Mr. HARDY. That leads me to come back to the same questions that I raised earlier, General, about fighting effectiveness after you have gone through this reduction in personnel.

You have indicated that you have a pretty good rate of reenlistment

now.

Your Marine Corps turnover, from your experience, is not as bad apparently as some of the others that have testified?

General SHEPHERD. It just increased recently, sir.

During last summer, it went down to as low as 10 percent there for a while.

But the point I wanted to make was that the bonus reenlistment I believe has helped us to retain reenlistments, which in turn add stability and technical knowledge, whereas if we got a little bit more I think we would do better.

Mr. HARDY. Well, with the reenlistment bonus which is already in effect and this proposed pay bill which we have and assuming that is passed, what will be the fighting effectiveness of the reduced size of the Marine Corps as compared to its present fighting effectiveness?

General SHEPHERD. I think as we get more experienced men, the effectiveness is bound to be better.

No question about that. A man with 1 enlistment of 3 or 4 years reenlisting, he is a much more effective and proficient fighter than one who is just a boot.

Mr. HARDY. At least you won't have to spend as much time and effort in training him?

General SHEPHERD. That is very definitely one item. That is the reason we are able to get along this year, because we have not a very great turnover in personnel which enables us to have more bodies in our combat organizations.

Mr. RIVERS. Well, General, the fighting effectiveness of the United States Marines is always 100 percent, isn't it?

General SHEPHERD. Yes, sir, that is right.

Mr. KILDAY. Thank you, General Shepherd.
General SHEPHERD. Thank you, sir.

Mr. KILDAY. Now the committee will stand in recess until 10 o'clock tomorrow, in room 304, the subcommittee room.

(Whereupon, at 12:08 p. m., the subcommittee was adjourned, to reconvene at 10 a. m., Tuesday, February 8, 1954.)

CAREER INCENTIVE ACT OF 1955

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 1955

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES,
SUBCOMMITTEE No. 2,
Washington, D. C.

The subcommittee met at 10:05 a. m., Hon. Paul J. Kilday, chairman of the subcommittee, presiding.

Mr. KILDAY. The committee will be in order.

We will continue this morning with the hearings on H. R. 2607. We have with us Assistant Secretary Hugh M. Milton of the Army, who will appear in lieu of Secretary Stevens. Will you come around, Mr. Secretary, and will you go ahead and give your statement without interruption?

STATEMENT OF HON. HUGH M. MILTON II, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF THE ARMY, APPEARING IN LIEU OF HON. ROBERT T. STEVENS, SECRETARY OF THE ARMY

Secretary MILTON. Mr. Chairman, the Secretary of the Army, Mr. Stevens, asked permission to appear personally before this committee, so important did he feel that this matter of legislation was to the Army, but, unfortunately, he was recalled before the Appropriations Committee and as inadequate as I am, he has asked me to appear in his place.

Mr. KILDAY. We are glad to have you, Mr. Secretary.

Secretary MILTON. Secretary Stevens had a prepared statement. If it meets with your wishes I would like just to file that for the record and extemporize on 1 or 2 of the important points in order to save your time.

Mr. KILDAY. Without objection, the statement by the Secretary will be included as part of the record.

(The statement of Hon. Robert T. Stevens, Secretary of the Army, is as follows:)

STATEMENT BY ROBERT T. STEVENS, SECRETARY OF THE ARMY, ON CAREER

INCENTIVE ACT

Mr. Chairman, members of the Armed Services Committee, the opportunity to make a brief statement in support of the career incentive bill is very much appreciated. I feel there is a pressing need for the early enactment of legislation for the Army and its sister services which affect pay and other emoluments of our career military personnel.

