $31 million because the bomber would offer only slight advantages over the existing B-52 force at a cost of over $11 billion for 241 planes.

"Our primary deterrent is the sea-based force. It has the mobility, the flexibility...yet cost less than the bomber," Proxmire contended.

Sen. Lloyd M. Bentsen (D-Tex.) responded, "We're asking our fliers to fly in a plane that's 20 years old in design." The amendment lost by voice vote.

Also beaten, 45 to 35, was a proposal by Sen. Gaylord Nelson (D-Wis.) to cut off all funds for Project Sanguine, a massive naval antenna system to be built across 6,400 square miles in Wisconsin, until reports on its environmental impact had been filed as required by law. Nelson said the armed services were not complying with reporting requirements on many projects.

A number of foreign policy and weapons amendment's are expected to be offered by Pentagon critics, including a new version next week of Majority Leader Mike Mansfield's amendment calling for a total withdrawal from Indonesia within six months.

But Sen. John Sherman Cooper (R-Ky.), it was learned, won't sponsor any amendment this year to cut back the Safeguard antiballistic missile system beyond the restrictions imposed by the Senate Armed Services Committee. The committee dropped the recommended new Safeguard site at the National Command Authority in Washington and allowed deployment to continue at Grand Forks and Malmstrom Air Force bases but kept it for advanced preparation only at two other sites.

about an agreement being reached at the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT), and from which he has just returned, and doesn't want to take away the President's bar-gaining power by trying to kill the ABM ordinance before the Russian negotiators agree to do likewise.

Also impending are amendments to limit spending in Laos, kill the main battle tank, put funds for multiple-targeted warheads in escrow until the outcome of the arms talks is known, and possibly cut back NATO troop levels.

There were reports yesterday that Proxmire, who is coordinating presentation of many of the weapons-cuts amendments, was證ved that so many of the presidential hopefuls were "wandering around the country so much."

WASHINGTON STAR 23 September 1971 P10

Military 'Takes the Hill'
In 1971 Battle of Bills

By JAMES DOYLE

¹ Star Staff Writer

Despite a close call and a three-month delay of extension of the draft, the Pentagon's problems with Senate appear to be over for the year.

The band of liberals that has launched past attacks on the military budget seemed to be losing some of its spirit yesterday as debate proceeded on the $21 billion military procurement bill.

In recent years, the Senate has taken from six to eight weeks to pass this bill, which includes the money for some of the Pentagon's biggest hardware.

McGovern Rebuffed

But in the first big test yesterday, a move by Sen. George McGovern, D-S.D., to drastically reduce funds for the B1 bomber

the issue was settled quickly and without a roll call.

By a-voice vote, the Senate $370 million to $31 million. McGovern let the issue drop there, noting, "We just didn't have the votes."

Later in the day, Sen. Gaylord Nelson, D-Wis., lost an attempt to prohibit the Navy from building a huge underground antenna grid under a large section of Wisconsin as an emergency communications system with Polaris submarines.

The program, called Project Sanguine, is considered by Nelson a threat to the environment. Despite long struggles in past more concerned about the votes, Nelson lost his battle on some of military spending. The first full day of debate by a roll call vote of 45 to 35.

Sen. William Proxmire, D-Wis., the chief critic of Defense spending and manager of the opposition to the procurement bill, said the bill could pass the Senate within three weeks.

One reason was the Senate's weariness after the 4th-month debate on draft extension, which encompassed most of the anti-war and anti-military issues that are raised separately in other debates.

Another reason is that Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Stennis of Mis-

sissippi, who took over in 1969, has gotten the hint and begun cutting fat in committee before the bills get to the floor.

Stennis has begun adding the number of aircraft he expects to be built for the amount appropriated, thus discouraging the Pentagon from approving cost overruns.

He also has cut back programs such as the Safeguard Anti-Ballistic Missile system while allowing construction to continue at the two initial sites in North Dakota and Montana.

The liberal critics of military spending never have succeeded in cutting much fat on the floor of the Senate anyway. But they have made the country — and the Pentagon and Stennis — Despite long struggles in past more concerned about the votes, Nelson lost his battle on some of military spending.

The Fervor Is Gone

Their effort was due to continuing in the coming days, but with the opposition to the procurement debate.

Proxmire and Sen. Vand Hartke, D-Ind., were offering an amendment today to scrap the F14 Navy jet fighter program which would cut $801.6 million from the procurement bill.

In a prepared speech, Proxmire said a recent Pentagon study shows that the present F14 fighter could be slightly modified to outperform the F14 at a speeds likely to be encounters in a dogfight.

WASHINGTON NEWS 24 SEPTEMBER 1971 PAGE 4

HHH would shelve MIRV

203

(UPI) — Calling for an end to the international 'drama of incorrect assessments and just for superiority,' Sen. Hubert Humphrey, D-Minn., asked the Senate today to suspend the nation's newest missile system.

Sen. Humphrey called up his amendment to place funds for the multiple independently targeted re-entry vehicle into reserve to await reaction from Moscow.

Sen. Humphrey's amendment was introduced on a $21 billion military funds bill — the annual Pentagon weapons measure.

## UNILATERAL STEP

Sen. Humphrey acknowledged that the step would be unilateral, but he said the United States must display "sophistication" if the world is ever to end the nuclear arms race.

Under Sen. Humphrey's amendment, funds earmarked for MIRV could not be spent for one year or until Congress and the President determine that the Soviet Union is deploying a MIRV system of its own, is building a large scale anti-ballistic missile system or taking other actions that require a further U. S. nuclear build-up.

The MIRV is a cluster of nuclear warheads

placed in the nose cone of a single ballistic missile. It is being deployed on submarines with 12 warheads on each missile and on land with three warheads carried by each Minuteman missile.

The system was developed during the Johnson administration when Humphrey was vice president.

## SEES TREATY

Sen. Humphrey, long an advocate of arms control, said the system must be suspended while the United States and the Soviet Union seek to negotiate a treaty limiting nuclear arms: He said the two countries are now working on an agreement to stop the ABM. Since MIRV was originally designed to penetrate an ABM defense by raining more missiles on an enemy than could be knocked down, there would be no reason for MIRV if an agreement were reached, Sen. Humphrey said.

The Defense Department contends that MIRV is needed to make sure that enough U.S. missiles survive to retaliate against a Soviet strike against U.S. Minuteman missiles.

"That line of reasoning is something like that for the emperor's new clothes," Sen. Humphrey said.

NEW YORK TIMES 25 SEPTEMBER 1971 (27)

## A HUMPHREY CURB ON MIRVS BEATEN

### Senate, 39-12, Bars Plan to Delay Development and Deployment of Warheads

WASHINGTON, Sept. 24 — In his most embarrassing setback since returning to Capitol Hill Senator Hubert H. Humphrey found an apparently uninterested Senate rejecting today the major disarmament amendment of the year, which he had proposed.

With a bare quorum present, the Senate rejected, 39 to 12, Mr. Humphrey's amendment to postpone the development and deployment of multiple warheads for strategic missiles.

His amendment, which he argued would help promote an agreement with the Soviet Union on strategic armaments, would have placed the development and deployment funds in escrow for a year as an American initiative toward stopping the nuclear arms race.

### Defeat Was Expected

The former Vice President, who made arms control one of his major interests since returning to the Senate this year, is expected to prevail in his push to end the arms race.

As he said at one point, his purpose was to "engage my colleagues" in an evaluation of the effect the multiple warhead program would have in accelerating the arms race and thus to keep up the pressure on the Armed Services Committees and the Nixon Administration to re-examine the desirability of placing such warheads on Minuteman missiles and submarine-launched Poseidon missiles. The warheads are known as MIRVs, for multiple, independently targetable re-entry vehicle.

Today Senator Humphrey found it difficult to "engage" his colleagues. Throughout his two-hour speech, at most two or three Senators were on the floor, and they seemed more interested in the documents on their desks than in the words of the Minnesota Democrat.

### Opposes Deployment

While privately expecting defeat, Senator Humphrey had not expected to lose so embarrassingly on probably his most important legislative effort since returning to Congress. For weeks, in conferences with disarmament specialists, with statements and speeches, he had been building up for the amendment to the military procurement bill.

His argument was that continuing deployment of multiple warheads was "not only unnecessary but harmful" to future arms control agreements and was another example of how the arms race had been accelerated by incorrect assessments and a lust for superiority."

His setback underscored the difficulties of a freshman Senator in adapting to the new leadership and new ways that have emerged in the Senate

since he left it in 1964 to become Vice President and then the Democratic Presidential nominee in 1968.

Earlier this week he agreed to a vote today on his amendment, at the personal request of Senator Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia, the majority whip, who specializes in working out unanimous consent agreements to limit debate on amendments. Only later, after this act of political generosity to Senator Byrd, did he realize that many Senators, including particularly his supporters, would be absent when his amendment came to a vote.

Senator Humphrey then went to Senator Mike Mansfield of Montana, seeking a delay in the vote until next week, but the majority leader reportedly demurred on the grounds that the Senate was "not working on a four-day week."

Sensing an embarrassing defeat, Senator Humphrey today asked Senator John C. Stennis, Democrat of Mississippi, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, to agree to a postponement of the vote until next Tuesday. Senator Stennis, who last week was granted a crucial delay in the vote on the draft bill, agreed. But Senator Byrd objected and insisted that Senator Humphrey be held to his agreement to a vote today.

### Burdick Declines to Leave

As the roll was being called, it appeared that a curium might not be present, which would have forced a postponement. Then Senator Quentin N. Burdick, Democrat of North Dakota, appeared without a quorum. Required 51st vote.

Bystanders said that Senator Humphrey asked Senator Burdick to absent himself from the Senate floor, but Senator Stennis

dicted declined and cast a negative vote.

Of the potential Democratic Presidential candidates, only Senator Humphrey was present. A total of 26 Democrats and 23 Republicans were absent, including Jacob K. Javits. Republican of New York; Lowell P. Weicker, Republican of Connecticut, and Abraham A. Ribicoff, Democrat of Connecticut.

One purpose of the Democratic leadership in forcing a vote today was to crack a whip at the growing absenteeism in the Senate.

WASHINGTON STAR
28 September 1971 P1

2 Senators
Case Fight
On ABM

United Press International

For the first time since he took office, President Nixon will not have to worry this year about a Senate move to stop the Safeguard antiballistic missile system.

