At a meeting in Air Vice Marshal James' Office this morning, General Whitten, Commanding General, United States Northeast Command, explained that the air requirements in the Newfoundland area were much greater than previously antici­pated. He said that at a meeting of SAC, MATS and his Command recently it had been agreed that existing facilities would be quite inadequate in the event of hostili-ties. In particular, they would wish the use of Torbay and, if available, would want facilities greatly enlarged there. Improvements would include extension of two of the present runways to 9000 feet to take B36's, as well as extensive areas for "park­ing", work shops, housing accommodation, etc. He anticipated that expenditure there perhaps would equal or surpass that for 1951 at Goose. Rough estimates have been already made and supplementary appropriations are being asked so that the work could get underway this summer if we are agreeable.

The functions of Torbay would be that of a staging base for SAC and MATS planes going to the Azores or the Mediterranean, although it would also be a stag­ing field for planes going direct to Europe. On enquiry, General Whitten said that it was not anticipated that storage facilities for special weapons would be needed at Torbay except in the event of hostilities. In this respect Torbay would be unlike Goose.

General Whitten said that it was anticipated that another field would also be needed in the event of hostilities and that some thought had been given to an area near Clarenville (or Shoal Harbour) as a possible site. They are not, however, ask­ing for appropriations for such a field this year and I gather that they are not likely to ask us to consent to such a field this year.

It is anticipated that the Appropriations Committee of the Armed Services will deal with General Whitten's request next week and, if the request is approved, we shall likely hear shortly. It was suggested to General Whitten that this matter should be taken up informally before a formal request was made and that the alter­native ways would be either an enquiry from the U.S. Air Member, PJBD, to the Canadian Air Member, or the matter might be put on the agenda of the next meet­ing of the PJBD.

Such a request would raise grave questions for us. We were told only in January that the United States would not have requirements beyond Goose Bay, communi­cation facilities and radar sites in the Newfoundland area. Torbay is on the outskirts of St. John's and its development as proposed would make it more of a target area than at present and especially if used by SAC. This would certainly raise problems of defence, probably both for the RCAF and Canadian Army. Inevitably the ques­tion of tenure would be raised. There is perhaps a good deal to be said for Canada developing the field, thus avoiding the questions of title and tenure, even if the cost would be substantial. Construction of the field would be a fair contribution to NATO. There is also something to be said for developing a new field entirely away from the settled area.³⁷

R.A. M[ACKAY]

³⁷ Note marginale :/Marginal note:
Mr. MacKay, thanks - agree we'll have to watch [A.D.P. Heeney]