General COLLINS. We have always detailed our people only temporarily to the General Staff Corps.

DISCUSSION OF LENGTH OF TOURS OF DUTY ON THE ARMY STAFF

Mr. COLE. What is the average tour of a person in the General Staff duty?

General COLLINS. Three or four years now, frequently less than that. Normally, it used to be 4 years.

Mr. KILDAY. That is the statute that you are repealing here.
General COLLINS. Yes.

Mr. VINSON. When you repeal that statute, you could get back to the German concept?

General COLLINS. I beg your pardon?

Mr. VINSON. When you repeal the statute saying 4 years, you could, under the broad flexibility of section 201, keep a man indefinitely in the General Staff.

General COLLINS. Yes; I guess you are right, Mr. Vinson. I had not thought about that, but I guess that is right.

Mr. VINSON. Then that does get to the concept of the German Staff system, from what you said.

Mr. COLE. In substance, but not in legalized form.

Mr. VINSON. Yes, in substance.

Mr. COLE. And that was verified by your statement. You said you had a policy in which you insist on your Staff people going out for duty with the troops.

General COLLINS. Right.

Mr. COLE. Which would indicate that their permanent, main specialty was staff duty and that occasionally they had to go out and get experience with the troops.

General COLLINS. No, sir. We wanted to avoid

Mr. COLE. That is why I asked what the tour of duty was with the General Staff.

General COLLINS. No, sir. We wanted to avoid the possibility. If you think this will strengthen the hand of a future Chief of Staff, to say that no person will be detailed on the General Staff in Washington for example, or in a General Staff Corps, for more than 4 years in succession, I would certainly have no objection to that.

Mr. COLE. Do you think it would strengthen the hand of the Chief of Staff to do that?

General COLLINS. Actually, it has never worked out that it needed strengthening. We do it by regulation today. Again, we would have some cases, I can readily see, that might arise. Suppose we have an officer in Germany now on the General Staff of General Handy over there and he has been serving there on the General Staff for 3 years or so and we need a man here in Washington on the staff who is intimately familiar with the conditions in Germany and we bring this man back. He could only serve for 1 year, then. It might be highly advisable to keep him for 2 years, perhaps, particularly a man late in his career, like a general officer, for example, or a senior colonel. It may be the last assignment the man is going to have. And the best use you might be able to make of him for the benefit of the Army and the country would be to switch him, we will say, from Germany and bring him

right here to Washington and retain him on the same type of duty with the General Staff in Washington.

It

Mr. COLE. What do the regulations say now on the subject? General COLLINS. Only with respect to duty in Washington. doesn't apply to the field-don't you see?—and the law does not either. Mr. COLE. The provision in this bill, if it is determined to put it in, could apply only to Washington.

General COLLINS. Yes, sir; it could. And I would urge that it apply really only to Washington.

Mr. VINSON. That is the only place it should apply.

General COLLINS. And I would have no objection to its being in the

law.

Mr. VINSON. Then, to get your viewpoint, you think it would be all right to put a limitation on the length of time that an officer can serve in Washington in the Department of the Army on the General Staff? General COLLINS. Yes, sir.

Mr. KILDAY. Wasn't that true before the war?

General COLLINS. Yes, sir; it was.

Mr. KILDAY. What was the tour? Four years?

General COLLINS. Four years.

Mr. VINSON. It has been suggested that that be repealed.

General COLLINS. Yes, sir.

Mr. VINSON. I think it strengthens the staff to constantly get the viewpoint of the man fresh from the field.

General COLLINS. I thoroughly agree with you, Mr. Vinson.

Mr. VINSON. And then you might even go to this extent: that he must have a certain length or tour of duty in the field before he can come back. Because you see you can send him away from here after 4 years and let him stay with the troops a year and then order him right straight on back to General Staff duty. Now what you want is a constant rotation?

General COLLINS. That is right.

Mr. VINSON. To get the viewpoint of the men and give every fellow an opportunity to come to Washington to work in the Staff.