Sens. John Sherman Cooper, R-Ky., and Philip A. Hart, D-Mich., have decided not to renew their annual fight against the ABM mainly because of the improving prospects for a Soviet-American agreement to limit deployment of the defensive weapon.

The two senators plan to make major floor speeches this week outlining their reasons for dropping the struggle. A decision by the Senate Armed Services Committee to confine deployment of the ABM to two initial sites is believed to have been a factor in their decision.

Major Tests Ahead

The two senators' acquiescence to this year's $1.1 billion outlay for the ABM smoothed the path for the pending $21 billion authorized bill for procurement, research and development of new weapons. Major tests are still ahead, however, on amendments to cut back tactical weapons, including the Navy's F14 fighter and a new Army super tank, the XM302, which will cost more than $1 million apiece.

In addition, Senate Democrat-
ic Leader Mike Mansfield,
D-Mont., probably will call up
Thursday his amendment setting
a six-month time limitation on
U.S. involvement in Vietnam.

Except for a shortened time-
bie. Mansfield's amendment is
identical to the one that led to a
congressional impasse over ex-
tension of the draft. The draft
legislation finally passed last
week included a much softer
version of his proposal, which
called for a U.S. pullout from
Vietnam in nine months.

Mansfield's proposal has as its
only condition the simultaneous
release of U.S. prisoners by
North Vietnam and an account-
ing of those missing in action.

Introducing his new amend-
ment yesterday, Mansfield said,
"I want no more blood on my
hands. I want to see these men
brought home."

Opposed Since 1968

Cooper and Hart have been
leading the bipartisan struggle
against the ABM since 1968.
They came within one vote of
winning in a 1969 senate roll call
that ended in a 50-50 tie.

Cooper and Hart have argued
that the weapon constitutes a
major new plateau in the inter-
national struggle for arms supe-
riority that could touch off bil-
lions in new expenditures for
counter-weapons and dangerous-
ly destabilize the balance of ter-
tor.

The ABM, possibly the most
complex weapon ever designed,
consists of radars, computers
and nuclear-tipped interceptor
missiles which destroy incoming
enemy rockets with x-rays and
neutrons. The current mission of
Safeguard is to protect minute-
man missile silos against a
pre-emptive Soviet strike.

204

WASHINGTON POST 28 SEPTEMBER 71 Pgl

Navy's Interim Plan
For A-Subs Scuttled

Faced with internal budget
problems and the possible loss
of congressional support, the
Navy has quietly abandoned
one of two costly programs for
extending the range and effec-
tiveness of its missile-firing
submarine fleet.

This comes only a month
after the chief of naval opera-
tions, Adm. Elmo R. Zumwalt,
had publicly argued that both
programs were vital to na-
tional security.

The project that has now
been dropped is known as
EXPO—an interim plan to
improve existing missile-firing
submarines by modifying the
current Poseidon missile to
extend its range.

Instead of pushing EXPO
(Extended-range Poseidon)

the Navy will go all out for an-
other project known as ULMS
(Underwater Long-Range Mis-
sile System).

This involves development of
an entirely new class of sub-
marine and a completely new
missile for the 1960s.

ULMS has had top priority
in Pentagon planning for the
past two years. Earlier this
year, however, EXPO became
a surface as a potentially
cheaper way to improve the
undersea position of the I-
nuclear detector, at least on
an interim basis until ULMS
is ready.

By pursuing EXPO, it was
reasoned by some analysts

AVIATION WEEK 27 September 1971 (28)

205

# DOD Asks $67.5 Million To Fund Prototype Effort

By Cecil Brownlow

Washington-Defense Dept. is requesting $67.5 million in new funding for Fiscal 1972 to launch Deputy Defense Secretary David Packard's formula for advanced weapon-system prototype developments.

Objectives are two-fold:

* Cut to a minimum past cost overruns and below-specification performance through single-source hardware selections early in the development state.

* Permit advanced state-of-the-art developments to keep this country on a technological pace with the Soviet Union in an era of predictably lean defense budgets.

Packard's request, currently under consideration by the Senate Armed Services Committee, is designed to provide the means to implement a series of advanced prototype projects by all three services on a minimal cost basis. These include:

* **Air Force**—New lightweight fighter, probably based on the X-27 design developed by Lockheed's Clarence L. Kelly) Johnson (AW&ST Mar. 29, p. 23) although there are other competitors, a quiet observation aircraft and a STOL transport.

* **Navy**—Vertical-lift V/STOL aircraft for anti-submarine-warfare operations off relatively small ships, an advanced version of the Hawker Siddeley AV-8A Harrier vectored-thrust VTOL fighter, advanced ASW sensors and surface-to-surface missile launchers.

* **Army**—Unmanned observation helicopter, new surface-to-surface attack missile and a multi-mission attack missile.

"Area of interest" letters by the services will be issued to industry for submission of proposals when, and if, congressional authorization is received. Fiscal 1972 funding represents a minimal, get-under-way effort. And, the request totals will expand in future years. The Navy, as an example, hopes to receive about $20 million for its program in Fiscal 1972. From Fiscal

1972 through Fiscal 1974, it envisions an outlay of $135 million.

Where development costs can be kept at a reasonable level, the Defense Dept. hopes to issue contracts to at least two prime contractors for prototype construction to provide for a final "fly-off" evaluation before any production decision. And, in some cases, there probably will be no production contract at all—either because there is no available funding or immediate requirement or because performance does not meet expectations.

In explaining his advanced prototype concept to the Senate Armed Services Committee, Packard recently said:

> "... The underlying objective of our prototype recommendation is to place more reliance on the performance of hardware and less reliance on paper analysis. We want to evaluate both the feasibility and utility of a new weapon to the extent possible with the hardware demonstrations in advance of production. ...

> "We want to find out ... if things work—not just if they look good on paper.

> "I want to distinguish between the several kinds of prototypes. The first is the advanced development prototype, where a proposed new weapon would be designed, built and tested to confirm that the technology is feasible and that the design does indeed have utility against a requirement. In our approach, an advanced development prototype would be completed and evaluated before a commitment is made to full-scale development.

> "The second kind is a production, or an engineering prototype. This type of prototype is intended both to assure that we have the engineering problems solved and also to permit thorough test-

ing and evaluation of a system.

> "This type of prototype would be very desirable in every program before a substantial commitment to production is made. And, finally, there are prototypes of components and subsystems which provide us with the opportunity to build and test parts of systems in advance of, or sometimes concurrent with, engineering development of the main system."

Under the Packard proposal, detailed engineering design drawings and other production-operational factors, including avionic packages, will be sidestepped as much as possible during the prototype development and construction stage. He told the subcommittee:

> "The programs we are recommending for prototyping generally will not have the object of producing a complete operational system. For example, the fighter aircraft [USAF lightweight fighter] will primarily be used to demonstrate the capability of the airframe and engine in actual aerodynamic performance, but it will not include all of the avionics, weapons, etc., which are necessary for a fully operational weapons system."

Navy program envisions an expenditure of $5 million on ASW sensor prototype projects in Fiscal 1972, a total of $15 million through Fiscal 1974. Comparable figures for its V/STOL programs are $11 million and $75 million; advanced weapons $4 million and $44 million.

Proposed pure-lift-engine V/STOL would attain its vertical lift from two fuselage-mounted 18,000-lb.-thrust J99 powerplants, an advanced program already under way on a joint development basis by the Allison Div. of General Motors Corp. and Rolls-Royce (1971), Ltd. Its primary mission would be ASW search and attack, flying from the decks of relatively-small surface ships.

The aircraft would have a gross weight of approximately 12,750 lb., maximum endurance of 4.3 hr., a cruise speed of 350 kt. and a maximum speed of 415 kt. Its specification requirements closely follow those contained in an unsolicited proposal submitted to the Navy by Bell Aerospace Div. of Textron Inc. Designated the X-14D, it is a derivative of the X-14A vectored-thrust aircraft.

WASHINGTON POST

29 SEPTEMBER 1971

# The F-14: Is This Plane Really Necessary?

For the past 10 days or so the Senate has been considering a variety of amendments to the $21 billion military procurement bill, and the debate will continue for some time. Most of the amendments have been designed to trim or eliminate authorizations for specific weapons systems. So far, none has succeeded. Whether or not they should have, and whether or not the string of amendments yet to come should be approved, it seems to us that the vote on one amendment—possibly to be taken today—is crucial and that the amendment should be passed. We refer to the move to eliminate from the fiscal '72 budget some $800 million in funds for the purchase of 48 tactical aircraft that go by the name of the F-14. This air-to-air-missile-bearing Navy fighter plane is pretty much a textbook case of what can go wrong in weapons planning—from the drawing board on.

The F-14 is meant to fulfill the mission of protecting our aircraft carriers against Soviet bombers and fighter planes in any prolonged conventional war we might have with the Soviet Union. It is thus to be equipped with the Phoenix air-to-air "standoff" missile for dealing with Soviet bombers and it is also supposed to have the characteristics-speed, maneuverability, and so forth-that would be necessary to engage Soviet fighter planes. Two large questions loom over the vote that now faces the Senate. One is whether a plane is needed at all to fulfill this particular mission. The other is whether the F-14 is the right plane to fulfill that mission if it is indeed a realistic or legitimate one.

It is our opinion, based on the argument and testimony so far concerning the F-14 that its mission is at the very least a dubious one. We are inclined to credit the widespread view that in any conflict such as that for which the F-14 is designed-i.e., prolonged conventional warfare with the Russians who have the only aircraft that would make such plane necessary-the F-14 would be unable to protect U.S. carriers from the main threat they would face, namely, Soviet torpedoes and cruise missiles. The very notion that carriers would have a useful role to play in this particular kind of conflict is questionable, and to invest in this plane before the future size and shape of our carrier force has been determined seems impractical and reckless to say the least.

