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United States............................................................................................... 1036
Natural Resources Not Limitless—Senate Charges Manpower Waste—Plans Made to Utilize Military Manpower—Air Force Reveals Air Reconnaissance—Military Limited to One Catalogue—
Lay Keel of U.S.S. Forrestal
U.S.S.R............................................................................................................ 1039
Soviet Collectives Miss Their Goals—Internal Crisis Suspected—
Soviet Demands Voice in Antarctic—Russian People Resent Their Government
Other Countries............................................................................................. 1044
Sweden Begins Baltic Maneuvers—British Comment on American Alert
Human Relations in Engineering—Navy Demonstrates New Lifeboat—Fastest Gulf Stream Current Measured—Pictorial Computer for Air Navigation
Strong Carrier Force Is Urged—Water-Based Aircraft Assume New Role
UNITED STATES
America's Natural Resources Not Limitless
New York Times, July 3.—The gradual transformation of the United States from a “have” to a “have-not” nation is a fundamental factor, which the platform architects at the Republican National Convention in Chicago would do well to stress, in the formulation of American military strategy and foreign policy.
A recent report, a document of tremendous importance to the nation’s future that forecasts basic changes in our lives, emphasizes that the riches of the American earth are no longer sufficient to support us. As President Truman put it on Tuesday, the report of his Materials Policy Commission shows “that in the past decade the United States has changed from a net exporter to a net importer of materials and projects an increasing dependence on imports for the future.”
The United States, in other' words, has passed the great divide—and the riches of our land are no longer sufficient to supply most of our needs. Our vaunted self-sufficiency has gone with the years, just as our vaunted invulnerability to attack has disappeared with ocean-girdling planes, long- range, guided missiles and snorkel submarines.
Cannot Be Arrested
From a “have” nation, rich in natural resources, we are becoming a “have-not” nation, dependent in part or wholly upon sources beyond our frontiers for the uranium, columbium, oil, minerals and other products essential to an industrialized economy.
Our increased dependence upon foreign resources can be delayed by more efficient and more rapid exploitation of our own resources, by the development of substitutes and synthetics and by technological developments. But our increasing need for raw materials outside our own borders cannot be arrested and can be offset only in part by any action we can take.
The old adage, so obvious to some Americans but tacitly disputed by others, that the United States needs the world is becoming more and more true in an economic sense, and this means that what the political scientist Brooks Emeny has dubbed “The Strategy of Raw Materials” will become a more and more dominant factor in the formation of a sound politico-military policy.
General of the Army Dwight D. Eisenhower seems to have the Republican Presidential aspirants at least—has interpreted the meaning of this development correctly in military terms. In a recent letter to John Foster Dulles on the Republican foreign policy plank which Mr. Dulles is shaping, General Eisenhower said that “any thought of retiring within our own borders will certainly lead to disaster for the U.S.A.” The general said:
“America cannot live alone . . . The minimum requirement ... is that we are able to trade freely, in spite of anything Russian may do, with those areas from which we obtain the raw materials that are vital to our country . . . Our programs will not satisfy our minimum requirement unless they protect us and the areas in which we are concerned from both kinds of aggression—that is, military and political.”
Air Power is Not Enough
Translated into terms of military strategy and policy, the corollary to this is clean. General Eisenhower has spelled it out in general, though not specific, terms. A “destructive retaliatory force” in the form of air power and atomic bombs is by no means enough. How can bombs dropped on Moscow protect Turkish manganese or Swedish iron ore from Communist political and economic conquest or a Korean-type military conquest by proxy?
Obviously strong air power is essential as a deterrent threat, but it is not enough. Control of the seas, which means control of the air above them and the surface beneath, is fundamental if foreign raw materials are to be imported to this country. And protection of the vital overseas sources of raw materials by all forms of military power—air power, guided missiles, ground power, fortifications and naval forces—is an essential part of any sound American strategy unless, as the Materials Policy Commission report warned, United States security is to be endangered far more gravely than it is today.
Put in plain terms, we are facing in the future an economy of scarcity, instead of the economy of prodigal plenty to which Americans, with a continent to exploit, have been so long accustomed. We are increasingly dependent upon the world for military as well as economic security, and any self-sufficient or isolationist concept, emotion, instinct, policy or action, whether it be “the Gibraltar theory” of Western Hemisphere isolationism, high tariff barriers or the air power retaliation concept, is now becoming, no matter how valid it may once have been, historically obsolete.
General Eisenhower has recognized, as both the Republican and Democratic parties ought to recognize, that no nation is selfsufficient. He has emphasized that no one form of military force is self-sufficient, that military power is indivisible, and that, in turn, political, economic, psychological and military factors are interdependent and that the influence of one factor—the slow transition of the United States into a “have-not” economy—is bound to affect profoundly our national life and strategic concepts.
Senate Charges Manpower Waste
Wall Street Journal, July 7.—A Senate group called for “drastic revision” of the armed service manpower program, and urged Defense Secretary Lovett to set up a commission of “eminent citizens” to work on the problem.
The Senate preparedness investigating group, a subsidiary of the Armed Services Committee, reported that the armed forces have too many non-essential jobs being filled by men who could otherwise be released to fight. The senators’ report said the services are “bloated by too much fat—too much water.”
As an example of wasted manpower, the senators pointed to the Air Force. In a jet fighter wing, which is made up of 1,688 men taking care of 75 jets, they found that one out of every 29 men is doing personnel work —including specialized personnel jobs as well as clerical jobs.
Communications Assignments Cited
For another example, the American Army Division—made up of 18,187 men—was corn- pared with the Russian division of 11,000 men. In spite of the fact that the Soviet division has only 60% of the manpower contained in an American division, according to the Senate report, the Soviet division has 67% of the firepower of its United States counterpart. This figures out to 10% more firepower on a man-for-man basis. One reason for this is the fact that the American infantry battalion uses 100 men for communications work, while the Russians get along with 50 men for those tasks, the report stated.
