John T. McNaughton was a brilliant man. His sudden death at the age of 45 has deprived Washington of an increasingly prominent official. The death of his wife, Sally, means the loss of a charming lady.

To his friends, McNaughton was a man of charm and reserve. To his colleagues, he was a hard-driving executive who grasped issues with great clarity. To the nation, he lent his abilities to disarmament and arms control.

Perhaps his finest talent was, in the words of a former Law School associate, "his very great sensitivity to the interrelation of political and military action." McNaughton waged a constant battle to keep military activity under control.

When he first joined the Kennedy Administration in 1961, his attitudes were not generally popular in Washington. Yet he remained constant to his ideal. As Deputy Assistant Secretary for Arms Control, as the Pentagon's chief representative on the nuclear test-ban team to Moscow, and as Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Security Affairs, he always sought the proportioned response--the wide range of political alternatives to military pressure, where possible. He exerted beneficial and imaginative influence over Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara.

McNamara had come to depend on McNaughton more and more as his confident and closest personal adviser. His death meant far more than the loss of a Secretary of the Navy. It meant an early end to a potentially great leader in American diplomatic affairs. The nation and the rational world grieves at this loss.