become an almost classic example of environmental imbalance brought about by wanton and unplanned applications of science and technology."[1]
Johnwill Faris' predictions about the relationship between the armed forces and his monument were more accurate than his guesses about local population growth. As early as January 30, 1946, he wrote to the regional director that "the [Alamgordo Army Air Base] will be manned by a skeleton crew merely as a plane refueling station, emergency landings, etc." As for the proving grounds to the west and south, "[it] seems to be going stronger so we are yet in the middle of excitement." What had prompted the WSPG activity was the capture in Europe by Allied forces of German V-2 rockets; the same weapons that had proven so effective in Adolf Hitler's bombing of London during the Battle of Britain. The Army wished to examine these V-2's for their accuracy and firepower, but needed more open space than the Aberdeen, Maryland proving grounds would permit. Without knowing it, Faris identified the most telling feature of the next 25 years at the dunes when he reported to regional headquarters of a visit from a WSPG executive officer, "Major Holmes." He had come to the park in late May 1946 because an early V-2 test had gone off course and crashed into the dunes. While Holmes denied any problem with the test, said Faris, "a general visiting here, who has been in charge of similar tests in Florida, informed me, unofficially of course … that … [the Army] themselves have little or no idea where the projectile might land."[2]
The rationale for testing of missiles in the Tularosa basin sprang from diplomatic and economic forces far beyond White Sands. Successful development of the atomic bomb in southern New Mexico had shown the military the advantages of the region's open space, sparse population, and pliant civic leadership. Victory in Europe and the Pacific theatres resulted from massive applications of air power, which the armed forces sought to maximize in the first years after the war. Then the burgeoning confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union provided more incentive for escalation of advanced-technology weapons research and testing. When one added the financial windfall of postwar defense spending, it was little surprise when Johnwill Faris learned in January 1947 of Army plans to consolidate air bases in Kansas and Utah at Holloman.[3]
Construction of test facilities throughout the basin began soon after the visit to the monument by President Truman's "Strategic Bombing Survey" team. Its members included Paul Nitze, who would become famous as an arms negotiator for the United States in the 1960s and 1970s, and Franklin D'Olier of the Prudential Insurance Company, identified by Faris as "a long time personal friend of former [NPS] Director Horace M. Albright." The survey team negotiated the first of several "joint-use"
