Charles Erwin Wilson (July 18, 1890 – September 26, 1961) was an American engineer and businessman who served as United States Secretary of Defense from 1953 to 1957 under President Dwight D.
During World War II, Wilson directed the company's huge defense production effort, which earned him a Medal for Merit in 1946.
Wilson's nomination sparked a controversy that erupted during his confirmation hearings before the Senate Armed Services Committee, based on his large share ownership in General Motors.
During the hearings, when asked if he could make a decision as Secretary of Defense that would be adverse to the interests of General Motors, Wilson answered affirmatively.
In his first annual report, he noted that the service secretaries were his principal assistants; decentralizing operational responsibility to them would make for effective exercise of civilian authority throughout the Department of Defense.
Eisenhower had criticized Truman's policies during the 1952 campaign, arguing that they were reactive rather than positive and that they forced the United States to compete with the Soviet Union on the latter's terms.
Eisenhower entered office with strong convictions about the need to reorient the nation's security policy by maintaining a staunch defense while decreasing government expenditures and balancing the budget.
With new weapons and techniques and ready reserves of troops and material, the United States could support capable military forces within budget allocations that Congress was willing to provide.
The major features of the New Look included greater reliance on nuclear weapons, using the advantage the United States had over the Soviet Union in such weapons; elevation of strategic air power, the major means to deliver nuclear weapons, to a more important position (not an expansion in the number of Air Force aircraft but rather development and production of better equipment); reductions of conventional ground forces, based both on reliance on strategic and tactical nuclear weapons and the expectation that US allies would provide ground troops for their own defense; an expanded program of continental defense, which, along with strategic air power, would serve as a principal ingredient of the New Look's deterrence program; and modernization and enlargement of reserve forces, enhancing the military manpower base while reducing active duty forces.
Implicit in the policy was rejection of the idea that a general war or a crisis with the USSR was imminent (to occur when the Soviets achieved offensive nuclear capability against the United States).
"Military expenditures," he observed, "must be adequate, but not so great that they will become an intolerable burden which will harm the social and economic fabric of our country.
Total obligational authority approved by Congress during Wilson's tenure decreased significantly at first and then began to creep back up, but it remained lower than the Truman administration's last budgets, inflated because of the Korean War.
Especially after 1954, when the Democratic Party regained control of Congress, the Wilson-Eisenhower effort to curb defense expenditures provoked growing criticism.
Its standing threatened by the New Look, the Army questioned the wisdom of reliance on "massive retaliation" and strategic air power to the neglect of other force elements.
The Army received indirect support from such critics of massive retaliation as Bernard Brodie, William W. Kaufmann, and Henry A. Kissinger, who noted that the United States and the Soviet Union had or were acquiring the power to destroy each other with strategic nuclear weapons, thus precluding their rational use in response to a limited attack.
While the Eisenhower administration did not adopt the Army's position, by the time that Wilson left office, it had accepted both the need to prepare for limited war and the idea that deterrence of a direct attack on US interests required "sufficient," rather than "superior," retaliatory capability.
On March 18, 1957, Wilson issued a directive to clarify his earlier decisions on the Army-Air Force use of aircraft for tactical purposes.
He made no major changes from the previous division of responsibility but provided a more detailed and specific listing of those functional areas for which the Army could procure its own aircraft and those for which it would rely on the Air Force.
He established in February 1956 an office of special assistant to the Secretary of Defense for guided missiles but made few other changes after implementation of Reorganization Plan No.
When asked in 1957 about persistent demands for further unification, Wilson responded, "It's an oversimplification in the false hope that you could thus wash out the problems if you put the people all in the same uniform and that then they wouldn't disagree over what should be done.
That caused a storm of protest and even brought a rebuke from Eisenhower, who said he thought Wilson had made "a very... unwise statement, without stopping to think what it meant."
Eisenhower noted when Wilson stepped down that under him, "the strength of our security forces has not only been maintained but has been significantly increased" and that he had managed the Defense Department "in a manner consistent with the requirements of a strong, healthy national economy.
Wilson wrote, "By reason of the basic medical responsibility in connection with the development of defense of all types against atomic, biological and/or chemical warfare agents, Armed Services personnel and/or civilians on duty at installations engaged in such research shall be permitted to actively participate in all phases of the program.
"[7] Jonathan Moreno and Susan Lederer wrote in a 1996 issue of the Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal that the Wilson Memo remained classified until 1975, limiting its availability to researchers.