carrier. In the post-World War II period prior to the Korean War, the Air Force wanted funding to focus on the massive Convair B-36 bomber for the Strategic Air Command (SAC). In the restrictive defense funding environment following World War II demobilization, this focus on the B-36 would be at the expense of aircraft carriers and Naval Aviation, as well as the Marine Corps and its amphibious assault role which Truman, Johnson and Matthews all saw as obsolete. Top Navy and Marine Corps leaders publicly expressed their dissatisfaction with the Defense Department's plans and policies in this regard, and several senior admirals, including the Navy's top admiral, ADM Louis E. Denfeld, the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO), were forced by Matthews to resign and retire, or did so in protest. The House Armed Services Committee (HASC) condemned the dismissal of ADM Denfield, who accepted cancellation of the supercarrier, but testified critically on defense planning and the administration of defense unification as it applied to the Navy and Marine Corps. Following Denfield's congressional testimony, Matthews fired Denfeld as CNO on 27 October 1949, explaining that he and Denfeld disagreed widely on strategic policy and unification. However, the HASC concluded that Denfeld's removal was a political reprisal by Matthews because of his testimony and therefore a challenge to effective representative government. Matthews' perceived vindictiveness towards much of the U.S. Navy's uniformed senior leadership during his tenure as SECNAV led to a perception by both the American public and the U.S. Congress of the Navy's civilian leadership woes, a perception that also did not go totally unnoticed by the news media of the period. As The Washington Daily News reported at the time, "Secretary of the Navy Matthews does not have the confidence of the Navy and can not win it...Moreover, Mr. Matthews has forfeited the confidence of Congress by firing Admiral Denfeld." Matthews served as SECNAV from 1949 through the first year of the Korean War. During his two years in office, the federal government had to suddenly reverse previous policy and massively increase defense spending to meet international crises on the Korean peninsula and in Europe, this following nearly four years of significant cutbacks in the U.S. military, especially in conventional (e.g., non-strategic / non-nuclear strike) forces. All of the U.S. armed forces were under major strain as they simultaneously tried to meet the demands of a hot war in Asia