The senators asserted that revision of the program and elimination of unnecessary jobs is “pressing,” and should be thoroughly studied by a group of “eminent and qualified citizens,” mostly civilians.
No Budget Relief in Sight
The report noted that economies could be effected either by cutting weapons output or by revising military programs, but concluded that the former course would be too dangerous.
“Our studies into planes, tanks and other so called military hard goods,” it declared, “has convinced us of one salient fact. It is simply that there is no foreseeable relief from swollen budgets in this area unless we are ready to weaken our defenses in the face of threatened aggression.”
The senators agreed that manpower reform is “beyond” Congress, but should be tackled by citizens representing the armed forces, industry and science.
Plans Made to Utilize Military Manpower
New York Times, July 9.—Robert A. Lovett, Secretary of Defense advised Congressional leaders today that he would set up an advisory committee on manpower and its most economic utilization within the Department of Defense.
He said that he had discussed the proposal, which originated on Capitol Hill, with Mrs. Anna M. Rosenberg, Assistant Secretary of Defense in charge of manpower problems, and that they were now prepared to go about “selecting and securing persons who have both the competence and distinction neces-
sary to make this committee completely effective.”
The Secretary made this announcement in a letter to Senator Lyndon B. Johnson of Texas, chairman of the Senate Preparedness subcommittee, who had joined with Senator Joseph C. O’Mahoney of Wyoming, chairman of the Senate Appropriations subcommittee on the armed services, in suggesting the advisory group.
In releasing the Lovett letter, Mr. Johnson extended congratulations to the Secretary “for his prompt and statesman-like response to our request,” also made by letter on June 25.
“His action places our country upon the only road leading to adequate defense at a price we can afford to pay,” the Senator said.
“Of course, the success of this group will depend upon the caliber of people who will be appointed to it. I have every confidence that Secretary Lovett will appoint able and distinguished Americans who will do the kind of job that must be done.
“This is an excellent beginning. The proper follow-through will mean rich rewards both in a stronger defense establishment and in badly needed economies that will strengthen our fiscal position.”
In their letter of June 25, Senators Johnson and O’Mahoney had expressed concern at “the mounting costs of defense which are imposing unprecedented burdens upon the American people” and the “waste of our armed services.” ,
Acknowledging the need for planes, tanks, guns and ships “in sufficient quantity to assure the security of our nation,” they urged committee study to find the means to “man those weapons with fewer soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen without lessening their power.”
They suggested that the advisory committee be made up “of the most competent and distinguished Americans available” and that it have the right to call in experts from private industry to make specific surveys.
Air Force Reveals Air Reconnaissance
Washington Post, July 15.—The Air Defense Command of the Air Force disclosed
officially today for the first time that there has been evidence of air reconnaissance of the Alaskan coastline by Soviet Russia.
Three months ago the entire command and the western, eastern and central air defense forces were alerted in the dead of night and put on “defense readiness” as a result of the sighting above Nunivak Island off western Alaska of vapor “contrails” at high altitude.
Nunivak Island is southeast across Bering Sea from the Chukotski peninsula of Siberia where a concentration of Red Air Force bases is known to be located.
Contrails of the type sighted are left behind by the exhausts of aircraft engines under certain atmospheric conditions. Observers who reported the sighting were sure that tney were made by rapidly moving aircraft.
Asked whether they believed the reports, Air Defense Command chiefs said: “There is every indication that they were accurate.”
Military Limited to One Catalogue
New York Times, July 1.—President Truman signed into law today a bill requiring the armed forces to do their buying from one catalogue instead of the fifteen or more now in use. Sponsors of the bill said it should cut defense spending by up to $5,000,000,000 a year.
Representative F. Edward Hebert, Democrat of Louisiana, chairman of a House Armed Services subcommittee that pushed the bill through Congress, said it was “the most important legislation passed by Congress this year.”
Mr. Hebert said estimates by a commission headed by former President Herbert Hoover indicated that the new law would save about one-tenth of the total defense budget of about $50,000,000,000 a year. Defense officials expressed doubt it would be this great.
The law in effect scuttles a five-year-old effort by the Munitions Board to compile a single military catalogue and starts the program afresh under a director, appointed by the President, who will work under the Secretary of Defense.
The Hebert committee reported to the House that the effort by the Munitions Board had been half-hearted and “largely ineffective” despite the fact about $50,000,000 had
been spent on it so far.
Under the new law the military will be required to give a single number and description to each of the 3,000,000 to 5,000,000 items used by the services, and to cut down the total number of items as much as possible by standardization.
Heretofore the Hebert committee found a single item often was listed in dozens or scores of ways. The result was over-buying and competition between agencies buying items at varying prices.
Lay Keel of U.S.S. Forrestal
The Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry- dock Company’s vast construction area was the scene of the impressive ceremony of the laying the keel of the U.S.S. Forrestal, which when completed, will represent a totally new concept of an aircraft carrier, designed for a new age in flying, and will be the logical development of the aircraft which it serves.
Details regarding speed, number of aircraft, armament, and related matters are highly secret, but the Navy has revealed that the Forrestal is to be a mighty vessel of almost 60,000 tons with a length of 1040 feet and a beam of 252 feet.
Speaking at the keel-laying ceremony, Deputy Secretary of Defense William C. Foster said, “The U.S.S. Forrestal when completed will be able to carry the naval air power of the United States to any part of the world to promote security and peace for ourselves and our allies. Let those misguided leaders of enslaved peoples who may contemplate aggression weigh well the fact that not even in their innermost lairs can they escape the devasting force of this mighty weapon.”
