ABSTRACT
The constancy and change that characterize the development of US strategic concepts during the post-war years can be interpreted in terms of shifting theoretical emphasis on the utility and probability of conventional warfare, limited nuclear war and central strategic war. This chapter attempts to relate the themes of the perception of the threat, the force planning response to the threat and the budgetary and public opinion constraints on that force planning process. As President Kennedy received the varying reports of evidence of a force planning process in disarray, he was also particularly concerned with Premier Khrushchev's speech in early 1961. The Army is developing plans to make possible a much more rapid deployment of a major portion of its highly trained Reserve forces. Reserve forces continued to remain at the same strength, with selected Reserve component units designated to round out and augment active Army divisions upon mobilization.
