MILITARY SITUATION IN THE FAR EAST MONDAY, MAY 28, 1951 COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES AND THE COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS, Washington, D. C. The committees met, pursuant to adjournment, at 10:05 a. m., in room 212, Senate Office Building, Senator Richard B. Russell (chairman, Committee on Armed Services) presiding. Present: Senators Russell (chairman, Committee on Armed Services), Connally (chairman, Committee on Foreign Relations), George, Green, McMahon, Fulbright, Sparkman, Gillette, Smith of New Jersey, Hickenlooper, Johnson of Texas, Hunt, Long, Bridges, Saltonstall, Morse, Knowland, Cain. Also present: Mark H. Galusha and Verne D. Mudge, of the committee staff of the Armed Services Committee; Francis O. Wilcox, chief of staff; Thorsten V. Kalijarvi, staff associate, Committee on Foreign Relations. Chairman RUSSELL. The committee will come to order. Gentlemen, our witness today is Gen. Hoyt S. Vandenberg, Chief of Staff, and therefore the miiltary head of our Nation's Air Force. General Vandenberg is in command of that branch of our armed services whose mission it is to keep control of the air and deal devastating counterblows on the very day that any aggressor may attack the United States. It is his responsibility to see to it that the Air Force is ready at all times to carry out that important mission. The Air Force under his command is playing a major role in the Korean War. It has protected our ground troops, bases, and installations throughout the fighting and bears a considerable share of the credit for the large number of casualties inflicted upon the enemy. Like our last witness, General Collins, General Vandenberg has been on thes cene in the Far East. He can bring us a first-hand account not only of the evets that we are studying but of the war itself and the lessons that we are learning from that war. General Vandenberg, the committee has instructed me to administer the oath to all witnesses. Will you please arise to be sworn? Do you solemnly swear the evidence which you will give to this committee on matters under inquiry shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God? General VANDENBERG. I do. TESTIMONY OF GENERAL HOYT S. VANDENBERG, CHIEF OF STAFF, UNITED STATES AIR FORCE; ACCOMPANIED BY LT. COL. IMMANUEL J. KLETTE, UNITED STATES AIR FORCE Chairman RUSSELL. General, do you have any prepared statement that you desire to present to the committee? General VANDENBERG. No, Mr. Chairman; I do not. 1375 VANDENBERG'S CAREER Chairman RUSSELL. Suppose you give us on the committee's time a brief statement of your career, General, for the benefit of the record. General VANDENBERG. From the beginning, sir? Chairman RUSSELL. Yes, sir. General VANDENBERG. I was appointed to the United States Military Academy, graduated in 1923 as a second lieutenant, in the Air Service, United States Army. I commanded as a second lieutenant the Third Attack, a squadron in the Third Attack Group which was one of the three combat groups in the United States Air Service at that time. I became a flying instructor at Brooks Field and at March Field, commanded a fighter squadron in Hawaii. I attended the usual staff and command schools, Air War College, was an instructor in fighter tactics at the Air Attack School. I was General Arnold's Chief of Operations shortly after the outbreak of war. Went to England, helped prepare plans for the invasion of north Africa, landed in north Africa on D-day, became deputy commander of the Northwest Strategic Air Forces in Africa. I went to Russia as air adviser to Mr. Harriman in the winter of 1943, came back to Washington as Deputy Chief of Staff, was sent back to England as the Deputy Air Commander in Chief of the Allied Air Forces in Europe. I was given command of the Ninth Tactical Air Force shortly after the invasion of Europe. Came back to the United States at the end of the war, became one of General Arnold's principal deputies; then became G-2 in the War Dejartment under General Eisenhower; then became the head of the Central Intelligence Agency, became Vice Chief of Staff of the United States Air Force and then Chief of Staff. EVALUATING RUSSIAN JETS Chairman RUSSELL. How many times have you been to the Far East during the course of the hostilities now in existence there? General VANDENBERG. Two times. Chairman RUSSELL. Do you remember about when those two visits were? General VANDENBERG. One was shortly after the engagement started in July, and the other was in January. Chairman RUSSELL. That is when you went with General Collins in January? General VANDENBERG. Yes, sir. Chairman RUSSELL. You have been in Korea with the Air Forces and other forces there? General VANDENBERG. Yes, sir; both times. Chairman RUSSELL. General, we hear quite a bit about the jets that are flying from Manchurian bases, and which sometimes have come in contact with our own jet fighters. Some of the news accounts that I have read state that those jets, which are Russian, and I believe they call them MIG's, are faster than our jets, and are superior planes. I would like to have you comment on that. General VANDENBERG. The indication