More to the point, even if the F-14's mission

could be justified, it would be far from obvious that the F-14 as we are about to know it is the plane for the job. In 'endeavoring to create a plane that could fulfill two different functions-that of fighter and that of launch platform for the Phoenix air-to-air missile-the Navy and Grumman aerospace appear to have wrought a plane that can likely fulfill neither very well. Owing to the requirements for the Phoenix missile, for example, the F-14 is a relatively slow and inadequate fighter plane. And the Phoenix missile which it is meant to bear is still in the throes of 10 years worth of trouble that has plagued it. The F-14 is less adequate as a fighter plane than the modified F-4 which it would replace. What is especially interesting about this point is that it will cost four times as much. Current estimates are $16.7 million per plane, and each firing of the Phoenix-if it can be made to function properly in this aircraft and if its mission has any point in the first place-will cost around half a million dollars. The F-14 program, as Senator Proxmire has observed, "is in many respects a microcosm of many of the problems which plague our defense establishment today: Initial cost estimates which later balloon: the incredible inertia of 10-year-old ideas which have never been thought through; the failure to test new systems before they have been deployed; and the continued emphasis on multi-mission aircraft which do no mission well."

Though the Senate Armed Services Committee in its careful report on the military procurement bill recommended procurement of these planes, it can hardly be said to have done so in a spirit of enthusiasm. It restricted purchase to 48 planes, the minimum possible under the terms of the contract with Grumman, and made its principal argument the fact that it would be even more expensive to buy the planes under any renegotiated terms. As it happens, the administration-if it is authorized to go ahead with the purchase-will have to do so by Oct. 1 to observe the contract's terms. Thus the Senate vote has a double urgency. The F-14 has too many attributes of another great defense turkey to be approved at this time by the Senate. We believe the Senate should send the Navy back to the drawing board to come up with either an improved F-4 or a new fighter plane that is not too costly to be purchased in adequate numbers and that has a reasonable chance of performing a valid function.

207

209

LOS ANGELES TIMES 29 September 1971 P43 (Oct 8)

# C-5A in Fiscal Stratosphere

BY ROBERT KIRSCH

Times Book Critic

Five billion dollars
There is a fiscal stratos-
phere in which such an
amount seems unreal. But
that is what the C-5A
Lockheed Galaxy is going
to cost us, the taxpayers.
Maybe more. No only real-
ly knows yet.

What we do know is that
since the original con-
tracts for this giant cargo
troop transport plane
(only 18 yards shorter
than a football field, one
writer calls it "Moby Jet")
were let in 1965, the cost
estimates rose from $3 bil-
lion to $5 billion.

Mind-Boggling Expose

THE C-5A SCANDAL:
An Inside Story of the Mil-
itary Industrial Complex
(Houghton Mifflin: $5.95)
by Berkeley Rice is a
mind-boggling expose of
this affair. Unfortunately,
this case study is no ex-
ception to the general
procedures in military
procurement, which, ac-
cording to Rice, have all
the care and caution of a
drunken playboy on the
town.

The frightening part of

the book is that much of it
is not new. Portions of the
story have been in the na-
tion's newspapers for sev-
eral years.

Questions have been
raised on the performance
of the C-5A and some crit-
ics have called it a "le-
mon." There have been in-
vestigations by Sen. Wil-
liam Proxmire's subcom-
mittee on economy in
government, the Senate
and House Armed Ser-
vices Committees, the
House military operations
subcommittee, the Gen-
eral Accounting Office and
the Securities and Ex-
change Committee. Expo-
sure of the $2 billion over-
run seems to have left the
public cold.

Why? Perhaps we are
rumb to the amount and
callous about what Sen.
Proxmire called "inconsis-
tencies, concealment, fail-
ure to disclose information
and manipulation of rec-
ords."

Putting this sorry tale
between the covers of a
book may make the public
realize what $5 billion dol-
lars is all about—more
than the combined budg-
ets of Congress and the
Departments of State. Jus-

tice. Interior and Com-
merce, nearly twice as
much as all federal aid to
public schools in 1970,
nearly three times the
budget for all federal
poverty programs, three
times as much as all feder-
al expenditures on public
health programs, nearly
15 times the money devot-
ed to the nation's park and
recreation facilities.

Fired for Truth

Well, virtually nothing
has been done about the C-
5A scandal except, of
course, for Ernest Fitzger-
ald, the Pentagon official
who blew the whistle on
the affair—and lost his
job. And what Fitzgerald
has to say is not encour-
aging:

"People don't realize how
often the Pentagon lies
about procurement costs.
When a program goes bad,
the military just plain lies
about it. For example, we
knew the C-5A was sick
back in 1966 but no one
would do anything about
it. The worse it got, the
more they lied. My only
fault was to commit
truth."

What is the hope for the

future? Wryly, Fitzgerald
says: "There won't be any
more overruns in the De-
fense Department now,
though. Every thing will
be classified, and there
just won't be any records
to base anything on. If you
don't have records, you
can't have overruns."

The problem is that the
C-5A experience is re-
markable only because it
became public because of
some men in government
who felt the taxpayers
ought to be given a fair
break, that officials ought
to hold contractors to their
commitments.

The fault lies in a system
in which every abuse is
built in. Rice points out
that the public has almost
no control over the milita-
ry-industrial complex and
defense spending.

There is an irony in the
remark of Robert Antho-
ny, former comptroller of
the Department of De-
fense, who has said: "I
don't see why everyone
has picked on the C-5A.
There are many examples
of defense contracting that
are much worse."

THURSDAY MORNING, 30 SEPTEMBER 1971
WASHINGTON POST 30 SEPTEMBER 1971 P-18

# The "Reckless" Talk About Military Spending

212

VICE PRESIDENT Agnew was preaching to the chair last Thursday when he told a dinner audience of several hundred military leaders and defense industry captains that all this talk about military spending cuts was "reckless and appallig."

Aside from some ugly and pointless remarks, attempting to link four Democratic presidential possibilities who have called for such cuts with the views of Gus Hall, the U. S. Communist Party secretary, the Vice President provided a classic example of one way to deal with America's defense needs.

The thrust of Agnew's remarks was that the Russians were coming and the best way to keep our guard up was to keep our defense budget up. Anyone who deviates too far from that standard is apparently either gambling dangerously with our future or in a league with old Gus Hall.

The audience loved the speech, coming as it did from the general direction of the White House and not from the Secretary of Defense—whose job it is normally to fight for funds for his department.

Mr. Agnew, however, may have missed an opportunity to better serve both his audience and this country's legitimate defense needs. Instead of the speech he did deliver, the Vice President might have read five pages of eloquent and perceptive comment on what's really eating away at America's military strength. Those pages come from a report issued earlier this month by Sen. John C. Stennis, the Mississippi Democrat who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee and who is hardly soft on anything.

What the Stennis Committee said, in essence, is that the military-industrial team itself is threatening to price the United States right out of an ability to defend itself.

The trend to soaring costs in new weapons, Stennis said, is "deeply troubling. If the geometric cost increase for weapons systems is not sharply reversed, then even significant increases in the defense budget may not insure the force levels required for our national security."

"In the more likely case that defense spending will level off or decline," Stennis said, "it will thus soon become clear that our present system cannot provide sufficient forces to protect our security. If we can afford a permanent force structure of only one-fifth as many fighter aircraft or tanks as our potential adversaries—because our systems are about five times more expensive than theirs—then a future crisis may find us at a sharp numerical disadvantage."

PERHAPS more would have been learned by the arms makers and users Thursday from reading a paragraph by another of the toughest guardians of U.S. military strength in the Congress, Texas Democrat George H. Mahon, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.

Commenting on the biggest part of last year's defense budget, Mahon said in his committee's report that "the country has every right to expect that the appropriation of $66 billion will provide formidable military forces."

"The effectiveness of the Defense Department," he added, "cannot be measured solely in terms of the dollar level of expenditures. Unlimited resources do not overcome efficiency and mismanagement. What this country needs is more defense for the dollar, not more dollars for defense."

But instead of a lecture on that point, the military and corporate brass got a pep talk and some scare talk from the Vice President.

"To say that we are drifting toward imminent war, I say that our national survival

## By Michael Getler

Yet, it must be an exaggeration of sorts for a nation that has 1054 ICBMs, some with multiple warheads, 656 submarine-based missiles, all with multiple warheads, several hundred B-52 bombers, and several hundred more nuclear-equipped tactical fighter-bombers on aircraft carriers and European airfields.

And, if we are to believe the hopes of Mr. Agnew's boss, what we are drifting into is not imminent peril but an arms limitation agreement with the Soviet Union.

"We cannot allow," said Agnew, "a small but influential minority of neo-isolationists—in and out of Congress—to cripple our defense capability ... nor can we countenance the false pretense that dismantling our defense establishment is an intelligent way to provide the funds to cover all of our social ills."

There are, however, few if any legislators who are advocating the overt or covert dismantlement of America's defenses, and if they did, their views would never prevail in this country.

There are, on the other hand, a number of honest, patriotic legislators and taxpayers who are legitimately astounded that even the $76 billion the U.S. will spend this year for defense won't be enough next year, when U.S. participation in Vietnam is supposed to be about ended.

For next year, with the huge annual costs of attracting an all-volunteer Army now taking their place along with all the other categories of military spending, Defense Secretary Laird recently told us that he couldn't guarantee the U.S. would not become a second-rate power if we spend anything less than $80 billion.

Though the astonishment over the size of the defense budget does exist in Congress, the fact of the matter is that there are not nearly enough lawmakers who take the time to make themselves effective critics able to force the Pentagon not to higher budgets but to a leaner and tougher way of operating.

PROBABLY the most effective critic, in the sense of doing his homework on specific issues, is Wisconsin's Senator William Proxmire, undoubtedly the most despised man in the gathering places of the military-industrial team.

Yet, if one views national security not only as a product of willingness to support the defense establishment but a desire to strengthen it by avoiding waste, then Proxmire and others like him can be considered as important as the military's top leaders.

For example Proxmire's record of accuracy on the runaway costs of the Air Force's C-5A transport and the Navy's F-14 fighter have been far better than the Pentagon's. Is the $2 billion overrun on the C-5A—that Proxmire refused to let be covered up—somehow good for national defense? Ask an Air Force fighter pilot flying 15-year-old planes what he thinks of the C-5A overrun. Because of that overrun, the service will only get 81 of these giant transports, not 115 which the planners said were needed.

The Navy's F-14 costs so much—currently $16.7 million apiece and counting—that the number on order has had to be cut in half. Is this result, which makes a mockery of supposedly carefully drawn up military requirements, Proxmire's fault or the Navy's?

