the elements of national power cannot operate successfully if held apart by artificial barriers of boxes on an organization chart. Moreover, a nation united in freedom must be united also in purpose. In such unity there are not second-class areas of responsibility. Each bears upon each other; the diplomatic decision that is crucial today, the economic decision that is crucial tomorrow, the military decision that may be crucial at another time. Each decision affects decisions in all other areas. Our enemy-and I believe that there is no inhibition about naming that enemy as imperialistic, aggressive communism-knows and fully exploits the advantage of being able to move across the entire spectrum of power, from the psychological to the economic, to the military and the diplomatic. No nation can survive against such a flexibility and determination unless it has equal determination and flexibility.

The American military today occupies, along with all other elements of national power, from civilian morale and industriousness to scientific expertise and diplomatic skill, a position in which it, the military, must have a view of the grand strategy for our free society to win, such as never before demanded of it.

Just as the military willingly and wholeheartedly concedes to the diplomats the frontal position in protecting the interests of the United States through international negotiations, so have diplomats realistically conceded to the military the responsibility for the military power which holds the enemy in check long enough to permit the negotiations.

We would descend rapidly to disaster if these two elements ever became separated in their conception of the nature of the war we are in. These facts, I feel, are what make your hearings of such enormous importance. For, in them, you are asking questions vital to this Nation's ability to mobilize all its force for the defense against an enemy whose attacks are launched, every day, every hour, on a myriad of fronts and whose assaults may continue far into the future of our patience and our will.

In your letter to me of November 1961, Mr. Chairman, you solicited views on certain questions which I should like now to address:

*** what should be the function of military personnel in alerting the public to the military and political menace posed by our potential enemy and what restriction should be placed upon their activities in this field.

The primary task of the military and naval leadership is to insure the combat effectiveness of the Armed Forces, not to insure that the entire citizenry of the Nation is alerted to the potential menace of our enemy. However, part of that function must include troop instruction on the nature of the enemy-not only his weapons and field tactics, but also his use, as a weapon of battle, of psychological and political warfare.

Military men of the past, who fought solely for national advantages or defense, in clamorous struggles over real estate, waterways, and mineral wealth, could perhaps afford to study the enemy only in terms of hardware and muscle power. Military men who are expected to fight in the defense of an entire world's freedom from barbarism and for the preservation of man's most highly developed political ideology, that of constitutional government, must know more.

for decades past and why it will involve a protracted conflict for decades ahead.

Even sudden combat, and the sharp thrust of the emotions in combat, do not wholly depend upon instinctual reactions. Protracted conflict that employs books as well as bullets, the assassin's knife as well as the computer-operated missile, requires more. It requires sure knowledge and unremitting dedication to the worth of the struggle, and the goals of its victory.

The military must involve itself in the sort of education that will accomplish this. And, in a free society, what and how it teaches, cannot be a secret or a thing apart from all other citizens. It is inevitable, and proper, that the byproducts of its education will reach the general public. It will do it through the families and friends of the military men themselves if through no other means. Consequently, then, I think it is the proper and, indeed, the moral responsibility of men so trained to contribute whatever special talents they may have to seminars, public discussions, and other means by which all of our citizens should be involving themselves in this most important of all dialogues the discussion of the nature of freedom and the threats to it from an enemy of whom we have vast knowledge but still insufficient general public understanding.

The involvement of the military in these discussions, as citizens with responsibilities equal to those of other citizens, can only remain proper, however, so long as matters of purely partisan politics are avoided. That area, every military man I know would agree, is off limits to the man in uniform.

Thus the clear distinction is essential: discussions of the nature of our freedom and the nature of the enemy who threatens it are a general public responsibility, with no distinction as to the clothes a man wears, the employer he serves, or the party for which he may, in ballot-box secrecy, vote.

The day that any segment of our society-the military or any other-is prohibited from such discussion we will have moved-not in the direction of proper restrictions of activity-but in the direction of improper exercise of authority and the abridgment of freedom itself at its most basic level, that of free speech.

