'AEROSPACE POWER IS INDIVISIBLE'.

This condition exists today.

Visually, there is no difference in the blue suits. But once he begins talking, the individual more often than not will quickly inform his listener that he is in a specific Command.

And sometimes an individual inherits this Command identification without any great effort on his own part. I think I can be considered a prime example of this. Because of my service in the Strategic Air Command, a lot of people think I am only interested in big bombers and have little faith in or use for missiles, tactical airpower, air defense, and the many other essential elements that go to make up total aerospace power. This most emphatically is not true.

I seek weapon systems that I think can do the best job and afford the nation the most protection. I am a military conservative in that I believe we shouldn't discard a proven, reliable weapon system or concept unless we have something that is able to replace it and do a better job. In short, I believe in having protection along with progress.

Identification with a Command is not confined solely to the people now in service. The same tendency is apparent among former Air Force men and other people in civilian life who are earnest supporters of aerospace power.

As you recall, when we became a separate service, we organized into Commands so we could manage our resources more effectively. We did not consider, however, that the functions of the different Commands were separate and autonomous. They were all part of the Air Force and mutually supporting. We in effect gained our independence through public understanding and conviction that all elements contributed to the entire broad spectrum of aerospace power.

During our growing stages there was strong emphasis on Command identification. To a point this was and is needed and desirable. But it must not go to the point where it contributes to an impression that the United States Air Force is a conglomeration of forces, that each type of aerospace power is separate from the other and incapable of action outside a specified role. This gives the impression of inflexibility and nothing could be farther from the truth.

Aerospace power offers the ultimate in flexibility. The ability to use it for different purposes and to concentrate it swiftly for a primary purpose, if need be, is one of its greatest assets.

Now, if we in our natural enthusiasm have contributed to a cloudy picture, it is time we take some swift and positive action to correct this impression. Since deterrence is credible only if there is understanding and determination, this calls for even greater unity on our part as we advance into the future.

Today, the Air Force is specialized. Many of our people have to specialize in one field due to the growing complexity of weapon systems. As a result, they often remain in one Command for most of their careers and do not get the broad background that was received several decades ago. This trend will become more pronounced in the future. I do not advocate a return to the so-called good old days. I merely point

68

CONTIN

out that technology has tended to multiply the of parts in our Air Force. Our problem then. reach higher and farther, is to maintain our var mission and unity as an organization as we app operational tasks in space. We must keep fin mind the fact that aerospace power is indivisible. T is stated in our basic doctrine. This basic doc hasn't changed over the years, not because our trine has become dogma, but because this pric has stood the test of time and experience.

And we still have the same concept: The pur of aerospace power is to deter attack against us and we are attacked, to destroy the enemy's mear wage war.

This requires aerospace offensive and defe forces capable of defeating the aggressor's of and defensive force. Only this kind of superior space force can continue to be a credible deter against attack.

This force should consist of both manned a manned weapon systems to give flexible and divers power. Parallel development and procurement manned and unmanned systems is therefore l tory as we update the forces in line with technol developments.

Today, at this moment, the Regular establishm your United States Air Force-and your Air Force: serve and Air National Guard units are at an allpeak of combat readiness.

Through common purpose, mutual understand and respect, we are capable and ready.

In closing, I believe we should do these thing ensure that the Air Force remains an effective inst ment of national security: First, we must have tim modernization of our aerospace forces; and we act with vision and daring to exploit technology e to achieve distinct strategic advantages.

Secondly, we must positively reaffirm our basic: cepts. To be a credible deterrent, aerospace p must consist of flexible and diversified forces that he a war-waging and war-winning capability.

And third, we need to restate firmly that the Unit States Air Force is an entity whose elements all tribute to the aerospace power that is vital for defense.

Not far from this very spot, in 1776, our ini nation made its Declaration of Independence. I that here at this Convention we make a declarat of unity so that we may best serve for the comm good of our nation.-END

The above article is General LeMay's address to “ Fifteenth Anniversary Luncheon at the AFA Convention Philadelphia on September 21. General LeMay be USAF Chief of Staff on July 1 of this year, after serving's years as Vice Chief under Gen. Thomas D. White. Bef that he was Commander in Chief of the Strategic Air Con mand. In World War II he served in the Eighth Air F before transferring to the Pacific to head the B-29 bo effort against the Japanese homeland. A profile of Gen LeMay, "Global Organization Man," by Claude W appears in the September issue of AIR FORCE Magazi

AIR FORCE Magazine November 19

W

HAT five outstanding Americans each intimately associated with national space programs and policies-had to say on the military significance of space at the Air Force Association's recent Symposium on "Space and National Security" at AFA's Fifteenth Anniversary Convention and Aerospace Panorama in Philadelphia, has been widely quoted in the national press, including heavy excerpting in the October 9 issue of U. S. News & World Report and in a special space supplement in the October 8 Sunday New York Times. For the record and convenience of SPACE DIGEST readers, we present on the following pages their complete remarks, plus an abridged transcript of the questions to the panel which followed the formal presentations.

