soundness of the proposed expansion of the strategic bomber forces. They were given added urgency by Truman's announcement on 23 September that the Soviet Union had tested its first nuclear device. Matthews announced that no Navy man would be censored or penalized for the testimony he offered at the hearing. This should have been unnecessary, since it was illegal to threaten witnesses testifying before Congress or to take action against them afterwards. Nonetheless, when Vinson opened the hearings on 6 October he declared: The naval officers called to testify were expected to support Secretary Matthews, but instead officer after officer arose to testify that the Air Force reliance on the B-36 was inadequate, and that the entire strategy of atomic bombing was immoral and misguided. Among the officers testifying from 6 to 17 October, were the naval leaders of World War II: Fleet Admirals Ernest King, Chester Nimitz and William Halsey, Admirals Raymond Spruance and Thomas Kinkaid, and General Alexander Vandegrift, the former Commandant of the Marine Corps. Burke had run tests which showed the Navy was already in possession of a fighter aircraft, the F2H Banshee, that could reach high enough altitudes to intercept bombers like the B-36, and he knew it would be unreasonable to assume that an opposing major world power would not also have developed such an aircraft. In that case, the B-36 would need to be accompanied with long-range fighter escorts with the requisite range and ceiling to complete its mission, and the Air Force had no such fighter available in their inventory. In his testimony, Denfeld broadly supported the Navy officers who had testified before him. Symington and Vandenberg rebutted the admirals' testimony, point by point, on 18 and 19 October. Regarding the United States, Vandenberg commented: "I accept the military capability of this ship as stated by the Chief of Naval Operations. My opposition to building it comes from the fact that I can see no necessity for a ship with those capabilities in any strategic plan against the one possible enemy." Symington denied that the Air Force favored the bombing of civilians or that it believed that an atomic blitz offered a "quick, easy and painless war". Vandenberg testified that "Veterans of the Eighth, the Fifteenth, the Twentieth and other historic Air Forces know very well that there are no cheap and easy ways to win great wars." He said that during