The Dilemma & the Design

(See Cover)

Defense Secretary Robert McNamara stood at complete and unmilitary ease behind the lectern on the stage of the State Department auditorium. In cool and well-punctuated sentences, with never an uh or an er, he recited fact after fact, figure after figure, in response to the blunt questions of newsmen.

McNamara's manner was that of a professor patiently explaining a simple matter to a slightly backward class. Yet his audience, over television, was the U.S. itself. And his mission, undertaken at the specific order of President Kennedy, was to tell the nation about the state of Soviet military strength in Cuba. "In recent days," said McNamara, "questions have been raised in the press and elsewhere regarding the presence of offensive weapons systems in Cuba. I believe beyond any reasonable doubt that all such weapons systems have been removed from the island and none have been reintroduced."

His didactic task completed, McNamara returned to his huge desk in the Pentagon's E Ring. He had applied the tidiest mind in Washington to clearing away the cobwebs of confusion about Cuba. And that, as far as he was concerned, was that.

Effective & Efficient. Despite McNamara's performance, the clamor over Cuba continued, and with good cause (see box). Nor is Cuba the only problem afflicting McNamara. For under Robert Stranre McNamara, 46, perhaps the most efficient, effective Defense Secretary the U.S. has ever had, the role of U.S. weaponry in the defense of the free world and the roles allotted to its allies have become a subject of deep dispute. At some points, the questions turned on diplomacy, not weaponry, and what blame there was to be meted out did not belong to him. Nevertheless, since he has become the most powerful man in President Kennedy's Cabinet, only in the record and personality of McNamara, his policies in the present and his design for the future, can real understanding be reached of the angry words that last week swirled throughout the capitals of the Western Alliance.

That there could be any argument about his policies is a source of astonishment to McNamara. He is utterly convinced of the inevitability of his views. He believes that any problem can be solved by examination of the facts, consideration of the available "options," and application of logical decisions. His computer machines and his cost-performance analyses are legend in Washington. Like no Defense Secretary before him, he has seized control of the Pentagon. Military leaders can offer advice, but McNamara makes the decisions (it is curiously significant of McNamara's Pentagon that aides recently were able to count up the number of major decisions he had made in the previous month and produce the precise figure of 629). No item, right down to the number of beds to be installed in an Air Force hospital, is too trivial for his attention. Yet not even his critics argue that he bogs down in detail.

New Shape, New Strategy. In the two years since he left the presidency of Ford Motor Co. to take over the Pentagon, McNamara has changed the whole size and shape of the U.S. defense establishment--and its grand strategic design. The price for such progress is an increase of $8.4 billion over the last Eisenhower defense budget. Items:

> McNamara has built up the U.S. capability to fight nonnuclear war. The Army now has 16 combat divisions instead of eleven, the Air Force has 21 tactical wings instead of 16, Marine Corps has been increased by 15,000 men to a force of, 190,000. To fight guerrilla actions, the Army's Special Forces has been tripled to 5,600 men. The Air Force's F-105 fighter-bomber, previously valued for its nuclear firepower, is being modified to carry conventional weapons as well.

> McNamara has immensely speeded up the building and placement of nuclear-armed missiles in hardened sites and elusive submarines, where they can survive an enemy attack and hit back. The first 30 fast-firing, solid-fueled Minuteman missiles are now operational, a year ahead of schedule, in protected underground silos in Montana. By 1966 some 950 will be ready to fire. Nine Polaris submarines, each carrying 16 missiles that can be fired from beneath the sea and reach the Soviet heartland, now patrol the North Atlantic. By 1966 there will be at least 30 Polaris subs. The U.S., with an estimated 50,000 nuclear warheads and bombs, has enough nuclear material to wipe out the Soviet Union several times over.

> McNamara has presided over a fundamental reorganization of the armed services to increase efficiency and save money. Where top Pentagon officials formerly had to wade through as many as eleven separate--and often conflicting--intelligence reports from the services daily, they now get a single, four-page summary from the unified Defense Intelligence Agency. Millions of dollars have been saved on items ranging from belt buckles to bloomers by the creation of a single Defense Supply Agency. Instead of the charming, old-fashioned practice of trying to cut up the defense budget pie more or less equally among the services, McNamara now budgets by function, cutting across service lines to provide funds for Strategic Retaliatory Forces, Continental Air and Missile Defense Forces, General Purpose Forces, Airlift and Sealift Forces, Reserve and National Guard Forces. Over anguished protests, he is pushing ahead with a reorganization of the National Guard and Army Reserve, including the elimination of 1,850 units. He has ordered nearly 100 military installations shut down, including many overseas.