Moderator of the Symposium, held September 22 at Philadelphia's Convention Hall, was Trevor Gardner, now chairman of the board and president of the Hycon Manufacturing Company of Monrovia, Calif. A native of Cardiff, Wales, who became an American citizen in 1937, Mr. Gardner was a principal architect of US missile programs, and Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Research and Development in 1955-56. A leading space planner today, he served on President Kennedy's Space Task Force early in 1961 and was chairman of the Air Force's Space Study Group, which has analyzed the various military potentials of space technology.

Leadoff speaker was Dr. Edward C. Welsh, executive secretary of the National Aeronautics and Space Council, top national advisory-policy group on aerospace matters, chaired by Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson. A native of New Jersey who holds a Ph.D. in economics from Ohio State University, Dr. Welsh has held a number of important governmental economics posts and is recognized as a leading architeet of Japan's postwar recovery. He was a legislative assistant to Sen. Stuart Symington of Missouri, in which post he played an

SPACE DIGEST / NOVEMBER 1961

important role in defense investigations, prior to assuming his present position early in 1961.

Following Dr. Welsh on the program was Dr. Walter F. Dornberger, vice president and chief scientist, Bell Aerosystems Division of Bell Aerospace Corporation, internationally known for his pioneer work in missilry and astronautics before and during World War II in Germany, where he commanded the famed Peenemünde Rocket Research Center which developed the V-1 and V-2 weapons.

Dr. Welsh and Dr. Dornberger devoted their presentations to the analysis and significance of the military challenge of Soviet space achievements.

The two other speakers, Rep. Emilio Q. Daddario, Democrat of Connecticut and a member of the House Committee on Science and Astronautics, and Gen. Bernard A. Schriever, commander, Air Force Systems Command, geared their presentations to the problems of proper American response to the military challenge of Soviet space feats.

Congressman Daddario, a vigorous proponent of maximum utilization of national resources and personnel in space programs, won his law degree in 1942 from the University of Connecticut. During World War II, he enlisted as a private, served with the Office of Strategic Services as an officer in intelligence assignments, and earned a Legion of Merit Medal. He was mayor of Middletown, Conn., in 1946-48, served in Korea, and was elected to Congress in 1958, reelected in 1960.

General Schriever, a native of Germany raised in Texas, won his wings in 1933. A one-time commercial airline pilot and holder of a master's degree in aeronautical engineering from Stanford University, he was the first commander of the Air Force Ballistic Missile Division of the old Air Research and Development Command, and managed research and development of our Atlas, Thor, Titan, and Minuteman missile systems. He was named to his present post in 1959.

71

A

IS WE sit here on this twenty-second day of September 1961, our nation is facing an imminent and dangerous Soviet space threat. We are late in awakening to this threat. We are deluding ourselves by declaring that we are ahead in space science, but the Soviets just happen to lead us by a few years in the development of large boosters and man in space. We cannot afford to continue to lag in the field of military space development.

Our President has already committed the nation to a major national effort in space explorationthe lunar landing and return program. Our national leaders are now confronted with the need for a similar commitment with respect to US military space superiority.

Let us direct our attention to the actual "score" in the space achievements of the US and the USSR.

The USSR has placed fifteen devices in orbit with a total announced payload of 109,000 pounds. The US has placed fifty-one devices in orbit with a cumulative payload of 30,000 pounds plus 29,000 pounds of engines and tanks. The maximum single payload we have been able to place in orbit is 4,600 pounds, compared with 14,292 pounds for the USSR.

Now let us look at some recent "ancient history." On August 19, 1960, the USSR placed a 10,120-pound spacecraft in orbit and caused it to land at a time and place of their choosing. A payload of this size could have been a major nuclear We had no means then, nor do we have weapon. any capability now, to neutralize, capture, or destroy such spacecraft if they are hostile. Nor is any

such capability under urgent development by our government.

Since August 19, 1960, the USSR has launched eight spacecrait of this general character, including the most recent launchings which carried Gagarin and Titov.

On September 1, 1961, the USSR resumed nuclear testing, and to date has conducted fourteen tests in the atmosphere. One possible objec tive of these tests is to perfect a "gigaton" (fifty100 megaton) bomb.

Almost simultaneously the USSR resumed a major ICBM test program in the Pacific in which two 7,500-mile successful tests have already beer accomplished. Their announced objective for the program is to test a new and even larger booste In view of recent Soviet behavior concerning reg sumption of nuclear tests, a real possibility exis that a forthcoming test in this new ICBM series could involve the explosion of a giant nuclear war head, instead of a dummy payload.

In the face of these two test programs and that grim implications of large thermonuclear bombs in orbit or in ICBMs, we must solemnly reexamine our military defensive and offensive space pla and urge our national leaders to permit us to e bark upon a new and invigorated military spat program.

We must also reexamine our civilian space pr gram (particularly the lunar program) so that will gain the maximum military yield as a divide from this investment.

It is our purpose here today to address oursel to these and other questions involving the milit potential of the national space program.-END

72

SPACE DIGEST NOVEMBER