13-08-2013, 11:21 PM
David, generally, i think that the Defense Authorization Act of 47 was SUPPOSED to unify the quarelling branches under the Sec Def but it failed to do so, and in this light the description of Johnson is interesting. Was he perceived as over reaching because the other branches still were resisting centralization as they were Forestal, who came from Navy and ran the problem of trying to nominally seem balanced re the main rival the New extremely ascendant Air Force?
Was Acheson's apparent triumph over Johnson accomplished with some degree of cooperation from the independent services, resisting cental control?
Later in the 1967-published book Hilsman is quite frank about CIA secretive influence in the State Department. It is pretty clear that he blames CIA for the weak role of the Department at least as represented by Rusk.
Of course the rivalry between the services were nearly as strong as they were in 1947, when MacNamera assumed the Sec. Def. position. He formed the DIA because he could not get good Soviet estimates from the different services, as each sevices' estimate was very different, and based on its self interest vis a vis the other services.
Was Acheson's apparent triumph over Johnson accomplished with some degree of cooperation from the independent services, resisting cental control?
Later in the 1967-published book Hilsman is quite frank about CIA secretive influence in the State Department. It is pretty clear that he blames CIA for the weak role of the Department at least as represented by Rusk.
Of course the rivalry between the services were nearly as strong as they were in 1947, when MacNamera assumed the Sec. Def. position. He formed the DIA because he could not get good Soviet estimates from the different services, as each sevices' estimate was very different, and based on its self interest vis a vis the other services.