NEW TANK ACQUISITION PROGRESS

Senator GOLDWATER. I think the great deficiency in the Army today in the matter of equipment is in your tank. You may not agree with me, but I think the failure of the main battle tank, the MBT-70, was a real blow to the Army. It was my pleasure to address the American Ordnance Society in Detroit the night before last and I was told there by one manufacturer that they have submitted a tank suggestion-I think it was Ford Motor. Would you comment on what progress you are making in Detroit with your ordnance group on the acquisition of the new tank?

Secretary FROEHLKE. As you know, we were instructed to cancel our XM-803. I would just like to comment, I am far from the expert in the tank field, but I am of the impression that we are competitive with potential enemies in the early 1970s today. I am not concerned by the fact that we do not have a new main battle tank today. Where we are concerned or where I am concerned is in the late 1970's; we must have a new main battle tank to meet the threat in the late 1970's. But we believe that our M60-A1 and A2 are adequate for today. Senator GOLDWATER. That is strange, because your commanders do not believe that.

Secretary FROEHLKE. Would you comment, General?

General WESTMORELAND. Senator Goldwater, I think that with the M60-A1, with the improvements that have been made on it and we are continuing to improve A1 and the M60-A1E, which is a missile-firing tank in the next several years, we will be competitive. But 5 to 10 years from now, we will not be competitive unless we can get authorization to develop a new tank.

Senator GOLDWATER. That is what my question was directed at. The question was what are your men in Detroit reporting to you as to the adequacy of the designs and suggestions being made, for example, by Ford Motor? I think this gentleman who sat next to me was with Ford Motor.

General WESTMORELAND. We have a committee, a very active committee now, headed by the Commanding General of the Armor Center at Fort Knox, Major General Desobry, who is studying this matter and will come up with the military characteristics that the Army will need during the 1980's for a new tank.

The guidance given to General Desobry was to look at all components that have been developed, components that were fully developed for the XM-803, where the technology has been proven, to look at the components of the British Chieftan, look at the components of the German Leopard, to look at the components of the French tank, and even the Japanese. The Japanese have are in the process of developing a medium tank; to look at all the components and to determine those which we might utilize to put together in the new tank that would satisfy our military need.

Senator GOLDWATER. You are talking of the 1990s now. My question was directed at a report I heard in Detroit, both from the military personnel and private industry, that tank suggestions have been made to replace the main battle tank. Now, have they or have they not? That is what I want to know.

General WESTMORELAND. General Desobry is considering all suggestions made by industry and although I cannot positively tell you that he has received the proposal from Ford Motor Co., I would suspect that he has.

Do you know, Feeney?

Colonel FEENEY. To the best of my knowledge, they have been provided to him; yes, sir.

General WESTMORELAND. Colonel Feeney is our expert on tanks. Senator GOLDWATER. Would it be possible to get a report for the record on this?

General WESTMORELAND. We will provide that for the record. (The information follows:)

The new tank proposal from Ford Motor Company (the "Innovator") has been furnished to the Army's Main Battle Tank Task Force at Fort Knox.

RETIREMENT PAY RECOMPUTATION

Senator GOLDWATER. Mr. Secretary, as you know, the President has promised time and time again that there will be a recomputation of retirement pay. How important do you think this is to the men in uniform?

Secretary FROEHLKE. It obviously is very important to the men. who were in uniform. I question how important it is to the man in uniform today. I have not had anyone approach me, for instance, in uniform today, expressing pro or con. I do not think it is a major issue for the man in uniform.

Would you comment on that?

General WESTMORELAND. I have taken the position that it is im-. portant to the man in uniform.

Senator GOLDWATER. The recomputation-you see, we have not had a hearing on this since 1958. That goes back a long, long time and there have been constant promises by several different Presidents that we would discuss it. We have never done it.

