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Mr. BLANDFORD. We have it in the Civil Air Patrol. It is an auxiliary of the Air Force and youngsters--I think as young as 14 or 15can enter the Civil Air Patrol program. I am sure that the Air Force has statistics on the number of people they eventually get through the Civil Air Patrol.

Mr. GAVIN. Has that been publicized to such an extent throughout the Nation that they are familiar?

General LEE. I am sure it has, Mr. Gavin. It is a very important auxiliary to the Air Force procurement program. And it is being carried out on a national basis. It is a civilian acivity. I think that it would be a very fine place for this young lad to become interested and work with the Air Force idea.

Mr. GAVIN. I am glad to get that information.

Mr. RIVERS. Each year they bring those outstanding students up here, when they have that big dinner up here for the Congress, they bring those fine young men up here with them who have completed that program.

Some of them, the outstanding ones.

General LEE. I would like to go back one moment, Mr. Chairman, if I may, with regard to this discussion we had, for Mr. Blandford's benefit, on the college, high school level men in the aviation field.

If we were to raise our standards again and go to the 2-year college man, then we would have the trouble that I believe the Navy has. Mr. BLANDFORD. I am not taking issue with you. General LEE. I am only trying to help you.

Mr. BLANDFORD. The answer is simple. The Air Force needs more pilots than the Navy. The Navy can therefore stick to their qualifications, little higher qualifications, because you have just so many people in the country who want to fly, and a certain portion want to go in the Navy and a certain portion in the Air Force. You need more, therefore, you have to lower your standards to get the larger numbers you need. The Navy doesn't need as many, so they are trying to hold the standards they have got. They may have to lower those to keep what they are trying to attain now.

General LEE. That is right, about 90 percent of our aviation cadet group has less than 2 years of college.

Mr. BLANDFORD. That is a very important statement, I think. Would you repeat that?

General LEE. About 90 percent of our aviation cadets have less than 2 years of college. The aviation cadet group as I said earlier will be providing a smaller proportion of our pilots than the ROTC program in the future but it is a group that we must maintain and keep our pilots coming from.

Mr. RIVERS. All right.

You are going to have to integrate your Air Force Academy students right along with your Air Force who will weigh students or whatever you call that group at university. It is the same as the Holloway plan.

General LEE. It is a different plan.

Mr. BLANDFORD. Straight ROTC.

Mr. RIVERS. And you are going to have to integrate them along with those young men who want to be integrated.

General LEE. We see no problem there, Mr. Rivers. Those lads from the Air Force Academy will receive their commission as do the other two Academy graduates today.

Mr. RIVERS. But whatever you take from the Academy, where he is not a flyer-he is not a flyer when he finishes his course, isn't that true?

General LEE. That is true. He will not at the moment, be a finished flyer.

Mr. RIVERS. He will just have rudimentary training and reciprocal training and no jet training to amount to anything, he will be an observer, that is all. Then if he decides to go to flight school, how are you going to reconcile him with that boy who has no college degree who is in flight school and having the same rank?

General LEE. That is happening today. We have West Point graduates today and Naval Academy graduates going to the flying school as second lieutenants.

Mr. RIVERS. There is no problem.

General LEE. No, sir; if it were a problem it would be there today, but it is not.

Mr. BATES. Back about 1949 I understand from figures which were published at that time that approximately 50 percent of the officers in the Air Force had college degrees. Is that figure correct? General LEE. I don't know.

Mr. BATES. What is the figure today?

General LEE. We have the figure for today. I will ask for it here. As to the 1949 figure I cannot say.

Mr. RIVERS. The MATS group don't have a great number of degrees. General LEE. No, sir.

Mr. RIVERS. A lot of those are transport pilots.

General LEE. No, sir; many of our pilots do not have degrees, that is because this aviation cadet source has been a noncollege group, primarily.

The overall level of the Air Force officers with 4 years of college or better at the moment is 43.7 percent.

Mr. BATES. You have dropped about 7 percent.

General LEE. That would be so, if-I am not aware of your figures. Mr. BATES. That would be expected if you have gone down to high school level.

General LEE. That is right, and with any expansion in that group. Mr. BATES. You don't have any figure there on pilots, do you? Colonel WELLS. Yes, sir; I do. In our regular pilots we have 52.5 percent, in our nonregular pilots there are about 22.7.

Mr. BATES. Nonregular, you mean a reservist?

Colonel WELLS. Yes, sir.

Mr. BATES. If you weight that figure then according to the whole you come out with what, around 30 percent?

You have about 80 percent of the officers in the Air Force today are reservists.

General LEE. That is about right.

Mr. BATES. The later figure you gave us is around 30.

Colonel WELLS. I don't have that figure.

Mr. BATES. Well, you have a 30 percent spread there and you get 80 percent of the figure, as a matter of fact it would be just a little lower, around 30 percent.

Colonel WELLS. Right.
General LEE. Yes, sir.

Mr. RIVERS. Any other questions from General Lee? (No response.)

Mr. RIVERS. Thank you, General, that was a very fine statement. General LEE. Thank you.

Mr. MILLER. I would like to associate myself with your remark about General Lee's statement.

Mr. RIVERS. I am glad to see you are so conversant with the problems of the other services. It indicates we do have a little unification, after all, in the Pentagon. I don't think we ought to get on here, with the Army taking such a first round beating on this reduction, unless we have a larger membership in the committee.

General, we want you to have a good audience, too.
Mr. BLANDFORD. Öff the record.

(Discussion off the record.)

Mr. RIVERS. Could you come tomorrow morning?
General YOUNG. Yes, sir.

Mr. RIVERS. 10 o'clock on the dot.

General YOUNG. I will be here.

Mr. RIVERS. Thank you.

(Thereupon, at 11:45 a. m., Thursday, February 17, 1955, the subcommittee hearing adjourned until 10 a. m., Friday February 18, 1955.)

CAREER INCENTIVE ACT OF 1955

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 1955

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

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

Mr. KILDAY. This morning, we renew the hearings on H. R. 2607, to increase certain pay and allowance.

We have Maj. Gen. R. N. Young this morning.

General YOUNG. May I present Colonel Brinckmann and Major McCabe?

Mr. KILDAY. Will you introduce them for the reporter so we will have their names?

General YOUNG. Yes. He has them.

Mr. KILDAY. Do you have a prepared statement?

General YOUNG. About 22 pages.

Mr. KILDAY. Go ahead and read it without interruption.
General YOUNG. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman and members of the House Armed Services Committee, I appreciate this opportunity to appear before you on behalf of the Department of the Army in support of the career incentive bill, recommended by the Department of Defense.

The need for this legislation is clearly evident when we consider the rate of personnel turnover experienced by the Army. On this chart to your right front you see the gains and losses by fiscal year and the total strength at the end of each year.

In fiscal 1953, for example, our losses were almost 800,000 men and we had to bring in almost an equal number to meet our strength needs. Our turnover that year was well over 50 percent of our enlisted strength.

In fiscal year 1954 our net enlisted losses were about 550,000, and during fiscal 1955, we estimate about 700,000.

This is costly and it greatly lowers the military effectiveness of our active Army. We can closely estimate the cost of training a replacement but we cannot measure the loss in know-how and experience when a man leaves the service.

Our regular enlisted strength was 546,575 at the end of November 1954. This is scarcely more than was our strength in 1950, at the outbreak of the Korean war.

The strength of our inducted personnel and other enlisted Reserve components on active duty as of November 30, 1954, was 676,664. Our inducted strength for the coming year will be close to half the total enlisted strength of our active forces.

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