wenhower:
Papers, ly5j-01 °
, (ann Whitman file)
that:
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AGPEIME GS.
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"An adequate merchant marine is-essential for defense purposes"
and "should be re-affirmed".
Secondly, the Council should decide whe-
ther, in their forthcoming computations of U. S. merchant shipping requirements for national defense, the Joint Chiefs should be asked to
compute these requirements on the differing assumptions of global war
and local war.
Secretary Quarles again repeated the views of the Joint Chiefs
of Staff that shipping requirements for general war would be larger than
shipping requirements for a local war, and, accordingly, the larger figure would be governing. He felt that this justified the Joint Chiefs'
estimate that 1200 ships in the merchant fleet were essential from the
point of view of national defense. Indeed, continued Secretary querles,
this Ligure was estimated to be the minimum requirement from the military point of view. General Twining added the point that the Joint
Chiefs, in their planning for the use of merchant ships, do teke into
consideration the possibilities of lccal war.
C
Mr. Brundage said it was his understanding that the general
planning of shipping requirements by the Joint Chiefs of Staff was
based on the assumption that it would be necessary to transport 20
U. S. divisions abroad in the six-months period following the cutbreak
of war. In view of recent Council discussions of the nature of nuclear
general war, Mr. Brundage wondered whether the point of view of the
Joint Chiefs was really valid.
Secretary Quarles pointed out that the transportation of the
nine second-echelon divisions in this six-months interval was not a
Significant factor in the Joint Chiefs' computations of shipping requirements. Actually, in their view, the peak requirements came earlier
and, moreover, even if these divisions were not transported overseas
they estimated that we would still require the 1200 ships. Mr. Brundage then suggested that the Council await the current JCS report on
shipping requirements, due in Jamary, to see what it says before the
Council acted. Mr. Cutler said it was his understanding that the
forthcoming JCS report would still set the requirement at 1200 ships.
Secretary Quarles, however, stated that if the situation permitted a
delay until the receipt of the JCS report, he did not object to
Mr. Brundage's proposal. Mr. Gray pointed cut that it would be impossible to exemine the future merchant marine program until we received the new JCS report. He felt that the Budget's question had
elements of validity and should be answered.
.
The President inquired what had been the shipping requirements in the Korean war. General Twining answered that we had required 2600 vessels. The President went on to say that, with respect
to & general nuclear war, the factor of shipping seemed to him acaGemic. On the other hand, the situations of limited war--such as that
which had occurred in Korea or which might one day occur in Indonesia
* UNCLASSIFIES