Let me say at the outset that we should never attempt to buy the services of our career personnel. Mercenary armies have usually failed for the lack of a fighting heart. Ours is not an Army of mercenaries-its career personnel are dedicated to their country and the fundamentals for which we stand. They

serve steadfastly to further our national purposes in every corner of the globe. For that reason I believe we should look carefully at the problem of career incentive. Today's civilian pursuits, with their attendant high rates of compensation, are attracting competent men from the military services. We want not only to hold these men, but we need to resolve the doubts of those who might otherwise choose their country's service as a career. The solution to this problem lies in the degree to which the burden of raising and educating a soldier's family and of providing for the needs of later years can be made to compare somewhat more favorably, than at present, with levels of civilian life. Adding to the problem is the erosion of the indirect emoluments which have traditionally been part of a career soldier's compensation. A young man screened by the military who chooses the service and defense of our Nation should be reasonably rewarded for his services.

A full measure of dignity should be restored to the illustrious profession of arms in order to insure that the leaders of tomorrow will meet the standards of those who have gone before. The career military service should be attractive to the highest type of young American. The quality of leadership so necessary to the future security of our country can be attained in no other way. If we are willing only to pay for "bargain basement" leadership, the certain outcome is that we will acquire and retain just that.

We must insure that the proper proportion of the top quality of American youth will be attracted to the military services. I am not now speaking for the Army alone. I am speaking for the Army, Navy, Marines, and the Air Force. On the one hand, we cannot indulge in the mistake of believing that leaders of merit can be nurtured in an atmosphere of indifference. On the other hand, we cannot afford the false economy of high turnover and the retraining which naturally results.

Every time we retrain an enlisted specialist, a noncommissioned officer or an officer we are putting a greater burden on the taxpayers of our country.

Among our junior officers are many capable leaders. The Eisenhowers, Marshalls, MacArthurs, Bradleys, and Ridgways of years to come are there-performing their duty inconspicuously out of the public's eye-but doing the jobs that we expect them to do in the superior manner which has been traditional among military men in this country. However, our past good fortune should not be allowed to lull us into expecting that this fine crop of potential senior leaders will mature naturally or remain in the Army so as to take their places at the head of the Military Establishment.

To today's younger officer, the question of whether to remain in the Army involves his weighing the heavy responsibilities demanded of him against the rewards for rendering such service. It is within our province to control the conditions which all too frequently have caused him to find his rewards too modest and to seek these rewards elsewhere.

We in the Defense Establishment have prepared and recommend to you the career-incentive bill before you today. This proposal is designed to eliminate some of the inequities which hamper the career serviceman. It provides for a selective pay raise for career soldiers; it increases hazardous-duty pay; it increases per diem allowance; and it provides a long overdue dislocation allowance.

The other service Secretaries feel just as strongly as I do about the need for this legislation. I feel that it is vital to our national security and to the proper discharge of a grateful Nation's obligation to those who serve in its Armed Forces.

Secretary MILTON. The bill pending before you, known as the Career Incentive Act, provides incentives in four major areas. While the measurement of these incentives is measured in terms of dollars, we would not have anyone believe for one moment that we think in terms of a mercenary Defense Establishment, because history has attested so many times to the inadequacy of that type of defense.

As you so well know, and as I so well know, we have always had a Defense Establishment made up of devoted and dedicated individuals, both enlisted and commissioned. Our success in battle has attested to the validity of that type of philosophy.

If I am prophetic in the least, I think that the American Army will always continue to be manned by men of that same deep devotion

and dedication to duty. It is by reason of this factor that we who are in mufti, the civilian leaders of the Army, feel that there is a compelling moral responsibility for us to lay before you our thoughts on this bill and ask you in your wisdom to give heed to the thoughts which we have expressed.

The bill, as you all so well know, provides for a modest increase in pay. It provides for an increase in hazardous-duty pay, for an increase in per diem, and the initiation of what we choose to call a dislocation allowance.

We are finding in the Army that the civil life, with its high degree of compensation, is taking from our midst an all too large number of competent leaders. We want to find the means whereby we can retain that competent talent, and at the same time we have the problem of resolving a doubt in the minds of the young officers who are weighing the possibility of a career.

We feel sincerely that the solution to this problem is going to be in the degree to which we can show the man already in, and the man who was weighing the possibility of a military career, how he can adequately take care of his family and educate them and lay something aside for the later years, in comparison with what he would get on the outside.

