Dear Mr. Chairman:
I have heard reports to the effect that the Senate Armed Services Committee is considering a fifty percent cut in H.R. 8120, the military construction bill which the House of Representatives passed a short time ago.
I do not know whether these reports are well founded, but they have disturbed me very greatly and I wish very earnestly to ask the Committee to guard against such a dangerous course.
We urgently need the air bases and depots and other installations that are covered by the House bill. They are absolutely vital to our whole defense plan. When this program was submitted to the Congress, it had already been pared down to the minimum that safety would allow. The House Armed Services Committee considered the program with care and found that the items in the House Bill were thoroughly justified. It would be a terrible disaster to lose half these facilities at a stroke. We just can't afford to let it happen.
Sincerely yours,
HARRY S. TRUMAN
[Honorable Richard B. Russell, Chairman, Committee on Armed Services, United States Senate, Washington, D.C.]
Note: On July 14 the President signed H.R. 8120, a bill to authorize certain construction at military and naval installations, and for other purposes (66 Stat. 606). The administration had requested $3,027,752,000 :for military and naval construction during fiscal year 1953, and the act authorized $2,398,282,800.
Harry S Truman, Letter to Senator Russell on the Military Construction Bill. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/231030