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billion by industry, there must be a grea t dea l of i ~ 1 .People working 111 basic esearch hould 1101 be de-prived-they have been gett ing the smallest sllce rightalong. In defense R D on he contrary. smne b1Gacademlc personages and mstltutlons ha ve been rldmgthe gravy tra111 Their protwts against contrnctlon 111R D. as presently cunstltuted , deserve nelthel mGrenor less consldera tlon th an those of labor or chambersof commerce when a navy yard IS closed or a companysuffers a contract cancellauon

Thc generally wrongheaded character o i much gov-ernment-sponsored R D 1s illustrated by Lhe ratherpleasant pllght of the Boenlg Company Boelngs 1964proflts eached a record of $ 42 mll hon , butman-agement is uneasy, because these profits came largelyfro m clvlllan busmess in jet air l ~ n e r s , whlle govem-ment sales fell from 1 6 billion m 1963 to 1 25 bll-lion in 1964. Tradltlonally, sir liners have been civlllarlversions or adaptatlons of mllltary alrcralt , and thereis still another benefit that a corporatlon does not wantto lose. The stimulus of a new weapons system, saysBoelngs president. Wllllam Allen, is of great value initself. Pa rt of this stimulus IS the fall out of yovern-

ment-financed R D Wlt hout wide base of govern-ment contracts. a company like Boemg cannot keepits engmeers and sclentlsts together, nor malntaln thefinancial res ources to compete for blg prolects, such asthe proposed 750-passengel military-clvlhan alrcraft

Some conslderation has recently bee n glven to oc-cupational conversm n of rese arch people If the federalgovernment gave out contracts to further useful tech-nologlcal evelopments, here would he howls ofsoclallsml Nevertheless, the state of Callfornia. besetby slackenlng aerospace activity a n d resulting unem-ploy ment , 1s undertaking a pilot p r o p t that may provesignificant hetateas asked erospace om-

panies w lthln Its borders to put somc of thelr sclerltlstsand engineers to work on 11rgent state problems Oneslx-month contract has aheady been asslgned o heAcrojet-General Corporatlon for plans to manage waste,lncludmg alr and water pollulion The amou nt, $100.-000 1s ;L mere speck on Aero;ct-Generals balan ce sheet ,but Dan A Klmball, its prcwdcnt, has assigned to theproJect the compmys best systems eam-the eamthal worked on the dcvcloprnell~ T Polarls and 1Cl11lutc-man-and says he r e g - ~ l d s 1 a b one o l the most slg-nlilcant econon11c developments 111 the country ~ o t l a yWhether or not anyth~ng comes of 11. somcbody 1smaking a first attempt to cll\ert It D Irom Its acceplccl

preoccupation wllh dcath and dest~ucllon.

Fields of Friendly StrifeAs a htlerateur, Ge11cr:~l D4acArthur n c v c ~ r.L one

word do the work of two. 50 whereas the Duhe o l Wcl-llngton had declared hat he battle of Waterloo waswon on the playing fields of Eton. the General. whenhe was superintendent of the U S h11111ary Acadcmy atWest Polnt. lnscrlbed over thc gates o f the stadium atypicallyMacArthurlan entence O n the lclds ofFriendly Strife Are Sown the Seeds that on Other Days

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and Other Flrlcls Will Bear Lhc Frul ls o V l c l o tThen. 111 1951. ninety cadets, ncludlng almosl t

cntlrr football eam.were xpelled 111 a11 a c : ~ dcheating candal And now. a s lml l a r scand~l herupted at the Air Force AcJdemy 111 Colorado SprinwA g z m the toothall eam 1s mvolved some thi rty mem -bers of the Alr Force team appear to be lmpltcatedcompared wlth thirty-elght Army players 111 1951

Are football players congenitally mmoral) Th atobvious nonsense Broadly. the situa tion is that chca~ n g S rlfe atmany nstllutlons of hlghel I ea tn ln gAthlotcs Jrc even more academlcally pressed than therun of students. and he more he spo rt 1s emphaslzc d.the greater he emptation t snt riendly strlfe all, the drive is to beat the other team at any cost Concentrating o n thw barballc obJective. ootball heroesare not. as a rule, he most brllllant students Theyare engaged in a io rm of moonligh ting one l o b 1swin glory for old S lwas h. he other to quahfy ordegree If a l i t t le che atl ng will keep the hero off thelnellghle list, does anyone expect hn n to refram?

