Liberty, Peace, Solvency
The hour of Dwight Eisenhower's homecoming was also the hour of his rival Robert Taft's most challenging address to the Republican Party and the nation.
Broadcasting from Washington after his last hard-driving primary campaign in South Dakota, Bob Taft concentrated on what he had found to be "the greatest concern" of the American people: U.S. foreign policy. With forthright emphasis, "Mr. Republican" denied the existence of genuine bipartisanship in foreign affairs, denounced the diplomacy of Truman and Acheson as "the most disastrous" in the whole history of U.S. foreign policy, then offered his own formula to protect freedom and defeat Communism. He disavowed isolationism in the strongest terms, and called for a "crusade" to "spread the doctrine of individual liberty throughout the world."
Indictment. "What," asked Taft, "are the purposes of foreign policy?" His answer: to protect the "liberty," "peace," and "solvency" of the U.S. people. The Democratic Administration, said he, protected none of these.
"In 1945, when Mr. Truman became President, the Soviet Union was exhausted ... Our Air Force was incomparably superior to any other. Our Army and Navy were superb fighting forces at the peak of efficiency. Our industrial plant was intact, and we alone had the atomic bomb . . . But our leaders wholly failed to realize the nature of Communism . . . Their policies at Yalta and Potsdam established Stalin in full control of Central Europe, dominating Europe, and in full control of China, dominating Asia . . .
"Thereafter, from 1946 on, the Administration neglected our Air Force, with the result that today Stalin has 20,000 military planes in organized combat groups. We have about 6,000 . . .
"In Europe, Stalin has 175 Soviet divisions and 60 satellite divisions. Our allies in Western Europe have about 13. We have six ...
"The war in Korea continues without any visible results. Our planes are outnumbered 4 to i; our ground forces 2 to i ...
"The President now demands the right to spend $85 billion in the year beginning July i, and also in the following year. That will take 30% of the people's income, plus 7% for state and local government. Many economists feel that we cannot prevent inflation or maintain a free economy at all if we take more than 25% for government."
Remedy. What should the Republicans propose to remedy the situation? Said Taft: There is only one safe policy, to which all other policies must be incidental --"the building of an Air Force sufficiently large to control the air over this country, over the oceans which surround this continent, and able to deliver atom, bombs on Russian cities and manufacturing plants."
Developing this argument, Bob Taft could not resist a sideswipe at his No. i fellow aspirant for the G.O.P. nomination. "A steady deterioration in our comparative air power," he observed, "began while General Eisenhower was Chief of Staff." Then he lunged again at the Democratic Administration. It was dominated, he held, by two obsessions:
"First, that this country cannot be defended unless we can successfully defend Europe; and
"Second, that a war against Russia can only be won on the continent of Europe, with bayonets . . ."
Quoting and agreeing with an article in LIFE by John Foster Dulles ("certainly, he is no isolationist"), Taft pointed out that NATO guards only 500 miles of the Soviet dominion's 20,000 miles of frontier with the free world. "In fact, our leaders have become the new isolationists. They would abandon most of Europe and most of Asia to Russia, and adopt a purely defensive policy which has no hope of bringing freedom to millions behind the Iron Curtain . . ."
Taft would not withdraw from Europe; he would keep there the six U.S. divisions already committed, and he would provide arms for allies. He would stay with the U.N. He would strive for a truce in Korea, then arm the South Koreans and pull out U.S. troops. But his basic point was that the U.S. could not match Russia in ground-force manpower. Nor must the U.S. "admit that our safety depends on begging bayonets from Germany or from France." The U.S. must be strong in its own right, and such strength lay, above all, in "control of the air."
Greater Intervention. If and when achieved, how should U.S. control of the air be used? Taft answered bluntly: he would use it as a deterrent to Communist aggression.
"I voted against the Atlantic Pact, but I made it clear at that time that I was in favor of definitely notifying Russia that if they attacked any of the pact nations, they would find themselves at war with us, a Monroe Doctrine for Europe.
"That certainly is not isolationism ..."
But deterrents, like containment, are negative and defensive. Taft, again standing with Dulles, called for positive measures to "ultimately defeat Communism." Among his suggestions:
CJ Help the anti-Communist underground "keep the hope for liberty alive."
Whether Republicans could combine on a foreign policy, as Taft hopes, is a question. But his speech left no doubt that the area of agreement on foreign policy among Republicans is becoming wider.
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