sians as NATO is to the United States, they are about 5 years behind, technologically, and much smaller in numbers; a system specifically designed to take advantage of Chinese weaknesses might be totally ineffective against the Soviets, but still effective against the Chinese. I believe it would be worthwhile to spend money on such hypothetical threats.

ARMS CONTROL

The arms control possibility is also important. As I mentioned earlier, we have some arms control today. Neither we nor, I believe, the Soviets are building the most destructive systems possible. There are militarily potent systems that could be built which are not being built simply because nobody wants to own them. If we had time, I could discuss the most spectacular and ominous possibility, the doomsday machine, in detail. If one were simple-minded, one might believe both sides were building such devices today. Such devices would indeed render obsolete many suggested civil defense programs. But so far as I know, neither we nor they are building them.

Other types of arms control measures may be implemented, but even if we have elaborate signed agreements with the Soviets and others, that does not mean war cannot happen. Barring a world government, we will still be in the business of defending our country. The agreements may be deliberately broken, they may be abolished, or they may be accidentally violated.

With many arms limitation programs, some of the problems which look like they might become almost intolerable if we got into a fullfledged arms race are sharply alleviated. Many of the defense programs which are being considered today are completely compatible with many arms control measures, and indeed work better with the arms control measures than without them. They may be both militarily effective and tend to reinforce the arms control measures. Therefore, this possibility must be considered.

TECHNOLOGICAL BREAKTHROUGH

The next possibility is the technological breakthrough. One must admit that most of the technical people feel it is more likely that technological breakthroughs will hurt rather than help civil defense, but this is not inevitable. In particular, there are real possibilities in active defense. Of course, active defense today has serious problems; though they are perhaps not as serious as some think who discount it completely. I happen to think one can procure valuable levels of active defense, but with current technology and vigorous use of countermeasures by the attacker, active defense can have some serious deficiencies. However, these measures of active defense do tend to reinforce civil defense measures.

In addition, we are working hard at various systems, and one can have technological improvement in defense as well as offense. Some of these improvements cannot be predicted. When they occur we would like to be in a position to take advantage of them. If we have not started the necessary programs we cannot take advantage of these improvements even if they occur.

Not only does active defense complement fallout shelters, it may also complement blast shelters. Some of the earlier testimony stated

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that blast shelters were not compatible with active defense. This may or may not be true, depending on what the system is.

RISE OF A HITLER

The last, and I hope, the least likely contingency on the chart is the rise of a Hitler. It is commonplace today to say that Khrushchev is not like Hitler. I think that is true. He is not as reckless, he is not as determined, not as malevolent.

Some, most notably A. J. P. Taylor, have said that Hitler was not like Hitler. In particular in the period 1933-43, Hitler and his government were relatively cautious as compared to the image we tend to remember. He acted much more rationally and prudently than most of us recall, and, in fact, came close to achieving his objectives. But even then he was an incredible threat to his warweary, peace-loving opposition. Today a Hitler type armed with thermonuclear bombs, particularly one who is crazy or realistically simulates being crazy, has the edge.

If somebody comes up to you and says, "One of us has to be responsible and it is not going to be me so it has to be you," he has a very effective bargaining advantage. If he can convince you that he is stark, staring mad and if he has enough destructive power, then deterrence alone doesn't work; you have to cave in or be annihilated.

It is difficult for Khrushchev to convince us that he is stark, staring mad because we can see he is thinking. I should add that Í do not think we can convince him that we are stark staring mad.

It may happen that a leader will take over somewhere, sometime who either is or tries to act that role. Our only ability to handle him, the only way we can challenge him, is to have a method of putting our people in a place of safety so we can say, "Look, if you really are mad, we will fight it out."

Let me summarize this last point by the following: If somebody says, "I would rather be Red than dead," he is a coward, and I think very properly an object of contempt and scorn. If somebody says, "I would rather have everybody Red than everybody dead," he is making a sort of reasonable remark. It is a perfectly reasonable position to take. You may not agree with it, but I would agree with it.