Secretary of the Navy Dan A. Kimball revealed that the Forrestal is the “first of at least ten carriers needed by the United States Navy” if this country is to maintain control of the seas in cooperation with our friendly nations. “It is a matter of urgency,” he stated, “that we have this ship and those to follow to keep control of 70 per cent of the earth’s surface.”
Representing the Newport News construction firm, Mr. William E. Blewett, Jr., recalled that the first United States carrier designed and constructed as such was the U.S.S. Ranger which was built by the same shipbuilding concern. Mr. Blewett called the Forrestal the first carrier for the age of jet aircraft and revealed that the flight deck will be free of all obstructions during flight operations because of a novel and rather spectacular feature of having all of her bridge and radar installations retractable below the level of the deck. He also disclosed that a secret system of television is to be employed in assisting aircraft landing on the flight deck.
RUSSIA
Soviet Collectives Miss Their Goals
Christian Science Monitor, July 10.—The monster kolkhozi (farm collectives) into which Prime Minister Stalin’s “third agricultural revolution” has started to herd the rural half of the country’s population are not producing the results expected of them.
At every one of the recent “plenums” of party central committees, in the Ukraine, in Byelorussia, in the Central Asian and in the Transcaucasian republics, the inefficiency of republican, provincial, and district agricultural administrations came up for sharp criticism. In Moscow, Chief of the Agricultural Administration, veteran Minister Ivan A. Venediktov, can hardly be pleased with the crop-prospect reports of his representatives in the field.
This year’s harvest will test the economic validity of the kolhoze merger of 1950-51. But so far, everything points to a failure of the experiment. And since the wisdom of measures initiated cannot be questioned, the minister’s career is at stake.
Acreage Increased
Last year, Mr. Venediktov must have been embarrassed when the grain crop dropped slightly below 1950, although the sown area had increased by more than 4,500,000 acres. The setback was explained by poor weather, but speeches at this year’s session of the Supreme Soviet hinted ominously that other factors might be involved.
This year’s sown area will be 8,250,000 acres larger than in 1951. More tractors combines, and agricultural machines of all, sorts are being made available. Yet there is evidence that the Kremlin is not counting on
a bumper crop. Targets published for several provinces are only a little above 1951 as far as the yield an acre is concerned.
The April issue of Planovoye Khoziaistvo, published by Gosplan, the U.S.S.R.’s highest planning authority, disclosed that the machine and tractor stations last fall were substantially behind in preparing the ground for this year’s crop. Pravda of June 13 warned editorially that the machine and tractor stations which are the direct responsibility of Mr. Venediktov’s ministry, are not ready for the harvest.
In Rostov Province, for instance, where the crop starts early, only 30 per cent of all available combines have been repaired and overhauled. In Kirov Province in the north, the annual repair plan has been fulfilled only to 6 per cent. A few weeks ago it was mentioned that the chemical industry had not supplied enough fertilizer. In a country where everything is operated and controlled by the government such statements can be interpreted only as an advance warning not to expect too much from this year’s crop.
Little has been said about the basic reason for the poor showing of the farms—the kolkhoze merger. From time to time examples are cited to prove the superiority of the new rationally managed system under which agriculture has been utterly divorced from the soil-bound village economy with its age-old experiences. We have been told that there now are 350 giant farm collectives in Moldavia, the southwesternmost republic of the Union, and many in Okhotsk Province on the northern Pacific. While it is reasonable to consider such statements as pep talks without much economic meaning, they also imply clearly that the government is not pulling back from its farm-merger policy. In some provinces the size of the super kolkhozi is still increasing.
Yet the government’s own decrees and instructions confirm the picture drawn by several farm managers and agronomists who succeeded to escape. According to them misery and suspicion stalk the villages; many hundreds of thousands of peasants are housed in primitive barracks or tents on the outlying lands of the monster farms; the main burden of the work rests upon the women. Large numbers of the remaining men folk have left the farms and roam the country in search of work. Many are employed in the big canal, power, and irrigation projects.
Special Positions
It also becomes apparent that never before has the differentiation in income between the ordinary kolkhoze members and the kolkhoze bureaucracy been what it is today. Never have there been as many taskmasters and informers. Kolkhoze presidents and their assistants—each kolkhoze has an average of 20 bureaucrats—are credited five, six, and seven times as many “workdays” as the ordinary peasant, the workday being the unit of payment in a kolkhoze. About half of the kolkhoze bureaucrats are exempted from field work.
Earlier this year, Izvestia complained that there was a swift turnover of kolkhoze chairmen. They were being fired by the harassed agricultural authorities before they had a chance of familiarizing themselves with the problems of their kolkhoze or of becoming personally acquainted with their wards. The provincial party committees which have adopted the practice of appointing kolkhoze chairmen over the head of the district and local authorities, now have a reserve of kolkhoze chairmen waiting to be assigned to this lucrative, though hazardous job.
The government apparently does not want to loosen this bureaucratic structure through sweeping regulations. Instead it prods and “unmasks” the authorities responsible for particularly ineffectual kolkhozi and issues countless instructions and decrees dealing with specific deficiencies.
Assistant Minister of Agriculture S. G. Hashtaria, a Georgian like Messrs. Stalin and Lovrenti P. Beria, Chief of the Secret Policy, has been put in charge of this activity. It was he who signed the instruction ordering kolkhoze peasants employed on the great public works projects to return immediately to their kolkhoze.
American and European students of Soviet agriculture interpret these developments as harbingers of a severe purge of the kolkhoze bureaucracy and of republican, provincial and district agricultural authorities. Such a policy may lead to the replace-
ment of Mr. Venediktov by a younger and more ruthless man, closer to the police agencies under Mr. Beria’s command.
