The Government's general reactions to the now renowned Harrison Salisbury articles on civilian casualties in North Vietnam were, first, anger that Salisbury had exaggerated the scope of the problem by depending upon the Communists for statistical data; second, an admission that there had indeed been civilian casualities in the North because it is difficult to bomb anywhere without involving some civilians; third, an emphatic declaration of intent to restrict the bombing to purely military targets. I want to argue here that this declaration was unwise, if well intentioned, for at least two reasons. It implied, first of all, that the entire conduct of World War II, both on land and in the air, was invalid - not merely the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Second, by attempting to draw the old and stark distinction between combatants and non-combatants, it obscured the nature of the problem. I want to mention a few aspects of that problem here. Jack Walker, who has seen extensive military service, recently contributed a series of articles on the "Nuclear Obsession" to worldview.

"Christ, to be sure, gave His Church no proper mission in the political, economic, or social order, The purpose which He set before her is a religious one." This is a formulation which the Bishops of the Catholic Church asserted in the Conciliar document The Church in the Modern World in the chapter devoted to "The Fostering of Peace and the Promotion of a Community of Nations." From this statement one should not conclude to the political irrelevance of religion. Rather, he should seek further for the precise mode of that relevance; he will find it, I believe, in the religiously enlightened person acting politically.