I would rather have everybody Red than everybody dead, but we must not allow a situation to occur in which this last is the choice that is presented to us. We must always have an ability to say: "That is not the question. Our Nation and system will survive the worst you can do and we are willing to accept large casualties rather than surrender."

We cannot handle a Hitler on just resolve. It takes programs because he may well have more resolve than we have, particularly if he is not listening.

This finishes my rather cursory survey of the strategic background of civil defense. In spite of the superficial nature of my remarks, I have taken up more of the committee's time than I intended. I do want to finish by saying that the current program recommended by the administration seems to me the right way to get into the civil defense business. I would have some criticism of some aspects, but providing the program is pursued expeditiously, competently, and efficiently-provided they do what they say they want to do then I have no hesitation in endorsing the recommendation.

CIVIL DEFENSE RESEARCH

Mr. ROBACK. Mr. Kahn, would you comment specifically about the request for research in that program?

Mr. KAHN. Well, we suggested a program in 1958 as a result of the 1957 RAND study. The "we" is the people who did the study not the corporation, and the suggestions can be found in RAND Report RM 2206-RC. There is a revised summary of these suggestions in appendix IV of my book, "On Thermonuclear War."

The report recommended that about $300 million be spent for a capability in being. The recommended measures were much like the current program. In other words, identification, counting, and labeling of existing fallout protection, and then making plans to use this protection. In addition, we suggested about $200 million for what we called research, development, and planning for the preliminary phases of a spectrum of programs. Here the administration's recommendations are somewhat less than ours.

We called some of this research, development, and planning program a part of the so-called preattack mobilization base. The idea was that in this country we theoretically have the capability to procure a civil defense program in just a year. We have the physical capability in the construction and the other industries that are necessary to actually carry through a massive program running between, say, $50 and $100 billion in 1 year. It can be done not only because the necessary industries have the capacity, but because these industries are very deployable.

One can give a construction company a blueprint on Friday for a new shelter, and on Monday this company would start to build it. It does not need a long leadtime like, for example, the aircraft or the traditional munitions industries.

One of the inadequacies of the current proposal is that it does not look enough at the various alternative programs and possibilities. The people involved may do all these things after they get started, but many of the possibilities are not explicitly recognized in the proposals set forth, or do not receive sufficient emphasis. I think the actual bill has a research budget for $7 to $15 million, something like that.

Mr. ROBACK. That is for research; there are other items in the budget, perhaps, that could be classified in that broad area.

Mr. KAHN. Yes. That is certainly much larger than we have had in the past by quite a bit. But it is not as large as we need.

Let me give some examples. It used to cost between $100 and $200 million to build a prototype fighter aircraft, $100 to $200 million just to do the research and development so that we could see what we might be able to procure. We used to develop five airplanes for every one we bought. In other words, we actually put out $500 million to $1 billion in order to see what five of these objects looked like; we then looked at them, picked one, and threw four away.

So far as I know, nobody criticized that process. Rather, some said, "Why don't you build more prototypes. Why are you so skimpy on research and development?"

Today the Department of Defense spends between $8 and $10 billion on research and development, if you allocate all the costs to research and development that really belong there. (This last number is different from official costs.) In other words, they spend one out of every

$5 or $6 they get for research and development. Research and development are costly.

Well, civil defense is an area which has been relatively neglected. Furthermore, it is more complicated than a fighter plane by quite a bit. We can afford to spend comparable funds on research and development in this area.

CIVIL DEFENSE COSTS COMPARED WITH CANCELED WEAPONS

Mr. ROBACK. You say, Mr. Kahn, that the public evaluation of civil defense outlays rates them so much lower than military weapons. Let us observe, for example, that all the money spent by the Federal Government on civil defense in more than a decade is less than the investment in the Navaho, which never became a weapon, or the Snark, which is being phased out after one squadron ?

Mr. KAHN. Yes.