While plunging into such specifics, McNamara never lets them blur the end purpose of his cold war strategy. That strategy was explained to Congress fortnight ago in a 198-page report that House Armed Forces Committee Chairman Carl Vinson, who has fought some McNamara policies, described as "one of the most significant documents ever presented to Congress."

Facing Facts. McNamara's strategy reflects his willingness to face fearful facts and counter them with his own cold logic. The U.S., contends McNamara, has a definite nuclear superiority over the Soviet Union (soon after taking office he impolitically dismissed the "missile gap" that Kennedy campaigned on in 1960). McNamara intends to maintain the advantage. Even if the Russians were to launch a surprise nuclear attack, the U.S., with its hardened missiles and its Strategic Air Command bombers--half of them now on 15-minute alert -- could strike back and destroy the Soviet Union. But, reasons McNamara, as Russia builds up its own hard-site missile bases and missile-firing submarines, as it is now doing, the U.S. could "double and triple" its present force and still not be able to knock out all the Soviet weapons. Thus, "regardless of how large or what kind of strategic forces we build . . . we could not preclude casualties counted in the tens of millions."

To McNamara, such a "balance of terror" should constitute a "mutual deterrent" against war. Even if nuclear war were to explode, McNamara has a theory that it might be limited. To achieve this, he would in effect hold Soviet cities as hostages. That is, he would have the U.S. first respond to attack by striking only at Soviet missile sites and military installations; he would then serve an ultimatum to the enemy to quit shooting or suffer destruction of its cities.

McNamara is fully aware of the imponderables in the theory. "The Soviet leaders always say that they would strike at the entire complex of our military power, including Government and production centers, meaning our cities," he concedes. "If they were to do so, we would, of course, have no alternative but to retaliate in kind. But we have no way of knowing whether they would actually do so. It would certainly be in their interest as well as ours to try to limit the terrible consequences of a nuclear exchange. Whether they would accept it [the alternative of trying to win without striking cities] in the crisis of a global nuclear war, no one can say. Considering what is at stake, we believe it is worth the additional effort on our part to have this option."

The shift in strategic thinking under McNamara boils down to an increased flexibility in how the U.S. might respond to whatever an enemy does. From nuclear warfare down to a jungle skirmish, it provides for McNamara's insistence upon "options." Under Eisenhower, the basic reliance was upon total nuclear retaliation.

McNamara presents his theories in a manner that others find not easy to argue with, for he has in his head all the facts and figures that led to the formulation of policy.* Every argument has been neatly organized, every problem "quantified," every solution tucked into a compartment to await its proper time to be applied. McNamara's speech bristles with the no-nonsense language of "controlled response," "second-strike capability" and "counterforce." Yet, despite the difficulty of refuting it, his strategy is highly controversial--and, despite his considerable abilities, Robert McNamara is a highly controversial Secretary of Defense.

Rapid or Right? McNamara's critics are legion; they can be found in the Pentagon, the Congress and in foreign capitals. His love of computers, and his own computerlike mind, have led to the bitter quip that IBM really stands for "I, Bob McNamara." Complains a top general: "He's one of the most egotistical persons I know. It never dawns on him that he might get more help from the military. He doesn't take our advice." Another military official contends that he has "tremendous intellectual arrogance." Says a former civilian aide: "He will listen, but unless the discussion is in line with his preconceived ideas, he listens very impatiently. He constantly gives the impression of preferring to be rapid rather than right." Says an admiral who is critical of McNamara's monopoly of Pentagon authority: "The concentration of detailed decisions at the top tends to build the idea of the indispensable man at the top. And it tends to destroy the initiative of people down below."

Air Force brass, who find it harder than in the past to get their views out to the public, privately argue that McNamara, in his emphasis on conventional ground forces backed by strategic missile might, is playing a dangerous game with national security. They say that in his refusal to provide more than prototype funds for the RS-70 reconnaissance bomber, McNamara is sentencing the manned bomber to death. McNamara in fact does believe that the manned bomber will be obsolescent by the 1970s, and all his projected force plans reflect that conviction.

Other critics can see no difference between "mutual deterrence" and a "no win" cold war policy that simply accepts "nuclear stalemate." The idea that a thermonuclear war might be fought without either the U.S. or Russia striking the other's cities is considered by many to be nonsense. Among the doubters is Princeton University's Oskar Morgenstern, whose 1959 book. The Question of National Defense, was one of the first works McNamara read when he took over the Pentagon. Although he admires McNamara and most of his policies, Morgenstern wonders how the U.S. could confine its attack to military targets. "Do we even know these targets, considering our generally very poor record of intelligence? We did not know early enough about the buildup in Cuba. How could we possibly know where all the Russian bases are, when the Soviet Union is so much larger than Cuba, and infinitely more complicated?"

