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Show U.S. Must Build Civil Defense MR FORCE CHIEF SAYS ENEMY BOMBERS CAN ATTACK AMERICA i-Ths J?,"" ftrsi "f " serirs f ""Mrs on civil defense, based on Ihe booklet "This Is Civil Defense prepared by the Federal Civil Defense Administration. It may be obtained from the Superintendent of Documents, Government Printing Office. H'ashinoton D C for ten cents.) By MILLARD CALDWELL Federal Civil Defense Administrator ' General Hoyt Vandenberg, Chief of Staff of the Of United States Air Force, has made a startling state- V-y ment one vvhich most Americans find hard to S believe. He had said that at best we could knock down only 30 out of every 100 enemy planes attacking the United States. That means that at least 7 out of 10 would get through. Despite our traditional attitude that "it can't happen here," we must believe these facts. This does not mean that our Air Force is ineffective. We have an excellent air force and our antiaircraft anti-aircraft defenses are good. In-the last war, the Germans also were well equipped with defense weapons, weap-ons, but they were not able to stop our attacking bombers. On the average, we lost fewer than 10 out of each 100 planes. That gives us something to think about! We know that everything possible pos-sible will be done to stop the enemy at our borders, and to prevent sabotage within, but we also can be sure that, in case of war, a good percentage of enemy attacks would be successful in spite of all that we could do. That is why we must have Civil j Defense. e The wide oceans which once "protected "pro-tected us have given way to global bombers. Today we face more kinds of attack than ever before, and our danger is much greater. There is only one sure way to keep any enemy from knocking us out of a war. We must know how to save lives and property, restore I our cities and industries, and carry ! on the fight no matter what kind of attacks are hurled against us. Russia Has Bombers Russia has hundreds of heavy, long-range bombers patterned after our B-29a which could get through most of our defense setups. We know that Russia has atomic bombs and that their heavy long-range bombers are capable of delivering them anywhere in the United States at any time the Kremlin dictates. She can wage biological warfare for she has scientists capable of preparing diseases for use against people, plants, and animals, and trained secret agents who could spread them. It is certain that she has the major war gases, including the new and deadly nerve gas developed by German experts who were taken into Russia at the end of the last war. That is not all we must plan against. In some types of biological warfare fifth columnists could begin be-gin work without waiting for a war to start. Saboteurs too, could attack from within and wreck our defenses and war production output. out-put. Hit Without Warning All these enemy weapons could hit us without warning. The outcome of modern war is not necessarily decided by armies in the field. Wars today can be won or lost on the home front. The home front cannot be hidden, and it cannot retreat not if we are to survive as a free people. Millions of Americans must be trained in civil defense before this country can be sure it is ready for enemy attack. Meanwhile, that attack might come at any moment. We have no time to lose in preparing pre-paring to ward off such an attack. Your home, your job, your family, your own life may be at stake. Civil defense is the sure way the only 'organized way for survival survi-val on the home front. (The next article will discuss what is civil defense and how it can help.) |