Mr. ROBACK. So we don't hear anyone moaning and groaning loudly about the Snark. It is written off because of technological circumstances.

But everybody moans and groans about civil defense outlays, asking: "What do we have to show for $600 million expended in a decade?" What, in your opinion, does that attitude reflect?

Mr. KAHN. I think partly a lack of ability just to recognize that these big numbers are not so big. In other words, $600 million looks like a lot of money.

Mr. ROBACK. Does it also reflect the unwillingness of people to face the need for civil defense, the thing you are talking about?

Mr. KAHN. Well, I think that is correct. In other words, when you say you put $1 billion into a Navaho, and it was a good thing that you did, even though you never bought the Navaho, people are willing to believe this notion; they are familiar with the fact that military programs are useful even if expensive.

They think of civil defense as being neither expensive nor useful, so naturally they begrudge the money. There is a real hostility to civil defense on both the right and the left.

This means that any mistakes that are made get played up and exaggerated out of all proportion.

USE OF AVAILABLE DATA

Mr. HOLIFIELD. Mr. Kahn, we have had a great deal of work done by the Government in designing various types of shelters. There have been tests out in Nevada, as you know, and work has been done by a great many private engineering corporations.

Now, do you believe that an expensive program of research and development is necessary for the purpose of designing shelters before we start in constructing them, or do you believe there are many types of shelters and many known principles of adaptations in existing cavities which could be used, and a current program embarked upon which would bring into being these shelters for the benefit of the people without a tremendous lag time for additional research and development?

Mr. KAHN. I believe there is absolutely no justification for delaying current procurement because better possibilities may be created

by further research and development. I would say that of all the weapons systems I have ever studied or been familiar with, for example, BMEWS, or other air defense and warning systems, or even SAC offense systems, that we know, comparatively speaking, as much or more about civil defense today as we knew about these other systems when we went ahead with them.

Mr. HOLIFIELD. The principles of protection from radioactivity by shielding have been pretty well developed now.

Mr. KAHN. I am sorry, let me go back. I stand corrected, and thank you. In terms of protecting from the weapons effects we know about, and I think, that for our immediate purposes we know much about the relevant ones—we know how to do it today. We can go ahead.

I still want to make the point that every military system today changes rapidly. We can never stop thinking. This thinking usually improves things. One is always sorry 5 years later that he did not think of his current ideas earlier and we have to be willing to live with this prospect.

We cannot in any of these systems say: "I will not go ahead now because I will know how to do it better later. That is always true." I would not like my testimony today to be quoted to the effect that I thought we should hold back because we are going to learn more later. I simply want to point out that we will learn more later— and the sooner the better.

COST OF SHELTER IDENTIFICATION PROGRAM

Mr. HOLIFIELD. I think this is a premise that anyone will agree to. We are somewhat concerned about the proposal of the administration to spend $93 million for the purpose of surveying and identifying and marking shelters.

Without going into a detailed study of it, it seems to some of us as if this is a program which might not cost as much as this, and also a program where criteria could be set up so that people at the local level could make their own surveys. This is the place where I think you could get a great deal of cooperation from civil defense organizations through volunteer help, providing they had the proper criteria to use in identifying shelter spaces and marking them and reporting them to a central point.

Mr. KAHN. I am willing to believe that if you spread the program over 2 or 3 years you could do it a lot cheaper. I think that is what your suggestion would really amount to, sir.

However, I believe that the identifying, counting, and labeling program is the kind of program that ought to be done in 1 year. We actually suggested such a program in late 1957 and early 1958, for implementation in 1959. We added that it ought to be in by 1960 because it might be partly obsolete by 1963 or 1964. While this last is perhaps too negative, the program is still of the kind one ought to do in a hurry. The fact that you would save $30 or $40 million by doing it more slowly does not impress me. I am a taxpayer, but I feel it is a very small sum compared to the benefits of rapid action.

Mr. HOLIFIELD. In other words, you feel if such a program is embarked upon energetically, that in relation to the time, the circum