The Civilian-Military Contingency Hospital System: Medical Planning for War

To the Editor: It is noteworthy that the Department of Defense, while denying that the civilian-military hospital contingency system (CMCHS) is designed for nuclear war, has not offered an alternative plan for such a war — this despite the facts that tactical nuclear weapons exist on both sides and that the United States is on record as stating that it would use nuclear weapons to repel an overwhelming conventional attack by the Soviets and, most recently, that we would retaliate with nuclear weapons in the event of a Soviet chemical-warfare attack. From a purely medical perspective, the CMCHS plan seems.