I think under the 1958 computation, the man in uniform today can look forward to a much better retirement benefit than the man who retires before 1958. I am thinking of that man who retired before 1958. I think we have as much responsibility to him as we have to you. Would you say on the overall that recomputation is important to the military?

Secretary FROEHLKE. I do not mean to hedge on the question. However, I do know the tremendous cost of recomputation.

Senator GOLDWATER. We have a tremendous cost every time we add percent to social security or add $10 million to education. I think there is a responsibility to the man in uniform. That is what I am getting at. Sure, it is going to cost; everything we do today costs and what is going to make the military stronger? I think that is more important than whether we have wide streets and better cities or anything else.

Secretary FROEHLKE. In the abstract, you will get no argument from me. It would be good for the man who served and for the military if we could have recomputation of benefits.

However, in the real world, I am very concerned that if this were enacted they would take that money that it costs and it is sub

stantial-not from the broad streets or from other areas but they would take it from the military budget and there is where I have the problem, Senator Goldwater, in priorities.

I think I know where I would come out, but I just wonder, if you take it from somewhere else, obviously, it is good. If, however, you take it from the Army budget, in my priorities, I just do not know if I can go along.

Senator GOLDWATER. Fine.

I have just one more comment and this is to General Westmoreland. I want to subscribe to what Senator Symington said. I have listened to this emotional appeal about casualties about long enough. I will be the first one to admit that the Army is the queen of the battle, always has been, always will be. You cannot win the war until some soldier walks in there and sticks a flag in the ground and says it belongs to me; and down through history, all the different types of military war we have had, the Army, the infantry, has always sustained the greatest losses.

I do not think this is any way to determine a weapons system. I think you can say if this is true, then the M-16 is not a good piece because it is not killing enough or our howitzers or mortars are not good enough. But to pick this one argument out and apply it against a weapons system that we have some honest questions about-I think the helicopter has probably done more to reduce casualties by lifting wounded men out than by what effect you have been able to have by forward or causal fire on the enemy.

I would hope that we can eliminate this argument. To me, you need a violin when you start talking this way. I flew with an outfit in India that had the highest combat losses in World War II up to that time, just by running into mountains. We are not flying airplanes today where you lose 12 or 14 men at a crack; we are flying them where you lose one. I do not think the combat losses of the Air Force will ever even approach the ground. If you are going to use the argument for a weapons system, then we can apply this to the Navy, the Army, the Marines and everything else. I think what your job is is to prove that the Cheyenne concept is valid in the field against the enemy and will replace or properly augment close air support by fixed-wing concept. I would be bending my efforts toward that instead of, frankly, beginning to hurt the feelings of Airmen, Navy, and Marines, who also get killed-not in the numbers that the infantrymen does but we know that and we are very sympathetic toward that. I think that you men in the infantry should be commended for the great reduction you have made in casualties and the great reduction you have made in men dying from wounds, by being able to get them to a hospital fast.

So, please, if you are going to mount that kind of opera, by golly, we are going to have to crank one up, too, and I can orchestrate pretty good.

That is all I have, Mr. Chairman, unless you want to comment on that, General.

General WESTMORELAND. Senator Goldwater, I do not intend to put inordinate emphasis on this point. I made the point in order to reinforce the comment and the conclusion made by the board that

was appointed by Mr. Packard that the two systems are complementary. In other words, it is not a question of either/or, and if you have both, you are going to reduce your infantry casualties compared with having only one. That is what I am saying.

Senator GOLDWATER. That is not the way the argument winds up, Frankly, I do not think the Packard report said anything. I think we would have been just as well off without the Packard report. I do not think they helped you; I do not think they helped the Air Force or the Marines; it is just a conclusion saying everything is going along fine; we will not change it.

But I think your argument, if you want to convince this committee and the House committee about the Cheyenne, is going to have to be directed (1) at vulnerability and (2) whether you are really going to be able to hit targets with it in sophisticated warfare. That is my

concern.