As you so well know, there has been, as well, a slow erosion of the indirect emoluments which have been traditional with the military service. We feel definitely that we must restore a measure of dignity to the profession of arms if we are going to insure the competent and qualified leadership today which has been characteristic in the past. The military career must be made attractive to the young man. We realize that today in the Army there are many devoted young men who are serving inconspicuously and who are carrying the purposes of this Nation to the far reaches of the earth. Those are the Eisenhowers, the Marshalls, the MacArthurs, the Bradleys and the Ridgways of tomorrow. These are the men that we must retain if we are going to have the sense of security which we believe we need at this particular time and in the foreseeable future.

It is with the thought that you have a dedicated and devoted personnel in the United States Army-men who are dedicated to God and duty and country; men who are going to serve you, this country, loyally and faithfully-that we in the Army sponsor and endorse this bill.

We have already had evidence by our increased enlistment rate that the bonus which you gave for reenlistment last year has increased the interest of enlisted men in the enlisted bonus in staying in the Army. It is evidence that by reason of the attention that is being paid to these problems, by men in high position, young men are being encouraged to stay in in both the enlisted ranks and the commissioned ranks of our Army.

To the end that we can have competent leadership in the future that measures up to the standards of the leadership of the past, Mr. Stevens wanted me to say to you we heartily endorse the bill now pending before you.

Mr. KILDAY. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.

I would like to ask you to enlarge on one matter you mentioned early in your extemporaneous remarks. That is, with reference to

dislocation allowance. We, or some of us at least, feel that the very frequent change of station is, of course, expensive moneywise. But perhaps more important even is the uprooting of families and the taking of children out of school and putting them into another school; and we feel the necessity of family separations constitutes one of the big handicaps we have, and it is one of the things that probably makes the service unattractive, no matter how much a man wants to stay in the service.

We, as married men ourselves, realize that if the family will not permit him to stay in the service he is not going to stay in the service. While the dislocation allowance would compensate in money perhaps, at least to some extent, it would do nothing on these other dislocations or separations which might have to take place.

I would like to have you enlarge on your thinking as to whether the dislocation allowance would increase rather than minimize the difficulty that we have here. In other words, would there then be an attitude that we are taking care of his expense, so we need not hesitate even as much as we may have in the past on frequent moves?

Secretary MILTON. I can assure you that the position of the Department of the Army would be quite to the contrary. We would be just as attentive to having him in a settled position in case the dislocation allowance is granted, as we are at the present time.

I am certain you are aware of what we call our Operation Gyroscope, by which we are taking units from certain localities to foreign fields and then returning them. I think that impinges somewhat upon the Congressman's thought. We want the men to have a feeling of security in a certain locality so that they can purchase their homes and live nearby.

Mr. KILDAY. Mr. Secretary, your assurance that you will be as vigilant as you have been in the past does not help me much, because frankly I do not think that the services have been very vigilant about it.

There have been entirely too many changes of station which could have been avoided.

Mr. RIVERS. That is across the board in all of the services.

Mr. KILDAY. That is all of the services and not just the Army. Back in the days when a man realized he had a 3-year tour of duty, whether foreign or domestic, and he knew it was coming and he could settle down for 3 years and his children were going to be in school for 3 years, it was a relief.

It seems to me a great deal of change of station has been had which might have been avoided by better planning, perhaps.

Secretary MILTON. Well, sir, I think your statements are valid. Maybe we have not been as vigilant. We have numerous problems, as you so well know. Our intention has always been not to do any more than we have been doing to dislocate them. Your words, however, will be taken to heart.

Mr. KILDAY. Do others have questions to address to the Secretary? Mr. GAVIN. Mr. Chairman.

Mr. KILDAY. Mr. Gavin.

Mr. GAVIN. No. I want to commend you on that particular point. I think you are definitely correct. It would appear to me that the men who are handling these assignments would carefully investigate each individual to ascertain what his situation is. Sometimes he is