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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jacques Chitte who wrote (86108)	8/22/2000 9:38:39 PM
From: Michael M	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

Agree with your assessment of three presidents telling Curt LeMay to cool it. But - I would not downplay the value of LeMay to those same presidents and their policy makers. The last guy you want to fight is one who doesn't care if he dies and/or one who might be nuts. LeMay was feared by our enemies and of much use to "cooler heads" in government. LeMay also deserves credit for establishment and operation of our strategic air forces. There is a case to be made that during cold war years this was one of the most credible and disciplined forces in military history. Mike

To: Jacques Chitte who wrote (86108)	8/23/2000 4:14:25 AM
From: Dayuhan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

In the Fifties this was far from established. They were winning the race for territory, they were winning the one-up game of military capability, they were winning the space race, which became the standard by which a superpower's fitness was to be judged. True. In fact, in the '50s the arms race was probably useful to the Soviet economy, which had a great deal of recovering to do from the second world war. Printing money and spending it is a useful short-term tactic in such situations; it doesn't stay useful for very long. My comment on the unnecessary nature of the Soviets' arms spending referred to a much later period. It seems generally accepted that the Reagan era arms race broke the back of the Soviet economy - though I would say that back was pretty close to breaking of its own accord already - and at that time the Soviets had no need to keep up with us in conventional or strategic arms. They could cause far more trouble to us by sending a few million dollars worth of small arms to a Latin American revolutionary group than they would have caused by adding a few planes to their air force. We certainly weren't going to attack them, and they stood to gain little or nothing by attacking us; beyond a basic strategic and tactical deterrent force, they didn't need to spend anything like what they did. One of the things I dislike about the Bush campaign is the promise to rebuild the armed forces, presumably at vast expense. When you look at our current military spending, and compare it with that of our principal rivals, you have to wonder what the point is, unless we're gearing up to fight the whole world at the same time.