The Senator—whose name was also invoked by Mr. Agnew though not linked with Hall's—now has brought extremely serious charges—denied by the Navy but none-

that the F-14's Phoenix air-to-air missiles won't work as advertised. If Proxmare is right, then the few billion dollars for Phoenix is wasted, along with $5 billion worth of F-14s, not to mention the billion dollar aircraft carriers that Phoenix is supposed to protect from enemy planes and missiles.

There is, in fact, considerable precedent for failure among those highly complex weapons and delivery systems started in the technological euphoria of the early 1960s, when Phoenix was born.

As Stennis' committee so aptly pointed out "... it is striking that in many cases we have developed and produced aircraft of extraordinary capabilities without demonstrably reliable and effective air-to-air munitions, bombers without long-range air-to-surface missiles, submarines without reliable and effective torpedoes..."

The Vice President talked, as have others, about the big Soviet power build-up, of our being outnumbered in ICBMs, submarines, and the growing strength of the Soviet surface fleet.

Yet, in fairness, and to keep the collective American chin up, it should also be noted that U.S. ICBMs are more accurate than their Soviet counterparts, that U.S. missile-firing submarines are more numerous, quieter and carry far more longer-ranged missiles than the Soviet version.

The Soviet admirals have nothing comparable to the mobile striking power of the U.S. Navy's 15 attack aircraft carriers, nor do they have an Air Force with anywhere near, the offensive punch—both strategic and tactical—of the United States.

While it is indeed dangerous to downgrade the military power of the Soviet Union, it is also expensive to view it in a vacuum.

The Vice President laid heavy emphasis, as have others, on the need for a "drastic overhaul" of the Navy's ships. There is no doubt that our fleet needs to be modernized. But that modernization has in fact been under way for several years now and among the products rolling down the ways is a new class of 46 destroyer escorts with one gun and one propeller and a new class of nuclear-powered frigates that cost so much—nearly a quarter-billion dollars each—that the Pentagon itself had to squash Navy plans to build more.

If the Russians are outspending us by $3 billion on new weapons research and development—a claim the Pentagon makes, Agnew repeats and the General Accounting Office disputes—maybe it's because they are more careful with their rubles. Or maybe they don't overload their army with every conceivable kind of support troops. Or maybe they don't have PX's stocked with hair dryers to keep their allies happy in Southeast Asia.

What this all adds up to is a case for more than one perspective on what's good for national security and who is acting on behalf of this country's best interests in that field.

There needs to be more room for the critics and less insinuations that somehow they are all buddies of Gus Hall.

213

WASHINGTON POST

1 OCT. 1971 Pg 1

# Colleagues Criticize Anti-ABM Scientists

Prominent scientists who led the attack two years ago against the Safeguard ABM project have now been criticized for the quality of their presentations before Congress and in the press during the ABM debate.

The criticism is contained in a lengthy report, to be released today, by a seven-member Ad Hoc Committee on Professional Standards of the Operations Research Society of America (ORSA).

Among those scientists whose work has been specifically challenged in the 135-page report are: Dr. Jerome B. Wiesner, provost of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Dr. George W. Rathjens, visiting professor of political science at MIT; Dr. Steven Weinberg, a physics professor at MIT, and Dr. Ralph Lapp, author and nuclear physi-

In a summary of its findings after 21 months of studying the record of the ABM debate, the committee states:

> "The evidence strongly supports the disturbing conclusion that when prominent experts outside the administration supported their opinions on Safeguard development with arguments or results of an operations-research nature, these analyses were often inappropriate, misleading or factually in error."

"Quite often," the report goes on, "the misleading nature of an analysis is not apparent on a superficial reading. Because of this, poor analysis can be quite effective in public debate."

The committee said it also found some "shortcomings in the analysis of the ABM situation provided by Pentagon officials and their supporters. But "they nowhere near equalled the cumulative mass of inadequacies compiled by the administration."

The 1969 fight over the Safeguard system to defend U.S. land-based missiles against Soviet attack was the most intensive battle ever waged in Congress over a single weapon system. The administration,

which supported the development of Safeguard, won that battle by a vote of 51-50. Vice President Agnew cast the deciding vote.

The pro and anti-Safeguard forces used many devices to affect the outcome. There were campaigns to fill up newspaper letters-to-the-editor columns. There were full-page newspaper advertisements, books, magazine articles, television debates. And through it all there was a procession of prominent scientists lining up on both sides of the issue. Rathjens, Weisner, Weinberg and Lapp led the scientific assault against Safeguard.

The stakes seemed to be enormous. On the one hand, billions of dollars in defense contracts were involved and that meant many thousands of jobs as well as profit potentials.

Beyond that, the debate had heavy political overtones. It pitted the Nixon administration against its critics, the "military-industrial complex" against those who would divert military funds to domestic purposes. In a vague sense, it was a "liberal" versus "conservative" confrontation.

Finally, there was the issue of "national survival." Safeguard, said the administration, was essential to the security of the nation. Its critics said it was an unworkable weapon system that would merely fuel the arms race and add to insecurity.

The report by the ORSA committee was, in effect, aprimand to the several scientists criticized. It was administered by a body of their peers.

ORSA undertook its investigation of the matter at the suggestion of Dr. Albert Wohlstetter, a University of Chicago professor. Who'stetter, one of the prominent academicians who supported the Safeguard project, said the study should deal with "professional standards and professional ethics and the responsibility of those who engage in operations research not to mislead . . . (the) lay public by distortion of facts . . ."

He urged that the study not focus on the merits of Safeguard and the ORSA committee says it followed his ad-

vice. It dealt only with "faulty professional practices" and was unanimous in its findings on the performance of Rathjens. Wiesner and others in the debate. But the organization's president, Robert E. Machol, said in an introduction to the findings that the committee was still "divided on the merits of "Safeguard."

Machol had one compliment to the scientists criticized by the ORSA committee. The country, he said, owes a "debt of gratitude" to all the "public-spirited men" who took part in the ABM debate.

ORSA founded in 1952. has about 8,000 members. They are employed by universities, private companies and the government. Their work involves observation, analysis and predictions about the workability of highly complex systems. The government is a major purchaser of their services.

The ORSA committee focused its study on one central issue in the Safeguard debate: Would the 1,000 U.S. Minuteman missiles be vulnerable to an attack by Soviet missiles without the protection of Safeguard?

On that point, the committee concluded that Rathjens, in his anti-Safeguard arguments, "ignored readily available classified material and used instead nonrelevant unclassified material in situations in which the more valid classified data would have substantially weakened his case."

Another conclusion was that Rathjens used a faulty method in arriving at an estimate of the numbers of individual warheads that could be carried by a single Soviet SS-9 missile. As a result, the committee said, Rathjens wound up "substantially underestimating the SS-9 delivery capability".

Other committee criticisms of Rathjens included a judgment that he overestimated the ability of Minuteman silos to withstand attack, that he used "invalid" techniques in estimating the effectiveness of Soviet missiles against U.S. missile silos and that he was over-optimistic in his estimates of how many U. S. missiles could survive a Soviet attack. Rathjens said in the debates that 25 per cent of the Minuteman missiles could survive an attack by 500 SS-9s without Safeguard. Wohlstetter, whose techniques were approved by the review committee, put the number at 5 per cent.

The committee criticized Wiesner of MIT for accusing the Defense Department's top scientist, Dr. John S. Foster, of having "altered" data to gain support for Safeguard.

Wiesner made the accusation at a Senate hearing on May 14, 1969. He said Foster at one point claimed that Soviets had only 500 SS-9 missiles and at another point raised the figure to 600.

The charge was unfair, the committee said, since Foster was talking about estimates for different years.

Wiesner and Dr. Steven Weinberg were further criticized for "ascribing official validity" to an estimate of the "kill probability of an SS-9 if they were used against Minuteman silos. The committee points out that the Pentagon provided a range of estimates and that some of them were higher than the one picked by the MIT scientists.

The criticism of Lapp, a popular author on scientific subjects, involved three matters. The committee said Lapp underestimated the number of multiple-warheads the Soviets would have and the reliability of their missiles. He also is accused of assigning a "grossly inefficient" targeting doctrine to Soviet war planners.

Wiesner, Rathjens and Weinberg, none of whom are ORSA members, were asked to comment on the report by the committee, but declined to do so. The three MIT scientists said they "found nothing in the report to cause us to change our views"—a outlined in a letter on Dec. 22 1969, at the outset of the project — "About the absurdity of the enterprise."

In their 1969 letter to ORSA, the MIT scientists maintained that the ABM debate could not be judged according to the standards of operations research, and that it was doubtful ORSA had the resources to carry out such an inquiry.

Such an inquiry, they maintained, would have to deal with the administration's shifting rationale for Safeguard, derivation of intelligence estimates, "and the possibility that it selectively released classified information to make its case."

The trio said that it is also important to find out "whether or not administration statements, regarding the threat to our total realignatory capability and Safeguard's effectiveness in countering any such threat, were misleading to the Congress and the public."

"We believe," the MIT group wrote in 1969, "that the ABM debate has been one of the most salutary developments in American political life." Such an inquiry as was then being proposed, they

214

wrote, "could well appear to
the nation as an ugly resur-
gence of those attacks on civil
liberties and dissent that were
far too common 15 years ago."

The committee, in its study,
did investigate Dr. Foster's
presentations and did criticize
the defense research chief for
using a type of model and a
set of data that tended to un-
derestimate the expected num-
ber of surviving Minutemen."
The net result of Foster's al-
leged errors, however did not
amount to much.

The seven-man ad hoc com-
mittee included four former
presidents of the ORSA.

Chairman was Thomas E.
Caywood of the Caywood-
Schiller Div. of A.T. Kerney &
Co. Other members, in addi-
tion to Berger, were Joseph
H. Engel, University of Chi-
cago; John F. Mazzee, Arthur
D. Little, Inc.; Hugh J. Miser,
University of Massachusetts;
and Robert M. Thrall, Rice
University.

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR 1 OCTOBER 1971

Alice in military budgetland

215

After two weeks of wrangling over the
$70 billion military procurement bill, and
more debate to come, the Senate has given
in on at least two highly debatable items.

The 64-to-21 vote for the antiballistic
Safeguard missile further deployment was
at least ironic. And in voting to build 48
Navy F-14 tactical aircraft, it may have
bought a turkey.

