More Troops Called Up In U.S.

Press, Volume C, Issue 29624, 21 September 1961, Page 21

More Troops Called Up In U.S.

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) WASHINGTON, September 20. The United States Government yesterday ordered another 73,000 military reservists, including’ two National Guard divisions, to active duty on October 15, United Press International reported.

The Defence Secretary (Mr Robert McNamara) also set up a new Unified Command that brought 50.000 Air Force men and 125.000 Army personnel into a single air-ground force. , It would be headed bv Lieuten-ant-General Paul Dewitt, the present Commander of the Third Army. Mr McNamara told a news conference that he saw no worsening of the Berlin crisis. But. he said, there was no indication that the military build-up ordered by President Kennedy last July to meet the Communist threat to Berlin could be relaxed. The reserve eall-un brought to more than 150.000 the number of citizen soldiers ordered to report for active dutv next month. Mr McNamara said there were no immediate plans to call up other reservists alerted on September 5, but they were expected to be called before December 1. The guard divisions called up yesterday were the 32nd Infantry of Wisconsin and the 49th Armoured in Texas The Wisconsin division is one of the oldest in the National Guard and the Texas division one of the newest. Thev each have fewer than 14,000 men. Allied Moves In announcing the new United States moves. Mr McNamara said that other N.A.T.O. allies were taking their own measures to increase Allied military strength in the face of the Communist threat to West Berlin. Mr McNamara also said the Defence Department and Atomic Energy Commission

were studying whether it would be necessary for the United States to test nuclear weapons in the atmosphere, •which cause radioactive fallout. The Soviet Union's threatened 100 megaton nuclear bdmb would be more of a terror weapon than a weapon of military potential, he said, but he again emphasised the need for protecting American missiles by placing them underground, undersea, and on mobile carriers.