p515  Chapter XI

The Army Hustled into World Wars

(1917‑1942)


Part 3 of 3

It was in this time when the army was faintly emerging from the doldrums of the twenties and early thirties, when many of the army personnel were still out on civilian duties, and military units were undermanned and in the lower ranks underofficered, that suddenly Sept. 1
1939 Germany attacked Poland, put on a blitzkrieg, and gobbled it in a matter of a little over two weeks. Despite the new design of tactics and amazing speed of synchronized air and mechanized avalanches, our country after the first shock settled down to the normal indifference that since our birth as a nation has nestled itself smugly between two mighty oceans.

By the first of the next year, the United States had waked up to the fact that it might be inveigled into war, and dimly it recognized it had a puny army. Let's do something. Jan. 4
1940 The President called for increased armaments. But even with the convincing proof of German intentions and the unmistakable effectiveness of the blitzkrieg, the mass of the people were unable to see any dangers applicable to ourselves. Congress limited the number of replacement aëroplanes to 57 and cut out twelve million dollars for the defense of Alaska.

 p516  April 9
1940 During this awe‑struck whisper period, while Congress and the people contemplated this idea, the Germans occupied Denmark and invaded Norway. May 10
1940 They invaded the Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg. May 13
1940 They took Sedan and reached Rotterdam, cutting the Netherlands apart, and the Dutch ceased resistance. May 17
1940 They penetrated •35 miles into France while pushing the British back in Belgium. May 19
1940 They came within •80 miles of Paris.

May 16
1940 By this time our country bestirred itself to such lengths that the President felt it possible to ask for 50,000 war planes and $1,182,000,000 appropriation for the army and navy.

May 28
1940 While Congress considered and many of the population were aghast, Belgium surrendered, May 31
1940 and the remnants of the thoroughly beaten British reached England from Dunkirk. The Germans bombed Paris and came within 35 miles of it. June 9
1940 Italy openly linked herself with Germany, and the Nazis crossed the Seine and took Paris. June 13‑15
1940 They took Verdun, and France sued for peace.

June 17
1940 The swift fall of our former ally, the cracking of the vaunted Maginot Line was our first real awakening.

Three days later a bill was introduced in Congress to provide for selective service for our manhood in war, commonly called the draft. June 20
1940 And on the same day that France signed an armistice in reverse of the one in November, 1918, in the Compiègne Forest, our Congress passed a National Defense Tax Bill amounting to nearly a billion dollars a year and raised the national debt limit from forty-five to forty-nine billion dollars. It also acceded to the wishes of the Chief of Staff to speed up promotion. June 22
1940 It provided for the promotion of officers on a length of service basis,​18 and for brigadier generals to be retired at the age of 62 and all other grades at 60. All officers below the grade of brigadier general and 60 years or over were to be retired by June 30, 1942. Major generals and above were not considered old until they were 64. The Secretary of War could hold out  p517 5 per cent of the colonels and keep them on active duty until they were 62. The bill gave opportunity and enthusiasm to younger men but eliminated many older men with superior records and high physical vigor whose experience and wisdom were difficult to replace and in whom the government had an appreciable investment.

While the mass air raids were deluging the British Isles, Italy was conquering British Somaliland, the Germans were entering Rumania, and Italy was invading Greece, the United States again was the calf that had its ears pulled off to get it to the cow and its tail pulled off to get it away. Money, the cure‑all, was sailed out from the pockets of Congress as fluidly as it had been withheld frozenly before. June 27
1940 A Supplemental Defense Appropriation Act was adopted for nearly two billions. July
1940 In a special message the President asked for nearly five billions more. Sept. 6
1940 Then Congress took action on a total defense bill of over five billions. The country — quite scared now, except for the destructive isolationists and idealistic pacifists — thought only in terms of billions. And billions more were to be flicked off as thousands had been denied in the twenties. America as usual was going to shoot the enemy with dollar bills. But time?