The Senate rejected an effort led by
anti-ABM forces that would have scut-
tled the $7.1 billion system. The irony of
the vote is twofold. First that it is the
Senate which has sturdily resisted the
White House-Pentagon penchant for nu-
clear weapons buildup in past years. And
second, that it was Sen. John Sherman
Cooper, a Kentucky Republican and long-
time foe of Safeguard, who came around
to the administration's way of thinking.
The White House argues this way: suc-
cess is close at hand in the strategic arms
limitation talks (SALT). The Russians
are close to agreeing to keep antiballistic
missile weaponry at a very low level of
deployment. Perhaps before year-end. So
keep the pressure on.

Senator Cooper bought that package
and sold it to his fellow senators. The
Armed Services Committee had already
cut the original administration's request
for $1.1 billion for four missile sites by
half, choosing instead to fully deploy two
existing sites in Montana and North Da-
kota.

There may be some merit in the argu-
ment that you have to buy more missiles
in order to have fewer of them, this being
the kind of Alice in Wonderland world
that it is. But we find it harder to justify
the F-14 item, even cut back as it was to
the minimum number of $800 million for
48 which the prime contract allows. Over
the decade that military tactical experts
have argued the merits and demerits of
the F-14, the original dubious premises
for its development have become even
more so. For one thing, it is supposed to
protect American aircraft carriers against
Soviet bombers and fighters, in the event
of a prolonged conventional war.

In the era of SALT, when both super-
powers are working to limit the spread of
nuclear weapons, the prospect of such a
conventional war becomes increasingly
remote, since each side fears that the
temptation for the other to push the nu-
clear button would prove too great.

In any case, many experts argue that
the main threat to an aircraft carrier, in
the dubious event of such a war, would
come from torpedoes or surface-to-surface
missiles, against which the F-14 is help-
less.

Finally, in its dual-function as a fighter
and launch-platform for the Phoenix (as
yet unperfected) missile, the $16.5 million
F-14 has sacrificed maneuverability and
speed, rendering it less effective as a
fighter than the F-4, which costs one quar-
ter the price.

Thus once again, it would appear, the
annual military procurement bill is being

used as the bottomless trough from which
the military procurers and suppliers feed,
while the public pays.

PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER 3 OCTOBER 1971

Senate Puts Up the ABM Chips
And the Diplomats Win a Hand

Secretary of State William P. Rogers and
Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei A. Gromyko
have signed two agreements described by a
top Administration official as "appetizers" to
the comprehensive curbs on strategic nuclear
arms which the U. S. and the Soviet Union
have been negotiating.

One of the agreements provides for an im-
proved "hot line," via communications satel-
lites, between the two countries. The other
sets up procedures whereby the two countries
would notify each other and act in concert
in the event of "accidental, unauthorized or
any other unexplained incident involving a
possible detonation of a nuclear weapon which
could create a risk of outbreak of nuclear
war."

The agreements are a healthy sign of pro-
gress toward a mutual goal. The main course,
though, is yet to come, and the cooking has
not been easy.

Concluding their fifth round of SALT talks in
Helsinki, negotiators for the two countries is-
sued a joint communique in which they de-
clared that "a clearer understanding was
achieved concerning issues to be resolved."
That is diplomatic language for saying that
the two sides are still far apart on the agoniz-
ingly complex matters before them.

Ideally, the U. S. and the Soviet Union
would stop the arms race where they are.
Realistically, neither will agree to that. For
understandable reasons, neither wants to con-
cede superiority to the other where it be-
lieves it is now inferior. The U. S., for example,

might accept a standstill arrangement on mis-
sile-firing submarines of which it has 41 to
the Soviet Union's 25. The Russians, trying to
catch up, balk at that but would be happy to
limit antiballistic missile systems, where they
are superior. The U. S., however, wants to
continue building its ABM capacity to counter
the Soviet lead in offensive intercontinental
ballistic missiles (Moscow, 1,500; Washington,
1,054).

The Nixon Administration has been pursuing
what it calls a "bargaining chip" strategy,
and the Senate, not with any great enthusiasm
but neither with particular reluctance, has
been going along.

Last week, with only a bare quorum present,
the Senate voted 39-12 to reject Sen. Hubert
H. Humphrey's amendment to freeze further
testing and deployment of MIRV offensive
warheads. A few days later, the Senate turned
down, by a decisive vote of 64-21, an amend-
ment offered by Sen. Harold E. Hughes of Iowa
to eliminate $748 million for continued deploy-
ment of Safeguard, but at only two sites rather
than the four requested by the Administration.
That vote, though, is in stark contrast with the
vote two years ago, when the Safeguard pro-
gram was kept in business by the margin of a
single vote.

Since the Senate has been notably cantan-
kerous, at least in the Administration's view,
on a number of other foreign policy issues, its
cooperation on this one is significant. In es-
sence, the Senate is saying that it will give
the Administration the chips but it expects
a successful outcome to the game.

217

of the Senate give the doves much chance
to make a respectable showing on any of
the issues involved.

Still, Proxmire can take some satisfac-
tion in knowing that it is harder to cut into
the defense budget these days because of
the efforts he and his colleagues have
made in the past. Before he even brought
the bill to the floor, chairman John Stennis
of the Armed Services Committee clipped
$1.1 billion from the Pentagon's request.
Knowing the Proxmire forces await, Sten-
nis makes sure he has a bill he can com-
fortably defend.

His defense can be fairly comfortable
now because of the SALT talks. Many of
the controversial budget items are those,
like the B-1, ULMS, and the ABM, that are
still principally in the development stage.
He can argue, as he did in defending the
B-1, that "we're all hopeful about SALT.
I'm not skeptical. But I know the amount
of money for this program will be a mere
mittance in value compared to what the
time element could be if things went
wrong in SALT and thereafter."

After all, according to the Stennis rea-
soning, if there is somehow a SALT agree-
ment before time runs out on the Penta-
gon's planning schedule, many of these de-
velopment programs can be scrapped. If
not, Melvin Laird will be asking Congress
for production decisions that will make
these costs seem insignificant. "The next
fiscal year is the big decision year," says
Senator Stennis.

219

WASHINGTON NEWS 7 October 1971

WASHINGTON POST 8 OCTOBER 1971 PAGE 1

ENGINE FELL OFF

# Pentagon kept quiet on C5A, Long charges

By MIKE MILLER

Scraps-Howard Staff Writer

The Pentagon delayed revealing that an engine had fallen off a C5A jumbo jet until after the Senate approved $472 million for the plane, Rep. Clarence Long, D-Md., said today.

Mr. Long said the Air Force announcement grounding seven of the huge planes was held back until a $21 billion weapons funds bill was thru the Senate. He said he would ask the General Accounting Office for a technical audit of the plane, which is the world's largest, and at $60 million each, the most expensive.

Air Force officials denied the delay was due to the Senate debate, which ended yesterday. They said the incident was publicized in Oklahoma when it happened on Sept. 29 and that they waited to put out a formal announcement at the Pentagon until they had preliminary information on the cause.

A preliminary investigation indicates failure the plane's aft pylon mount — the mechanism that is supposed to hold the engine to wing.

The Air Force said the C5A had taxied onto the runway at Altus AFB and the crew was applying full power when the outer engine on the left wing fell to the pavement. The crew then shut off power. A small fire developed from spilled fuel and oil but was quickly extinguished. There were no injuries.

The Air Force said engineers previously had identified the aft pylon mounts as susceptible to fatigue and issued orders last month to have them reinforced. But the modifications had not yet been made.

In addition, the Air Force last month inspected the mounts in all C5As with considerable flying time, including the plane which lost the engine at Altus, but found no defects.

A Lockheed spokesman said the C5A aft pylon mount is produced by the Rohr Corp. of California, a sub-contractor, but that Lockheed designed the mechanism and is responsible for any design deficiency.

The C5A involved in the incident had logged almost 1,300 flying hours and made more than 3,000 landings. Seven other C5As with comparable flying hours and landing totals have been grounded until new pylons are installed, the Air Force said.

The cost overrun on the C5A almost drove the contractor, Lockheed Aircraft Corp., into bankruptcy before Congress approved in August a bill to authorize the government to back $60 million loan to the company.

The Air Force's original C5A program called for 120 of the planes for an estimated $3.2 billion. But faced with a $2 billion overrun on the contract, the Defense Department cut the order to 81 C5As for an estimated $4.5 billion. In addition, Lockheed is being forced to take a $200 million fixed loss on its C5A work.

# Pentagon Explains Delay In C-5A Mishap Disclosure

By Michael Getler

Washington Post Staff Writer

The Air Force has grounded most of its giant C-5A jet transports after an accident Sept. 29 at Altus AFB, Okla., in which an engine fell from one of the planes preparing to take off.

On Wednesday—a week after the mishap—the Air Force belatedly announced the accident in Washington and said that seven of the planes had been grounded. Yesterday, the Pentagon said that 22 more of the 41 operational C-5As were being kept out of the air as a safety precaution pending more tests.

The announcement yesterday was made by Pentagon spokesman Jerry W. Friedheim, instead of the Air Force.

Friedheim, apologizing to newsmen for the delay in disclosing the incident here, said that the Defense Department's top-ranking civilian officials responsible for keeping the public informed also had not been told of the accident by the Air Force, until a press inquiry Wednesday forced the news out.

The disclosure in Washington of the incident involving the costly and controversial plane brought quick charges from Rep. Clarence Long (D-Md.) that the Pentagon intentionally held up the news here until after the $21 billion military procurement authorization bill—which includes $472 million for the C-5A—had passed the Senate Wednesday.

Friedheim strongly denied the charges, claiming "there was no intention to withhold information." Friedheim said the Air Force made a public statement about the accident at Altus on Sept. 29 but because of some foul-up, the information was not made known to top Pentagon offi-

CIAIS.

Friedheim also pointed out that there still were several congressional votes that had to be taken before the Pentagon got its final appropriations bill through Congress.

The Pentagon spokesman described the accident, in which one of the plane's four engines tore loose at full power, as "spectacular." Indicating that it must have attracted considerable attention at Altus. This apparently prompted the Air Force release of information in Oklahoma.

