“MISSILE GAP” DENIED

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28887, 6 May 1959, Page 15

“MISSILE GAP” DENIED

McElroy On ILS. Defences

(AZ.Z. Press Association—Copyright) WASHINGTON, May 4. The United States Secretary of Defence (Mr Neil McElroy) said today that neither the United States nor Russia would have inter-continental rockets ready to fire much before the end of this year, and denied there was a “missile gap.” Testifying before the Senate Defence Appropriations Sub-com-mittee, Mr McElroy said the impression of a “missile gap’’ was created by comparing what Russia could produce with what the United States actually planned to ! produce. He added that “for an indeterminate period of years ahead, the manned bomber will continue to , be the principal means of delivering heavy weapons in the volume and with the accuracy required to strike a decisive blow.” Mr McElroy told the sub-com-mittee: “It does not make good sense, nor is there a need, to react to each new crisis with a military build-up only to reduce forces when the particular crisis abates.”

He said that United States defence plans were based on the number of intercontinental ballistic missiles the Russians could produce. “We plan to meet this threat, not by matching the estimate, missile for missile, but rather by continuing to rely on a widely diversified retaliatory force including not only landbased aircraft and missiles but also carrier-based bombers, tactical fighter bombers and missiles deployed overseas.”

Missing Plans Returned

(Rec. 11.20 pin.) • SAN BERNARDINO (California), May 4. Two "elderly women” who unwittingly walked off with an Army engineer’s briefcase at a bus station returned it today and were relieved to learn that they ihad taken nothing secret. | Mrs Bernard Stuhlnacher. who had just returned from Hawaii on [the same plane with Lieutenant- | Colonel Walter Blum, identified I herself as one of the women ■ observed with the briefcase 'shortly before the officer missed •it on Saturday. The briefcase contained the plans for a missile base on Kwajaleim Atoll in the Pacific. Mrs Stuhlnacher said that at first it was hard to believe she was the culprit. She was only 48 “and just slightly grey-haired,” she said.