It was not of great moment. The Selective Service Bill dragged on for 86 days, while France succumbed, Vichy became a vassal state, mass raids intensified on Britain, and the Axis forces roamed at will over success­ful roads in Europe, Asia, and Africa, with tentacles in North and South America. The lawmakers were considering — considering their selfish interests and personal views — while the man in the street knew better than to sit naked in the open with hail storms flitting around the horizon. Great lobbies of well-intentioned homicides, with little knowledge of our true history, brought forth arguments against conscription as being undemocratic and favored the unequable, wasteful volunteering. And so the Congress was made to dilly-dally at the cost of delayed training and the lives and losses to come on Oahu and the Bataan peninsula. Sept. 16
1940 The bill was finally passed in early fall.19

Meanwhile, the army did what it could for itself, while the  p518 lawmakers threw it crumbs and promises from the succession of political banquets. Feb. 1
1940 It did away with the normal courses at the War, General Staff and Industrial colleges in order to use the plants and staffs for direct war purposes. Particularly did the office of the Assistant Secretary of War strike out on its own in the work of industrial mobilization. Swamped with sudden expansion many times the size of the year before, it placed orders with astounding rapidity. The ten‑year program had to be compressed into two. Had it not been for its quiet foresight and exact plans made in the lean years with the aid of the Army Industrial College, the immense load for aëroplanes (six times the average annual purchase of the years preceding), semi-automatic rifle, anti-tank, anti-aircraft, seacoast weapons and equipment, all sorts of ammunition, fire-control matériel, tanks, combat vehicles, radios, telephones, searchlights, pontoon and other bridge equipment, medical supplies, gas masks, in fact all the tools of war could not have been shouldered. But the schedules that industrialists formerly had pleaded were out of the question suddenly, under the licking flames of Europe, were found reasonable and effective. Even with all the efficiency of the Assistant Secretary, Louis Jackson, these necessary supplies could not be immediately forthcoming. Time — with its six‑year lead — could be gained on by only a few paces. The maneuvers of the First Army, commanded by Lieutenant General Hugh A. Drum in northern New York, disclosed a tragic rather than ludicrous want of weapons. In order to gain a similarity to actual usage in battle and a little practice, the Army Commander stimulated the construction by the various units of imitation weapons. Stove pipe, wood, sheet iron, and other materials were marked 60‑mm mortar and 50‑cal. machine gun; certain motor trucks answered as tanks.

These maneuvers were part of the more extensive practice of large units during this year and an indication of the growing relaxation of our lack of training. In other parts of the country large units likewise had practice. Apr. 12
1940 The First, Fifth and Sixth Divisions were concentrated in a corps at Fort Benning, Georgia, for two weeks of maneuver. Apr. 1
1940 The Second Division and First Cavalry Division had maneuvers in east Texas, after which there were larger exercises between the Georgia and Texas corps on  p519 the Texas-Louisiana border. The Second Army, consisting of the Seventh Mechanized Cavalry Brigade of the regular army and the Thirty-second, Thirty-third, Thirty-seventh and Thirty-eighth National Guard Divisions under Lieutenant General Stanley H. Ford held two weeks of maneuver near Sparta, Wisconsin. The First Army consisted of the First Division of the regular army and the Twenty-sixth, Twenty-seventh, Twenty-eighth, Twenty-ninth, Forty-third and Forty-fourth National Guard Divisions. The Third Army under Lieutenant General Stanley D. Embick concentrated along the Sabine River in the Alexandria, Louisiana, area. It consisted of the Second Division and First Cavalry Division of regulars, and the Thirtieth, Thirty-first, Thirty-sixth and Forty-fifth Infantry Divisions and Twenty-third Cavalry Division of the National Guard. The Fourth Army under Lieutenant General John L. DeWitt concentrated at Fort Lewis, Washington, and Camp Ripley, Minnesota. It consisted of the Third and Sixth Divisions of the regular army and the Thirty-fourth, Thirty-fifth, Fortieth and Forty-first Divisions of the National Guard. Jan.
1940 In the early part of the year the Third Regular Division sailed •2,000 miles in 6 transports off the California coast practicing landing technic and convoy regulation with the navy.

Oct. 16
1940 While the nation was registering 16,400,000 selectees, the enlisted force of the regular army numbered approximately 250,000 — still 30,000 less than the number called for in the National Defense Act of 1920.

Along with the lengthy discussion over the Selective Service went the similar protraction of just as vital legislation. If we were to get anywhere, we must call out and train through the next winter all components of our budding army. Clothing, shelter, camp sites, and all the appurtenances necessary for men training in cold weather were lacking. May
1940 The War Department's original request for the federalization of the National Guard as of primary importance was forehandedly sent to Congress in the spring, so that construction could be ready and troops would not be exposed to disease and improper shelter when called out in the fall. There would have been ample time to engage sites and construct proper camps had Congress acted promptly. But the debates ran through the months, Aug. 5
1940 and the pleas of the Chief of  p520 Staff of the army again remind one of Washington's supplications during the Revolution:

This plaint is so typical of the many that were made during this intense pre‑war period and so explanatory of the principles which kept us on the defensive, with all its useless losses later, that it is given here in its entirety.