General WESTMORELAND. I certainly agree with you, Senator Goldwater, that the Cheyenne has to be judged on its performance and this is what we intended to do.

Senator GOLDWATER. Fine.

That is all I have.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Senator.

COMMITTEE PROCEDURE

Members of the committee, I have just conferred with Senator Cannon regarding the report of his Subcommittee on Close Air Support. It will be ready soon and I think it is highly worthy of a special meeting of the committee. I would like to have every member of that subcommittee here to express their views and submit to questions, and I hope we can have it that way. To that extent, Senator Cannon and I both thought it would be better to wait until after such a meeting to release the report. I hope we can do this next week.

Senator CANNON. Yes, sir; we will have the report-it should be in final form tomorrow.

The CHAIRMAN. All right. That is the way we will do it, next week, have the meeting I have outlined.

Senator GOLDWATER. Could we shoot for Monday or Tuesday? The CHAIRMAN. Tentatively, we have a special hearing for Monday already but, yes, Tuesday might be all right. We are going to have votes though, I think, some of the final votes.

Assuming there is time to distribute the report, let's tentatively set on Tuesday. I do not think it will take very long. Perhaps we can meet over in one of the appropriations rooms if voting is going on. All right, Senator Cannon.

Senator CANNON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

U.S. TROOPS IN EUROPE

General, your chart indicates that the Army would have to send approximately [deleted] is that correct?

General WESTMORELAND. Yes, Senator. We have, as you well know, 4% divisions in Europe now. [Deleted.] That would mean that we [deleted].

Senator CANNON. Your chart indicates [deleted] Army in Europe. by [deleted] which after deducting the [deleted] already there, means you will have to ship [deleted].

General WESTMORELAND. That is approximately correct.

Senator CANNON. How will that be achieved, General, and is that a realistic plan?

General WESTMORELAND. First, we plan to utilize the airlift, the Military Airlift Command-MAC-which will include the C-130s, C-141s, and the C-5s. The number involved there, as I remember, is about [deleted] as I remember, aircraft from that source. So that would transport the personnel. The C-5s, and, of course, the C-141s, would be transporting a certain amount of materiel; then we will have to go to the merchant marine and procure bottoms available in the U.S. Merchant Marine, which will not be sufficient at this present time. There are only six U.S. flag roll-on and roll-off ships; of which three are government controlled and three are commercial ships.

So our plans involve going to our allies in order to procure surface shipping in order to build up at the rate required by our plans.

Senator CANNON. Do you have confidence in those figures that that is realistic planning?

General WESTMORELAND. It is the best we can do under the circumstances and if we do have the support of our allies, there is sufficient free world shipping to move troops and materiel in the quantities required.

În summary, there is no problem on personnel; there is a problem on moving equipment by sea and transport, in view of the poor state of the U.S. merchant marine. We would have to procure shipping from our allies; and there is sufficient shipping in the free world to provide this.

Senator CANNON. The European Command says that [deleted]. What confidence do you have that both personnel and equipment could reach Europe within that time frame?

General WESTMORELAND. On personnel, there would be no problem. because of the substantial air fleet available to us in the United States. The movement of the heavy equipment we could accomplish if we get sufficient warning, and I think the essence to the answer to your question is whether or not we will get sufficient warning in order to mobilize sufficient sea vessels.

Senator CANNON. When you say mobilize, you mean what you can get from our allies?

General WESTMORELAND. That is correct, sir, in the short time. frame.

Senator CANNON. And as to positioning, you would have to have some very serious and long-range warning to permit you to position your allied shipping to give you that capability, would you not?

General WESTMORELAND. I Would say we would need at least 2 weeks, perhaps a month, in order to get the necessary bottoms from our allies into appropriate ports.

Senator CANNON. Does the Navy have the basic responsibility of transporting the Army divisions to Europe? Would the Army have the responsibility to get them dockside?

General WESTMORELAND. That is basically the definition of responsibility, sir.