At the briefing, Friedheim said that the Pentagon's top public affairs official, Assistant Secretary of Defense Daniel Z. Henkin, "yesterday directed that a release be made across-the-board here within an hour after he first learned of the C-5 situation."

Air Force officials said they had no estimate of the cost to replace the pylons that hold each engine to the wings. A total of 81 C-5As, which cost almost $60 million each and which have suffered other technical problems, are scheduled to be built by Lockheed.

"The Air Force said it hoped to absorb the cost within the existing total of $4.57 billion for the C-5A program, but officials noted that the C-5A contract with Lockheed recently has been restructured on a cost-plus basis so that any added expenses have to be paid by the government.

A spokesman for Lockheed yesterday said its engineers previously had notified the Air Force that the engine mountings were "an area of potential weakness" and proposed a structural change to strengthen them.

The Lockheed warning reportedly came last summer. The Air Force made inspections early in September of those C-5As that had accumulated a lot of flight time and said it found no faults. But the Air Force says that about Sept. 20 it ordered a go-ahead for modifications required to strengthen the engine mounts. No grounding order was issued, however, and the Altus accident took place before the work was started.

221

U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT 11 OCTOBER 1971 (6)

222

FIRST SIGNS OF UPTURN
IN DEFENSE SPENDING

The slide in U. S. defense spending
has come to a halt. For the first time in
three years, the country's over-all mili-
tary budget is on the rise.

This turnabout comes even though
costs of fighting the Vietnam war are
still declining sharply-down an esti-
mated 4.3 billion dollars in the current
year.

Inflation, it appears, has eaten up the
entire amount that was predicted/
would come with the winding down of
the war.

Defense spending reached a peak at
78.7 billion dollars in 1969. Total mili-
tary outlays in the year that ended last
June 30 were down to 75.5 billion.

Now, instead of a further drop, the
budget for this year will be up by at
least 500 million dollars.

Three main factors are responsible-

*   Inflation. The military budget for the current fiscal year that started July 1, although officially estimated at 76 billion dollars, will have only about the same buying power as the 50.8 billion pent eight years ago. Military hardware missiles, aircraft, electronic gear, ships -carries increasingly higher price tags. A nuclear carrier currently under construction may cost 1 billion dollars.

* Skyrocketing payrolls. Five military pay raises since mid-1968 have increased average basic pay of servicemen by 57 per cent. Now, another 7 to 8 per cent increase is scheduled for next July 1.

*   Less congressional resistance. The Pentagon's requests for research and development funds for "big ticket" items -items that will become more and more costly as work progresses-are having a much easier time than usual on Capitol Hill.

Charts on these pages show the sharp
cutbacks in military buying since 1968.
After that time, more than 1.1 million
defense-plant jobs evaporated. Prime
military contracts plummeted 8.6 billion
dollars in three years. California, Texas
and Connecticut each lost more than 1
billion dollars in defense work. Almost
every section of the country felt the
belt-tightening.

Now the built-in inflation is catching
up fast. Defense Department payrolls
and related costs, such as subsistence
pay for quarters, are eating up half the
military budget. The most recent pay
increase, a record 2.4 billion dollars an-
mally, takes effect November 14.

Thus, while the over-all budget is up,
there is still no brisk pickup showing
in defense orders.

For the current year, the Defense De-
partment again proposes to spend slight-
ly less to buy new hardware and only
slightly more than last year on research
and development.

The Pentagon's original request for
22.2 billions was trimmed to 21 billions
by Senate committee action.

As considered by the U. S. Senate,
these are the provisions for some of the
major weapons systems-

*   Missiles: 1.1 billion dollars for Safe-
    guard antimissile missiles. Funds would
    provide full deployment of ABM's at
    Grand Forks Air Force Base in North
    Dakota and at Malmstrom Air Force
    Base at Great Falls, Mont., and for site
    preparation at two other bases, White-
    man near Kansas City, Mo., and Warren
    at Cheyenne, Wyo. Another 1 billion
    will be used to modernize Minuteman
    missiles, the backbone of the U. S. stra-
    tegic force.

Also, 103 millions would go into re-
search and development of an undersea
long-range missile system.

* Ships: 3 billions for 15 new vessels and modernization of nine present ships, plus conversion of submarines from Po- laris to multiwarhead Foseidon missiles.

*   Aircraft: 485.7 millions for the
    F-111A long-range-fighter-bomber pro-
    gram: 396 millions for continuing work
    on C-5A cargo supertransports; 801.6
    millions for 48 Navy F-14A fighters;
    370.3 millions for development, but not
    production, of the B-1 strategic bomber;
    17 millions for prototypes of AX close-
    support planes with air-to-ground mis-
    siles. 102 millions for 30 Harrier V/-
    STOL (vertical-short take-off and land-
    ing planes for the Marines.

A SHARP RISE IN MANPOWER COSTS

While outlays for hardware have been scaled back, the Pentagon payroll and related costs are soaring. In the last three years, such spending climbed from 32.6 billions to 38.4 billions, now accounts for more than half the defense budget—despite a reduction of 1 million military and civilian jobs.

AND: Pentagon officials predict that with continuing inflation and the need to raise pay to attract an all-volunteer Army, manpower costs will continue to rise sharply in years ahead.

["WALL STREET JOURNAL - 12 OCTOBER 1971 P-18", "223", "Military Flypast in the\nSenate", "Debate ended and the Senate passed the $21 billion military procurement bill more or less in tact last week. In truth, the whole affair was rather like a flypast of Pentagon authorizations, with a handful of senators occasionally shaking their fist at the various weapons systems roaring by. The new B-1 manned strategic bomber, the F-14 Navy fighter plane, the ABM, the main battle tank or XM803—these were among the controversial items that easily survived attempts at elimination or modification by amendment.", "It is not necessary to have endorsed all of these efforts—or any of them, for that matter—to perceive that what was only recently billed as the issue for the seventies, a great debate over priorities and defense spending, has pretty much gone the way of the hula hoop. On the part of a number of senators who just a few years back had made a loud and dramatic commitment to the issue, interest was low, absenteeism high, and preparation for debate piti ful. Sen. Proxmire and those others who carried the main burden deserved much better from their colleagues.", "Why didn't they get it? Apart from political fickleness—a kind of issue-of-the-month club approach to things—a number of reasons have been put forth. One is that at a time of painful unemployment, the legislators had little appetite for casting votes to terminate defense industry contracts. Another, which is a little too delicately flowerish for our taste, holds that after their initial defeats two years running on the Safeguard authorization, the bloc of interested and critical legislators simply did not have the heart to go on with other challenges to the military. There is, in addition, the fact that fulltime work on headbreaking detail is required if anyone is to make a sensible challenge to various parts of the Pentagon budget, just as it is required (and undertaken) by those defending that budget. In our view all this may explain the lassitude and indifference in the Senate this year, but it does little to justify either.", "There are, however, some built-in impediments to making prudent decisions on this subject in the Senate and to translating such decisions into a majority vote. These have to do with the budgetary process itself, and if one looks at the principal arguments in support of some of the more questionable projects that were funded this year, one begins to see how that process tends to control the Congress—instead of the other way around.", "As it seems, it is always either too soon (the B-1) or too late (the F-14) for Congress to exercise a restraining influence on any given weapons system. Cautious and relatively cheap research and development on some project that could be critical to our defense can hardly be opposed at the beginning. Then, in all but imperceptible yearly stages, the project develops into a major investment and one that is passionately defended by the service involved. To abandon it outright would be a shameful waste, it is argued. Merely to delay it (the argument goes on) would be to kill it, since the technological ", "team" would be dispersed; besides, it would cost more, not less, if procurement occurred at a later date. Recent studies (generally made by the service itself) demonstrate good new results. It is", "Consider Sen. McIntyre's defense of the B-1. While conceding that he had himself, in committee hearings, been partial to the idea of a cheaper alternative (a refitted B-52), the Senator disclosed that he had not been able to wring any concession from the Air Force that the alternative would actually do the job. \"I cannot take my intuition,\" he went on to explain, \"and jump.\" Again, the tough-minded members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which brought the bill to the floor, repeatedly issued stern warnings in their report that this or that recommendation for an expenditure of funds did not necessarily imply a commitment to a program, and they also lamented the *fait accompli*, \"no choice but this\" manner in which various proposals came before them. Surely the Armed Services Committee is entitled to more confidence that provisional funding will not automatically turn into \"no alternative\" program commitment. And surely Sen. McIntyre should not be obliged to choose between \"intuition\" and Air Force assertions in weighing the merits of a costly Air Force proposal.", "In our estimation, the best recommendation for changing the odds in this annual encounter was one which most of these senators voted against when it was presented as an amendment by Sen. Gaylord Nelson. Sen. Nelson would have compelled Congress to view the military budget in more or less the same timeframe that the military does—namely, on a five year basis. He observed that by the time the Senate gets around to voting on various programs, the Pentagon is already well into the next year's budget, that the military works on five year projections of its own, and that until the relevant committees of Congress organize themselves to think in terms of long range threats and possibilities and needs (as distinct from the bits and pieces approach to various weapons) they will never be able to assert an effective degree of control over the Pentagon budget they are meant to supervise. The opposition argued that the work involved would be monstrous and that it would require too much crystal ball predicting. We think the work would be manageable and worth it: so far as the predicting is concerned, we have never observed much shyness on either side of Pentagon budget disputes in the Congress in matters involving future threats, future costs, or future technological achievements. Why not try to make the estimates and prognostications on which Congress operates now a little less idiosyncratic and a little more systematic?", "Sen. Nelson's idea should be reintroduced as separate legislation and given another try. We would recommend it especially to those legislators whose interest in the whole affair has been flagging. It would mean a lot more work, but it would provide the prospect of real results—for those who wish to do more than inveigh against our skewed priorities."]

224

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR

15 OCTOBER 1971

Perspective on weapons

This newspaper believes that in an im-
perfect world, which this one still is, the
United States serves itself, its friends,
and its allies best by being suitably armed
against any unfriend who might otherwise
be tempted to upset the considerable sta-
bility which happily does exist now.

But being "suitably" armed is a matter
of interpretation.

We admire the Pentagon admirals and
generals for the imagination they expend
on devising new weapons systems and the
diligence with which they extract moneys
for such weapons from a bemused Con-
gress. That's what we civilians pay them
to do.