Aug. 27
1940
Sept. 9
1940
Sept. 24
1940 Authority calling the National Guard into federal service arrived in the fall, but the money for the camps did not come through until thirteen days later and for the Selective Service construction until nearly a month later. Had it not been that the  p521 President in his forthright prevision put up twenty-nine and one‑half millions from his emergency fund for those necessary and lengthy constructions such as hospitals and sewer systems, so that the army could get going, disease, hardship, and waste would have resulted. To add to the "unbusinesslike" procedure the War Department was really forced to induct the National Guard before it was ready for them, because it was warned that a delay in induction might defeat passage of the Selective Service Act. So at this ominous date the army was pummeled between political caprices.

1940 At the end of the year the War Department found itself frantically attempting to expand an army of 172,000 into one of one and one‑half millions — over eight times its size, in a matter of months, with late funds and early winter. Specifically, there were 1,400,000 men, of which 500,000 were to be in the regular army, 270,000 in the National Guard, and 630,000 as selectees.

Feverish military haste marked the last of 1940 and the beginning of 1941. Dec. 16
1940 An act provided for an Under Secretary of War, an addition to the Assistant Secretary. The President called upon Congress for increased armaments. Jan. 4
1941 Meanwhile, the troops shivered, conducted schools, and such training without sufficient weapons and target practice as cold hands and snow camps would allow. Old units were drained of their experienced men for training new units. The corner grocery store had to produce a nation-wide chain by spring. About the time a commander would be whipping his units into some sort of shape, his best instructors would be taken away. Both the parent store and the home office had been too suddenly narrowed and cramped to produce a finished and expensive business. But there was surprisingly little hardship in proportion to the handicaps.

Oct. 28
1940
Nov. 23
1940
Dec. 6
1940
Jan. 5
1941
Mar. 1
1941 Meanwhile, constant attention had to be paid to the new and success­ful methods in Europe, Asia, and Africa. Italy had invaded Greece over the mountains of Albania. Germany had overrun Rumania. Greece had turned the tables on Italy by desperate mountain fighting and captured Porto Edda. The British had put on some new desert fighting that captured Bardia and trapped 25,000 Italians. But the Allies' successes were short-lived. Nazi troops entered Bulgaria in the early spring,  p522 captured the Balkan states and Greece, taking, killing, and putting to flight many British. Much was to be learned from this mountain and winter fighting, together with that in Finland. New methods of employment and new types of equipment were coming to light. The burden upon the small, trained army in acquiring trustworthy information and testing devices for their practical worth was almost beyond bearing or carrying to the proper spot.

However, despite blasts of weather, hurry of housing, hampering in labor, shortages of a multitude of supplies needed instantly, and the consequent speed of revision and erection, sufficient and acceptable shelter and facilities were through suffering gained for the troops by spring. Twenty-nine large reception centers throughout the country were completed where the huge quotas of volunteers and selectees could be received, classified, uniformed, given preliminary training, and sent on their way. Twenty-one replacement centers were established where each arm and service could get the thirteen weeks of basic training, after which the novice was passed on to his tactical command. In this way the progress of army units went along unimpeded by any interruption of having to train recruits on the side.

March 8
1941 An indication of the increasing expansion of the army lay in a Congressional authorization to train 30,000 pilots and 100,000 mechanics annually for the air corps. Akin to that enlargement was the widened territory the army had to cover. New bases had to be organized in the Atlantic and occupied. Then came the most elaborate military training of large units ever to be conducted in this country. Every army in the continental United States was involved. Hitherto the larger headquarters had reckoned in divisions; they now did so in army corps. Jan.
1941 The year started with joint army, navy and marine corps maneuvers near Puerto Rico, parts of the first Division of the regular army participating. May 24‑
June 30
1941
June 1‑13
1941 In the spring the Fourth Army had extensive exercises at Fort Ord and Camp Hunter Liggett, California, as did the VIII Army Corps of Third Army in the Brownwood, Texas, area. June 2‑28
1941 Simultaneously the VII Army Corps and the Second Army, with attached GHQ Units, went nearly a month in the vicinity of Camp Forrest, Tennessee.  p523  June 16‑17
1941
Aug. 11‑30
1941 The Third Army had exercises for a fortnight near Camp Beauregard, Louisiana. The VII Army Corps and the Second Army with attached GHQ units held exercises near Camp Robinson, Arkansas. The V Army Corps contested against the VIII Army Corps near Camp Beauregard, Louisiana. The First Army consisting of the I, II and VI Army Corps held maneuvers in the Carolinas after which GHQ operated a maneuver between the First Army and the IV Corps of Third Army, with a mechanized corps attached to the IV Corps. The largest maneuvers were between the Second and Third Armies near Camp Beauregard, Louisiana. The main difference between these and prior exercises lay in the length of time each unit could practice continuously in the field. Instead of units being called for two weeks' training, which with preliminaries and postludes amounted on the average to little more than five days' actual practice for the larger units, warlike conditions were simulated in lengthier periods of knowledge and hardening and in the free type of exercise. Although there was still a lamentable lack of weapons and experience with them, the maneuvers were the most benefiting in the history of the country.

