would be ready to pool their efforts to make and exploit technological advances. The field is wide open for scrutiny in Western Europe and in such trans-Atlantic forums as OECD.

There is no shortage of such problems of mutual concern. As has been suggested in this report, opportunities abound for mutually helpful cooperation on problems that do not have to be invented but are already high on national agendas.

U.S. POLICY-MAKING

As this report has emphasized, the United States Government cannot work effectively on the unfinished business of the Alliance without attending to some of its own attitudes and approaches. These further lines of improvement commend themselves:

Particularly in matters affecting the East-West military balance, safety-first is still the rule, or should be. The attitude of some high officials about anti-missile defenses that "we cannot afford to do much about it" could end up endangering the credibility of the Western nuclear deterrent and unsteadying the Western resolve at a moment of crisis. The price of collective safety and individual liberty is high-and may go still higher. Yet as Robert Lovett told a predecessor subcommittee: "We can do whatever we have to do in order to survive ***"

In working with allies, of course, there is no substitute for confidence in the word of the American Government. That is why playing with facts and figures, even if it will gain a few yards now and then, may lose the game. Not all of our appointed officials have learned this lesson. It will be a sad day if the people come to agree with Mark Twain that "there are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics."

Clear and reasoned policy, approved at the top of the government, is the precondition of effective cooperation with allies. Too often American officials negotiate from divergent points of view, tripping over each other in the process and confusing our allies and ourselves. This is bound to result in making a difficult situation more difficult. There is still much to be done in providing timely, approved formulations of policy and unkinking lines of authority in the conduct of Atlantic affairs.

The founders of the Atlantic Alliance were forward-looking in 1949. Their successors should be equally forward-looking today. The future is filled with challenges no one of the allies can handle in isolation, and that neither North America nor Western Europe can meet alone.

Today's political leaders-executive and legislative-have solemn duties. Theirs is the main responsibility to assure the common defense, to advance the cause of a genuine European settlement, and to provide for stability in Europe as a basis for a peaceful international society. They must inspire the oncoming generation of young people to do its best in the unfinished work of the Alliance.

For today as yesterday the need for the Alliance is fresh and compelling: it is difficult to imagine a hopeful future which does not rest on the stability and steadiness of our association, and, of course, especially on the steadiness of American policy.

O

Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Operations

73-563

U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

WASHINGTON: 1967

PURCHASED THROUGH

LOC. LX. PROJECT

LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL

Hon. JOHN L. MCCLELLAN,

JANUARY 30, 1967.

Chairman, Senate Committee on Government Operations,
Washington, D.C.

DEAR SENATOR MCCLELLAN: In your letter of June 16, 1966, you authorized my trip to Europe for the purpose of inquiring into the programs of property disposal undertaken by the Department of Defense at its overseas installations. My trip in July and August of 1966, in which I was accompanied by Mr. Herbert W. Beaser, chief counsel, and Mr. Joseph Lippman, staff director, coincided with a period of intense activity on the part of the U.S. officials responsible for the removal of U.S. bases from France. Because of the overriding importance of this problem, I focused the inquiry on our disposal programs in France with particular concern for the adequacy of the financial arrangements which had been entered into with the Government of France by the Department of State and the Department of Defense to protect the tremendous U.S. investment in the construction of installations and facilities across France.

I, or my staff, visited France, Germany, Belgium and Spain and had numerous formal and informal discussions with our top military and political representatives in each of these countries. A considerable amount of factual, documentary material was obtained at Headquarters, European Command; Headquarters, U.S. Army, Europe; Headquarters, U.S. Air Force, Europe; and at the American Embassies in Paris, Brussels, and Madrid. Considerable material had been obtained from the Department of Defense before my departure for Europe. The report that is submitted herewith contains a number of significant conclusions which suggest the desirability of a continuing review of the surplus property disposal programs overseas by the Committee on Government Operations. The report also contains the result of a followup review in Europe of the serious deficiencies in property disposal practices of the Department of Defense which were disclosed during hearings in 1966 held by the Subcommittee on Foreign Aid Expenditures.

I would like to thank the many officials in our military and diplomatic missions overseas who were so helpful in accumulating the necessary data and in making it available.

With best wishes, I remain,

ERNEST GRUENING,

Chairman, Subcommittee on Foreign Aid Expenditures.

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