The fact that Mr. Venediktov in April was decorated with the Order of Lenin does not necessarily contradict this view. It would not be the first time that the Kremlin has honored a man slated to be made responsible for government mistakes.
Russian Internal Crisis Suspected
Christian Science Monitor, July 8.—The more America’s top experts on Russia have studied Moscow’s “hate America” campaign, the more they have leaned to the belief that it reflects deep internal problems in the Soviet realm rather than a storm warning of some impending new explosion of Russian force on the world scene.
There can be no doubt that the vehemence and virulence of the propaganda outbursts against the United States represent something new in Russian behavior.
Also, no prudent man would overlook for a second the possibility that this might be the first move of the Russian state apparatus to “steam up” the Russian people for war. It is merely elementary that the defenses of the West, under such circumstances, should be kept on an “alert” basis.
However, the most exhaustive study of the whole campaign tends to produce the conclusion that preparation for war is the least likely explanation of the matter and that there is no valid reason, up to this moment, to revise the basic assumption of western power-struggle thinking that the Russian state does not regard war with the West as a desirable solution to its many problems.
Sifted by Kennan
The subject of the “hate America” campaign has been the primary concern of George F. Kennan, the new American Ambassador to Moscow, since he took up his post there about two months ago. Mr. Kennan has sent back several reports on the subject.
In his first report, he expressed his own sense of shock on coming into direct contact with the Kremlin operation. He found that to face it in person was more disturbing than to read about it from a distance, and he recognized the possibility that it might require a reassessment of assumptions about Russian purposes.
But in subsequent reports, Mr. Kennan got down to the kind of balanced analysis which has made him one of the most respected practitioners of the art of diplomatic reporting. In those subsequent reports, he has concluded that the possibility of preparation for war is only one of several possible explanations, and not the most plausible.
The main reason for down-grading the first tendency to alarmist analysis is that if Moscow were consciously preparing for war, it probably would be doing more than just whipping up emotional fervor against the United States. The logical concomitants would be the ringing of Moscow with antiaircraft batteries, preliminary mobilizations, preliminary rationing, and conversion of industries producing civilian goods to production of military goods. While the Russians could do much of this beyond the sight of the diplomatic corps in Moscow, it seems unlikely that they could conceal all of a major program of conversion to war economy. So far, there is no evidence detectable by diplomats in Moscow that any of these other things are being done.
This leads to a search for other possible explanations.
There must be some explanation, for this is without doubt an unusual campaign. It is marked by two main differences from previous propaganda campaigns.
Scraps Normal Line
Its first difference is its lack of “ideological selection.” That is, it does not distinguish between various classes of Americans. Instead of observing the Marxist theory of the class society, with all evil to be found in the “exploiting class” and all good among “the workers,” it calls all Americans “barbarians.” It seems to go even further in this respect than Moscow’s wartime campaign against Germans when Moscow always maintained that there were some Germans deep down underneath the Nazi pile.
Its second distinguishing characteristic is that it abandons the normal Moscow practice of maintaining a technical dissociation of
the government from the propaganda campaign.
Other such campaigns have been carried by portions of the propaganda apparatus, but never by all of it at any one time. Thus Pravda might carry the burden of some one campaign while Izvestia kept out of it. Thus the government itself always could make the technical contention that the campaign was merely the journalistic “enterprise” of Pravda, not the firm policy of the state.
In this case, there is no technical basis for such aloofness of the state from the campaign. Every agency of propaganda sings the same tune. Therefore it can be recognized only as the full and formal propaganda line of the state itself.
Began Early in 1951
However, it is not so new as has been assumed here. It did not begin with the spring of 1952. On the contrary, it began in early 1951 and has been maintained almost at peak ever since. The change-in intensity is not marked or sufficient to justify any assumptions now which would not have been justified for more than a year.
There are many possible interpretations imbedded in the fabulously involved mental contortions of the Soviet state. If one wishes to seek explanations related to foreign policy, a plausible one would be to see it as a foundation for an attempt to drive a wedge between the United States and the other western Allies. There is some supporting evidence for such an assumption. Certainly the United States is the arsenal of the West, and certainly the effort to cut the United States out of the alliance is a first purpose of Russian foreign policy.
However this is a campaign designed and employed for the most part inside the Soviet realm. It has not been “exported” in the way most such campaigns are exported. Its maximum pressure area is bounded by the Iron Curtain.
But at the end of all these possible theories, the experts come finally to the one which seems to them slightly more plausible than all the others. That is that Moscow is doing its best to deal with a major internal problem—the problem of how to cope with widespread apathy and cynicism throughout the
whole Russian realm.
The Russian state is a tyranny. Tyrannies rule by wielding whips and brandishing “ghosts.” The “ghost” always justifies the whip. But when people begin to lose their belief in ghosts, they also begin to question the need for the whip. The old ghosts have begun to look like stage props—and raveled ones at that.
If the Russian state is to continue to use the whip on the Russian and satellite peoples, as it must to survive, then it needs a new and better ghost. Thus we have the new Moscow invention, the American “cannibal,” supposed to be intending to destroy utterly all the human beings who live under the “benevolent” rule of Moscow.
The conclusion intended to be drawn in the mind of every “loyal” subject of the Kremlin is that only the present regime in Moscow can protect them from the American “cannibal.” There is an implied warning that they had better believe it.
In other words, a plausible explanation of the whole phenomenon seems to be that the Russian state is worried about the loyalty of its subjects and has resorted to the legend of the “American cannibal” as its latest device for reviving implicit obedience to the edicts of the Kremlin.
Soviet Demands Voice in Antarctic
Christian Science Monitor, July 12.— Moscow’s recent refusal to recognize any settlement of the delicate Antarctic question on which it has not been consulted is seen by some western diplomats as a propaganda move, while others are disturbed over a possible Soviet attempt to interfere in an area where sovereignty over vast regions still is unsettled.
