Basic data on present level of defense effort of selected countries In general, expenditures on internal security forces are included; veteran's benefits and nonmilitary May include some nonmilitary items. Roughly estimated order of magnitude for Portugal, Iceland, and Turkey, which have no national accounts figures. Negligible. Not available. 7 Fiscal year 1948–49. It is noteworthy that the percentage of national income reflected in military expenditures is identical as among the Western Union nations on the one hand and for the United States on the other. The mutual defense assistance program will, of course, change the ratios slightly. It will involve a 7.5-percent increase in military expenditure for the United States and a 5-percent increase for the Western Union countries. With these factors introduced, the percentage of United States income devoted to military purposes will rise to slightly less than 6.9 percent. That of the Western Union will rise to slightly less than 6.7 percent. The third point involves the question whether the project of restoring the ground forces of Europe is militarily worth while. The restoration of units for ground defense of western Europe is avowedly a means by which this program is intended to progress toward its objective of restoring the security of the free nations. Is the idea of ground defense obsolete? No question received more thoughtful and thorough consideration than this in the committee's study. This question was dealt with searchingly by General Bradley, and by Maj. Gen. L. L. Lemnitzer, deputy commandant of the National War College and member of the Foreign Assistance Correlation Committee, in their testimony before the Committee on Foreign Affairs. Most of their testimony entered into phases of military plans of secret character. The committee sought also the view of a military expert on this subject, Mr. S. L. A. Marshall, military critic of the Detroit News, formerly chief historian of the European theater, and member of the Army Historical Advisory Commission. His arguments on this point are cogent, in the committee's judgment, and are restated at length below: This comment is made for such light as may be shed on the question of how the money which the United States may be preparing to spend on an arms-support program among its friends in Europe may best be directed toward developing the greatest measure of defensive power within the general frame of the North Atlantic Alliance. It would appear incontestable that the main object should be to equate the further building of western Europe's defensive forces to that of our own so that the strength of the alliance as a whole will be in balance toward its main problem-the prevention of a total overrunning of Europe by aggressive action on the part of the U. S. S. R. This cannot be done by air power alone or by ground power alone. It can only be done through the organization of a ground establishment, within Europe and in support of Europe, which is strong enough to assure a reasonable degree of defensive security to air operations. Be the American-British air power ever so able to dominate in its own element, it is not within reason to believe that its technical and tactical superiority could finally avail the alliance military victory if in the build-up period of war, it was compelled to operate from bases far remote from the U. S. S. R. interior and lines of communication into western Europe. From this could come only an excessive logistical strain, resulting in the depletion of existing air strength before we were ready to fight, and multiplying the costs of getting any of our formations forward to the area of engagement. In World Wars I and II, the United States emerged victor only because of the effective help of strong allies. Had they fallen away from us at any time, we would not have won through. Had their ports and other main bases not been available to us, and had they not provided the greater part of the shield which guarded our communications to them, we could not even have made the start. The nature of the threat which brought the alliance into being is such that it would be supremely rash to conclude that we could meet and defeat it with any lesser extension of our power than was required in the wars now past, or that it would be less needed in future time than formerly that we could take firm hold on the far side of the Atlantic because of the good services of our allies. Equally, to maintain a decisive undertaking overseas for any length of time without the help of allies would be so depletive of our power that we should embrace it only if events were to come with such a rush that we were allowed no alternative. The question then is whether our strategy, and the power equation which is the basis of strategy, are now being shaped according to the lines of main chance the winning to our side of allies who can give us truly effective support, and whose contribution to the over-all position of the alliance will most perfectly, and most economically, complement our own. Relatively speaking, the sea power of the United States and Great Britain, is strong and quite satisfactory to the needs of the alliance. The overriding problem lies in the defense of land areas on the far side of the Atlantic, and the adjusting of air power and ground power here and in Europe to that need. This includes consideration not only of time-and-space factors, but of the condition of industry in the United States and abroad, the availability of mass manpower for military training both here and in Europe, and all other related issues, such as the moral question of what form of military power will most directly and most speedily restore the confidence of European peoples in their own security undertakings. On this latter point, it is inconceivable that if the alliance as a whole were to concentrate on an air power build-up at the expense, or to the neglect, of strength in field divisions, it would have the desired effect. Air power is not the inner stuff of a viable alliance. It is by nature committed to destructive work against the body and plant of the enemy rather than to constructive support of the material defenses of a friend or ally. Confident alliances mature fundamentally through ground forces working with their kind