Mr. DELLENBACK. If I may, Mr. Chairman, may I commend you as the chairman of this subcommittee and your members for having these hearings. I think we are here dealing with a tremendously important problem, so far as America is concerned, and we of the House recognize that while our direct responsibility is not to ratify the treaties that are involved, these problems are as much our concern as they are the other body's. And I commend all of you for your willingness to plunge into this and to do some helpful and creative thinking.

Mr. ZABLOCKI. After all, this is our obligation. We are spokesmen for the people, direct representatives of the people. Therefore, we should voice our views on this particularly delicate matter.

Mr. DELLENBACK. It is a fine move, sir.

Mr. ZABLOCKI. Thank you very much.

Mr. Broomfield?

Mr. BROOMFIELD. Yes, Mr. Chairman.

T

CBW STUDY SENT TO PRESIDENT NIXON

John, I, too, want to join with the chairman. I am very impressed with your comments and statement this morning. I think they have been extremely helpful to this subcommittee in their deliberation on this subject.

I was wondering, has President Nixon been given a copy of the study report made by a group of members working with you?

Mr. DELLENBACK. Yes, Mr. Broomfield, we have sent a copy of this to the Department of Defense. We have sent a copy directly to the President.

Mr. BROOMFIELD. It is my understanding that the United States did not use any kind of gas, even tear gas, in World War II or Korea. Do you know why this was so and why the policy was changed in Vietnam?

Mr. DELLENBACK. I don't know. Your understanding is like mine, that maybe with an isolated slip or two, there was no deliberate use of tear gas in the Second World War. Certainly, there wasn't in any of the theaters in which I was involved, or at least not to my knowledge. And I don't know why the change was made in connection with the Vietnamese conflict.

REASON FOR DELAY IN RATIFICATION

Mr. BROOMFIELD. I think the other thing that bothers me is the delay since 1925 in the consideration of the ratification of this protocol.

Do you have any comment on why this is delayed so long?

Mr. DELLENBACK. Well, I read with interest the newspaper article the other day that some of you may have seen, which made some remark about a tidy chairman of the Senate committee who is responsible for the fact that the issue isn't before the Senate at the present time, and made the point that at the time that Vandenberg was chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, apparently, he made it a point to look over the docket of the committee. And he found, apparently, that there were some 19 different treaties of some variant age that were there, and they weren't being acted on.

And so he said, "Well, let's sweep all these old things out of the way and let's clear the deck. Let's turn them back to the executive department and let's go forward with a clean docket."

And the 1925 Geneva Protocol was one of those, under those circumstances. And so it ended up back in the hands of the administration, not formally before the Congress at all, you see. And it has been in that position since then. No administration has turned around and handed it back to the Senate for ratification.

This is, at least, the thrust of this article, and I know nothing to the contrary that would apparently contradict that which was done at that time.

THE NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL CBW REVIEW

Mr. BROOMFIELD. I see. Thank you.

Have you any idea about the nature of the or outcome of the review of this CBW policy which presently is being conducted by the National Security Council?

Mr. DELLENBACK. I don't have any hard information on it, Mr. Broomfield, of the nature on which we can rely. I have only a few rumors. And I don't know what the outcome will actually formally be, so far as they are concerned.

Mr. BROOMFIELD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. ZABLOCKI. Let me just pursue this matter a bit further. The National Security Council is carefully considering the CBW issue? Mr. DELLENBACK. This is my understanding that they are considering it carefully and in depth, and it is my hope that they will continue to do it in very real depth.

Mr. ZABLOCKI. I am hopeful that these hearings will serve as a spur to those deliberations and that the Council will come up with some good recommendations.

Mr. DELLENBACK. There is precedent that a hearing on the part of one body or the other of the Congress has that effect. We hope that will be one of the effects.

Mr. ZABLOCKI. This subcommittee apparently has had some worthwhile effects on national security policies as a result of our hearings, even in this particular short period of 11 months. But we are hopeful that any positive action on the part of the Security Council will to some degree, at least, be affected by our activity in this subcommittee.

Mr. Fraser.

Mr. FRASER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I was just going to say I hope that there is more visible impact than our hearings on the MIRV seem to have had thus far, on the Helsinski talks.

Mr. ZABLOCKI. Well, I am not completely pessimistic, even in that regard.

Mr. FRASER. I hope not. I am sure they are thinking very seriously

THE NONUSE OF GAS IN KOREAN CONFLICT

Mr. Dellenback, I want to commend you for a very thoughtful statement. I think that your work in making the study and involving the Members that you have will help to create a climate here in which there might be a chance of gaining widespread support for the position you are advocating.

On the use of gas in the Korean war, my understanding is that in part we were faced with the fact that we were alined with large numbers of other nations who are members of the United Nations, and who were also signatories to the protocol and had taken the view that any kind of gas would be a violation of the protocol, so that we were under constraints there that we apparently are not under in Vietnam.

Whether that is the full explanation or not, I don't know, but I understand that some of the field commanders did ask for the right to use gas in Korea, but that they were turned down, I suppose in part on those grounds.

Mr. DELLENBACK. It would make sense if that were the case, it would appear to me, Mr. Fraser. And, as you recall, one of the thrusts of my testimony, one of the comments which I made, was that so far as the practicality of the use thereof, we might well find ourselves in an ally situation with other ratifiers of the protocol, and it would be a very sticky situation, because common weapon policies would have to be followed, and it is the very type of thing to which you are now alluding.