The Antarctic Continent is an area of 5,000,000 square miles, almost twice as large as Australia. It is the largest tableland in the the world, 3,000 to 10,000 feet high, crossed by mountain ranges up to 15,000 feet high. Nine-tenths of the area is covered by a vast ice sheet, in some places believed to be thousands of feet thick.
Norway Claims Big Area
Norway, whose great polar travelers participated prominently in the discovery of
this region, claims the largest part of the Antarctic Continent. However, Great Britain holds the most valuable territories in these icy regions. Its sovereignty has been extended over many polar islands as well as over the Falkland Islands. But two Latin- American nations—Argentina and Chile— have joined forces to oppose Britain.
Other claimants of Antarctic regions are Australia, New Zealand, France, and the Union of South Africa.
It is significant that the Soviet demand for participation in a possible Antarctic settlement was brought forward just at a moment when anti-British propaganda in Argentina and Chile was at its peak.
Peron Pushes Demand
Argentina’s Peron government has greatly stepped up the demand for “return” of the Falkland Islands which it considers part of its national realm. The inhabitants of the islands are counted as Argentine citizens in the census and drafted into the Army if they venture to set foot on Argentine soil.
Argentina also claims other Antarctic outposts held by Britain, such as South Georgia and the Southern Orkneys. Chile claims Graham Land and the Southern Shetland Islands. Both countries agreed mutually to recognize and to support their claims.
Today Britain operates six bases in the polar regions, while Argentina has established a meteorological station on the Deception Islands and an outpost at Port Hope. Chile’s President Gonzales Videla has visited Graham Land and the Chilean Army has set up an outpost there and on Greenwich Islands.
Russian People Resent Their Government
Christian Science Monitor, July 16.— Bonn, Germany.—A bushy-haired Russian, described by American officials as the “most knowledgeable” civilian deserter to the West in recent years, told a news conference here he does not believe there will be any major war for several years.
But if “international dissensions between the western nations ever become serious enough to give the Soviets the advantage,” he warned, Prime-Minister Joseph Stalin would not hesitate to throw his troops into war.
The Russian is Eugeny S. Volchansky, an engineer who worked for six months in East Germany as the official Soviet representative at a factory before he escaped to the West with the aid of friendly Germans. He has applied for political asylum.
“Stalin desires others to fight for his objects,” said Mr. Volchansky at his press conference July 15. “If he decides, however, that a favorable time for war has come, he will then use Soviet troops.”
“The idea of war is completely repugnant to the Russian people,” he said, but added: “I believe that Russians would fight if they were convinced that they were again defending their homeland. And because the Soviets have the greatest propaganda apparatus known to man, it is highly conceivable that they could be so convinced.”
Mr. Volchansky told the news conference that one deterrent to the Soviets’ starting a shooting war “is the fact that revolution within the U.S.S.R. would be possible under war conditions.”
“Today, revolution is unthinkable because of the entanglement of controls exercised over the people. In wartime, a disturbed and resentful people would be able to liberate themselves upon receiving arms.”
If a cold war lasts and a hot war is averted, there is a long-range possibility that revolution without war can occur in the Soviet Union, Mr. Volchansky said, adding:
“This can only happen if the people can organize themselves, find adequate leadership, run frightful risks, and arm themselves.”
He reported active resistance to the Moscow regime among both the military and civilian population in the Soviet Union and in Communist-run East Germany.
As an example, he said industry and transport leaders “make phony attempts to fulfill industrial plans. Workers have become skilled at stealing parts from nearby assembly lines and claiming they made them, thus cutting down on total production.”
“The Soviet Government is afraid of the people,” Mr. Volchansky continued. “Spies from the party cannot stop the dissatisfaction among the people. Soviet leaders today do not concern themselves with the theory and practice of classic communism.
“The false lures of achieving better conditions for humanity through communism are employed now only to get sympathizers in foreign countries—the starry-eyed idealists, the miserable and oppressed and the misguided dupes. The Russian people have had communism for 35 years and they are thoroughly fed up with it.”
OTHER COUNTRIES Sweden Begins Baltic Maneuvers
New York Times, July 17.—The Swedish Navy has begun annual summer maneuvers in the Baltic unmindful of the Soviet Union’s growing tendency to regard that sea as its own, as the Russians have forcefully demonstrated on several recent occasions.
The maneuvers will take Swedish naval and Air Force units into the same international waters where Soviet jet fighters recently shot down two unarmed Swedish Air Force planes, but will avoid the twelve- mile territorial water’s limit arbitrarily and unilaterally imposed by the Soviet Union for Russian and Russian-occupied shores. Orders are to return fire if the Russians should intervene.
In the most recent Swedish note on the subject of the two Swedish planes, sent to Moscow two weeks ago, it was plainly stated that Sweden viewed the Baltic as free to everybody and intended to continue the movement of her ships and planes as usual.
Soviet Has Not Yet Replied
Moscow has still to answer this note, which was strongly worded and went into great detail to prove Russian guilt. Meanwhile, the Swedish Government has received assurances from leading United Nations officials that they will advocate United Nations aid on the Korean pattern to Sweden, which is not a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, in the event of Russian aggression against Sweden.
Highly modern cruisers, and flotillas of destroyers, submarines and subchasers are participating in the exercises, in which the coastal artillery and Air Force are cooperating. The over-all aim is to practice defense against invasion. The possibility of a Swedish-Soviet incident in the course of these maneuvers, always to be reckoned with in view of the Kremlin attitude on the Baltic, is further strengthened by the circumstance that the Soviet Navy and Air Force also are training in the south Baltic these days.
