"With the development of radioactive fallout, there is no town or city too small to be in danger.

"People who live in small cities and towns and those who live on the farm are now the direct victims of atomic war because radioactive fallout is now one of the main weapons of attack," said Federal Civil Defense Administrator Val Peterson at a recent meeting of the National Advisory Council for Rural Civil Defense.

"For some reason, people who live in rural areas got the idea that civil defense was a big city problem. That is all a thing of the past. Take, as an example, a relatively sparsely settled state like South Dakota. Ellsworth Air Force Base, located near Rapid City, South Dakota, would surely be a target. One nuclear bomb would demolish the base and dig an enormous crater hundreds of yards across. All that material would be blown into the sky and, with the prevailing winds to carry it, would spread deadly radioactive fallout particulars over wide areas of the state."

The former Nebraska Governor noted also that small cities and rural areas near the major target areas would have new problems of providing care and shelter for target-area evacuees.

"If twenty or thirty of our biggest cities are destroyed, people will have to be loaded into every school house, public building, and home within 100 miles of the big city.

"Our aim is to plan evacuation so that it can be accomplished with a minimum of disruption. If evacuation isn't planned, controlled and directed, the people evacuated will be a howling churning mob.

"There will be staggering problems of providing first aid and medical care. Plans must be made for feeding and clothing the refugees. Shelter must be found. Just providing water and sanitation facilities will be a great problem," he said.

Drawing from his first-hand knowledge of the Swedish program for dispersal and locating of factories underground, Peterson said, "If America is serious about surviving in a thermal-nuclear age, we must begin soon to think about dispersing and going underground."

While making it clear that he did not recommend the moving of any present industry from any city, he cautioned that we should consider dispersal in all future plans for new factories. As an example of the need, he pointed out that most of the great commercial food warehouses are located in the target areas and would presumably be destroyed in an attack. He reported that this is one of the reasons for the government storing grain in surplus ships in more remote places.

The following plan of action for small cities was suggested:

1. An adequate civil defense organization should be established in every community and staffed with trained volunteers. This unit should be co-ordinated with other units throughout the state.

2. A realistic plan should be prepared so that in time of emergency the community is prepared to act to protect its own citizens and to provide assistance to surrounding communities and care and shelter for evacuees.

3. Both the plan and the organization should be tested frequently so that in a military or civil disaster response is automatic and well organized.

Mayors and city officials should turn to their local and state civil defense organization for technical advice and assistance in preparing their communities for emergency. Numerous reports, studies, manuals and other aids are available.

Congress has recognized federal responsibility for civil defense by authorizing federal financial aid to states and local communities through the Federal Civil Defense Contributions Program. Under this plan, federal funds are made available to states and their political subdivisions for facilities, materials and organizational equipment on a fifty-fifty matching basis.

After Congress has appropriated funds for the program, FCDA advises each state of (1) its share of the allocated funds (2) the items for which funds are available and the basis on which allocations to each state are made. Applications from municipalities for specific items must be approved by the state civil defense director.

Subject to various program restrictions, the following types of items will be eligible for matching funds: Rescue tools, rescue truck or trailer, rescue kit, rescue training facilities, warning devices such as sirens (and related equipment such as gasoline storage tanks, switches, etc.), emergency kitchens and related equipment, first-aid supplies, blood

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donor equipment, emergency hospital units, water testing equipment, radio transmitters and receivers, mobile radios for emergency equipment, control center communications equipment, public address systems and portable electric megaphones, emergency and auxiliary power equipment and police revolvers.

To be eligible, equipment must be determined by the Civil Defense Director to be (1) necessary for civil defense (2) of such type or nature as to require it to be financed in whole or in part by the federal government. Normally, this does not include items utilized by the community for combating local disasters except when such items are required in unusual quantities dictated by requirements of civil defense.

Complete details of legal restrictions, program restrictions, administrative policy, specifications of approvable items application procedures and all the details of reimbursement and administration of the program are contained in the Federal Civil Defense Administration Manual M 25-1. This is available free of charge along with applications from your state civil defense director or local civil defense director (insert name and address). The document is also for sale at $1.25 per copy from the Superintendent of Documents, Washington 25, D. C.