Colonel BRINCKMANN. That is right.

Mr. RIVERS. At that point, could we have that part, Mr. Blandford, inserted in the report, where they make that interpretation of the existing statute?

Mr. BLANDFORD. We discussed that last year if you will recall. The previous reenlistment bonus bill I think required a man to complete a stated period of time before he could enlist in the Regular service, and then be eligible for a reenlistment bonus. At that time, we were thinking of the man joining the National Guard and going on 2 weeks training duty, then enlist in the Regular Army and be eligible for reenlistment bonus. So the previous law precluded him from doing that under the Career Compensation Act. Then when we brought up the reenlistment bonus bill last year, we decided that if a young man was that ambitious and intelligent, to figure out a way to obtain a reenlistment bonus by doing exactly that, that he should be entitled to that.

Mr. RIVERS. It is clear in the statute.

Mr. BLANDFORD. It is clear in the statute.

In fact, it was put in there deliberately.
Major MCCABE (reading):

4. Definition of reenlistment. In this section of these regulations a “reenlistment" means-(a) An enlistment in the Regular Army after compulsory or voluntary active duty in the Army; or (b) A voluntary extension of an enlistment for 2 or more years.

Mr. KILDAY. Of course, that was one of the purposes we had in mind was to get the men to sign up.

Mr. BLANDFORD. After completion, did you say?

Major MCCABE. After compulsory or voluntary active duty.
Mr. BLANDFORD. After completion of it?

Major MCCABE. You would have to have completed one period of service.

Mr. BLANDFORD. That is not true, though, for the National Guard man or reservist. Under existing law a National Guard man or reservist can serve a short period of time as National Guard man and then enlist in regular service and that is considered a reenlistment.

Major MCCABE. But his tenure as National Guard man would be terminated upon enlistment in the Regular Army.

Mr. BLANDFORD. Is it true an inductee in the second day in camp can go down and reenlist in the Army?

Major MCCABE. I can't quote the law on that, but under the Army regulation no reenlistment bonus may be paid to a member who reenlists during his period of basic recruit training.

Mr. BLANDFORD. But after he has finished 16 weeks, he enlists and that is considered a reenlistment.

Major MCCABE. Yes, sir.

Mr. RIVERS. There is no question in the law on that?

Mr. BLANDFORD. No.

Mr. ARENDS. How much would an inductee get at the end of two years of reenlisting?

General YOUNG. It depends.

Colonel BRINCKMANN. The monthly basic pay to which the man was entitled to at the time of discharge times the number of years he is enlisting for.

Mr. KILDAY. 180 would be the least, wouldn't it?

Mr. BLANDFORD. For 4 years, it would be $320. It is the number of years times his monthly pay.

Mr. RIVERS. He couldn't save that much in 2 years in Congress. [Laughter.]

Mr. KILDAY. Is there anything further from the general? (No response.)

General YOUNG. Thank you.

Mr. KILDAY. Thank you.

We will now hear Brigadier General Nelson of the Marine Corps. We are glad to have you, General.

You have a prepared statement, you can go ahead.

General NELSON. I have Major Stockman and Major Perkins with me this morning, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I appreciate this opportunity of representing the United States Marine Corps in connection with the proposed Military Career Incentive Act of 1955.

In the constant indoctrination and training of our officers and men we have always pointed with pride toward the intangible rewards connected to service life-such things as opportunity to demonstrate leadership, esprit de corps, satisfaction in serving one's country, and devotion to duty.

These are a few of the psychic goals or objectives which contribute. to a high order of motivation and normally tend to guarantee leaders of high caliber. These motivating factors must characterize our career personnel if our standards are to be met and maintained.

Through our promotion processes our officers and noncommissioned officers advance through positions of increasing responsibility which correspondingly demand increased knowledge, experience, and skills. The Hook Commission, in its report completed in 1948, recognized the fact that service pay should be directly related to responsibility, knowledge and skill. The base pay tables submitted by that Commission reflected this relationship. With the enactment of the Career Compensation Act of 1949, the basic principle of this relationship was clearly set forth by law. This represented a great stride forward in the area of pay legislation. The slight upward revisions in 1952 were the answer to the then existing requirements for adjustment necessary to bring military pay into closer harmony with the cost of living.