Russian Activity Reported
Reports from the Danish isles of Bornholm and Zealand indicate much Russian activity in the air and on the sea with strong formations of Soviet bombers accompanied by jet fighters allegedly violating Danish territory during the night. Swedish naval units will put into Zealand on a purely courtesy visit during their maneuvers, it has been officially announced here.
The Swedish Navy is being actively expanded and further modernized under the pressure of the tense world situation. The new destroyer Halland was launched today at the Goetaverken shipyards in the west coast city of Goeteborg. The Halland is 2,600 tons and is the largest destroyer ever built here. She will be ready for trial sometime next year.
With a crew of 290, the Halland will be equipped with Bofors 4.7-inch rapid firing guns, 3.3-inch ack ack guns and eight torpedo tubes plus rockets for submarine defense.
The new building program for the Swedish Navy stresses cruisers in preference to larger ships in addition to providing for a considerable number of destroyers, submarines and subchasers, minelayers and sweepers. At the completion of this program the Swedish Navy will be able to hold its own in the Baltic fairly well, Swedish experts think.
British Comment on American Alert
Manchester Guardian, July 1.—A curious story is told by the brothers Alsop in the New York Herald Tribune. It concerns the defence measures taken by the United States to protect its cities, industries, and ports. The Alsops say that the United States Government has not only ordered a contin- ous air watch with radar and other forms of spotting—as already announced in public but has also issued instructions which severely limit access by Soviet and satellite ships to American ports and the Panama Canal. The point which the Alsops wish to emphasize is more than the mere fact that these measures are in force. It is that the United States Government ought to have stated the reasons for its action—and, since it has failed in this, the brothers Alsop do so instead. They report that the Soviet Strategic Air Force occupied its forward bases in Kamchatka six months ago. Since then, they say, active Soviet air reconnaissance has been detected over the American continent on several occasions. Hence the order for a full air watch. It is a chilling story, with its grim reminder of German flights over the British coast in August, 1939. But our blood may run a little less coldly through the knowledge that today such flights, if they have taken place, may have been as much for pure experiment as for military reconnaissance. And—one cannot be too certain in these matters—is it not possible that American aircraft, in their testing of transarctic flying, have once or twice crossed the Soviet frontiers? But to return to the brothers Alsop: the reason they give for the shipping ban is less alarming. It is that any innocent-looking freighter could ride into an American port or the Panama Canal with an atomic bomb hidden in its hold. One well-placed bomb would be enough to neutralise a harbour. That is obvious enough, and the danger to ports like London, Antwerp, and Bordeaux must be as great as to New York, Boston, and Baltimore. Are we taking it too lightly or is the United States taking it too seriously? The answer is for each country to settle for itself. Sentiment here will, on the whole, be against dramatic measures.
SCIENCE
Human Relations in Engineering
From A Speech By Rear Admiral J. F. Jelley, USN, Chief of the Bureau of Yards and Docks— One day, an eminent engineer was asked by the president of the university that he had attended,'to comment, in the light of his experience, on the adequacy of the engineering training he had received.
“The engineering courses were excellent,’’ he replied, “but there was one great deficiency in my training that I have spent the rest of my life trying to correct.”
“What was that?” asked the president in surprise.
“Not only did the university fail to teach me anything about the art of dealing with people,” answered the engineer, “but my teachers did not even mention the importance of such a thing to success in my profession.”
Unfortunately, his is not an isolated case. Looking back over their careers, many successful engineers would agree that when they were graduated they were not even aware of the importance of the art of human relations. Yet, it is a basic factor in the success of any engineer.
Great progress has been made by engineers during the past century in service to mankind. Their accomplishments since 1852 have been remarkable. Many engineers have become famous, but before that, they had to learn that great goals can be achieved only through men, their fellow workers; that engineering is not all plans and projects. All too frequently the young engineer fails to realize that he must accomplish his objective through the medium of human beings. Without them he can not build the great shipyards, the testing facilities, and the airfields. Only after he has realized that the social implications of his profession are as important as the purely technical aspects can he hope for success in his career.
Men are not machines. And if the engineer would succeed he can not treat them as machines. Their desires and feelings, their need for proper recognition, their innate resentment at injustice must be recognized if they are to give their best co-operation in any project.
One of the most valuable experiences of my career was accorded me as a young ensign, just out of the Naval Academy. As the engine room watch officer, I was responsible for the safe and proper operation of the main propulsion plant of the ship and of the associated auxiliaries. I knew the rules and regulations. I understood the machinery, the turbines, and the pumps used in that room, and I knew how to handle them. But I had to learn how to handle men. And there, in that engine room, I discovered something that probably helped me more than anything else. I found out that my attitude toward the men who worked those machines made a difference in the way the machines worked. As I watched those men attend to their duties, I realized that all men must have incentives if they are to work contentedly and efficiently at tasks in which they may have no personal interest.
And so it is all through an engineer’s career. He must know how to work with people, if he is to accomplish his objectives. An engineering administrator will find that he spends most of his time on such matters as personnel problems and public relations. He will have to supervise the preparation of expense estimates and present them to the proper authorities. He will have to deal with various groups as well as individuals—labor unions, contractors, and architects. It is through them that much of the engineering work on any project is accomplished.
All these and many other duties call for knowledge and understanding of men. For not the least of an engineering executive’s equipment should be the realization that many, indeed, are the non-engineering responsibilities of his position. He must insure that his organization is well staffed. He must know how to select qualified engineers to help him. He must be able to enlist qualified workers to care for the many non-engineering details inherent in any engineering organization or project, regardless of its size.
In order to do this, he must understand people and know how to evaluate their idiosyncrasies. The successful engineering organization is a team on which everyone works for the success of each project. Cement alone will not produce concrete, no matter how it is stirred or distributed. Concrete requires also sand, gravel, and water, and they must be mixed in just the right proportion to produce the greatest strength.
