tions that the committee intends to put to us. I would like to say that the report is classified “Secret.” If we are going to talk about it, I hope that everyone in the room is cleared. My people are.

Mr. FASCELL. We are starting out on an open hearing and hope to discuss as much as we possibly can that way. If the subcommittee feels that we are getting into an area that we ought to get on the record in executive session, we will do that. Otherwise, we will try to stick to discussion of the problem in open hearing. I think we can start out, can we not, with a short statement about the operations here?

Why not give the subcommittee here a brief outline of what your mission is and your responsibility and duties here? Before you get into that, however, who was your predecessor, and how long was he here before you got here?

General BABCOCK. My predecessor was Maj. Gen. C. E. Ryan, of the United States Army, who left on the 30th of June. He came here February 1956 and then went home and retired. His predecessor was Maj. Gen. T. E. DeShazo, and he served from sometime in February 1954 to February 1956.

Mr. FASCELL. Let us now take Colonel Eisenhart.
How long have you been with this mission! ?

Colonel EISENHART. I arrived here in August 1955. I have been here a little over 2 years.

a Mr. FASCELL. Prior to that what was your assignment !

Colonel EISENHART. I attended the Industrial College in Washington for 1 year, and prior to that I was in the Air Materiel Command at Wright Field, working with the foreign-aid program.

Mr. FASCELL. Colonel Kern, how long have you been here?

Colonel KERN. Mr. Chairman, I arrived here in April of this year and assumed my duties as Chief of the Army Section the 1st of July.

Mr. FASCELL. Who was your predecessor!
Colonel KERN. Colonel Lang.
Mr. FASCELL. What was your prior assignment, Colonel?

Colonel KERN. Assistant Chief of Staff, G-3, 5th Army Headquarters, in Chicago.

Mr. FASCELL. Is this your first opportnnity on this type of assignment?

Colonel KERN. I served 6 months in Korea as a division adviser in the Korean military assistance advisory group. The work was somewhat different there. I was with the combat element and not at the headquarters.

Mr. FASCELL. Commander, how about you!

Commander LEE. I arrived in MAAG-France in mid-March of 1956.

Mr. FASCELL. Your prior assignment was what?

Commander LEE. I was executive officer of the United States Fleet Air Defense Training Center, Dam Neck, Virginia Beach, Va.

Mr. FASCELL. Is this assignment here in France the first such assignment? Commander LEE. Yes, sir; it is. General BABCOCK. Colonel Sternberg?

Colonel STERNBERG. I arrived the 26th of July 1957. I just beat you here by a few weeks.

Mr. FASCELL. What was your prior assignment?

Colonel STERNBERG. Continental Headquarters at Fort Monroe, Va., as Chief of the Organization Tactics and Doctrine Division of the Infantry Section.

Mr. FASCELL. What significance, if any, should the committee put on the fact, General, that an Army man is heading this mission?

General BABCOCK. I think merely, Mr. Chairman, that the French Army is the largest and strongest force that France has and that, I think, is the only reason for it. They thought that the Army interest here was somewhat greater than the other services. France's contribution to NATO land forces is probably a little greater than any others. I think that is all.

Mr. FASCELL. Go right ahead now and tell us about your mission and responsibilities.

General BABCOCK. Briefly, my mission is to administer the military aid which is granted to France under the Mutual Defense Security Act. It is administered or given to France to enable it to carry out its commitments to NATO in the mutual defense of the free world. It is our responsibility to program the aid which France is to receive and to deliver that to the French, as well as to inspect, to the best of our ability, to see that it is being employed for the purpose for which it was intended and to render such assistance to the French as we can in the use of the equipment which we furnish them. By that I mean to give them advice, based on the experience which we have had with that equipment. Much of this equipment is new to the French, especially the more modern equipment which is coming over now, and we find that we have, through experience, found out a great deal about the equipment, how best to use it, how best to take care of it, and we try to pass that information on.