CB WEAPONS VERSUS NUCLEAR WEAPONS

Mr. FRASER. Let me ask you a kind of a philosophical question. With four or five nations possessing nuclear weapons, with the enormous damage they can inflict, and the follow-on damage that occurs through the fallout and radiation, and so on, what do you see in the chemical and biological field that would suggest that we should address ourselves to this particular type of means of inflicting casualties or incapacitating people?

When we do have these nuclear weapons which have this enormous mass destructive capabilities

Mr. DELLENBACK. Well, if I get the thrust of your question properly, Mr. Fraser, I am not advocating a turning to the use of these other weapons. I do feel-and it is part of the statement that we make in our study paper-that the very existence of that nuclear weaponry, however, is of such a nature that it is a strong reason why we just do not need this other field of weaponry.

We are talking about having a weapon which could be used as a retaliatory deterrent. We don't need this other field of weaponry, with all its tremendous potentials for worldwide devastation. I allude particularly to biological weaponry. I think it is a frightening weapon, and it concerns me that there is an apparent history of a policy feeling we need this in our arsenal of weaponry. These weapons are so horrible that we should not be using them. We have this other very powerful deterrent to which you have alluded.

It seems to me that is another reason why we do not need to move forward. In fact, we should be moving backward in the CBW field.

Mr. FRASER. You are saying that because we have two terrible weapons, and the latest weapon makes the first relatively obsolete, we ought to get rid of it?

Mr. DELLENBACK. No; not obsolete. I am not talking in terms of ! obsolescence.

Mr. FRASER. In terms of the security needs of the United States, though.

Mr. DELLENBACK. I think it makes it unnecessary. It is a second type of weaponry which has its own frightening possibilities. And the only justification that I could see from the standpoint of the nature for going forward with the stockpiling or the production would be if we absolutely had to have it for national defense.

Well, it seems to me that that reason just does not exist. This was part of the thrust of our study. That need is just not there. We don't need it for those purposes.

THE PROBLEM OF PROLIFERATION

Mr. FRASER. One of our other concerns about nuclear weapons, of course, is proliferation. It is a fact, is it not, that proliferation in the chemical and biological fields is probably lots easier and cheaper for countries than the nuclear field, which would be another reason why we should go along with the world opinion to try to get rid of those weapons, or at least to prohibit their use?

Mr. DELLENBACK. I am sure you are not reaching in this direction, Mr. Fraser, but I don't want even impliedly or indirectly to be standing with those who are advocating, if there are indeed any, the use of nuclear weapons. So I am not moving in the direction of saying we should be using these things-there is a better weapon, it is a more effective weapon than this one.

I am merely looking for the moment at the CBW field and saying my admittedly limited examination of the field has left me with the impression that we have little to gain, if any, that the gains are marginal from having his weapon in our stockpile, in view of everything else that exists in the world at the moment.

And I think that it would be a long step in the direction of permanent peace if we were to take the steps that we have suggested here of moving away from having this in our stockpile, and having it in production. I think we ought to be saying clearly we will not use this weapon.

I would like us to, see, go way beyond the protocol, Mr. Zablocki, but as a second step, not tied to the first step, because it is right here in front of us, and being relatively easily taken, then let's be ready to make it a first step and go on to the second and third steps.

Mr. FRASER. Thank you very much.

Mr. ZABLOCKI. Mr. Taft.

Mr. TAFT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

"THIN LINE" BETWEEN USES OF TEAR GAS

Mr. Dellenback, this tear gas thing bothers me a little bit. I wonder what you think about the use of tear gas at the Justice Department last week. Was this a justifiable use, or not?

Mr. DELLENBACK. Well, so far as the 1925 Geneva Protocol is concerned, Mr. Taft, let me say only that it doesn't deal with any nonmilitary use of tear gas. It deals only with military uses, and it is dealing with a first-use situation.

In my testimony, I have deliberately stayed away from the civilian use of tear gas.

Mr. TAFT. It is a pretty hard line to draw in a guerrilla warfare type situation. Let's get away from Vietnam for a moment and just discuss the reports of the Sino-Soviet frontier, where it is reported at times that great masses of unarmed Chinese settlers, in effect, were pushed over on the ice and told to go out there and settle, and the Russians tried to herd them back in or tried to hold them back in.

Whether these reports are true or not, I don't know, and it isn't important. As a hypothetical situation, under these circumstances, what should the armed forces of a nation faced with this type of aggression do? Should it use tear gas or not, or what should it use if no other method, short of far more repressive and/or dangerous methods, from the point of view of the safety of the people involved, is an issue? Mr. DELLENBACK. Hard cases make bad law.

is.

THE USE OF PHOSPHOROUS SHELLS

Mr. TAFT. I agree. I don't know exactly what the answer to that one

Let me go on to another hard case, I think, which hasn't been discussed, as far as I know.

What about the use of high-explosive, white phosphorous shells? Is this chemical warfare, or isn't it chemical warfare? We used them extensively all through World War II, as I am sure you know.

Mr. DELLENBACK. I would say two things, Bob, if I may, about this. One, before you came I carefully sought to disqualify myself as a real expert in this field. And I am a deeply concerned Member of this body. We have done some studying, and we have done some thinking and some talking about it.

I would have difficulty drawing the sort of line you draw and that you touch on with that question. It is a hard one, and I am not prepared-I mean, without much more intensive study-to attempt to draw that line.

I would say the second thing, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, if I may, that I am personally persuaded that the road to permanent real peace for the world doesn't lie down the road of developing newer and newer and more and more powerful weapons systems. I think this is a race that has a very real frightening possi