We have had a tragic example, already, of what can happen when American soldiers are trained only for combat but not for understanding what they are fighting for and what they are fighting against. The seemingly incredible success of the enemy in eroding the will of our men captured in Korea-so that not one of them even successfully manager to engineer an escape-is not incredible, really. It was, as it has been proved, due simply to the inability of those troops to resist even rudimentary arguments and persuasions concerning the nature of constitutional government and the background of the decision to resist an assault against that government on a remote battlefield.

These men, who had never heard the subjects discussed in their communities, and had not heard them discussed in their military units, had been deprived of a basic weapon when they went into battle against an enemy whose ideologies travel in tandem with his guns.

This posed a serious problem for responsible military leaders. It was obvious that a gap existed in the earlier training and education

tion had to be remedied. It is important to point out that the sole remedy of the situation was not simply in troop education and the code of conduct. It was in improved discipline, training, and espirt. Belief in what one's outfit is doing, high morale, and combat effectiveness go hand in hand. A man with high morale believes in himself, in his outfit, in his service, and in his country. In combat a sensible loyalty to the unit and to the men in the unit, a sense of discipline, and a belief in the authority of the leaders all add up to the will to fight and win. But the prisoner of war is involved in a situation where he is isolated from his unit.

Hence, there can be a time when the individual must have a clear loyalty beyond the comrades in the unit, beyond the unit itself. Particularly is this true when he is alone. He must understand why he must fight, why he personally must make a sacrifice, why he must be willing to die for his country. His family and others dear to him must also understand this. So in terms of combat effectiveness, we are faced with two challenges. First, there is the challenge of increasing the discipline and the esprit within the unit. Secondly, there is the challenge of developing in the soldier, the sailor, the marine, the airman, and the officer, for the times he might have to stand alone, the armor of a greater understanding of our free way of life and the values which we hold dear. We realize that primarily this development is the responsibility of the community, the family, the school, the church. But if the soldier, sailor, marine or airman recruited into service does not have the loyalties necessary for effectiveness both in combat and in the lonesome occasions of the cold war, the unit commander and the services cannot neglect their role in making up for this inadequacy.

In short, we must not teach these men a doctrine of the political right or left, but we must find ways to teach them patriotism. It must not be blind patriotism, but a patriotism based upon deep and broad understanding of the values of our society, that our freedom is ordered freedom, that our Government has been a strong but limited Government, that our political creed of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness rests upon a willingness to sacrifice, if necessary supremely, for fellow men imperiled by tyranny.

I do not believe the day will ever come in this wonderful free country of ours, when discussion of our form of limited government, of the values and responsibilities of an open, free society is described as a partisan matter that must be denied to the very men who are pledged to fight and die for it. Such a day would signal the end of that open society. It has not arrived. I pray God it never does. The second question is:

* whether or not it is possible to draw a clear line between proper military and improper nonmilitary matters and between military questions on the one hand and foreign and domestic policy matters on the other.

Let me first give some background for my answer.

There is no substitute for men of judgment. Judgment flows from experience and knowledge. To make good military judgments or to give intelligent military advice, military men must be well-informed on the political, economic, psychological, and other matters bearing on the problem. Likewise, civilians must be well-informed on the

when nonmilitary experts ignore those with experience in the military and regard themselves as final authorities on military matters. Equally, dangers arise when military men ignore those with experience in economic, scientific, and foreign policy fields, and regard themselves as endowed with superior wisdom in these areas. Nevertheless, all persons with a variety of experience must harmoniously work together. These areas cannot be compartmentalized and

isolated.

I pointed out the reason earlier. A nation's influence in world affairs is greatly dependent upon the power which that nation possesses and how that power is used. National power consists of interlocked elements-economic, diplomatic, military, psychological, and moral. The answer to a military problem may lie in the scientific area; the answer to a psychological problem may lie in the military area; and so forth. Yet we Americans tend to solve our problems by rigidly staying in the area in which the problem is offered, while the Communist powers freely move from one element of power to another, winning important advantages as they do.

