500 BOMBERS ON AIR ALERT

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29326, 4 October 1960, Page 8

500 BOMBERS ON AIR ALERT

Plea Ry C.S. ■ General (Special Correspondent N.ZJ 3 .A.) [ (Rec. 10 p.m.) , LONDON, October 3. The commander of the United States fleet of 2000 nuclear bombers, General T. Power, renews in the latest issue of the “Air Force Magazine” his demand for permission to mount a permanent alert force in the air. “As the Soviet missile threat continues to grow,” writes General Power, “it becomes increasingly urgent to supplement the ground alert by placing at least part of the heavy force on an airborne alert. Tests have clearly shown that the Strategic Air Command can initiate a sustained airborne alert to the full extent permitted by available resources. The major problem is the stockpiling of necessary spare parts.” Commenting on General Power’s statement, the "Guardian’s” defence correspondent says problems of a constant air alert are technically formidable and it is only now that the Strategic Air Command thinks it can provide an airborne force for the dangerous period ahead. “Money has been made available to allow an eighth of the heavy bomber force to be permanently in the air. General Power wants to go so far a» to put a quarter of them in -Afte’ air during -the period in which the Russians will have a full fleet of long-range missiles and idle Americans will not have their ballistic missile early warning system, which is expected to give them 15 minutes’ notice.” . The correspondent says that once this is. finished, it is expected eventually to provide sufficient reliable warning to permit an airborne alert force to revert to a ground alert. The warning system, he says, would be completed when the British station at Fylingdales Moor is built.