But it is wise to try always to keep
these matters in perspective. Otherwise
the entire income of the U.S. Treasury
would go to the armed services with noth-
ing for any other branch of government.

Right now, in its laudable enthusiasm
for new appropriations, the Pentagon is
making it sound as though the Russians
are forging fast ahead of the U.S. in num-
bers and types of nuclear weapons and in
sea power. To read the headlines the in-
nocent bypasser would be tempted to
think that the U.S. is already a mere sec-
ond-class military power on the way to
sinking to a third-rate level.

We are worried about what the Vietnam
war has done to the morale and efficiency
of the U.S. Army and we applaud the can-
dor and concern on this subject of its
Chief of Staff, General Westmoreland. But
when it comes to missiles and sea power,
it is in order to call attention to one fact
which usually gets omitted from the
Pentagon presentations.

During 1971 the Air Force and the Navy
began fitting MIRV warheads to their
long-range nuclear weapons. A MIRV is a
"multiple independently targetable re-
entry vehicle." That means that each war-
head packs at least three different blows
which can be aimed at at least three dif-
ferent targets. And, so far as we yet know,

the Russians have not solved the problem
of the MIRV.

So, the biggest change in the strategic
balance of power in 1971 has not been the
increase in the number of missile mounts
in Russia or in the number of Russian mis-
sile-bearing submarines, but in the pro-
liferation of blows which the U.S. can
strike at Russia — or anyone else it
chooses.

This means that until and unless Russia
can come up with its own MIRV or some-
thing else which will multiply the num-
ber of blows it can throw, it is falling
behind.

The Russians today do have more in-
tercontinental missiles mounted in silos in
the ground than does the U.S. It is also
building nuclear armed submarines faster
than is-the U.S. But there would have to
be three times as many with single war-
heads to equal the U.S. present number
with MIRVs. The Russians are not going
up in numbers that fast. Besides, it is the
avowed, although not explicitly declared,
policy of the Nixon administration to let
the Russians catch up with the long lead
previously held by the U.S. Mr. Nixon
wants "sufficiency" — not "parity" or
"superiority." It is not at all necessary to
have more missiles in order to have a
"sufficiency," Quality can be far more im-
portant than quantity.

As for sea power. The U.S. Navy badly
needs some updating. It is oversupplied
with obsolete or obsolescent types of
ships, short on small, modern vessels able
to toss long-range surface to surface
missiles.

But to a large degree this is their own
fault. The admirals of today have clung
too long to the big aircraft carrier just as
the admirals of the 1930's clung too long
to the battleship.

Had they given up carriers in favor of
small boats they would today have as
modern a fleet as the Russians. They
didn't, and don't.

Washington

The Nixon administration has decided to try to forestall cutbacks in several key military areas for at least another year.

The new budget to be forwarded to Congress in January will reflect the administration's current resolve to keep some of the more visible manifestations of military power at current levels. Cutbacks will still be in process, but the administration wants desperately to maintain a viable appearance in American conventional forces.

As a result, reliable informants say, these key decisions have been made:

* Total Army divisional strength is to be maintained at 13 divisions despite budgetary pressures and the judgment of the civilian hierarchy in the Pentagon that more drastic cuts would have to be made.

* The Navy aircraft-carrier force is to be maintained at 16 carriers the level authorized for the end of the current fiscal year. This represents at least temporary halt in the downward slide of aircraft-carrier strength evident over the past several years.

* Congress will be asked to approve initial funding for another nuclear carrier, to bring the total afloat or under construction to four. In. Elmo R. Zumwalt, Chief of Naval Operations, has sold his bosses on the usefulness of two nuclear carriers stationed on each coast, so there would always be available on each coast a nuclear carrier with nuclear escorts capable of immediate, high-speed deployment in crisis.

## Speedy action sought

The Navy is eager for Congress to go along with the request this year, for cost now is estimated in excess of $900 million. Another year's delay will cause the cost projections for the fourth carrier to break a billion dollars. Some Navy officials are fearful that the cost breakthrough might cause further defections from the ranks of supporters, and there are few enUGH back- ers as it is.

Last year, the defense leadership refused to back funding for the new carrier. Now the Navy has at least nominal backing. Much will depend on the level of support by Secretary of Defense Melvir R. Laird and the White House. In the past, the National Security Council staff has evidenced substantial coolness to the proposal.

The decision to stick to 13 Army divisions represents an interesting study in how decisions can be made in Washington. According to sources, Mr. Laird and his assistants had gone over the proposed budget and said that it would be necessary to chop one divisional total possibly down to Gen. William C. Westmoreland, Army Chief of Staff, was arguing steadfastly for 13 but the Navy, the Pentagon was running

## Staffers back request

for a $100 million budget at the White House.

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR

19 OCTOBER 1971 P-1

# U.S. wary on military cutbacks

nowever, the Westmoreland position was backed by the President's national security adviser, Dr. Henry A. Kissinger, and other White House staffers. So, the President decided to support the higher level.

Both Mr. Laird and Mr. Kissinger would like to see Army strength rise. However, Mr. Laird, who is acutely attuned to congressional thought on the defense budget, sees a very real need to keep the defense budget and the force supported at a level that can be approved by Congress without too much trouble.

Mr. Laird's understanding of what the Congress will agree to without great quibble and what it will not has been demonstrated rather strongly this year. The defense request of about $76 billion now is moving through Congress with some cuts, but relatively unscathed in most key areas.

For Mr. Laird, manpower cuts represented the best way to realize speedy savings in defense spending. The greatest spending flexibility is in money for operations — in fuel, ammunition, sortie rates — and in funds for people.

While the Vietnam war was at a high level in terms of American involvement, the secretary had a great deal of monetary leeway by virtue of discretionary authority over battlefield spending. But with the

American withdrawal nearing its final phases, that leeway is vanishing, leaving only manpower as a source of fast savings.

Thus, defense planners scheduled further manpower cuts next year to about the 2.3 million level, with the strong possibility of getting down to the 2 million level in another year or so. For the Army, the further cutbacks could have meant a division level of 11. But now, with the decision made to keep to 13 divisions, some more men than originally envisioned will be required, although the decision also may be made to spread the manpower somewhat thinner than would otherwise have been necessary.

In backing the higher total, the White House undoubtedly has been deeply concerned with the ramifications of the continuing American retrenchment overseas. There was a strong feeling among some planners that the American commitments would simply not be viable with further substantial decreases in ground-troop strength.

Expenditures for Vietnam are being offset by equipment purchases and manpower cost increases.

The struggle toward a volunteer Army could add billions to the annual defense bill

226

CHICAGO DAILY NEW. 20 OCT 71 (21)

Taking off on a
wing and a dole

227

By William McGaffin

Of Our Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON — An embarrassing thing happened to the Air Force the other day. An engine fell off one of its giant new C-5A cargo planes as it was preparing to take off.

This was only the latest defect to turn up in the controversial plane, a product of Lockheed Aircraft Corp. To Sen. William Proxmire (D-Wis.), who revealed that the C-5A was going to cost $2 billion more than originally estimated, it was the last straw.

"The C-5A, with its cracked wings, its engines and wheels that fall off, its missing parts, landing gear that doesn't work and numerous other deficiencies, is one of the greatest rip-offs of the public treasury in defense contract history," he declared.

"What is worse is that under the present contract, the public must pay the cost of correcting every one of Lockheed's bonehead fumbles."

THE DISTRESSING THING TO Proxmire and other knowledgeable critics of the military is that the C-5A, in their judgment, is not an isolated instance of taxpayers' money going down the drain on Pentagon goofs.

Two years ago, Congress and the American public became incensed when they finally began to realize that huge sums were being squandered on weapons systems that consistently fell far short both in cost and performance.

For the first time, the critics were able to register with their charge that national security was only one of the reasons for the lavish annual spending of public money. Equally important, if not more so, was the role defense spending played as a kind of giant WPA program that produced profits and jobs.

However, the new managers who took over at the Pentagon when the White House changed tenants in 1969 pledged that they were not going to perpetuate this wasteful system. They were going to institute reforms which would restore sense and economy to the Pentagon puzzle palace.

Two and a half years later, however, they still are carrying on with the problem-plagued weapons systems they inherited from their predecessors — the C-5A, the F-111, the Mark 48 torpedo, to name a few.

INSTEAD OF THE PROMISED reforms, say the critics, the new civilian chiefs have let the services continue in the old rut of developing weapons that will cost too much and will be obsolete or ineffective in any event when they finally are built — for example, the F-14 Navy fighter, the Safeguard antiballistic missile network, and the main battle tank.

"I cannot see any fundamental improvements that they have made," said Ernest Fitzgerald. "The only thing they have done is return to the old cost-plus contracting system of the 1950s and promulgate some slogans like 'fly before you buy.'"

"The new administration, Fitzgerald contended, "is unwilling to take the steps that must be taken to get costs down."

He speaks from the vantage point of a man who for years had an inside view of the Pentagon. He was deputy for the current staff of the Air Force until he stuck his脚 out and tested in a proximistic hearing that the C-5A is going to cost an extra $2 billion. That damaging disclosure so angered the Air Force it fired him.

A consultant to Proxmire's Joint Economic Commission recommended that he get into trouble during his role as the Pentagon's acting acting "should cost" consul

tem of weapons contracting "I was never able to get a bureaucrats to buy that," he said.

In the case of the C-5A, he said, what the new administration did was to tear up the old contract with Lockheed and replace it with a cost-plus contract. "Lockheed will not be penalized for its failures," he said. "They will give Lockheed whatever money it needs and will get from Lockheed what the company chooses to produce. The contractor has very little business incentive to do better."

STAGGERING SUMS ARE INVOLVED in the production of the new weapons. Forty-three C-5As have been made to date with 38 more to come. The bill for the 81 planes will come to $4.57 billion — plus whatever Lockheed charges to fix the engine mountings so that more engines don't fall off.

Fitzgerald faults this biggest plane ever built (only 18 yards shorter than a football field) not only for its runaway costs but because it has failed to meet some of its original specifications. He noted, for example, that the Air Force no longer required the plane to be able to land on dirt runways. "It cannot do it because it is too flimsily built," said Fitzgerald.

"This is a case of specifications meeting the plane — not of the plane meeting the specifications."

