Kennedy: The Classic Biography (112 page)

But these same calculations of deterrence also enabled Kennedy and McNamara to see clearly the folly of unilateral disarmament, and the irrelevance of complaints that we already had enough to “overkill” every Soviet citizen several times. Because our safety as a second-strike nation required a great enough force to survive a first strike and still retaliate effectively, and because our strategy required enough weapons to destroy all important enemy targets, there was no absolute level of sufficiency. The concept of deterrence, moreover, required not only superior forces but a degree of superiority that would, when made known—and the Kennedy administration took unprecedented steps to make it known—convince all Allies and adversaries of that fact.

THE MISSILE GAP

This same problem of determining how much is enough in comparison with a secret, aggressive society produced the issue known as the “missile gap.” That controversy, which rose rapidly on the political scene following the successful Soviet missile tests in 1957, can now be put into perspective:

• Contrary to the charges made by some Democrats in 1960, the Eisenhower administration’s official intelligence estimates of Soviet missile prospects were not revised downward for political or budgetary reasons.

• Contrary to the charges made by some Republicans in 1961, Democratic alarms in previous years about a coming “missile gap” had been sounded in good faith and with good reason. The gap prediction was not the fictitious invention of either deceitful politicians or budget-hungry Air Force officers who knew their fears were exaggerated. It was largely the result of honest error by both military and civilian officers; and it was spread by Republican officials as well as Democratic Senators and nonpartisan columnists.

• Eisenhower was right in downgrading the “missile gap” dangers in 1960; Kennedy was right in stepping up our missile program in 1961. In fact, the high-priority missile build-up undertaken by both Presidents, prodded by these fears which proved unfounded, prevented the opening of any gap.

Much of the controversy stemmed from different definitions of the same phrase. While “missile gap” to some implied a comparison of each country’s current missile efforts, to others it referred to the future. While some talked about intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) only, others talked about all missiles. While some compared sheer numbers, others proposed a more realistic equation of technology, vulnerability, delivery systems and the advantage lying with the aggressor.

If the phrase referred to the Soviets’ lead in 1957 in rocketry and engine thrust, to their capacity to convert that lead into the world’s first sizable force of ICBMs, or to the
total
number of missiles of all sizes and ranges targeted by either side, then clearly a “missile gap” did exist at one time. But if the phrase referred to a Soviet missile-based over-all military superiority capable of reducing on first strike America’s retaliatory capacity to an insignificant level, then clearly no such “missile gap” ever existed.

Yet even that latter gap might have existed, and concern with it was not incomprehensible. The successful Soviet missile test in 1957, their subsequent space exploits, Khrushchev’s claim that missile mass production was under way, and his new belligerence and fondness for nuclear blackmail, all seemed to confirm the worst fears of the U.S. intelligence experts in the late 1950’s. They assumed that the Soviets would seek a superior first-strike force, since they had the industrial and technological capacity to do so. These fears were repeated by a series of secret and public reports by impartial commissions, leaked to columnists and Congressmen and variously supported by the testimony of several top generals. President Eisenhower and his Secretaries of Defense stated that, it was probable that the Soviets were ahead in some areas of long-range ballistic missile development, at least in numbers; and the House Appropriations Committee, after listening to Secretary Mc-Elroy in closed session in 1959, indicated that its information forecast a possible three-to-one Soviet lead by the end of 1962.

But before all U-2 flights were ended on May 1, 1960, their photography indicated that Khrushchev had been bluffing. Apparently his first ICBM had been too costly, too cumbersome and too vulnerable a weapon for mass production and deployment. He had settled, instead, for a very few of those missiles while pushing ahead on the deployment of medium-range missiles aimed at Europe and the development of a better ICBM.

But 1960 was a campaign year. Republican attempts to downgrade the issue were looked upon with suspicion. All the evidence available to Kennedy, and to those Senators on whose efforts he drew, indicated a dangerous situation. In his primary and fall campaigns he referred sparingly and for the most part cautiously to the Soviet missile “advantage,” avoiding precise dates and numbers, quoting nonpartisan experts and emphasizing that the United States was still the stronger military power although danger lay ahead. The conflicting claims over dates and numbers, he said, were differences of degree which he preferred to avoid: “I say only that the evidence is strong…that we cannot be certain of our security in the future any more than we can be certain of disaster…. If we are to err in an age of uncertainty, I want us to err on the side of security.”

