Clashes Disrupt Defense Strategy, Huntington Says

Embittered relations between civilian and military strategists in the Pentagon will increasingly disrupt the formation of American military policy, Samuel P. Huntington, professor of Government, predicted in a talk before Toscin last night.

Under the administration of Secretary of Defense McNamara, the power of the military chiefs has been sharply reduced. The military has acquiesced to this diminished role in strategy making because in the past two years they had received funds to support proliferation of new weapon systems.

A revised military strategy and the rigid "cost-efficiency" standards of McNamara, however, have dictated recent cutbacks in weaponry.

A "theory of strategic pluralism," a theory based on the diversification of weapon systems, was adopted as a defense strategy by the Kennedy Administration in 1961. Strategic missiles were increased in number. Conventional troops were made more mobile. New guerrilla forces were established. Since these costly revisions have been achieved the Administration is now cutting back expenditures.

Military Leaders Allenated

The allenated military leaders, Huntington said, are not sensitized to the economics and politics of defense planning.

Revisions in defense spending have created a coalition between these generals and some right-wing Congressmen. Confronted with the ruthless "cost-efficiency" standards of civilian managers, many military leaders have sought Congress as an ally, Huntington continued.

Led by this new coalition, criticism of the defense strategy of the Administration has "grown in intensity." The Cuban crisis had temporarily satisfied this criticism, Huntington noted.

In the future, however, Huntington predicted a stabilisation of relations between the civilians and the generals. The rise of the "military intellectuals" would lead to more harmony in the decision-making machinery.