ATOMIC POWER

Press, Volume LXXXII, Issue 24898, 11 June 1946, Page 4

ATOMIC POWER

“Not The End Of Civilisation” SIR KEITH PARK’S OPINION People who said that the development of the atomic bomb meant the end of civilisation were talking “tripe,” said Air Chief Marshal Sir Keith Park in an interview in the city yesterday. He did not think that the bomb altered the fundamental principles of war, any more than had the invention of steam power, or gunpowder, or submarines. What the bomb did do was to put in the hands of industrial nations a potential weapon of immense destruction. And it put a very high premium on air power. “The power with air supremacy to begin with could smash the others,” he said. From a defence viewpoint, any nation within 2000 miles of another highly industrialised nation, in the Army phrase, had “had it” unless it had kept up-to-date in three things. These three* things were:— Scientific research. Technical development. Production of a number of the most modern weapons.

Atomic power could be a blessing in one respect. It would be a very strong deterrent to war. And if war did come, it would have the further advantage of decisive results being obtained, in a verv short time. » “It would be noisy, disruptive, and destructive but it would be over quickly,” he said, and that would be a good thing, sociologically and economically. Sir Keith Park said he did not believe that man had sprouted white wings since the last war, and the advances that had to be made technically made it necessary that side by side with them should come advances made politically. Wars were not made just because one side had a lot of weapons the others did not have. They came from a clash over economic and political differences. They were the logical end of diplomatic and political failures to end struggles between nations. The higher premium put on air power should dispose once and ’for all of the view that there was a “senior service” among the services. That was an “outworn, Crimean” idea. Now that the order of priority for defence had been changed, there was no excuse for the phrase. All services were essential to a war, but air supremacy had to be there before the others could mobilise. Sir Keith Park emphasised that the views he expressed were his own personal views, and in no way official.