Probably the largest advantage throughout this period over World War I conditions was the 100,000 officers in the officers' reserve corps, made up largely of R. O. T. C. graduates of our colleges, who had been faithfully keeping up with their military training theoretically and practically in the backward years, many having taken their fourteen days' field training every year that appropriations would permit. In addition to that substantial preparation the army established Officer Candidate schools for enlisted men who had given promise in their basic training of becoming excellent leaders. By a three-month course it was able to turn out about 10,000 officers a year when running to capacity.

May 27
1941 The President aided our military preparedness signally when he declared an "unlimited emergency."​20 The War Department had a freer hand and more supple reactions from the public. It set up a General Headquarters of the field forces at the War College to direct and supervise training, and transferred  p524 to it the War Plans Division of the War Department General Staff. So that the field forces could operate with fuller attention to field training, local administration and supply were transferred to the 9 corps areas in the United States, which ceased to function tactically. General Headquarters Air Force took over the command of the 4 air‑defense areas of the United States and coördinated aviation, anti-aircraft, aircraft warning and balloon barrage defense in the various localities. Many new units had to be formed and old ones expanded — such as armored divisions, parachute troops, ski troops, anti-tank units, anti-aircraft units, mountain and desert troops, and motorized units. These expansions do not include the many new devices to be designed, improved and supplied especially in the Ordnance Department and Signal Corps.

An innovation in the assignment of officers to duty with troops came in with the emergency. Already the law for the older officers indicated the trend toward age as a criterion of efficiency and vigor. Sept. 5
1941 In the fall an order was issued from the War Department showing maximum ages for grades with troops. Those who were over the age were relieved, or would be when the particular age overtook them.​21 All above division commanders were exempt. If a promotion did not catch up with a second lieutenant before he was 31, he was unfit for troops; similarly with other grades. As it turned out, many of those relieved were more vigorous and efficient than the younger replacements. Commanders complained of having to begin much of their training all over again or be hampered by backward training because of sudden relief and inferior replacements. There was an appreciable loss of morale among many of the army's best and highest officers as they applied and suffered an iron-clad rule which made vigor an invariable function of age; as they saw officers who were accomplishing superior and extraordinary results with their men suddenly jerked away from their prospering commands; and as they unsuccess­fully strove to gain a promotion for the subordinate so as to have him attain a higher age bracket and stay on. On the one side many felt a  p525 larger proportion of the relatively few capable military trainers in the United States could be more largely used as a matter of economy. On the other, many felt that the step toward youth and vigor was progressive in meeting the excessive drains of modern war with higher efficiency and stamina, and that the loss of morale was negligible and could not be avoided on account of our late preparations.

1941 By summer the army was spread from Iceland and the Caribbean to Alaska and the Philippines. Port facilities of New York, Charleston, New Orleans, San Francisco, and Seattle had to be expanded immensely while troops were sneaked from the mainland without publicity. The strength of the forces was distributed thus: 456,000 to 29 divisions of 9 corps of 4 armies; 43,000 to 4 divisions of the armored force; 308,000 to 215 regiments of corps, army and GHQ troops; 167,000 to the air corps; 46,000 to harbor defenses; 120,000 to garrisons in the Pacific and Atlantic; 160,000 to corps areas which provided for the housekeeping and supply of 550 posts, stations, depots and ports; and about 150,000 selectees to replacement centers for training — making a grand total of 1,450,000.

