AMERICA'S ARMED STRENGTH

Rotorua Morning Post, Issue 5284, 21 December 1946, Page 2

AMERICA'S ARMED STRENGTH

REGAHMNG UWT POWER CAPABILITY OF MEETINGS NEW AGGRESSIOjNi DISOUSSED. WA S'HIN GTON. ' Should the United , States in the near future again be forced into war it would take quite a long time for the nation to muster enough strength to take the offensiv , in the opinion of veteran officers of the country's armed forces. But, these officers emphasise, the armed power of America is increasing. Strength lost between the end of the war and early last summer is being regained. The'' United States 'Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, and the Secretary of War, Mr. Patterson, among officials who have expressed themselves on this siu:Jbject.in recent months, each have stated that it would take the United States six months to regain the naval and military power it had when - Japan surrendered. Other mformed authorities say 't would take longer. One naval officer, whoce information is authoritative ,estimates that it would take "several years" for the Navy to become as strong as it was , when when Japan surrendered. He said it could regain three-fourths of this strength v/ithin a year, ibecause it could capitalise on its millions of recently demohilised veterans and its still useful laid-up ships, hut that much more time would he needed to organise the remaining 25 per cent. of its potential combat strength. Military leaders seem fully aware that other nations may develop new weapons before America does, and they stress the importance of military intelligence. Lieutenant-General Hoyt S. Vandenberg, Director of the Central Intelligence Group, finds the Army, Navy and the U.S. State Department increasingly co-operative in creating the over-all intelligence agency, and he says many qualified experts have joined his organisation. Volunteer Personnel. Both the Navy and the Marine Corps feel secure in one factor: all their personnel are volunteers. Their strength in August was: 642,170, Navy; and 112,560 Marino Corps. At the end of the war their strength was : 3,408,347, Navy; and 4185,833 Marine Corps. The Navy also is •lceping in constant training 200, C00 officers and men in its organised re^ serves to augment its regular forces. The Marine Corps ground and air organised reserves, now activated have a quota of 32,400 men. A War Department officer whose job is to plan for all contingencies, feels that the army ''could start some kind of offensive in nine months," but not a "major, sustained attack." For the first year, he said, most of the veteran manpower recalled to arms would be needed to train reeruits. Another officer recalled that each United States division was trained for a year before being ordered into combat in the recent war. An Army Air Force executive said he believed it would take a year and a half for air power to regain the strength it had at the end of the war. American air units now overseas are "not in a condition to fight over a long period of time," he said, since they would need heavy replacements in aircraft and personnel. Many military leaders interviewed said that American occupation forces overseas, in the event of war, could fight only a brief delaying' action if attacked. War Not Expected. None of the 'high-ranking officers questioned expected war soon. They seem confident that present inter-' national differences will be settled and that Russia, the only nation which could be a challenge, is not in a sound position to fight. As to weapdns, in the event of another war in the immediate or near future, military leaders say that they would be about the same ones used at the end of the last war — that guided missiles and other new paraphernalia still must be developed further. They recall that the designing of the B-29 Super-Fortress, "the atomic bomber," was started in 1938, with the first model built in 1941, and with mass combat construction coming only" in 1945. S.cientists are hard at work, as are o'ther technicians. But air officers see litt|e tactical advanfe^ge glaiined in the construction of the new superbombers, the B-35 and B-36, with only one each of these planes now in use, and with fewer than 50 army petpropelled' aeroplanes and few navy jet-propelled carrier planes now in operatkm. American military mobilisation plans, as a result, say the experts, envisage no radical departure from the war machine in 1945. The industrial mobilisation plan, now being written by the Army and Navy Munitions Board, will be esentially^a programme to mobilise civilian resoorrces to the fullest extent. General Dwight Eisenhower, United States Ghief of Staff, discounts the theory that long-range bombers and pilotless planes would render unnecessary advanced bases. He says that American security "demands that we surround ourselves with a cordon of bases from which our forces may intereept attacking unjits aind from which we may quickly Iaunch counter blows."