First, we must strengthen our military tools.  We are moving into a period of uncertain risk and great commitment in which both the military and diplomatic possibilities require a Free World force so powerful as to make any aggression clearly futile.  Yet in the past, lack of a consistent, coherent military strategy, the absence of basic assumptions about our national requirements and the faulty estimates and duplication arising from inter-service rivalries have all made it difficult to assess accurately how adequate—­or inadequate—­our defenses really are.

I have, therefore, instructed the Secretary of Defense to reappraise our entire defense strategy—­our ability to fulfill our commitments—­the effectiveness, vulnerability, and dispersal of our strategic bases, forces and warning systems—­the efficiency and economy of our operation and organization—­the elimination of obsolete bases and installations—­and the adequacy, modernization and mobility of our present conventional and nuclear forces and weapons systems in the light of present and future dangers.  I have asked for preliminary conclusions by the end of February—­and I then shall recommend whatever legislative, budgetary or executive action is needed in the light of these conclusions.

In the meantime, I have asked the Defense Secretary to initiate immediately three new steps most clearly needed now: 

First, I have directed prompt attention to increase our air-lift capacity.  Obtaining additional air transport mobility—­and obtaining it now—­will better assure the ability of our conventional forces to respond, with discrimination and speed, to any problem at any spot on the globe at any moment’s notice.  In particular it will enable us to meet any deliberate effort to avoid or divert our forces by starting limited wars in widely scattered parts of the globe.

(b) I have directed prompt action to step up our Polaris submarine program.  Using unobligated ship-building funds now (to let contracts originally scheduled for the next fiscal year) will build and place on station—­at least nine months earlier than planned—­substantially more units of a crucial deterrent—­a fleet that will never attack first, but possess sufficient powers of retaliation, concealed beneath the seas, to discourage any aggressor from launching an attack upon our security.

(c) I have directed prompt action to accelerate our entire missile program.  Until the Secretary of Defense’s reappraisal is completed, the emphasis here will be largely on improved organization and decision-making—­on cutting down the wasteful duplications and the time-lag that have handicapped our whole family of missiles.  If we are to keep the peace, we need an invulnerable missile force powerful enough to deter any aggressor from even threatening an attack that he would know could not destroy enough of our force to prevent his own destruction.  For as I said upon taking the oath of office:  “Only when our arms are sufficient beyond doubt can we be certain beyond doubt that they will never be employed.”