We program our aid to France by taking the force goals which the Joint Chiefs of Staff have determined France should work toward. That is, the ships, planes, guns, and other equipment or units which the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the United States Defense Department feel France should have in order to carry out its commitments. We always program on a deficiency basis. That is, we program for aid which will enable us eventually to fill the deficiencies which exist in French forces when balanced against the Joint Chiefs of Staff criteria (what they feel France ought ultimately to have), so that our request which goes in each year is very much larger than actually appropriated for. It is not expected that we will meet those ultimate goals immediately. Each year we program to fill up the deficiencies which still exist in the French forces, and it comes to a very large amount of equipment although a very much smaller amount appears in the approved program.

Next year we program, and subtract from that program what has come to us, although we also have to take into account the fact that new weapons come into existence and there is a deterioration and, therefore, there is a continuing need for aid all the time. Mr. FASCELL. This raises a very interesting question. I had not

I realized before, on this last point, something which comes to mind about your programing. Each year the full extent of the force objectives of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

General BABCOCK. That is what we program. That is not necessarily what gets to Congress.

Mr. FASCELL. I understand that, but, if that is true with all other country military missions, then I wonder about some of the very strong criticism that has been leveled at the military assistance program by the General Accounting Office in their unclassified report. I do not know whether you have had the chance to see the overall worldwide report on military assistance, but it summarizes the recommendations and the findings that are made in all of the reports that were undertaken country by country, and the country reports are the backup for this general, unclassified document.

One of the things they came up with–I will go over this, because I do not know if you have had an opportunity to analyze it to that extent so we might discuss it-but the General Accounting Office, through the Comptroller General, were discussing this matter before the Committee on Foreign Affairs in the House of Representatives just prior to the issuance of this overall report. There he was talking about programing of military assistance. This goes on and on, and

is talking about what an unrealistic job the whole thing is. One of the first things he says is:

* It appears that the force objectives are not always realistic in terms of capabilities of the country concerned

He goes on to say that some of the countries have not even reached a basic understanding of what they were going to do, if anything, and* * * force objectives are not always motivated by military considerations or limited to military purposes

We understand that all of this had to start in the field and worked its way up to top level, but the point I am making is this: If all that you do in programing and if all everybody else does in programing is to fill up the deficiency necessary to meet the criteria laid down by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the question of the relationship of finances to force objectives is a top-level problem and somebody ought to be carrying that onus other than the country missions. Do I make myself clear?

General BABCOCK. Yes, sir. Of course, we program against these deficiencies, Mr. Chairman, and then we are required to take into consideration a number of things, such as the ability of the French to support the forces which are programed, to take care of the equipment or to support the forces for which this equipment is provided, and also the French ability to produce equipment to support themselves. That is the basic thing against which we program, the Joint Chiefs of Staff force goals. Let us say we want them to have so many units. We take that and we subtract from that what we think they can take care of themselves. We subtract from that equipment what we think they can produce for themselves and so on, and then we come up with a final figure.

Mr. FASCELL. Now I understand better what the variable factor is. That means that the country mission does have the responsibility of determination for getting a country agreement and understanding and, also, determination of capability to meet the force objectives. This determines the difference that you will program. General Accounting Office recommendations and comments make sense at this point.

General BABCOCK. Yes.

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Mr. FASCELL. By the way, if any of you have any questions at any time, jump in and get them on the record.

Mr. Montgomery?

Mr. MONTGOMERY. We still want to try to keep this in open session. General, in connection with your statement that the program is in accordance with the force goals laid down by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, would you explain in a little more detail the factors which go into the ultimate program? You have the Joint Chiefs of Staff force goals and you subtract from that, No. 1, what? The country's assets?

General BABCOCK. Equipment that they have on hand and which we think they can make for themselves or ought to be able to make for themselves. Then, if we think that the goals cannot be met, the country just never will be able to absorb that equipment, we make such a recommendation, too, and do not include it in our program. May I explain what I mean by that?