The F-111, made by General Dynamics, a swing-wing jet fighter which became the subject of a congressional investigation, will cost about $8 billion for 526 planes. "The McClellan Committee report on this was devastating," Fitzgerald recalled. "It said the plane is supposed to be a fighter but it could not outperform a commercial airliner with a full bomb load."

## F-14 vs. Soviet MIG

The F-14, produced by Grumman Aircraft Corp., is a new fighter which the Navy wants for its aircraft carriers. "This is a big turkey just like the F-111," Fitzgerald said. "It can not climb as high as the MIG 23 and it cannot maneuver with the MIG 21 at low levels."

He downgraded it, in addition, because its costs are running away. The Russians build a MIG 21 for only $560,000 while a MIG 23 or "Foxbat," their newest fighter, only costs an estimated $5 million, he said. But the F-14 will cost, according to present calculation, $16.7 million.

THE NAVY ORIGINALLY planned to buy 710 of them for $8.377 billion but when the costs got out of hand it cut the order down to 301 with the cost estimated at $5,212 billion. Another problem with the F-14, Fitzgerald observed, is that the Phoenix air-to-air missile it will carry to help guard the fleet apparently will not work as advertised — despite Navy assertions to the contrary.

"The Navy was not supposed to start producing the F-14 until a prototype had been flown but it got around this by the device of persuading the House Appropriation Committee to secretly reprogram some funds to get it under production," said Fitzgerald. "This was done in a closed door session of the committee in March, 1970. By the time it became public knowledge in September, 1970, it was too late to stop it."

## A runaway torpedo

The Mark 48 torpedo has been under development since 1964 and, according to Fitzgerald, holds the all-time record for runaway costs. Its supporters in Congress now estimate it will cost a total of $2.5 billion but Fitzgerald estimates it will be $4 billion. "It is years late and still not entirely satisfactory," he said.

The Safeguard ABM system, which the administration insisted on building although the Senate came within one vote of defeating it, is a waste of money, Fitzgerald contended. "Even if it worked, a potential enemy could easily defeat it," he said. Congress so far has authorized $3.7 billion on it and if it follows through with a four-site program the bill will come to $7.1 billion.

WASHINGTON POST 25 OCTOBER 1971 (26)

229

Pentagon Is Winning
To Senate Budget War

By George C. Wilson

Washington Post Staff Writer

Sen. Allen Joseph Ellender, the cost-conscious farmer-lawyer from Montegut, La., who is chairman of the influential Senate Appropriations Committee, threw down his hands in a gesture of frustration and ex-claimed: "I'm regusted."

Then, going beyond the immediate question of why amendments to cut Pentagon spending had been beaten so badly this year, Ellender hastened to add that the battle is far from over, that recent weeks' lop-sided Senate floor votes favoring the Pentagon's authorization request are only the first skirmish.

Ellender predicted that his committee, which hinders the bills actually appropriating the money the Defense Department will get could cut from $2 billion to $1 billion from the Pentagon's request for $78.7 billion in new money for the fiscal year ending next June 30.

Such talk will doubtless put the Pentagon's budget men at battle stations again. But it does not explain why the Defense Department appears to have gained the high ground in its annual budget battle on the Senate floor.

Nor does it explain the apparent contradiction in the fact that these Defense Department victories come at a time when its Senate critics actually possess more evidence than before of seeming Pentagon mismanagement—such as flaws in the C-5A transport plane and rising costs of the F-14 fighter.

Some examples of how things have changed.

* From a heated debate and a 50-to-50 tie vote in Congress over whether to build

Safetyguard antiballistic missile (ABM) system, the Senate went to a cursory vote on a 64-to-21 vote in favor of the system ten years.

* The amendment sponsored by Sen. Charles E. R.MD. and Sen. Proxmire (D-Wis).

to $68 billion in fiscal 1972 failed on a 63-to-24 vote.

* Sen. George McGovern (D-S.D.) lost on a voice vote in his latest attempt to shoot down the Air Force's new bomber, the B-1.

* Proxmire, in what he termed his "biggest heartbeat by far because we made such a good case for it," was defeated 28-to-61 on his amendment to cancel the Navy F-14 fighter program.

* Sen. Thomas F. Eagleton (D-Mo.). after three years of documenting the case against the Army's Main Battle Tank, lost 51-to-42 on an amendment to reduce its funding from $62.8 million to $27.5 million.

* Sen. Hubert Humphrey (D-Minn.) barely mustered a quorum in losing 39-to-12 on an amendment to hold Fiscal 1972 money for the multiple-headed missile known as MIRV in escrow until President Nixon and the Congress determined that the Soviet Union was testing and deploying MIRV or building an ABM defense that threatened the U.S. ofense.

Little Progress Noted

In short, the voting this year indicated little progress in the Senate effort to curb or cancel Pentagon weapons projects, with the ABM result the most dramatic comparison. Even the identical amendment offered by Sen. Harold E. Hughes (D-Iowa) to delete ABM money for deployment lost ground between last year and this. It went down by a vote of 62-to-33 in 1970, or less than two-to-one, and by 64-to-21 this year, or three-to-one.

Senators and their aides give several explanations for the slowing of the anti-Pentagon effort.

"They argue that the Senate Armed Services Committee, which this year authorized $1.2 billion less than the Defense Department requested, is doing a more critical job than it did in prior years.

"They know we're really

we're not just going through a pro forma exercise," said Committee Chairman John Stennis (D-Miss.).

Job Element

Another explanation offered is that rising unemployment makes it politically harder to cancel Pentagon projects that mean thousands of jobs.

"The labor people are getting tougher and tougher," said Sen. Henry M. Jackson (D-Wash.), a defender of many of the military programs under challenge. He added that the widening conviction that the Soviet buildup is a real threat strengthens labor's argument.

Still another factor is the prospect of success at the strategic arms limitation talks (SALT), which has made Senators reluctant to deny President Nixon "bar-gaining chips" like the ABM, which he insists he needs for the negotiations with the Russians.

Sen. John Sherman Cooper (R.-Ky.) said this argument caused him to switch his vote to support the ABM this year after sponsoring an amendment to stop its deployment in previous years.

"I did not want to alter the situation when I believed there was a possibility and a probability of an agreement on the limitation of the Safeguard ABM in the United States and the Soviet counterpart," Cooper said in an interview.

"My firm conclusion was that the most important thing was to get this ABM agreement this year so we could move forward to determine if it is possible to reach agreement on offensive systems to stop the arms race. Otherwise, we are in a race which will become more and more difficult to control."

The winding down of the Vietnam war combined with the Senate's focus this year on the draft also affected the votes by taking emotional steam out of the drive to trim military projects.

"The Senate can take on only one battle at a time," said one dispirited staffer

on Pentagon budgets.

At the same time, the Soviet military threat has become more visible because it has taken the form of an expanding, Navy-something that is more convincing than preview unverifiable statements about numbers of missiles.

More Pressure

Finally, President Nixon and his administration leaders are putting increased pressure on Senate Republicans to support the Pentagon's budget request.

"When you can get 15 Republican votes," said a Senate defense specialist who worked on the military budget-cutting effort, "you're in the ball park. Then you can get other senators to go along because there is a good chance of winning. But getting Republicans on board was tougher this year."

As Ellender made clear the Pentagon cannot consider its budget safe from further trimmings, despite its victory on many of the Senate amendments. Even so, senators who zeroed in on military projects this year believe they must become more effective in the future.

"Our failure this year was the failure to relate the military programs to our foreign policy," said Sen. Mark Hatfield (R-Ore.) who chaired the Members of Congress for Peace Through Law, a bipartisan coalition trying to curb the arms race.

"We haven't, for example, really examined our commitment to NATO and how much money goes into it.

Task Ahead

"What we will have to do in the future," continued Hatfield, "is to go one step further and create an even more complex structure than our present group to relate the military projects to our foreign policy.

"We at least have to get the questions asked—he said—such as. What have we actually done to implement the Nixon Doctrine? How has it been implemented into military spending programs?"

Proxmire, as another leader of the Peace Through Law group, seemed led by

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drive against specific projects in the Pentagon budget.

"We ran into this funny attitude." Proxmire said, that if you have all these aerospace plants open, why not use them? It is very hard to get through to my colleagues that it is an either-or proposition—domestic programs versus military spending. They still think they can have both without limiting either.

## Higher Tax Angle

"But," Proxmire argued, "the message will really get tough in 1974 or 1975, when it will become apparent that we either have to impose much higher taxes to do both or cut back on our military spending."

Another disadvantage encountered by him and his allies, Proxmire said, is that the Pentagon withholds from Congress embarrassing information—like the en-

gine falling out of the C5A—at a time when it could have affected Senate votes.

Despite the setbacks on the roll call votes, Proxmire said he will keep battling to trim military spending. "I'm in office until 1976," he said with a grin.

Sen. Stuart Symington (D-Mo.), a member of the Senate Armed Services and Central Intelligence Agency committees, agreed that lack of full information hinders the lawmakers as they challenge administration projects and activities.

"We are kept too much in the dark on what the CIA as well as the Pentagon is actually doing," Symington said.

Sen. Cooper suggested that a joint congressional committee with full access to military information might help.

Sen. Mathias said he fa-

vors some kind of defense "think tank" for Congress, perhaps a special branch of the Legislative reference Service in the Library of Congress.

"We're getting to the point," Mathias said, "where we really need to beef up the professional and expert arm of the Congress to give us independent, objective advice on the nature of weapons systems, the effectiveness of them, the mission they would accomplish."

## 365-Degree Problem

Beyond arming itself better for what is now an unfair fight with the Pentagon, Mathias said, "Congress has to see that providing for the common defense—as is our duty under the Constitution — is a 365-degree problem."

"It is providing for defense in a military sense with adequate weapons sys-

tems. It is providing for defense in the economic field so that you don't let your concentration on weapons systems totally debilitate the economy.

"And," Mathias continued, "it is providing for the common defense in the area of the kind of morale and the kind of confidence and the kind of steadiness in the population which — as we have been observing in the Vietnam war — is an essential ingredient to any kind of defense policy."

"If there is any function given to the federal government and to the Congress," said Mathias, "it is to provide for the common defense. And if we delegate that authority and just shrug our shoulders and say we don't know — "Go ahead and buy it—what is there left really within our constitutional scope of duty?"