Now Hear This, You People

Rear Admiral Hyman G. Rickover, 58, wispy (5 ft. 7 in., 130 Ibs.), single-minded godfather of the atomic submarine, speaks only one language: plain English, spiced with pepper. Last week he flouted Navy customs by showing up in civvies before the House Select Committee on Astronautics and Space Exploration, flouted congressional etiquette by unleashing peppercorn potshots that had even his hosts ducking for cover.

Pity for the Mind. First came his blunt reasons why he thinks that the Administration's new space program ought to be directed by a civilian agency. "The Defense department is already too large," said he, "and if you let it grow on as it is, it soon will be controlling the country."

As for the idea that the U.S. ought to spend its time and money in a space race with Russia--that, to Rickover's mind, is so much hot air. "The most pressing problem" is education.

"If you people weren't concerned about political implications, instead of organizing a committee of this type," he said. "you'd probably have a committee investigate what goes on in education today. You people set up laws on what is to go in people's mouths, but you won't even set up recommendations on what goes into their minds." A survey of European educational methods would cost about $50,000, and, he added with a touch of acid, "I know you people don't fool around with peanuts like that."

The Admiral was taking nonsense from nobody--not even Massachusetts' Democrat John W. McCormack, chairman of the committee, who made the mistake of observing that one of his subcommittees once recommended that there should be more stability in the technical services of the military establishment. Back came Rickover: "I indict you. You wrote a report and then did nothing to put it into effect."

Pity for Weeding. Annapolisman Rickover had still more in his sea bag, and he unloaded it later in an address on getting an honorary degree of doctor of engineering at Brooklyn's Polytechnic Institute. The blast: "We waste the best years of our children in the name of democracy and of the sacred comprehensive school. The careful manner with which European authorities find the proper schooling for each child's gifts is criticized here as cruel and undemocratic. Weeding out by examinations arouses pity and horror.

"Most Americans seem to regard education as a commodity or service which anybody ought to get, simply by paying tuition or by having the cost of education met through taxes. A school system that insists on the same instruction for the talented, average, and below-average child may prevent as many children from growing intellectually as would a system that excludes children because of social, political or economic status of parents. Neither system is democratic."

Along with the silver-haired admiral's blunt words last week came quiet word from the Pentagon that Hyman Rickover, passed over twice (1951 and 1952) for rear admiral on the promotion lists because of his plain English opinions, will soon be marked down for a vice admiral's third star.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.