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Show lustrated talk by Air Force personnel. As they finished I was thrilled that maybe some of our questions could be answered. ans-wered. They were not. Partly Part-ly due to the evasiveness of the Air Force personnel and partly due to the fact that we were asked to leave the gym so that a basketball team could practice. As these questions are basic ip-'Tonij-- - (Fd!(idb(Mk EDITOR'S NOTE: Because of the controversial nature of MX, many letter writers take to their soapbox, often with lack of information or false or misleading information. It will be the future policy of the COUNTY NEWS to print only first person letters on MX, and not letters written to someone else and submitted sub-mitted to the COUNTY NEWS for publication. We also caution writers to keep their facts and figures fig-ures current, and up to date. There are already too many rumors and misconceptions about MX, circulated by opponents op-ponents and proponents of the project. For instance, the map released by Rep. Francis Farley two weeks ago, was over two years old, drawn in the infancy of the project and has been revised re-vised many times. She also made the false statement that the launchingpads would be protected by nerve gas. She admitted under questioning, ques-tioning, that she didn't know where she had heard it, nor did she have any evidence to back it up. The Air Force denys that any such idea ever existed. We welcome your comments com-ments either pro or con on MX. We'll be happy to print your letters to theedi-.tor theedi-.tor an provide you a forum for-um for your opinions if you adhere to these guidelines. "Red" Navy's submarine based systems do in fact capitalize capi-talize on this feature. I remember a card which circulated cir-culated around the Navy Department De-partment back in the late 1950's. It showed an aircraft air-craft carrier underway. Underneath Un-derneath the picture was a little ditty: "Move deter-ents deter-ents out to sea, where they are far away from me!" It made a lot of sense then, and it still does. We do not need to restrict our nuclear nu-clear missiles to submarines! sub-marines! The floating launch (Hydra) missile can easily be just plopped overboard from almost any surface ship and can be ready to fire almost al-most immediatly. If you and your neighbors are interested in removing the necessity for installing racetracks throughout Nevada Ne-vada and Utah, and in saving bundles of tax money in the process, then by all means consider the advantages of these Hydra rockets. If the Russians can take advantage of this free launch pad which Mother Nature provides, then I don't see why Americans Ameri-cans can't. I recently wrote to our congressmen making some of these points. With all the problems facing our. country, shouldn't we start by using some common sense? JOHN E. DRAIM Captain, UJS. Navy (Ret.) Submitted by SYLVIA BAKER Dear Editor: Last Thursday I attended an MX missile program in the Panguitch High School gym. I had many questions regarding the MX program and tried to listen to the presentation carefully despite de-spite the disruptive interferences inter-ferences from the high school students during the 11- to our very survival as a people, I feel that some of them must be asked publicly. publi-cly. Many pertinent questions were asked but the answers were worded so as to confuse con-fuse you or give you the least possible information. A good example was the question of the area to be used. We were told that 2 12 acres would be needed need-ed for each shed. That doesn't sound like a lot until un-til you multiply that by 23 sheds in each cluster, and 200 clusters, and then you come up with 11,500 acres ( which was given to us as 25 nautical miles). We discovered later that the 11,500 acres includes only the fenced off portion; no one said a word about the fact that over 4 million acres would be affected in other ways roads, railroads, safety areas, and control centers. There are many questions regarding the impact of the sudden growth on the areas involved which were not even discussed. One of the most important who is going to be paying the bills? The Air Force assured us they could bring in portable porta-ble housing and then move it cut when it was no longer needed, but not a word was said about where they would be put, or about the schools stores, hospitals, doctors, dentists, churches, libraries, librar-ies, or recreational facilities' facili-ties' that will be needed to accommodate 105,500 people peo-ple in areas where the average aver-age community is about 1,000. Is all of this to be paid for by people who will not be legal residents of our state, and therefore, not tax payers nor property owners to provide a tax base? If the Army is planning on paying pay-ing for these things, then they had better double or triple their 33 million dol- ness that the so called strategic stra-tegic planners in Washington Washing-ton have yet come up with. It is really a multi billion dollar boondoggle for the industry and will beef up our defenses much less than other, more reasoned approaches ap-proaches could provide. I recently had a meeting with Admiral mom Moorer, a former for-mer Chief of Naval Operations. Opera-tions. He told me that the amount of concrete alone in all those racetracks would equate to 23 of the present pres-ent Interstate Highway system. sys-tem. What are we doing, building an American Magi-not Magi-not Line?? As an alternative to the MX racetrack, I have proposed using a very simple and inexpensive in-expensive launch method which was successfully tested test-ed at the U.S. Naval Missile Mis-sile Center at Point Mugu, CA in 1960. Since the aerospace aero-space industry didn't see how they could make money on launchers which Mother Nature Na-ture provides for free, and the Navy's Polaris Empire couldn't stand competition from a more effective launch technique, the project which I headed (Project Hydra) was effectively killed by starvation starva-tion of funds. The technique is quite simple, has little or no environmental or ecological eco-logical effect, and additionally addition-ally could be deployed in ocean or remote water areas away from the limits of the continental UJS. I figure it could save in the neighborhood neighbor-hood of $20 billion for the U.S. taxpayer. Have you heard of the 'sponge' theory? This says that location of strategic nuclear nu-clear weapons inside the U.S. will attract enemy nuclear weapons to that same area -the same as a sponge attracts water. Many naval strategists, stra-tegists, such as Rear Admiral Ad-miral George Miller (Retired) (Re-tired) make that point. The Dear Red: This morning I read the article in the Washington Star on your concerns about the MX Missile system. As a professional weapons engineer en-gineer both in and out of N the Navy for all of my adult life, I share your concern and would like to offer you my assistance. The MX system, in my estimation, , is the closest thing to mad- lar budget. Either way, you and I are still going to pay for it. Another unlaced problem is who will do the policing in these areas? Will U be left up to the understaffed local agencies or will the Federal mars halls takeover as was necessary in such boom towns as Page, Arizona? Ari-zona? After it is all over, who will pay the paxes on our inflated in-flated land? Who will maintain main-tain the empty stores, and schools, hospitals, churches and libraries? Who will support the closing recreation re-creation facilities? Who will pay for red rilling the wells on all of the farms on the flat land because of the low water table caused by supporting sup-porting the minimum needs of that many people living in a desert? All of this we will be faced with if all goes as smoothly as the Air Force has promised it will. I mean no dry water years, no large dust storms, no large scale industrial accidents, no accidental ac-cidental detonations, and never having to use the system. sys-tem. If this system Is really needed and not just a toy for the Air Force as many have charged, then why not consider con-sider some of the other options? op-tions? Build a 23 shed system sys-tem for the Minute Man. It would be much more economical eco-nomical and we already have the capacity to destroy the world. Or possibly break up the system and put it in where there is more readily available to such resources re-sources such as water, large employment rolls, and where false prosperity won't do so much damage. I feel that these concerns should be considered before destroying what no one can replace; a way of life. ELAINE M. BALDWIN Panguitch, Utah |