Because of the high degree of interdependence in modern society, the acquisition and use of military power must be coordinated with the acquisition and use of other elements of national power. Otherwise the Nation will not have a maximum ability to deter aggression and extend freedom.

In the context of current history, it is particularly apparent that while military power represents only one of many interdependent elements, none of the other elements can be effective without security, and it is a military element which provides this security and, hence, is one of the most critical components of national power.

Such uniqueness is not new to the military profession. It was said during World War I that Admiral Jellicoe, the commander of the British fleet, was the one man who could lose the empire in an after

noon.

But in the cold war, civilian views on the use of military power have become more important than ever in determining how that military power should be used. Likewise the views of military men are more important in determining how other forms of national power are used in arriving at the best decisions.

Now to answer the question. International politics and military matters are so closely intertwined, so mutually interdependent, that it is impossible to make general rules, applicable under all circumstances. to separate them clearly and distinctly.

Does this leave us in a state of endless confusion? No. In regard to the military, there is the principle of civilian control. No mature U.S. military officer I know of has ever questioned it. Indeed, it is a sacred part of our military tradition itself. If a military man cannot reconcile his convictions with his civilian superior's order, he has only the recourse of leaving the service.

But the principle of civilian control can be perverted. Civilian control of the military is properly exerted by the President, the Secretary of Defense, and the secretaries of the individual military departments over the military services, within the guidelines laid down by the Congress. The senior civilians in the Government have the final decision on all problems affecting the military posture of the

In my opinion, it is improper that civilian control should be exercised in any other echelon but at the top. It should not be extended to every subordinate military echelon. To be specific, orders and directives to the military should come from the top civilian elements to the senior military people. They should not come from junior civilian elements to junior military people.

There is an obvious reason why civilian control should be exercised from the top and not laterally on every echelon. An effective military organization depends upon detailed knowledge of military operations that can be gained only by experience. Senior military officers spend a lifetime in accumulating this experience. They have devoted all of their adult life to military problems and international problems related to military matters. Thus they have gained a special knowledge. Rotation through various assignments both in operating units and in staff work give them an advantage over the civilian who has been, for example, in the Pentagon at a desk throughout his career.

There is a second obvious reason why civilian control should be exercised from the top down and not laterally. The Military Establishment has to be geared to function in a shooting war as well as in a cold war. The military chain of command has to be an operation within the military. In the final analysis, the military services are built for combat, and experience with the actual operation of combatant forces is needed to direct combatant operations.

Here is a final point in my answer to the questions of whether or not it is possible to draw a clear line between proper military and improper nonmilitary matters. While it is not possible to compartmentalize the various areas dealing with our national power, it is possible to define rather well the difference between international politics related to national security and partisan politics.

The Chairman's letter was also concerned with the difficulty

in clearly delineating the boundaries between legitimate expressions in the exercise of the right of freedom of speech and activities or expressions in the field of partisan politics.

Freedom of speech is a cornerstone of free government. Curtailment of freedom of speech, no matter how it may be justified, curtails basic freedoms. There cannot be freedom without freedom of speech. It has become a part of the military tradition, however, that the active duty military not participate in partisan politics.

There are, of course, certain issues that become identified with a particular partisan issue, but which are not basically political in terms of our two-party system. The military man must use judg

ment.

In the conduct of Government business, there must be some restrictions on what can be said, and what can be disclosed. In the military services, particularly, the officers must speak and act in accordance with the policies established by the President, the Secretary of Defense, and other officials senior to them in the chain of command.

It is an officer's duty to call the attention of his superiors to orders or policies which he believes to be detrimental to the interest of the United States but he cannot act contrary to established policies and orders. He can try, within the chain of command, to have them