General COLLINS. Yes, sir.

Mr. VINSON. Because that is the highest branch of the service and the highest honor probably for a career man?

General COLLINS. No, sir: I don't agree with you there. In my judgment——

Mr. VINSON. Whenever a man is on the Staff in Washington City, the country thinks he is a pretty good officer and he has a pretty good assignment.

General COLLINS. Yes, sir. But they ought to think more of him if he is commanding the Second Armored Division in Texas.

Mr. VINSON. I know. But the country looks upon a man on the General Staff as an outstanding officer with an important billet. General COLLINS. That is right, sir.

Mr. VINSON. And it is an important billet. But you want to rotate constantly that billet in the service.

General COLLINS. Right.

Mr. VINSON. To give the man commanding troops in Texas, who has demonstrated his qualifications down there, an opportunity to come up here. Let him come here and rotate it.

60266-50-No. 187- -7

And then I think further after he goes back to the troops he should not be ordered back immediately. He should be required to be with the troops a certain number of years.

General COLLINS. We would agree with that; Yes, sir.

I do not want in any sense now to appear argumentative about it, Mr. Vinson, or contentious.

Mr. VINSON. Oh, no.

General COLLINS. I am trying to give you my best thought.
Mr. VINSON. That is right.

General COLLINS. There is one draw-back to prescribing that too tightly. Again let us think in terms of an emergency, but not an emergency declared by the Congress where the war powers would come in. Yet, it is a decided emergency in view of the world situation. We might find that we have some people that are the best-qualified people in the Army in certain areas or in certain positions. They have left Washington and they have been gone for only 6 months. And a situation arises where we just simply have to get those people back in Washington.

Mr. VINSON. Well, General, you can accomplish that by saying that those men ordered back are ordered back specifically by direction of the Secretary. The theory of Congress and the theory of the legislation was to get new blood and new personnel.

General COLLINS. Yes, sir.

Mr. VINSON. Because you see today you do not have to do anything. You just order him back.

General COLLINS. But actually we do do it. We thoroughly agree with the principles that you have just enunciated. I feel very keenly about it in fact.

Mr. COLE. I am glad to hear you say that.

Now I am wondering what you feel would be a proper division of the time a person should spend in Washington before he goes out to the field and may return? A period of 3 years on the staff and then 2 years

General COLLINS. I would say a maximum of 4 years in Washington and a minimum of a year away.

Mr. COLE. Those are the extremes. I am wondering how you feel about a standard practice of 3 years in Washington and 2 years in the field?

General COLLINS. I would prefer not to have that, Mr. Cole.

Mr. COLE. Why?

General COLLINS. Because, again, of this business of some flexibility in the thing.

Mr. COLE. We will work that out in other ways.

Mr. VINSON. Yes. You should have flexibility.
Mr. COLE. As a standard proposition.

General COLLINS. Oh, as a standard proposition, I would say probably 3 years is adequate.

There is another factor that is involved, and that is mileage money, travel money back and forth.

Mr. VINSON. That is right. That is one reason I am talking about this. Because he does not get his seat cushion fixed before he is ordered back to Washington.

That is the trouble. That eats up your money.

General COLLINS. Yes, sir. If we make it too short a tour

Mr. VINSON. That is right.

General COLLINS. It eats up your travel money. And, frankly, my experience has been that it takes at least 6 months after a man has been here, if he has never served here before, before he becomes thoroughly acquainted with his job and with the relationships with the other members of the staff.

Mr. COLE. That only happens once in his whole career.

General COLLINS. Yes. The next time he comes back that is all settled. But in his initial tour-and a good many of these chaps serve only one tour in Washington, most of them serve only one

tour

Mr. VINSON. I would say if he serves not exceeding 4 years he has to go back in the field and serve at least 2, unless in an emergency or direct orders by the Secretary.

General COLLINS. If you put some flexible phrase in that, it will be thoroughly agreeable to me.