Such criticism, from within and outside the Pentagon, perplexes Robert McNamara. But it does not persuade him to change his mind. Conviction of his correctness, or at least of the correctness of the answers that his methods will produce, is a McNamara strength. "His greatest weakness," says a longtime associate, "is his failure to understand the impact of logical decisions on human beings." An ally's feelings of its own nationalistic pride, a neighbor nation's sense of envy, a friendly leader's misgivings about future U.S. intentions, are factors that must influence U.S. policy, even though they cannot be run through a Univac 1107. And it is the failure to take them sufficiently into account that has involved the Kennedy Administration in its present troubles with its allies. It could be argued that the diplomatic niceties are not McNamara's affair, but it is not an excuse that McNamara himself makes. He is deeply involved in it all.

The NATO alliance, stretching from Nome to Mount Ararat in Turkey, is like nothing else in history--a treaty pledge by 15 nations that an attack on one is an attack on all. Its strength lies in U.S. atomic power, the so-called nuclear umbrella that would protect all NATO members. In Europe, where the wisecrack at the time of NATO's creation was that all the Russian army needed to reach the English Channel was shoes, the theory was that a conventional force of ground troops would serve as a "shield" to fend off any initial Soviet attack in Europe until the U.S. could unleash its nuclear retaliation on Russia itself.

From Shield to Trip Wire. Europe felt safe enough to rebuild itself, and its leaders (even De Gaulle on occasion) expressed their gratitude. But NATO required steady exertion and expense, and when NATO nations failed to supply the promised manpower, the shield was called a "trip wire" which would merely sound the alarm that would set off the U.S. nuclear punch. In 1958, the NATO troops were given nuclear artillery and intermediate-range nuclear missiles. The U.S., under the 1946 McMahon atomic energy act, insisted that it retain control of all nuclear warheads. The McMahon Act was passed at a time when the U.S. had secrets it thought the Russians did not know, and when it had reason to question the security practices of both Britain and France.

Finally, after prolonged controversy, Congress permitted a special nuclear arrangement with Great Britain. France was excluded--a fact that made De Gaulle all the more determined to develop his own force de frappe. The U.S. was disapproving, and McNamara himself made a speech deploring the "proliferation" of nuclear powers and vowing he would have no part of it. It was hard for Europeans to understand why an ally should be denied secrets that a common enemy already knew.

Part of the U.S.-British deal was a U.S. offer to develop and sell to Britain at discount prices a nuclear-armed, 1,000-mile, air-launched missile named Skybolt. But late last year Skybolt was churned through McNamara's cost-performance computers and found wanting: as a weapon, McNamara decided, Skybolt was simply not worth the money and effort. His decision made, McNamara flew off to London to tell British Defense Minister Peter Thorneycroft the bad news. McNamara had not reckoned on the reaction. Harold Macmillan's Tory government was already on shaky political ground; its Labor opposition was always easily stirred on nuclear matters, and Macmillan and Britain had based all their long-range nuclear hopes on Skybolt. McNamara's cancellation of the Skybolt project met with furious British protests.

Still unshaken and unshakable, McNamara returned to the U.S., went vacationing in California's High Sierras ("You don't know the feeling you get when you're on top of a mountain"), hopeful that the storm would soon blow over. Instead, it grew worse. President Kennedy agreed to meet Macmillan at Nassau. Kennedy ordered McNamara back from vacation to attend the sessions, which Secretary of State Dean Rusk did not.

At the Nassau meetings, Harold Macmillan convinced Kennedy that he simply could not afford to go home emptyhanded. But what to give him? Neither Kennedy nor McNamara had any real plan, but they swiftly hammered one out. Under it, the U.S. offered to sell Polaris missiles to Britain (program's eventual cost: about $1 billion), which Britain would place under a new NATO nuclear command but could withdraw for its own use under certain unlikely circumstances.

Robert McNamara, appearing later before a congressional committee, declared his belief that "time will show the Nassau Pact to be a major milestone in the long march to a truly interdependent Atlantic alliance." Perhaps. But not yet. The Nassau Pact suffers from improvisation and imprecision. McNamara did not even tell the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff that the pact was about to be made. Said one chief: "The first I knew about it was when I read it in my newspaper." Under the plan, missile-bearing Polaris submarines probably will have multinational crews. West Germany, Italy, Belgium and Turkey have already indicated their willingness to participate, although they have not yet been told how much of the expense they will have to bear. The British promise to assign some 180 of their Vulcan bombers to NATO's new nuclear command, and the U.S. probably will contribute some SAC planes. But there are many sticky details still to be worked out. Who, for example, will turn the firing keys? And under what conditions? McNamara's Pentagon aides insist that there is plenty of time to iron out such details; after all, the NATO Polaris force will not come into existence for at least five years.