All the U-2 evidence was in before the Kennedy-Nixon campaign began. But it was never made available to Kennedy in the CIA and military briefings arranged for him. Late in August he flew to Strategic Air Command headquarters in Omaha for a briefing arranged by the administration. Almost immediately it was apparent that he was not to be given a full-scale top-secret fill-in on Soviet-American missile and bomber strength. Somewhat angrily Kennedy insisted that he had had more access to information merely as a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee—and that if the Air Force was that complacent, he would remember it at appropriation time the following year.

When Kennedy and McNamara took office, their first review of the National Intelligence Estimates revealed not one but several estimates—and these were likely to coincide in the case of the military intelligence representatives with the strategic views and roles of their respective services. The Air Force estimate, for example, of Soviet missiles then in being was far higher than that of the Navy. While they searched for better answers, the Secretary of Defense—new to the perils of the Washington press corps—stumbled over the ill-defined meaning of “missile gap” in a background press briefing, causing a new controversy as to whether he had admitted that no such gap existed. But before the summer was out the picture was clear.

The new 1961 estimates did suggest a “gap” favoring the Soviet Union in raw numbers of ballistic missiles then in operation; but the quantities of long-range missiles on both sides were so small compared to our bomber force that this “gap” had no serious military significance. Even this estimate was later revised downward, and the build-up undertaken by the Kennedy administration helped make certain that no gap would ever subsequently open.

CIVIL DEFENSE

Kennedy’s error in 1960 on the “missile gap” had been the result of the public’s being informed too little and too late—even after the facts were certain—about a danger which he had in good faith overstated. His error in 1961 on civil defense, however, was in giving the public too much information too soon—even before his program was certain—about a danger which with good reason he understated.

John Kennedy’s views on civil defense, unlike most of his views as man and President, were too quickly formed. He did not, to my knowledge, ever talk about the subject as a Senator or candidate. It was not mentioned in his Inaugural or State of the Union addresses. It was ignored in his March 28 Defense Message, despite all the attention that message paid to continental defense. It was not stirred by intermittent and unreliable reports that the Soviet Union was starting a vast fallout shelter program.
¹

Nor was the President influenced by the zealous advocacy of his Director of the Office of Civil Defense Mobilization, Frank Ellis. After rendering effective political support in Louisiana, Ellis had finally settled for the OCDM job. Hoping to make it more meaningful, he publicly appealed for more funds than Kennedy allotted him, and vigorously sought ways to alert the public to the importance of civil defense. Upon learning that Ellis planned to fly to Rome to seek a testimonial from the Pope in behalf of the Ellis plan to install a fallout shelter in every church basement, the President gently suggested that it would be a mistake to bother the Pope at that time.

But more serious mistakes lay ahead. It is often said that Kennedy’s decision to push civil defense was the result of the Berlin crisis. In fact, it came during the five weeks of agonizing reappraisal between the Bay of Pigs in April and his second State of the Union Message in May. A study by Carl Kaysen of the White House staff made clear that the current effort was based on outmoded concepts, that its budget was a waste, and that the United States should either face up to the problem in a serious way or forget it. It was not in John Kennedy’s nature to forget it. Facing up to it was consistent with the note of added urgency and effort he wished to sound to the Congress. His obligations as President did not permit him to ignore the protection of human lives while protecting our weapons of war. He did not expect an attack, but he was always aware of the danger of escalation, miscalculation or accidental war. Nor was he unmindful of the fact that New York’s Governor Nelson Rockefeller, who appeared then to be his most likely opponent in 1964, was criticizing the administration’s “complacency” on civil defense in much the same terms Kennedy had applied to the “missile gap” in earlier years.