In the same way, a strong organization requires various ingredients, mixed in the proper proportions. The mixer must know his ingredients, whether they be men or materials, their functions, and their possibilities, if he is to construct a solid structure.
Only with a genuine understanding of his fellow-men and an attitude of sympathetic helpfulness can the engineer achieve the flexibility that success in his profession demands. Only with the determination to work together and to regard each other as individuals first and as specialists second can we solve tomorrow’s problems.
Navy Demonstrates Neiv Lifeboat
New York Times, July 17.—The Navy and the Coast Guard demonstrated yesterday morning at Floyd Bennett Field a new airborne rubber lifeboat that inflates in thirty seconds to provide protection for fifteen survivors in either sub-zero or blistering tropical weather.
A helicopter dropped the lifeboat into the water off the field and “survivors” scrambled aboard handily. The lifeboat was designed by the Small Craft Design Section of the Bureau of Ships and the B. F. Goodrich Company.
Previous tests by the Navy in Arctic waters have indicated that the heat from the bodies of fifteen men would hold the temperature inside the canopy of the boat at close to seventy degrees. That was not necessary yesterday. Tests in tropical waters show that the insulated canopy offers protection from sun and wind.
Fastest Gulf Stream Current Measured
Washington Post, July 18.—The fastest current ever measured in the open ocean— almost 11 miles an hour—has been found in the Gulf Stream, University of Miami scientists reported today.
Dr. F. G. Walton Smith, head of the university’s Marine Laboratory, said this “amazing flow of water” was discovered in the Gulf Stream about 15 miles offshore from Miami Beach 10 days ago. Electric magnetic devices and navigational fixes showed the current moving at 9| knots (10.92) miles an hour).
Pictorial Computer for Air Navigation
The Military Engineer.—July-August.— Doubt as to his position will soon cease to be a problem for the aircraft pilot. With the pictorial computer mounted in his instrument panel, the pilot will have a continuous and accurate, all-weather display of position over the ground, plus magnetic heading. The position of the aircraft is shown as a “bug” superimposed against an aeronautical chart, and the magnetic heading is indicated both by the attitude of the bug and by a pointer through it. Having a number of features to ensure simplicity and reliability of operation, the pictorial computer and its related equipment assure the pilot of an instantaneously accurate and reliable display of the navigational situation in a form easy to read and interpret.
Omni-bearing Distance System
Latest of a new series of aircraft instruments to improve and simplify air navigation in an age of increasing speed and traffic volume, the pictorial computer is the display instrument of the Omni-bearing Distance (OBD) system of air navigation. This system has been under development by the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) since shortly after World War II. In its present development the OBD system consists of three principal airborne elements:
1. Navigational Receiver for determining azimuth from a fixed ground facility. Development of this equipment is complete, and it is rapidly being installed in most transport aircraft, both commercial and military.
2. Distance Measuring Equipment (DME) for determining distance from a fixed ground facility. Development of this equipment is nearly completed, and it is expected shortly to be certified by the CAA for procurement by civil aircraft.
3. Pictorial Computer for calculating and displaying the navigational fix and the aircraft heading at the instrument panel. Prototypes of this instrument are currently being evaluated by the CAA in flight tests at its Technical Development and Evaluation Center at Indianapolis.
The pictorial computer consists essentially of a projection system in which a chart on 35 mm film is magnified and focussed on a 10-inch diameter, see-through type viewing screen, and a computing mechanism for positioning an aircraft bug in the projection system. The display unit of the computer, is mounted in the instrument panel of an aircraft and is designed to be clearly visible to to both pilot and co-pilot under all operating conditions. It contains the projection system, charts, electromechanical portions of the computing servo-mechanisms, and all controls. Relay, servo-amplifiers, and other electrical elements are separately packaged in an amplifier unit, designed to be remotely mounted in the aircraft radio rack.
Features of the Pictorial Computer
Special features adding to the pictorial computer’s inherent usefulness include the following:
Chart storage is entirely within the computer. Up to 700 different charts, each centered at an OBD ground facility, may be stored on 100 feet of 35 mm film, enough to service adequately the entire continental United States. The total number of OBD stations presently authorized is 291, so that the designed chart capacity allows for charts at various scales, including some to be used for airport approach. Charts are selected by simple manual control of a slewing handle on the face of the display unit; they are arranged on the film in geographic or route sequence to keep normal chart changing time below ten seconds.
The route sequence is made up of several series of film frames, each series'containing the charts for OBD stations (ground facilities) encountered in a route between two terminal cities. The chart for any given station may be located by reference to an index sheet which provides the number of film series in which the particular station is located and by use of the call letters of the station at the chart center.
A chart selector motor, in conjunction with a variable speed device, drives the film roll at any desired speed up to a maximum slewing speed of ten charts per second. The film may be readily driven by the chart changing mechanism at a speed slow enough to enable the OBD station call letters to be read directly from the chart image.
Automatic receiver tuning (Navigational Receiver and DME) is afforded by use of coded, punched holes in the chart film. It is not necessary to tune the receivers manually to the frequencies of the ground facility at the center of the chart in use, since tuning is automatically controlled from the computer the instant a new chart is selected.
Automatic scale selection is similarly furnished through use of coded, punched holes in the chart film. Charts are furnished at four scales; the scaling of the computing mechanisms to conform to the scale of any chart is automatically insured by the coding oC the film. No separate scale switch is required.
Simplicity of operation is maximized by the in-flight use of only one control, the slewing handle for changing charts. No other controls are necessary for the en route operation of the entire OBD system. Elimination of human error is virtually insured. It is deleted entirely from the calculation of the navigational fix, from selection of proper scale, and from tuning of receivers. The pictorial form of the display has been shown experimentally to be superior to other methods of data display, such as dials, counters, and cross pointers, by minimizing the possibility of human misinterpretation.
