The New Policy

Congressional tempers have simmered and boiled at reports that Army & Navy commanders overseas were destroying surplus property to get it off their hands. Last week, along with pictures of trucks and other material dumped in the Pacific Ocean, a House Committee finally got the services to admit that it might be so.

The Navy's materiel chief, Rear Admiral C. H. Cotter, granted that such things had happened. Under Secretary of War Kenneth C. Royall said isolated cases of wanton destruction were "unavoidable." The services made no secret, however, of their feeling that surplus property was a growing nuisance. Said Royall: "If anything, [the Army] is spending too much money and too many man-hours to protect property of doubtful value." And General MacArthur had already told Washington that if he could ship back surplus goods, he could demobilize men held overseas only to guard stockpiles.

Irked by such talk, the Administration has changed the policy on surpluses abroad. Under a directive from President Truman, the Army and Navy will bring home surplus goods in the Pacific, instead of letting them sit while the Foreign Liquidation Commission (which handles surpluses), hunts buyers, usually with no success.

Just how much of the $2 1/2 billion in surplus on MacArthur's hands will be worth shipping, no one knows. But some of the surplus is construction material. The U.S. can use that.

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