GOVERNMENT: Air Force Stretch-Out

While sweating out the budget-axing mood of Congress, plane and missile makers last week were shaken by the unhappy prospect of a still bigger cut by the usually friendly Pentagon. At hearings of a Senate appropriations subcommittee, the meaning of a directive issued by Defense Secretary Charles Wilson three weeks ago was spelled out for the first time. The directive, which outlawed military "installment buying" for all services, will hit the Air Force hardest. It threatens to slice existing and future Air Force contracts by $4.2 billion in fiscal 1958.

Wilson's order...

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