There is no reallstlc dlvldlng 11ne between profes-sional sports and he an~ateurs who play for he

great unlversltles and he servxe academles A h sclass college quarterback may be worth $400.000 whehe urns pro, and even whlle he retalns his vlrtuousamateur standing he is subsldlzed almost an) whewlth room, board, tultlon, spending money. etc worth

2,000 to $3,000 a year. Ii your son 1s lust il goostudent, It m a y cost you $10.000 or more to pul hthrough college, If he 1s ood footbal l player. yhave no worries A t the ervlce cademles tudentsare educated at public expense, but he recrultmgeven more reckless tha n at civilian schooIs One Jus tl -iicatlon IS that athletes are supposed to bc supcrmofficer malerlal Perhaps so, but Rep Samuel S S t r

to11 IS also correct when hc says that athietic p ro i csionalism 1s ra mp an t n a11 three service academws

It 15 all part of the generally degraded atmosphcrcof American hfc The cheatlng athletes are no w othan a great many respec ablc b ~ s l n e s s m ~ n . erhalthclr own athers Econom~calIv nd ulturally, t hwholc way of lllc 1s lopstded, and I t secms nornlal 1o ~ l y xxause we are used 10 I t ChcJtlng at ex.1mln.lLlolls 1s o ~ l y mc symptom

McGovern versus Nixan

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and he has plenty of co-workers in the Johnson Ad- .mimstration -- proposes to extend th e war. The ac-cepted Washington term escalate has palled *even onhim; he w ants o quarantine the war, using th e Navyand Air Force to seal off guerrilla supply lines bybombing along t he routes and at the staging areas inLaos and North Vietnam. Except f ,or bombardment oftargets within North Vietliam, there s nothing newhere. Nison Eroposes to puni sh the North Vietnamesewithin heir own borders put, with huma nitari an re-

stTamt; h e does pot advocate th e use of nuclear weap-ons. He concedes that eyen TNT involves risks, but thealternative to carrymg the war o the North Vietnameseis to make the Pacific a Red sea.

Senator McGovern, backed up by Senators FrankChurch and Ernest Gruenmg, suggests a settlement toinclude Bve minimum teqd-which, it may be re-marked, he Na t i o n has been advocating for @ e pastthree years. The first is a cease-fire and association orconfederation betweeq-North and South Vietnam, witheach government retai1;ing fu ll autonomy. Both Viet-nams would b e neutralized. General de Gaulle wantsto neutralize he entire Indo-Chinese penin sula and

nothing else really makes sense, but a beginning mustbe made somewhere The North Vietnamese would notaccede to aeutralization immediately, but it is a talk-ing point and, if a stable peace were achieved, thechances are hey would not object. They wpre subjectedto Chiqese oppressign fp r centuries, and tbelr alliancewith the Chinese Qeds is even more a marriage of con-venience, than are nqxt lliaqces between nations. An-other McGpvern proposal is ha t a Ur\T unit shouldpolice the peace-not nea rly as difficult a prpject as inthe Congo, what with sensible statesmen like Sihanouk-of Cambodia to give support

The remaining McGovern suggestions ar e for con-

structive measures-renewed trade and rail links be-tweenthe severed halves o Vietnam and a, cooperativeMekong Rder development to provide flood - c.qntro1and hydraelectric power. Gnly a vestige of gQod senseis needed to show the p ract jcab hty of these measuresand the coqtrast they o f f e r f-o an indefinite prolonga-tion of bloodletting and humiliatlol1, or to a turn ofevents whicl1 migh t make our position completely un-tenable. We mtervened i n a civil war which arose outof a protracted antl-colonial struggle, and ohr fate hasbeen the usual reward of foreign interlopers. We mustrecognize our mistakes (not necessanly admit them-no Great Power does that ) zyd retrieve what y e can by

negptiatlon. enator McGovern has shown the way.

