Anyone who has read in detail the testimony by various officials before the senate committees on the so-called Truman-MacArthur controversy must have come, we think, to the same conclusion as David Lawrence, as described in his column today. Some confusion and much disagreement there is to be found to be in any government, but it is inexcusable that only 10 years after the terrible mistakes that resulted in Pearl Harbor there should be such inefficiency in the matters of defense and foreign policy.

When we think of how the administration was caught flat-footed in Korea we must wonder what the foreign policy and military planners are doing, if anything, about threats to security in other parts of the world. Naturally, our government cannot know where trouble will break out next, but we do know, for example, that there may be real trouble in Iran. Are we to discover years from now that neither the state department nor the military planners had any definite plan in regard to Iran? They should know at this moment what they intend to do, or refrain from doing, if Russia seizes control. They should not wait until Russia moves and then say, “Now let’s see, what shall we do about Iran.” Even if they plan to do absolutely nothing, they should have an understanding.

What we apparently lack in Washington are enough real leaders.