Claims by some Pentagon officers that supplying Israel with weapons is stripping bare the U.S. arms defenses have been shot down by Defense Department leaders. Secretary of Defense James R. Schlesinger himself is known to be annoyed by officers making general observations of the army’s equipment from their knowledge of only small segments of its operations.
The army’s new Chief of Staff, Gen. Fred C. Weyand, has publicly declared that the main reason the army found itself with a tank shortage is not sales to Israel and other countries but that "we let our production base deteriorate." Weyand disagreed with some officers who have charged that the requirement to ship tanks to Israel and other countries including Iran, Saudi Arabia and Ethiopia has seriously damaged army combat readiness.
Asked if he feels the army is dangerously short of tanks and other equipment, Weyand replied, "No, I don’t." The army, he said, is about 1800 tanks short of its current requirement of slightly more than 10,000 tanks. Weyand said that if the tank shortage "should get to the point where it would affect training and morale, I would be deeply concerned, but it is not at that point."
NEW TANK PRODUCTION GROUP FORMED
The Pentagon confirmed to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the army has organized a new tank production group to expedite conversion of M-48 tanks to have firepower on the level of M-60 units and increased production of the latter from 30 to 100 a month. The Pentagon also said that it does not think the readiness of the U.S. forces has been "degraded to any significant extent" by its arms deal with Iran.
This comment came after Rep, Clarence D. Long (D. Md.) disclosed he had learned that Pres- ident Nixon made major secret arms commitments to the Shah of Iran in May. 1972 without national security studies of its possible consequences, including any increase in the peril to "the friendly state of Israel." Long said that U.S. arms sales to Iran totaled between $5.8 billion and $6.8 billion during the past two years alone.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