A flag alarm on the computer face instantly warns of any failure in the computer to other elements of the OBD system which would affect the accuracy or reliability of the display.
AVIATION
Strong Carrier Force Is Urged
Aviation Week, July 21.—U.S. multh million-dollar investment in overseas air bases is worthless unless it is backed up by a strong Naval Air carrier force, John F. Floberg, Navy Air Secretary told the aviation press last week.
In an address before the 14th annual convention of Aviation Writers’ Assn., Floberg decried the self-hypnosis with which the average U.S. citizen focuses his attention on the construction of U.S. air bases along Russia’s perimeter of defense.
A Military Problem
“All too often,” Floberg said, “the concept of control of the air is reduced to an arithmetic problem—how many total airplanes we have as compared to how many total airplanes someone else has.” The problem is not arithmetic but military, with arithmetic furnishing only a factor in the problem. Basically the problem boils down to how many aircraft of the right types and performance are present at the point of contest.
To emphasize the need for more carrier aviation and its inherent ability to reduce enemy odds by the element of surprise, Floberg said, “After Iwo Jima in the six months before the atomic bombs were dropped, U.S. carrier striking forces destroyed over 5,000 aircraft over Japan at a rate of 800 per month.”
“This result,” he said, “was accomplished by a force which never had more than 1,500 carrier-based aircraft at any one time, but its ability to move its area of operations and to choose the time and place of combat with an overwhelming local superiority of force enabled it to achieve an approximate 14-1 ratio over enemy losses to its own.”
Efficiency Reduced
However, elements of these same fleet air units, while operating afloat, on occasion were shore-based. During these periods, the same groups which had made the 14-1 ratio record had their combat kill efficiency cut to a 7-1 ratio because fixed-base operation virtually eliminated the element of surprise.
“Everyone is conscious of the fact that a fast task carrier force has the ability to move six or seven hundred miles in a twenty-four hour period and to project its air power almost as far again from its point of surface location.
“On our East Coast we have a series of industrial and commercial centers, commencing at Portland and Portsmouth and running south through Boston, Hartford, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, Norfolk, Charlestown, Jacksonville, and Miami. Each of these major centers is sufficiently removed from its neighbor so that no two of them could easily furnish effective mutual support in the event of heavy enemy air attack from the sea.
“And yet, in order to have an equal number of aircraft at each of these places to combat a task force of eight carriers, each of these cites would have to have 800 aircraft based around it and immediately available.” At these 12 locations alone a total force “arithmetically” of 9,600 planes would be required.
Carrier Craft Need
Presently, Floberg explained, this country has a virtual monopoly on one major weapon in the modern military arsenal—sea-borne air power.
“This capability, which is unmatched in the world, gives us the opportunity for initiative if we are ever called upon to exercise it, but to take advantage of this principle it will be necessary for the American people to press for more carrier air with which to increase this fundamental strength.”
He warned however, that the current absence of significant surface fleets of the enemy has lulled the average American to a sense of false security. “All too few people realize how close we came in both great wars to losing that control.
“In both these cases it was critically jeopardized in the Atlantic without any appreciable enemy surface forces ever being at sea.”
What It Means
“Some conception of that degree of threat may be inferred,” he said, “from the fact that over 24 million tons of Allied shipping were sunk during World War II.” This would be the equivalent of about two-and- one-half ships of 5,000 tons each per day throughout the war—or a Victory ship a day for five and one-half years.
Eighty-two per cent of these ships, he said, were destroyed by submarine and aircraft of the German navy. Yet this degree of loss was achieved by an enemy which began a major war with somewhere between 30 and 60 submarines and a few thousand aircraft at their disposal.
Comparison with those minor enemy forces of World War II to what today’s aggressor with known submarine forces of three or four hundred craft and many thousands of aircraft is staggering, Floberg said.
Water-Based Aircraft Assume New Role
Christian Science Monitor, July 15.—Seaborne aerial warfare may assume a new role of prominence as the result of fundamental researches in hydrodynamics covering a period of 12 years by the Consolidated Vultee Aircraft Corporation.
Working virtually single-handedly against the strong prejudices of the industry and the services toward water-based airplanes, the Convair hydrodynamic laboratory of the San Diego division of Consolidated has effected revolutionary improvements in seaplane design and performance.
As a result of these researches, Convair says the flying boat has been lifted from obscurity. This formerly unwieldy and aerodynamically inefficient vehicle now faces the exciting possibility of becoming an airplane with as startling a performance as the fastest land-based fighter aircraft.
Front-Line Role Seen
In addition, the 12-year work by Convair indicates to that company’s engineers that water-based aircraft may again be assigned front-line operational roles in aerial warfare.
Before members of the Aviation Writers Association convening here, Convair hydrodynamics engineers demonstrated models of aircraft incorporating these discoveries as proof of the changes they have achieved in the performance of water-based aircraft.
At a small public lake in MacArthur Park the writers saw the Skate, a two-place, twin- jet transsonic speed night-fighter model cleave the water at high speed, leaving very little water piled up before its bow and a very small wake. This indicates that very little of the power of the prototype full-scale aircraft that may be built from this model will be wasted in pushing the craft through the water.
No Sacrifice Expected
Ernest G. Stout, who has carried the ball for the improved water aircraft, told the writers that all categories of planes are contemplated for development at no sacrifice in performance.
He said that the employment of water- based aircraft means that our fighting forces may use unprepared water bases to launch attacks.
Mr. Stout disclosed that the technological part of the development which hindered the development of water craft has now been brought to fruition. He said, moreover, that his company is fully prepared to implement its new concept.