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Show CIVIL DEFENSE Millard F. Caldwell Faces Task Of Building U.S. Civil Defense (This ls the first of a series of five articles on civil defense as written by Walter A. Shead, Western West-ern Newspaper Union's Washington Washing-ton correspondent.) WASHINGTON, D. C. A tall, lean, square-jawed, broad-shouldered man sits in a temporary office of-fice in one of the many converted government buildings a short two blocks from the White House whose name is destined to become well known to millions of Americans. Ameri-cans. He is Millard F. Caldwell, former governor of Florida, who has been handed the tremendous responsibility responsibil-ity of the nation's civil defense and who will head up a volunteer army of civilian Americans which will total some 20,000,000 men and women wom-en in every state of the union. His Immediate job is to weld together to-gether a small force of approximately approxi-mately 3,000 paid employees, approximately ap-proximately 1,000 of whom will be administrative workers here in Washington, the rest to become field officers in various states and strategic stra-tegic areas. At the same time he must start from scratch to train these people, who will in turn train his 20-mil-lion-man army, in the new field of civilian defense. Governor Caldwell must come up with the answers to these questions: What can I do to protect myself and my neighbors if an atomic bomb is dropped in. or near my home? What about a hydrogen bomb? What protection do I have in case a bacteriological bomb or balloon is loosed in my community? What defense is there against radiological radio-logical warfare, or the dropping of insect pests or plant diseases to destroy de-stroy crops and animals? Governor Caldwell believes that it is entirely within the realm of possibility that the American people peo-ple face one or all of these horrible methods of modern warfare if the nation should get into a full-scale war with Russia. The extent would depend only upon the enemy's ability abil-ity to pierce our air defenses, our sea defenses and just how far the Russians were determined to go. So a well-trained civilian army is as essential to the nation's defense as a well-trained and equipped military mili-tary force; it is just as essential, and possibly more so in saving the lives of American civilians. THERE ARE DEFENSES to these atomic bombs, to attacks against health and crops and ani: mals. But every citizen must be as well educated in these defenses, as acutely aware of the danger, and as alertly conscious of just what action to take as he is of any chore of his daily life, for it is possible we shall be living with these dangers dan-gers for many years to come, if we live. So the job of the civilian defense administration is to educate the people, to organize defenses, to set up this volunteer army, to see that state legislatures pass such enabling en-abling legislation and appropriations appropria-tions as are necessary, and to train men and women in scores of facts incidental to a catastrophe such as certainly will happen if a bomb is dropped in their midst. These include, not only protection against the bomb itself to minimize loss of life and injury, but efficient first aid, fire fighting, evacuation, health facilities, water supply, medical medi-cal attention, food supplies, social services, warning signals, and an efficient organization for any contingency, con-tingency, which spreads from the cities into the small towns and rural sections of every area in the nation. The help of every organization in the nation and of every individual bill be enlisted not only to join in the civil defense, but to help make the masses of the people bomb-conscious, to prevent fear and hysteria so that a major catastrophe may be averted. The government has been for months making detailed studies of the bombing of European cities In World War II, of the effects of the atomic bombs at Nagasaki and Hiroshlmo. They have worked out pattern and effects and defenses. The Puublic Health Service and the American Red Cross have worked out detailed plans for health protection; protec-tion; the bureau of animal hus-bandy hus-bandy and the bureau of plant industry in-dustry of the department of agriculture agricul-ture have a plan of action for defense de-fense against release of gases, pests and plant disease aimed at animal and crop destruction. However the effective civilian defense de-fense program cannot work on a basis of "let George do it." Every citizen, every organization must constitute himself or itself a committee com-mittee to learn first-hand just what each con do in the emergency should an enemy plane, bearing death or injury for thousands, pierce the, nation's military defenses. de-fenses. . (The second of this series of .articles .arti-cles will appear next week.) |