Tension in the Tank

During his six-year reign as Defense Secretary, Robert Strange McNamara has done more than enshrine the computer in government. More significantly, he has also cemented civilian control over the Pentagon, an achievement that notably eluded his seven predecessors. Though he is still the unchallenged master of his mighty domain, McNamara of late has found himself increasingly and unmistakably at odds with Earle Gilmore ("Bus") Wheeler, the urbanely outspoken Army general who, as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff since 1964, has brought that post to maturity.

Inevitably, in so long and contentious a tenure, the McNamara mystique has lost some of its luster. The heightening of the war has also increased Wheeler's authority on Capitol Hill: as Kipling noted, the man in uniform may be everyone's goat in peacetime, "But it's 'Savior of 'is country' when the guns begin to shoot." Wheeler has never indulged in the public griping or corridor grumping of previous JCS chairmen. On the contrary, as the nation's top advocate for the military viewpoint, he has sufficient courage, diplomacy and professional skill both to cooperate effectively with McNamara and argue opposing convictions dispassionately but persuasively within the Administration and before Congress.

Washington General. Tall and polished, Bus Wheeler, 59, is a Washingtonian by birth and a Washington general by training. Unlike his five predecessors and many other prominent alumni of the Joint Chiefs, Wheeler has always been the planner and strategist, never a war hero or even much of a combat vet eran. He had only five months of frontline infantry service during World War II, and even that was a staff assignment; during the Korean War, he was assigned to the Pentagon and Trieste. Though all too clearly no Patton type, he is known nonetheless as the most gifted tank officer that the JCS has ever had—based on his cool performance in the second-floor Pentagon "tank," where the Joint Chiefs meet thrice weekly by themselves and confer each Monday with McNamara and Deputy Secretary Cyrus Vance. Wheeler is also at ease on Capitol Hill, even when that involves directly contradicting his superior. In recent testimony before congressional committees, Wheeler and McNamara have differed on several touchy issues.

On the question of withdrawing U.S. troops from Europe, McNamara originally hoped to bring home two full Army divisions, which, with supporting units, would have amounted to some 75,000 men. Wheeler opposed any pullback, and not only for the conventional soldier's reasoning, which flatly opposes reductions of strength on principle. Conceding that the forces could be quickly sent back, the general argued that the U.S. might find it "politically undesirable to do so because to take action at a time of tension or time of crisis might trigger the very event you are seeking to avoid or deter." So far, the Administration has compromised on the figure of 35,000 men.