McNAMARA's CHALLENGE

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

Two weeks ago in a speech at Boston College Vice President Humphrey said it was the obligation of dissenters to the war in Vietnam to suggest alternative courses of action. Yet never during the course of this war has the Administration sought a dialogue with members of the Anti-War Movement and, in fact, has done its best to ignore them. Therefore, some 50 faculty members, 93 teaching fellows, and about 1600 Harvard and Radcliffe undergraduates have petitioned Secretary McNamara to debate Robert Scheer, a noted spokesman for the Anti-War Movement.

Professor Neustadt, speaking for Secretary McNamara and the Kennedy Institute, rejected this proposal on three grounds: that such a debate would not advance the purposes of the Kennedy Institute; that the prospect of a debate would not allow McNamara to be as informal in his meetings with the students as otherwise; and that a debate would establish a bad precedent, making others reluctant to accept invitations from that Institute.

The debate, however, was proposed as a supplement to the information al meetings, not as a substitute for them. There would be ample time in Secretary McNamara's visit for both. Secondly, the Secretary of Defense, whose position requires him to speak informally with the President at one moment and address a news conference the next, surely would not feel inhibited merely because he was to speak formally later that day. Finally, Secretary McNamara is a principal architect of a controversial American foreign policy, a policy which raises serious moral objections. Both the policy and McNamara's responsibility for it make the Secretary unique among the proposed guests of the Kennedy Institute and justify a demand for a direct public confrontation. Ron Yank 3L   Mike Ansara '68   Dennis Gregg 3G   Co-chairmen, H-R SDS