and sea power keeping the lines up. Finally, there are no other safeguards than these. We can even reduce the problem to one element-armored power. Without armor, there can be no security for national frontiers. Without security of frontiers, there can be no mutually helpful military alliances between states. In part for the aforegoing reasons, but more especially because of those which follow, I give it as my judgment that the reestablishment of the ground defenses and field formations of the European states within the North Atlantic Alliance should be the fundamental object of American spending under the arms support program. The present field combat structure of the United States is altogether inadequate, and the state of popular and political opinion does not permit of the likelihood that it can be expanded to 30 divisions and upward, which is the minimum practical figure for initial operations overseas in the event of a general European war. Our European allies possess manpower resources sufficient to the raising of 30 to 40 divisions, provided they can be assured proper training through a solution of their weapons supply problem. The strategic and tactical air strength of the United States can be deployed to western Europe practically as promptly as the ground strength of that area can be mobilized, but it would not be so deployed unless furnished with a relatively firm base through the strengthening of the ground establishment on the far side of the Atlantic. A general strategic and economic advantage would accrue to the alliance as a whole by concentrating air strength within the frame of an already existing and thoroughly modern training and operating system supported by an efficient aviation industry, here and in Britain. This is the surest way to get the largest possible return in terms of our power requirements per dollars expended. Weapons evolution since World War II, despite the improvement in the atom bomb and progress in the guided missile field, has not altered the traditional role of ground power, or insured that there can be possibility of decision if ground power is continued in a state of passive weakness, prior to the outbreak of hostilities. It may well be that among our leaders in military aviation there are those who would take issue with these views. To proclaim strongly one doctrine here in the United States makes it more than a little difficult to support what seemingly appears an opposite doctrine for the European half of the North Atlantic establishment. The natural tendency of the air power proponent is to claim priority for air power at all points of the compass and for the salvation of all national forces. To the extent that the alliance can resist any such concept, and can build its forces with a view to their operational effectiveness as a whole, making the best use of the present potential, capabilities, and natural promptings of the various peoples, it will improve the chance to achieve its political purpose the prevention of a third world war. Failing to do this, it will either develop a strategic structure which is not balanced toward the protection of the very object for which the alliance was formed, or will deteriorate into a weak union of dissatisfied states, each concerned primarily with the problems of its own security system. The above quotation brings out the concept of balanced force in this program-another way of expressing specialization. The balance of forces will necessarily have to develop, as the program evolves, in the direction of balance not within, but among, nations. It is not intended that each participating country develop proportionally in all branches of military activity. In the necessities imposed by the hard facts of position and population, each nation will have to play its destined part. In words from a letter of the Secretary of State to Representative John Davis Lodge, Member of Congress: * It is the firm conviction of the executive branch that the militaryassistance program has been so planned and will be so executed as to assure that it will aid in the development of that kind and amount of strength appropriate to the role which each country should play in a collective defense effort * * The program here envisaged makes a moderate approach to the goal of balanced force. It does not envisage huge expansion of military organizations. It does not contemplate an armament race. It does not seek a radically quickened pace of military activity. Its purpose is rather to develop the mobility and the fire power of units already in being, to provide additional training of Reserve components on an improved basis, to improve mechanization by the supply of spare parts for deadlined equipment, and to make possible increased local production of items of military utility. The committee has scanned these plans in broad outline and in detail. The members were given, in executive session, the benefit of classified information developed within the executive branch regarding this program. This information dealt with the present strength of forces in western Europe, their state of readiness, the level of reserve material, and the levels of current military production in western Europe as expressed in dollars. The information included also the strength and deployment of forces behind the iron curtain. To publish the information regarding strength and resources in western Europe would cut athwart the purpose of this bill. It would give any putative enemy precisely the information which his espionage is seeking. Even to reveal the information assembled on the disposition of forces of nations not involved in this program would entail a security risk. For it would reveal the calculations which are the basis of this program. In the interest of security and in a sense of obligation to those officials of the executive establishment who gave this information in executive session, the committee feels compelled to withhold it. C. NATIONAL SECURITY The mergence of United States security with the security of the other nations of the North Atlantic community is now an accomplished fact in the foreign policy of this country. It should be emphasized that it is a case of mergence, not submergence. In nowise. is United States security subordinated in the pattern of obligation |