Cold Reply. But it is no mere detail that Europeans are being asked to man, and help underwrite, an expensive weapon that they will never be able to use on their own without U.S. say-so. West Germany may not mind such an arrangement, says Charles de Gaulle, since it brings it into nuclear politics. But France minds. De Gaulle rejected the subsequent Anglo-American invitation to join in the NATO nuclear command, and is going ahead more determinedly than ever to develop his own force de frappe. White House staffers profess surprise at De Gaulle's anger over Nassau. They say that the idea of the multilateral NATO command was devised deliberately to include France. Besides, Kennedy invited De Gaulle to visit him in Florida at De Gaulle's convenience either before or after Nassau, and was coldly told that De Gaulle had nothing to discuss with Kennedy.

Actually, U.S. defense planners still see no real military need for a new nuclear force in NATO, since the U.S. striking power is so great. Used to big numbers, they dismiss De Gaulle's force as being less than 2% of the striking power of U.S. missiles and aircraft. But at that, De Gaulle's Mirage IV and Etendard IV planes will carry 50-kiloton bombs--more than twice the power of the bomb that leveled Hiroshima. As part of McNamara's conviction that the manned bomber will soon be obsolete, De Gaulle's force will be out of date before it is active--but McNamara will find argument inside his own Pentagon on that point.

Phantoms & Shivers. McNamara also wants a buildup of NATO's ground forces from the present 24 divisions (which include 400,000 U.S. troops) to a programmed 30 divisions. "We must continue to do everything in our power to persuade our allies to meet their NATO goals," he says, and he means De Gaulle most of all. "Until these capabilities are achieved, the defense of Europe against an all-out Soviet attack, even if such an attack were limited to non-nuclear means, would require the use of tactical nuclear weapons on our part." McNamara also is striving to increase NATO's tactical airpower, has approved the purchase of more than 1,000 supersonic Phantom II fighters to be used by the Air Force.

The manner in which Europe responds to its own future defense may well decide the success or failure of McNamara's five-year plan. That plan includes Polaris submarines with advanced missiles that nearly double their striking range to 2,500 miles. And to close the range gap between the Polaris and the 350-mile Pershing tactical missiles, McNamara has ordered research on a new medium-range missile that can be fired either from surface ships or mobile ground launchers. Through improved airlift, U.S. troops will be able to move much more rapidly to the world's trouble spots. Sealift for amphibious operations will be increased, but the future of the fleet is in question. McNamara recently sent shivers throughout the entire Navy when he said: "The entire question of the cost and capability of the fleet in relation to the cost of defending it against air attack is still in need of a most thorough analysis."

McNamara gets that same glint in his eye when he talks about the "intellectually challenging, but militarily useless, engineering tour de force" of military research and development. "Poor planning, unrealistic schedules, unnecessary design changes, and enormous cost increases over original estimates have continuously disrupted the efficient operation of our program," he told Congress. "We want to do our thinking before we start bending metal. Pencils and paper are a lot cheaper than the termination of programs."

To achieve his aims will require every bit of McNamara's brilliance and dedication. His programs may run into political objections, at home and abroad, that compel compromises or retreats; if so, he expects to be in on the decisions. Along the way to his goals, he will injure plenty of feelings, but he has thought about that too. "I see my position here'" he says, "as being that of a leader, not a judge. I'm here to originate and stimulate new ideas and programs, not just to referee arguments and harmonize interests." In his cramped, left-handed script he will continue to pepper his military leaders with incessant questions: "Why? How much? What are the alternatives?" He regrets the fact that those military leaders so often disagree with his decisions. Explains one close associate: "If there were time, he could do more in the way of complete explanation of every decision. He believes that these people are devoting themselves to the defense of the country and they'd understand. But if you don't have time and the nation's security is at stake or great sums of money are being wasted, you move ahead." And to Robert McNamara, moving ahead is just about everything.

* When he testified last week before a House subcommittee, two Republican Congressmen made side bets on whether McNamara could be asked something he couldn't answer. Melvin R. Laird of Wisconsin owes William Minshall of Ohio a lunch because McNamara precisely pinpointed a section of the Nassau Pact that Laird thought he might not know.

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