The Evening Star (December 31, 1946)
Eliot: Defense in 1947
By George Fielding Eliot
The year 1947 will be a critical one for the armed forces of the United States.
This is a matter in which every American is directly concerned.
He is concerned as a taxpayer, desiring a reduction of taxes and a balancing of the federal budget in order to prevent further addition to an already overwhelming national debt. In this capacity he may properly scrutinize with care the heavy military appropriations which are in prospect.
But he must remember that he is also concerned as a citizen of the United States and, if you like, as a citizen of the world, in seeing to it that progress continues to be made toward the establishment of a just and lasting peace. On the record of the past year, he must realize that the principal stabilizing force in the world has been, and seems for some time likely to continue to be, the influence and power of this republic. I say influence and power, for without the power the influence would have no greater authority than on the two previous occasions during this century when we spoke for peace but were unable to act for peace, and when our unsupported words were contemptuously brushed aside by men whose minds were set on war. However desirable an immediate reduction of taxes may be, neither America nor the world in general can afford the weakening of our military power below the level necessary to enable us to speak with firm authority in world affairs until such time as there exists an international order capable of maintaining the peace against any conceivable challenge. No benefit which Americans could conceivably derive from a reduction of taxes and a temporary balancing of the budget could make up for the effect upon our economy of continued fear, continued uncertainty, continued confusion. As 1946 draws to a close we have seen a little hope for better things.
There was, for one example, a direct connection between our final success in the matter of the South European peace treaties and the presence of our fleet in the Mediterranean Sea. The results obtained by a linking of policy and power are such as to suggest the greatest caution in laying power aside before policy has accomplished its aims for the future.
Between the various interests and purposes there is, of course, room for a certain amount of compromise. The President’s budget message will contain the proposals of the government for military expenditures for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 1947. The citizen should not imagine that these proposals will be wholly those of the War and Navy Departments, reflecting the considered judgment of the military chiefs as to what is necessary for the national security. They will represent, in fact, a compromise already achieved between the War and Navy Departments and the Bureau of the Budget, which must consider the overall relations to be established between revenue and expenditure. It would certainly be a great step forward if there existed some means by which the budgets of the two departments could be sifted out and coordinated beforehand, eliminating all overlapping and duplication. A merger of the two departments has been suggested, and will be suggested again. It has not in the past and does not now seem to this writer that such a merger is the best way of attaining the desired result; its disadvantages and dangers seem to me to be prohibitive. Yet budget coordination is essential if the needs of the national security are to be upheld, and above all the bickering and ill feeling between the services which have arisen as a result of the merger controversy must be brought to an end.
Personnel procurement for the regular services, and the question of universal training to give substance to our reservoir of young man power, will likewise be subjects for debate in 1947. The universal training program is now under study by an eminent and well-chosen group of civilians. Meanwhile, the Congress must consider how the authorized strengths of the Army and Navy are to be maintained if voluntary enlistments prove inadequate to the established needs of the national security.
Finally, the new Congress will have to consider programs of permanent military legislation upon which the postwar armed forces will be based. Almost all our military laws are now either wholly out of date or in need of substantial revision. It would seem better to sweep the decks clear of all the old laws and start afresh, and both the War and Navy Departments have been at work on proposals of this nature.