is, Mr. Chairman, that they have a jet engine in the MIG 15 that is superior to any jet engine that we have today. Our training is superior and our gunnery control in the aircraft is superior, which gives us an advantage, even though they have the advantage of speed and climb and operations at altitude. [Deleted.] IMPROVING UNITED STATES JETS Chairman RUSSELL. What steps are being taken to improve our own jet engines to where they will be as fast, or faster than these Russian jet engines? General VANDENBERG. We have given all the information that we have been able to obtain, on the improvements that the Russians have put into their jet engines; we are collaborating with the British who have been making good jet engines, and through our research and development program, we are doing everything possible to procure the best jet engines that American manufacturers can make. BRITISH INFLUENCE ON SOVIET JETS Chairman RUSSELL. Do we have any knowledge as to whether or not the Russians built this engine that is in these MIG's, or do we think it is an improvement of the British jet engine? General VANDENBERG. It is a very marked improvement of the almost obsolescent jet engine that was sold to the Russians several years ago. It was made and developed in Russia, possibly with the help of German technicians; but any thought that we might have that it is due solely to those German technicians is fallacious. The quantities in which they are now appearing on the front, both in Western Europe and in the Far East, would indicate that mass production methods of very excellent aircraft are now a capability of the Russians. Chairman RUSSELL. When you speak about the engines sold to the Russians, do you mean the Rolls-Royce jet British engines that were the subject of some controversy when they were sold to Russia some time ago? General VANDENBERG. Yes; I believe it was the NENE. Chairman RUSSELL. Rather than the Rolls-Royce? General VANDENBERG. I think it was probably manufactured- According to newspaper accounts, every time our jets encounter Russian jets we shoot down from one to four or five and we report · no losses. Are the newspaper accounts on that reasonably accurate? SUPERIOR UNITED STATES TACTICS AND EQUIPMENT Chairman RUSSELL. How do you account, then, for the fact [de.leted] that our people go practically unscathed while they shoot down these Russian planes? General VANDENBERG. Our pilots are at the present time much superior in tactics and technique of air fighting, in my opinion. They are better trained and their armament is superior. I think those are the two factors. 83797-51-pt. 2-42 Chairman RUSSELL. You mean the machineguns General VANDENBERG. Yes, sir. Chairman RUSSELL. And the 40 millimeter or whatever we equip our jets with? General VANDENBERG. Yes, sir, and the sights. Chairman RUSSELL. How far have these jets come into Korea? Have they come down below the parallel, the Russian jets? General VANDENBERG. No, sir; that is about the extreme limit of their range, and they wouldn't be able to do much fighting when they got down there under the present configuration of the MIG-15. COMPARING THE RANGE OF JETS Chairman RUSSELL. How does the range of our jet compare with the Russian jets? General VANDENBERG. That is difficult to answer in an all-inclusive answer, Mr. Chairman, because it depends upon what type of our jets we are talking about. If we are talking about the F-86 Sabre, which is most nearly comparable to the MIG-15, I would say we had some slight advantage in range. Chairman RUSSELL. Have our air forces encountered any bombers coming out of Manchuria or is it exclusively the fighter planes? General VANDENBERG. There have been a few reports of single aircraft operating at night that indicate that some of those might be bombers. Chairman RUSSELL. Have there been any attacks made upon our troops and installations and bases in Korea by these planes? General VANDENBERG. Bombs have been dropped upon occasions. To my knowledge, they have caused no casualties as yet. JCS RESTRICTIONS ON BOMBING Chairman RUSSELL. Did you participate in any meetings of the Joint Chiefs of Staff when restrictions were placed upon the bombing of the Chinese installations and bases and troop concentrations north of the Yalu River in Manchuria? General VANDENBERG. Yes, sir. Chairman RUSSELL. Did you approve of these orders which prohibited the Air Force in the Far East from attacking north of the Yalu? General VANDENBERG. Yes, sir. AIR POWER NORTH OF THE YALU Chairman RUSSELL. Well, you are the Chief of Staff of the Air Force, General, and of course one of the stanchest champions of air power as a weapon of war. Why did you conclude that it should not be used north of the Yalu River? General VANDENBERG. Mr. Chairman, the application of air power is not very well understood in this country by people in general, in my opinion. While I was and am today against bombing across the Yalu, it does not mean by any stretch of the imagination that I might not be for it tomorrow, a month from now, or 6 months from now. Air power, and especially the application of strategic air power, should go to the heart of the industrial centers to become reasonably |