But Hallice says the worst crisis he's ever seen came during the Harvard student protests of 1969, when he acted as a police captain as well as civil defense director.

"I saw blood on the streets," Hallice says, adding that some of the student protests "had a Russian tint."

In his capacity as police captain, Hallice gave the order to use tear gas for the first time on students. "I thought tear gas would be better than clubs," Hallice says, adding that "some guys like to hear the crack of a club on another guy's head."

With only a single full-time and one part-time employee under his command, Hallice says the tax cuts caused by Proposition 2 1/2 can't hurt the city's civil defense program "unless they decide to put me out of business altogether."

He considers that possibility highly unlikely because "you always need plans." The federal government currently funds 50 per cent of the Cambridge civil defense budget.

Planning for the past 15 years for an event he hopes will never occur doesn't bother Hallice, but he does worry that "the Soviets spend a billion where we spend a million."

Hallice says he's been aware of the "Soviet threat" since the time he graduated from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) academy in 1948, and adds that the civil defense conferences he's attended during the last 15 years have not changed his mind.

Touring underground defense facilities and meeting generals who "had the authority to push the red button and hit Moscow" has made a deep impression on Hallice. As he says, "Some of the things I've seen would frighten you."