His May 25 address to the Congress thus called for shelters as a new form of “survival insurance” against the hazards of radioactive fallout. Partly as a matter of more efficient government organization, he transferred jurisdiction over civil defense from Ellis to McNamara. A long and difficult negotiation between the two men on the terms of the transfer, mediated by the Budget Bureau with my help, had not yet been completed by the time of the President’s speech. Ellis was willing to have only the shelter program transferred to Defense, McNamara wanted full responsibility or none. To obtain the agreement of both men to the language in Kennedy’s announcement, I carefully worded that portion of the President’s message to read somewhat ambiguously: “I am assigning responsibility for this program to…the Secretary of Defense.” Each man assumed this meant I had decided he was right. But shortly thereafter all civil defense functions were moved to Defense, the OCDM was reorganized into the Office of Emergency Planning, and Ellis resigned to accept a judgeship.

The May 25 plea for a new Federal effort was strong in comparison with past Presidential statements but cautiously worded. The President emphasized that it was insurance “we could never forgive ourselves for foregoing in the event of catastrophe.” A new plea for civil defense was thus logically included in his TV address on the Berlin crisis some two months later. But this speech, unlike that in May, was delivered in a context of clear and present danger. It had the anxious attention of the nation to a far greater degree. It was concerned with a possible nuclear war over Berlin that very year, not simply an accidental attack at some speculative time. And its concluding advice on civil defense was couched in particularly ominous tones:

In the event of an attack, the lives of those families which are not hit in a nuclear blast and fire can still be saved—
if
they can be warned to take shelter and
if
that shelter is available…. The time to start is now. In the coming months, I hope to let every citizen know what steps he can take without delay to protect his family in case of attack. I know that you will want to do no less.

The President’s aim was to bestir a still slumbering public; and he succeeded beyond his own expectations and desire. The civil defense “balloon” not only went up, it disappeared from sight. Shelter manufacturers reported a surge in sales at $1,500 each (and some did their best to keep fears at a peak). Local civil defense officers were besieged with inquiries. Saving one’s family from fallout became the individual citizen’s contribution to foreign policy. Scientists and pseudoscientists debated how many could survive a nuclear war with or without shelters, how long they would have to remain underground and what life would be like when they emerged. Clergymen debated whether man’s ethical values required him to accept death like a cinder or life like a mole. Woman’s-page columnists offered handy advice on foods to stock, clothes to bring and books to read. Merchants quickly sold home survival kits, ration packs, sandbags, periscopes, and phony fallout suits and salves. A national controversy raged over whether those who had provided for their own survival could shoot less diligent neighbors demanding access, or whether those barred from a shelter would block up its air shafts. Parents warned their children not to reveal the whereabouts of their shelters. Do-it-yourself became save-only-yourself.

Jingoist groups thrived on the level of near-hysteria which was reached—at least in some parts of the country—as increased discussion only made it obvious that no program could save everyone. Some shelter owners, believing the claims of
Life
magazine and others that shelters could enable 90-97 percent of the population to survive a nuclear attack, said it would be “just another war.” Pacifist organizations assailed shelters as though they were a substitute for our efforts on peace. Local civil defense officials proved in some cases to be overzealous or confused.

The confusion and panic were aggravated by the Kennedy administration’s lack of a comprehensive shelter program, a clear-cut shelter policy or even an authoritative voice placing the whole problem in perspective. Only the President could supply that voice. But the President was uncertain; and his advisers, like the country, were divided. All agreed that any effort that might save millions of lives was worthwhile. But should it be family shelters or community shelters—receive high budget priority or a more limited investment—be under national or local control? He had spoken of shelter against fallout, but nuclear scientist Edward Teller told him that, for a mere $50 billion, the nation could protect itself against even nuclear blast by burrowing deeper and deeper as the Soviet weapons grew larger. There were political pressures on every side; and the President, aware of the different effects his own two statements had caused, and conscious of his obligations to save Americans in the future and unite them in the present, resisted suggestions for a new “fireside chat.” He wanted no more said until our program was ready, and he wanted that program weighed carefully. Having created this laboring mountain, he was reluctant to bring forth a mouse; but he was even more unwilling to let the mountain overshadow his over-all policy.