A sad note was injected into this brisk war effort just when the army was beginning to feel that popular support of military strength at any cost had about crystallized. In early spring the War Department realized that legal limitations would by fall wreck the large armies which had been pieced together with so much pains and expense. The time of many National Guard units would expire after a year. Similarly the 75 to 90 per cent of reserve officers in various other units would be gone also, as would a large proportion of selectees. In other words, the vast force would evaporate with relatively few to carry on the training. In effect, the whole structure would have to be reared all over again from the first shovel­ful for the foundation, and most of the labor of a year would be lost to future training, if Congress did not under the "unlimited emergency" repeal the time limits, so that our land defense could be a going concern. The measure came before the Senate in midsummer and after heated debate was passed with an unimpressive majority. It caused arguments in the House which seemed to reveal more thought of the constituents than of the country as a whole. August
1941 It was passed in the  p526 lower body by just one vote — just four months before the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

Even though there were sprags of politics in the wheels of the army's development, the United States for the first time in its history, though late, with preparing before declaring — was getting ready before war was thrust grimly on the country and the people. This unprecedented undertaking was bearing fruit, and it looked as if the advantage of time and preparation our potential enemies had gained over us in the past decades might after all be offset. It was too heartening to be true. This time our future Allies needed every munition we could make, in contrast to the last time when we needed almost every thing they could make. Mar. 11
1941 The Lease-Lend bill became a law. We had to strip down and ship huge consignments over both oceans. As we were beginning to arm our comparatively meager force, we were suddenly disarmed and dismantled just before the extensive training periods of the year. Our unprecedented preparation, the foresight of a great President, the gruelling sweat and strain of the army had to be expended on our outposts of friendly nations. Naturally, certain elements of training at home had to lag.

Nevertheless, we had plenty of money if we did have little immediately to show for it. It was better than having no money and plenty of things to buy as in the twenties. The weaponless, large-scale maneuvers were immensely valuable for staffs and commanders to practice with large units, for hardening the troops, for finding out how badly large masses of transportation could be handled, for seeing how mechanization should not be used, and in general for gaining practical coöperation and manipulation through trial and error. Dec. 1
1941 By the end of the exercises much of what not to do had been learned and the soldiers had been promised target practice with the weapons they had been toting and manipulating but had not had a chance to shoot. Again eleventh-hour preparation disappointed them. Dec. 7
1941 One week after the last set of maneuvers Japan bombed Oahu, Wake, Midway, Guam, and the Philippine Islands in a Sunday morning surprise attack, and we were in the war lock, stock and barrel, with all our deficiencies on our backs.

We shelled out more money. Congress voted over ten billions  p527 for the armed forces, and the country rushed feverishly into production. Another bill went through in a few days to extend the draft for ages from 20 to 44. Politics, pacifism and isolation nearly disappeared in the catastrophe. Added to the thousands of casualties in Hawaii, and the vessels, planes and buildings destroyed, Dec. 24
1941 Wake Island after a gallant stand surrendered to the Japanese. The next day, Christmas, Hong Kong fell. Dec. 27
1941 Then the American and Filipino inhabitants of Manila, which had been declared an open city, were bombed by the Japanese.

Meanwhile, three columns from different landings bore down on the American and Philippine forces. In the first attack most of the aircraft and aviation facilities were destroyed, and there was a comparatively small handful of ground troops to oppose the landings of the Japanese.

The eyes of the world were focused on MacArthur. 1936 A year after he had taken charge of the military forces of the Islands he had been promoted to a Field Marshal by the Filipino Government while still an officer of the United States Army — another precedent broken. Dec. 31
1937 A year later he retired from active service of his country and devoted his attention to the upbuilding of the Islands. July 25
1941 Four years later he was recalled to active duty by the President as Commander of the United States Forces in the Far East. Successively he was made a lieutenant general and a general after being called from retirement — another precedent broken.

The United States especially and the world in general felt it was only a matter of weeks before Luzon would fall as all the rest of the key points between Japan and Australia had done. Slowly MacArthur was pushed back from front, rear and side. Daily the people of the United States awaited news of the capture and destruction of his small band. Daily he retired slowly, inflicting immense damage upon the enemy. Just when the trap was ready to spring and close upon his stubborn forces, he cleverly side-stepped them into the rugged, wooded Bataan Peninsula, where secretly he had prepared defensive positions.