Mr. VINSON. Whenever the Secretary feels that an emergency and such a crisis has arisen whereby this man is needed back here, it can be less. Put the responsibility directly on the Secretary. Because then the man knows he goes to Washington and he cannot stay but 4 years. Then when he goes back to Texas or Camp Benning, he knows under normal conditions he will stay there at least 2 years before he has to pack up his furniture and move his family back to Washington.

General COLLINS. That is right, as long as we have some flexible proposition.

May I go off the record?

Mr. KILDAY. Off the record.

(Statement off the record.)

Mr. VINSON. You can exempt the Chief of Staff. You need not make that applicable to the Chief of Staff. But with the Army Staff generally, a tour of duty of 4 years here is long enough. And let him go back and get acquainted with what the infantryman looks like and the artilleryman looks like, except being acquainted with what strategy and a piece of paper looks like. And then let him stay there under normal conditions at least 2 years before he can be ordered back.

Now we have some similar provision in reference to going to sea. General COLLINS. Right, sir.

Mr. VINSON. Get new ideas. They have to go back every 2 years and rub elbows, and get acquainted and then see what is going on. General COLLINS. Yes, sir.

Mr. VINSON. It is a good thing to get back to the ground roots.
General COLLINS. I would be perfectly happy to have it.

Mr. KILDAY. Wasn't the normal tour of duty on the Staff before the war 3 years?

General COLLINS. Two to three years. There was no hard and fast rule on it. We usually try to keep a man for a minimum of 3 years in order to save travel money.

Mr. KILDAY. Of course, under the Economy Act you had to keep them longer than that.

General COLLINS. Yes, sir.

Mr. BLANDFORD. Mr. Chairman, may I point out one problem here that I think we should discuss before we put a limitation in here, and that is the 2 years in the field requirement. You have a lot of technical-service people here that I do not know whether you could use in the field as such. In other words, if you confine it to duty with troops, it would be almost impossible for you to find billets for them.

General COLLINS. I would suggest, Mr. Chairman, that our staff get together with your staff.

Mr. VINSON. That is right. But you understand what is running through our mind.

General COLLINS. Surely; and work out some language which we will then submit to you for approval.

DISCUSSION OF ARMY GENERAL STAFF

Mr. COLE. Mr. Chairman, I would appreciate it if the general would indoctrinate me a little further and tell me what part of the Army staff is the General Staff.

General COLLINS. The General Staff now are the members of the four divisions: The G-1 Division, the G-2 Division, the G-3 Division, and the G-4 Division, and

Mr. COLE. Are those the basic branches?

General COLLINS. No, sir. They are not basic branches at all. They are the four divisions of the General Staff here in Washington. Officers assigned to those four divisions, plus those assigned to the Office of the Chief of Staff and his deputies, constitute the Department of the Army General Staff. And I think it should also include those assigned to the Office of the Secretary of the Army. Those are the members of the Department of the Army General Staff. Mr. KILDAY. That is what you mean when you say

General COLLINS. In Washington. Now, from a division on up in the field, from the organization of a division on through all higher units, it is an exactly similar thing-in other words, the chief of staff of the infantry division and the four general staff divisions of the infantry division, or of a corps, or of an Army in the field, make up the general staff of those units.

Mr. VINSON. I want to get just a little information. How many officers of the Army are assigned today in the Office of the Secretary of Defense?

General COLLINS. Do you have that figure at hand? We can get you that, Mr. Vinson. I don't know what the number is.

Mr. VINSON. Because I am of the opinion that the Office of the Secretary of Defense, including officers and civilians, has a personnel strength of about 2,700 people.

General COLLINS. I don't know about that, sir.

Mr. VINSON. And I was just wondering how fast the umbrella is growing.

General COLLINS. I don't know, sir.

Mr. VINSON. I just wanted to get that information, as we sort of are in a round-the-table town-meeting discussion here.

General COLLINS. Yes, sir. We will have that.

Mr. KILDAY. We are spending a good deal of time on this, but it is very important, probably the most important part of the bill.