Eisenhower Library, Eisenhower papers, Whitman file
Memorandum of Discussion at the 227th Meeting of the National Security Council, Friday, December 3, 1954 1
[Extract]
eyes only
The following were present at the 227th meeting of the National Security Council: The President of the United States, presiding; the Vice President of the United States; the Secretary of State; the Secretary of Defense; the Director, Foreign Operations Administration; and the Director, Office of Defense Mobilization. Also present were the Secretary of the Treasury; the Director, Bureau of the Budget; the Chairman, Council of Economic Advisers (for Item 2); Assistant Secretary of Defense McNeil (for Item 2); Assistant Secretary of Defense Hensel (for Item 2); the Secretary of the Army (for Item 2); the Secretary of the Navy (for Item 2); the Acting Secretary of the Air Force (for Item 2); the Deputy Director, FOA (for Item 2); the Deputy Director, Bureau of the Budget (for Item 2); Mr. John H. Ohly, FOA (for Item 2); the Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff; the Chief of Staff, U.S. Army; the Acting Chief of Naval Operations (for Item 2); the Chief of Staff, U.S. Air Force (for Item 2); the Commandant, U.S. Marine Corps (for Item 2); the Director of Central Intelligence; Robert Cutler, Special Assistant to the President; the Deputy Assistant to the President; the White House Staff Secretary [Page 804] (for Item 2); the Executive Secretary, NSC; and the Deputy Executive Secretary, NSC.
There follows a summary of the discussion at the meeting and the main points taken.
1. Review of Basic National Security Policy (NSC Action No. 1272)2
Mr. Cutler called on General Ridgway to make his presentation. General Ridgway pointed out that he was making known his individual views concerning existing over-all basic national security policy by instruction of the President transmitted to him by Mr. Cutler. He then proceeded to read his report (copy filed in the minutes of the meeting3).
At the conclusion of the report the President asked if there were any questions to be asked of General Ridgway. There being none, the President thanked the Chief of Staff, and General Ridgway left the Cabinet Room.
The President then commented that one of the points that General Ridgway had dwelt on in his statement was one with which he, the President, was living all the time—namely, what do you do with the world after you have won victory in such a catastrophic nuclear war? The President went on to say that General Ridgway appeared to believe that if the United States didn’t resort to nuclear attack in general war, the Russians in turn would not use such weapons, and the President said he did not believe any such thing. Furthermore, said the President, he had a strong feeling that General Ridgway was sincere in his view of the need for balanced U.S. military forces rather than reliance upon atomic retaliatory capacity. In other words, thought the President, General Ridgway was not merely presenting a “parochial”’ Army viewpoint. On the other hand, said the President, the United States could not afford to prepare to fight all kinds of wars and still preserve its free economy and its basic institutions.
Secretary Wilson said that we must not quarrel over words. Ordinary fission weapons have a quite different effect from thermonuclear weapons. Moreover, if we swept over Soviet Russia and China with vast land armies we would have the same or similar problems as those outlined by General Ridgway as constituting the bitter aftermath of a nuclear war. The President thought not quite the same problems. Secretary Wilson also underlined the importance of the time factor in another war. He said he could not conceive of sending millions of American troops to fight in Europe while the [Page 805] United States itself was under atomic attack. For one thing, it would be impossible to get them across the ocean.
Secretary Wilson also indicated that this was a split in views among the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and that General Ridgway was making a justification for a much larger Army. It was quite proper for General Ridgway to advocate larger Army forces, but the Council should recognize what it was hearing. In fact, said Secretary Wilson, he would not want to have a Chief of Staff of the Army who did not fight for the objectives and requirements of his Service.
Governor Stassen inquired whether it would be fruitful to have a special group undertake to make a study of the difficult problem which General Ridgway had underlined and on which the President had commented—namely, how to organize the victory after the end of a nuclear war—how the U.S. could rebuild a shattered world without destroying its own economy.
Secretary Wilson thought that such a study would be worthwhile because, among other reasons, if you put some of the measures which would result from the study in effect now you might have a better chance of avoiding a third world war.
Secretary Humphrey, speaking with great force, said there was a three-fold difference between the view presented by General Ridgway and the views held by the rest of us. First, General Ridgway started with the one-sided premise that the whole effort should be directed to maintaining the U.S. military posture, with little or no regard for the maintenance of the U.S. economy. The President thought that this did something less than justice to General Ridgway’s views.
Secondly, said Secretary Humphrey, General Ridgway was also clearly wrong in his assumption that if the United States did not resort to nuclear warfare the Russians would not. The President said he agreed with Secretary Humphrey on this point, although it was significant that in World War II the Germans had not resorted to the use of poison gas. Even Hitler was too horrified at the prospect of gas warfare when he hesitated to use gas, and, of course, he also feared that the allies would retaliate with something as bad or worse. There were some, said the President, who believe that modern warfare imposes its own limitations.
His third point, said Secretary Humphrey, was that General Ridgway was arguing in favor of all kinds of forces designed to fight all kinds of war at all times. For the United States to maintain such forces was absolutely impossible.
The President stated that our only chance of victory in a third world war against the Soviet Union would be to paralyze the enemy at the outset of the war. Since we cannot keep the United [Page 806] States an armed camp or a garrison state, we must make plans to use the atom bomb if we become involved in a war. We are not going to provoke the war, and that is why we have got to be patient. If war comes, the other fellow must have started it. Otherwise we would not be in a position to use the nuclear weapon, and we have got to be in a position to use that weapon if we are to preserve our institutions in peace and win the victory in war.
Governor Stassen said he doubted the entire validity of General Ridgway’s thesis that we would draw down upon ourselves the hatred of most of mankind if we resorted to atomic warfare. History showed that the great hatreds were engendered in the post-war period rather than during the time of the actual conflict.
The National Security Council: 4
Noted and discussed the individual views of the Chief of Staff, U.S. Army, on the subject, as orally presented at the meeting.
. . . . . . .
- Drafted by Deputy Executive Secretary Gleason on Dec. 4.↩
- For NSC Action No. 1272, see footnote 12, p. 800.↩
- Report not found. For information on minutes of NSC meetings, see footnote 1, p. 394.↩
- The following paragraph constitutes NSC Action No. 1279. (S/S–NSC (Miscellaneous) files, lot 66 D 95, “NSC Records of Action”)↩