In the United States training and production moved unobstructedly. March 28
1942 By early spring Congress had appropriated during the previous eight months over one hundred and sixty billions  p528 of dollars for the army and defense, whereas it had haggled over half that many millions a decade previously. It was possible to begin any number of projects hitherto denied. Orders for staggering numbers of weapons and munitions poured out upon manufacture. All sorts of specialized training were set on foot. Desert, air‑borne, and mechanized forces were inaugurated and put in training. March 27
1942 Major General Joseph W. Stilwell was promoted a lieutenant general and appointed Chief of Staff March 19
1942 (afterwards Corps Commander) to Generalissimo Chiang Kai‑shek, Commanding General of the Chinese forces in Burma, China and India. American divisions were in Ireland, Java, Australia, and islands other than Luzon in the Philippines.

The immense overhead in our national capital had grown unwieldy. The General Staff worked out a simplification of control and elimination of unnecessary offices at the direction of General George C. Marshall, Chief of Staff. March 9
1942 The tripartite decentralization was approved by the President. The three subdivisions were designated Ground, Air, and Supply and commanded by lieutenant generals​22 who reported directly to the chief of staff. A number of offices were dispensed with, such as the chiefs of infantry, cavalry, field artillery and coast artillery, and large powers were entrusted to the three commanders.

Still MacArthur and his gallant band were holding out unbelievably in the Bataan Mountains. March 25
1942 For his brilliant heroism he was accorded the Congressional Medal of Honor. By this time people of the Allied nations were stirred with similar impulses. MacArthur must be saved. He must be held on for higher command. Here was a possible savior. Feb.
1942 The President realizing the same need ordered him to repair to Australia, but MacArthur begged for a few weeks' delay. He wanted neither to depart from his command and his men nor to relinquish his fight in the Islands. But the administration was adamant in the end. MacArthur with his wife and son were spirited away in torpedo boats, traveling four nights and waiting under cover for three days Mar. 11
1942 for the plane which finally arrived and carried them off to  p529 Australia. Apr. 21
1942 There he was finally established as Commander-in‑Chief of the General Headquarters of the Southwest Pacific Area, an officer of the United States Army becoming generalissimo over foreign forces — another precedent broken.

But the sad remnants of the United States and Filipino divisions in Bataan were being worn down rapidly. After MacArthur left, the mantle fell upon Major General Jonathan M. Wainwright, who had been mainly responsible for the execution of the remarkable retirement into the Peninsula. Although he was promoted to a lieutenant general, he found himself in a sorry plight. Starvation, disease, exhaustion, and deprivation of the barest necessities of campaign had worn down his gallant units. The life line to the Philippines had been cut. The people of the United States who had in a previous decade objected to fortifying Guam or anything else, for fear of offending the Japanese, had seen to that. Two boat loads of supplies from America out of every three were sunk by Japanese explosives. Daily the men of Bataan looked to sea hopefully — then hopelessly. In the face of fresh Japanese numbers and mightier Japanese onslaughts Wainwright's force finally capitulated — worn down, worn out, killed, wounded or captured. April 9
1942 He made his escape to Corregidor with all he could rescue, about 3,800,​23 while Major General Edward P. King, Jr., executed the formal surrender of the sad remnants of our countrymen.

So far the United States had only loss, humiliation, defeat, and anxiety in World War II.

Those were the words of MacArthur in 1935. Those were the ideas we were then too busy to notice. Those were the sores in the hearts of the surviving little band of Bataan.

---

The Author's Notes:

18 The captain, major and lieutenant colonel were to be promoted after 17, 23, and 28 years' commissioned service respectively in the regular army; the second and first lieutenant after 3 and 10 years respectively. The promotion list of colonels was limited to 705. Majors and lieutenant colonels could not be promoted unless they had held the lower grade for 6 and 5 years respectively.

19 The first bill provided for ages between 21 and 36, later changed to 20 and 44. The act was modeled after the one of May, 1917.

20 He had declared a limited emergency on September 8, 1939, after the attack on Poland.

21 Major Generals (division commanders), 62; Brigadier Generals, 60; Colonels, 55; Lieutenant Colonels, 52; Majors, 47; Captains, 42; First Lieutenants, 35; Second Lieutenants, 31.

22 The first three were Lieutenant General Leslie J. McNair for the ground offense, Lieutenant General Henry H. Arnold, air forces, and Lieutenant General Brehon B. Somervell for supply.

23 Approximately.

◂ previous
Images with borders lead to more information. The thicker the border, the more information. (Details here.)
UP TO:		History of the United States Army	American & Military History	Home
A page or image on this site is in the public domain ONLY if its URL has a total of one *asterisk. If the URL has two **asterisks, the item is copyright someone else, and used by permission or fair use. If the URL has none the item is © Bill Thayer. See my copyright page for details and contact information.