\

Jererpiai-rs aqd PpcifiersAll within a few days of one anpther, Look comes out

with a story on Automation-We Can Handle It,The ew Yo r k T m e s M a ga zi newith Autolnatioa IsNot the Vlllairi, Fortune wit11 Techpology and heLabor Market, the first of a series on The- Real News+bout Automation. Th,e Lopk piecg tells abopt a 35-yem old metalworker who was displaced by automationat a Loclaeeii plant, ,whereupon he studled the hell

Feb7uar y 8, 985

out .of titanium, in the meant ime working- as an analyti-cal chemist. Full of titaniu m, h e was rehired by Locl-heed, where he is now studying the hell out of cryo-genics and working with a company subsidy towa;rd aE.S. in metallurgy at UCLA. Is he exceptional? Thewriter answers with a one-word sentence: ,Hogwash.

In the Tzlnes Peter F. Drucker quotes President Ken-nedys statem ent that machi nes are displacing 1.8 mil-lion workers a year, but shows that this figure repre-sents the number of jobs that disappear h m l l causesand that, for the present, new obs are being created atthe rate of 2.5 to 5 million, a year. That there.i s agrievous p-ob lem of unemployment among the un-s w e d Drucker does not deny, but he oo relies on tech-nical ducation to solve It.Cl~arles E. SilbermansFortune article is largely gevoted to rebutting wi1,dlyand irresponsibly exaggerated warnings by. social sci-entists and a few businessmen. He accuses paxticularlyDonald M. Michael, Charles C. Killingsworth, John ISnyder, Alice Mary. Hilton, W. H. Ferry and the self-appomted: ,Committee on the Triple Revolution. Hiw-ever, he also concedes that the rate of unemploymenti s too high; furthermore, he anticipates that it will risestill higher.

What Fortunes Bupiness Roundup aptly callsgovernment policy focgsed on the forced feedin g ofconsumption via tax redpction has had a beneficialeffect on employment, but will the next shot in the armbe equally efficacious? And i f federal axes are cutellough to produce an expanding deficit, what aboutinflation, which is always ju st Fo un d the corner in a neconomy run on Keyn,esian principles?

T h e N c t i o n has never emphasized automatipn perse as a cause of unemployment and economic distress.In the foreword to Robert Theobalds Abundance

Threat or Propise? (May 11, 1963), which iisp+edmuch of the culzent discussion, the editors said, ,-. .attention has been focused o n the wrong th reat. i t 1snot autpmaticm tliat. meqaces us. . . . The real threat isqbundance. That abupdance s so badly distributedthat relief re,cipiplits now nyrpber almost 8 million andhave increased more than 40 per ce nt i n the last dec-ade, or twice as fast as population; nor does,that figureinc lud e the millions of social security pensioners liv-ing in penury. The dispossessed are not peimitted tostarve an dthey have roofs of a ort ov er.thei r Ilea&,bgt present m easures,give not the lightest promise thattlleir numbers will di,mmish or that they will receive a

decent share of the benefits of the Great Society.Writers like those ci.ted are eager to allay t he wide-

spread fear o f automation and its consequences, whichwas characterized at a meeting of the Natlonal Indus-trial Conference Board last year as perhaps the singlemost important force GI mployee motivation, manag e-ment persoqnel polives, union bargy@ng obltctlvesand government domestic economic problems. Butbetter that the short-term conseqyences should be ex-aggerate4 than that they should be ignored or worse,as jp this hs fap ce, tha t the long-term consequencesshould~be iven a spprious gloss. . . .

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