The Grey Zone

The shape of SHAPE needed changing. That was what Dwight Eisenhower was brought back to discuss (see NATIONAL AFFAIRS). A drastic scaling down of the West's ambitious North Atlantic defense program was in the making.

As originally conceived, NATO was to grow by 1954 into an international army of 60 up-to-date divisions and necessary air units. The U.S. was to provide most of the money and tools and some of the men; the Western Europeans were to provide most of the men, some of the arms, all of the bases. The planned result: a North Atlantic air-land-naval force capable of standing off an initial Russian invasion until help arrived.

New Problem, Old Rifles. This program had proved too ambitious. Engulfed by the needs of the Korean war, the U.S. had fallen 80% behind in its promised deliveries of heavy arms to Europe. Britain and the West Europeans did at least as badly in making good their promises; their economies were groaning under the load, and their politicians were making capital out of the strain.

By last September, when they assembled at Ottawa, delegates of the twelve NATO nations had shed some illusions and prepared to scuttle some plans. Where they had expected to have 30 divisions in fairly good shape, they had the skeletons of only a dozen, perhaps 15. Of these, only the six divisions sent over by the U.S. stood anywhere near fighting trim. Most of the other divisions in NATO's army had only one battalion of artillery apiece where six apiece were planned. There should have been 2,500 U.S. tanks on hand, but there were only 500. So busy were SHAPE'S planners at the complicated task of meshing distant needs in materials, factory construction, production and manpower that too little was being done to equip what forces were now on hand.

Must Do to Make Do. At Ottawa, the contraction began. Under W. Averell Harriman, an Anglo-American-French committee nicknamed "The Three Wise Men" was formed, and a committee of the twelve NATO countries ("The Twelve Apostles") was set up to assist them. The Wise Men and the Apostles went to work to determine what kind of NATO force could be made out of what the NATO countries could actually contribute. With that, the byword of NATO and SHAPE changed from "must do" to "make do."

That the situation was disappointing, Eisenhower was prompt to admit. "There is always," he explained, "the grey zone of human affairs." The picture was not all grey. In Eisenhower's judgment--and in the initial calculations of the Three Wise Men--ithere was enough on hand or within reach to put together a NATO army of 20 fully equipped divisions by next year. Washington convinced itself that such an army in being by 1952 was preferable to 60 on paper now, and half ready by 1954. Besides, the development of tactical atomic weapons might make a 20-division army more formidable than was believed when NATO was blueprinted a year ago.

That, of course, did not minimize the unpleasant fact that the West is finding it necessary to take a big tuck in democracy's suit of armor.

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