Press and Radio Conference with General Nathan F. Twining, Air Force Chief of Staff
This is an interview with General Twining, Air Force Chief of Staff, about a United States Air Force delegation visit to the Soviet Union.
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OCR Page 1 of 13THE WHITE HOUSE
GETTYSBURG
PRESS AND RADIO CONFERENCE --
WITH GENERAL NATHAN F. TWINING, AIR FORCE CHIEF OF STAFF
Thursday, July 5, 1956, 1.50 p.m., e.d.s.t.
MR.HAGERTY: Two things before we start. Let us have
6.
the usual agreement that as long as we are here, nobody tries
to telephone out or move copy, except the photographers can
shoot a plate out.
The group I think you know all the group here with
me. Of course, General Twining, Secretary Quarles, and
Lieutenant General Frank F. Everest, who is Deputy Chief of
Staff for Operations of the Air Force and who accompanied General
Twining to Moscow.
Secretary Wilson, Admiral Radford, Governor Adams,
Jerry Persons, myself and these other three gentlemen were with
the President for an hour and 20 minutes. They met in his den
at his home -- his farm at Gettysburg. And General Twining
reported to the President on his trip to Moscow.
There are several other things that I have to tell you
before we start this. General Twining is going to testify before
the Congress, and consequently there are some matters that he
cannot tell you at this time, but he has to make a report, first,
to Congress. Since he came here, however, to report to the
President, I told him of your interest in meeting with him
briefly and he said that he would come down and make a brief
report to you on the trip. But he still has to testify before
the House -- before the Senate, I believe, the Senate Committee --
and he has to make a fuller report and more in detail to them
prior -- to them, rather than he can to you today. Maybe when
that report is finished to the Congress, then he may also be able
to talk a little more freely on some of these other matters, but
he has to report there first.
So now, without any further
Q. Jim, may I interrupt just a second -- is that
before the Symington Committee, or Appropriations, or what?
MR. HAGERTY: Either Armed Services or the Symington
Committee, he does not know which.
Q. That is the Subcommittee of the Armed Services?
MR. HAGERTY: That's right, or it may be the full
Armed Services Committee.
So now, if I may, I would like to turn this over to
General Twining, who will give you a brief report of his visit.
GENERAL TWINING: As I told the press yesterday when
I
landed at the airport, that there are no experts on the Soviet
Union or the Soviet Air Force. And after our short, well-
controlled, directed trip over there of eight days, me and my
group are certainly not qualified as any kind of expert.
I do want to say that the trip was very profitable.
We got quite a bit out of it. The Soviet people treated us very
fine and entertained us wherever we went very lavishly.
But you must remember that on a trip of this nature,
they showed us just what they wanted us to see. Nothing else.
And I repeat again, it was very tightly controlled.