I do not want to get into detail, but let us assume that we have a country that is a little on the backward side and that the program calls for a certain type of unit which is complicated, a modern type of unit. We do not feel that the country is ready yet to absorb that kind of a unit, and we would then recommend, or would not program for that, and would recommend that we make the necessary recommendations to have it either delayed or eliminated.

Mr. MONTGOMERY. What part does the country MAAG play in the determination of Joint Chiefs of Staff force goals? Final recommendations, or what?

General BABCOCK. I would like to ask someone who has been around a little longer to answer that. I do not believe we accept to put in those recommendations if the JCS force goals include units which we do not think that the country can absorb—they are too modern, we will say—or they cannot financially take care of the upkeep on it. Then we would make a recommendation that it be eliminated. We do not, to the best of my knowledge, help the Joint Chiefs of Staff make those force goals.

Mr. MONTGOMERY. For example, if a country's military mission or commitment to NATO were based on X number of divisions and our aid goal is to equip those forces, do you recommend to the Joint Chiefs of Staff that the aid goals be decreased or increased if you think they are unrealistic?

General BABCOCK. May I answer that this way? Before I go on I should ask, am I getting into ARQ procedure? Is that classified?

I Commander LEE. No, sir.

General BABCOCK. SHAPE or NATO send out an annual review questionnaire which they send around to the various countries asking them what they intend to furnish to NATO.

Mr. FASCELL. May I interrupt at this point?

What is the relationship between the NATO commitments and the force objectives laid down by the Joint Chiefs of Staff?

General BABCOCK. They are very similar, but not necessarily exactly the same.

Mr. Poland. Which ones, General, would be controlling on your operations ?

General BABCOCK. The Joint Chiefs are controlling. We are getting awfully close to classified material now.

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Mr. FASCELL. All we are trying to do is to determine what is the relationship of the military mission to the NATO problem and to the administration of the military assistance funds under the mutual security program?

General BABCOCK. I think that I can explain the difference between the JCS force goals and NATO, but I do not think I can do it in an open hearing. I would rather not try.

Mr. FascELL. You have already answered the question for us which points out what the problem is.

General BABCOCK. It is not too much of a problem at least from our point of view. The report here mentions the fact that there is a difference and I think I can explain that difference. I would rather not try_it though. There is a very good reason for it.

Mr. FASCELL. What is your chain of command? Let us get that straight.

General BABCOCK. I have only one and that is to EUCOM and from EUCOM. That is the United States European Command, where you are going this afternoon and through them to the Assistant Secretary of Defense. The actual man is the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs, Mr. Sprague. I have a very close relationship with the Embassy because I am a member of what is known as the country team, which consists of the Ambassador, the Minister Counselor for the Economic Affairs in the Embassy and such other people as the Ambassador may designate, and myself. That includes anything which affects the politics or economics of the country and that, of course, includes any important thing that I do which must be cleared with the Ambassador.

Mr. FASCELL. You anticipated my next question. In other words, you work very closely?

General BABCOCK. Yes.
Mr. FASCELL. What is your relationship with DEFREPNAMA?

General BABCOCK. We merely exchange information. He has no control over my operations, but this review that I spoke of, the ARQ, eventually winds up with him. He may have talked about that yesterday.

Mr. FASCELL. DEFREPNAMA is the highest representative of the Secretary of Defense in Europe and he also does something else?

General BABCOCK. He is an adviser to Ambassador Perkins who is the American representative on the NATO Council.

Mr. FASCELL. What is your relationship with that group, if any? General BABCOCK. None, only with Mr. Haskell in his capacity as DEFREPNAMA. That is a regional organization and their closest relationship is with EUCOM, United States European Command, which is also a regional organization which controls all the MAAG'S of Europe.

Mr. MONTGOMERY. General, in your programing procedures, which I understand you cannot discuss specifically because they are classified, is any consideration given to political factors as distinguished from strictly military factors ?

General BABCOCK. That is where the country team comes into the program. Programing is coordinated very closely with the Embassy. They know exactly what we are doing and they provide the economic guidance to us for our programing. If there are political consider