Armed Forces: Engine Charlie

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Wilson ruffled Senators by constantly calling them "you men" and by his reluctance to give up his G.M. holdings as a prerequisite to Government service (a sacrifice that ultimately cost him $2,500,000). In the middle of the 1954 recession, he faced Detroit reporters and came up with an analogy about the nation's unemployed that was raised as a Democratic battle cry during the year's congressional election campaigning. Said Wilson: "I've always liked bird dogs better than kennel-fed dogs myself. You know, one that'll get out and hunt for food rather than sit on his fanny and yell." In 1957, when he accused the National Guard of being a haven for draft dodgers, Wilson was publicly rebuked by President Eisenhower.

"Why Worry?" As Secretary of Defense, Charlie Wilson's record was bittersweet. He strove to apply Detroit's big-business methods to big Government, in his first 17 weeks in office fired 40,000 civilian employees. Over three years, he slashed $11 billion from the nation's defense budgets. But in running the Pentagon, economic efficiency is not always equivalent to military effectiveness—and there can be little doubt that Charlie Wilson, chopping away at the U.S. Army on behalf of the Eisenhower Administration's massive deterrent policies, left wounds that pain to this day. Beyond that, and despite his own mechanical inventiveness, Wilson was remarkably blind about the basic research that leads to new technological revolutions. Said he: "Don't worry about what makes the grass green or why fried potatoes turn brown." Wilson was a hardware man, and he could see little sense in projects that did not have an obvious military value. Even in 1957, when Russia entered space with Sputnik I, Charlie Wilson was scornful. "Why worry?" he asked. "It isn't going to fall down and hit you on the head, you know."

When he resigned in 1957, Wilson had served longer as Secretary of Defense than anyone else. In his efforts to get more bang for the buck, he had retarded the U.S. potential for fighting any kind of war, any place, any time. But he had effectively led the armed forces in their development of the strategic missiles necessary for all-out war.