Since 1952 conditions have further changed and it is now apparent to everyone that further adjustments are required. This could have been done by further upward revisions of the old law. Instead, the Department of Defense Committee that examined the area of military pay and accomplished the basic preparation of the proposed Career Incentive Act of 1955, developed another principle relating to military pay-the concept of adjustment through the addition of career incentive pay increments. This is a logical extension of the philosophy contained in the Hook Commission study.

I believe that the proposed Military Career Incentive Act of 1955 now under study of this group is a very realistic attempt to link material inducements and tangible rewards to the psychic or intangible rewards traditionally associated with service life.

This represents a more valid approach toward a solution of the military pay problem than an across-the-board or uniform increase based solely on a cost of living differential.

This proposed legislation presents an opportunity to realize a greater return on our investment in military personnel because of its selective appeal to the very officers and men the Armed Forces wish to attract and retain as career personnel at a time when those officers and men must make a decision on the future of their military careers. The many provisions of this bill are generally designed to cope with some of the most urgent areas of concern that exist in military personnel administration today.

(1) Base pay, in which increases are manifestily required.

(2) The bill increases extra hazardous duty pay in recognition of the increased hazards associated with the jet age.

(3) It provides a dislocation of allowance which will reduce the amount of personal financial sacrifice long associated with service. family moves due to permanent change of station orders, an area that long has needed remedial action.

(4) It provides for increased per diem in order to prevent first class military men from being forced to live under second class conditions while on legitimate Government business or else paying the difference out of their own pockets.

(5) The proposed act applies to retired personnel as well as to those on active duty. This is an important point, for immediate career incentives to persons on active duty would have reduced appeal if they are countered by discrimination against persons on the retired list. Retired pay represents an equity built up over a long period of years, and it must maintain a constant and healthy relationship to active duty pay. We must never allow our retired personnel to be placed in the position of forgotten men.

In conclusion, I want to say that I consider the principles upon which this proposed act is based to be sound. I believe this bill looks into the future. The enactment of this measure should decrease personnel turnover and help to stabilize the Armed Forces as a whole. I view it as a sound investment. In retaining an increasing number of potential career officers and noncommissioned officers who otherwise may be expected to leave the Armed Forces each year, the savings in experience and training costs generated by this proposed legislation will characterize it as being a great forward step in military pay thinking.

Mr. KILDAY. Thank you, General Nelson.

Are there questions of the general?

Mr. RIVERS. I just want to say this, Mr. Chairman.

Do you think it is just as important to hold out to a man who is going to remain on active duty for the indefinite future that there are benefits in retirement as well as benefits in active duty? General NELSON. I do, very much so.

Mr. RIVERS. That is a great factor in retaining these promising and worthwhile men in the early days when they make a definite contribution.

General NELSON. That is a most important factor.

Mr. HARDY. If I might pursue that just a little bit further. General, is it your thought then that this tying of the pay of retired personnel to the revised scales for active duty personnel would indicate a permanent policy of making adjustments in retired pay every time there are adjustments made in active duty pay?

General NELSON. Yes, sir, I think that that is very much justified.

Mr. HARDY. In other words, your thought is that we should establish a precedent here with respect to the retired pay for military personnel?

Mr. KILDAY. No; that we should not break a precedent.

General NELSON. I think that is more proper, we should not break a precedent.

Mr. HARDY. Then do I understand-Mr. Chairman, I hadn't realized that that was a consistent precedent.

Mr. KILDAY. I don't recall a time-and I have been on pay bills since 1942, and each time we have done that. In 1949, there was a little change, that they were given an option to qualify to one or the other, dictated by a very practical situation: The retired list had become so great since the war under the provisions of Public Law 18 of the 76th Congress, and so many men were retired, that in order to prevent a militation against the retired system and retired pay we had to be practical in 1949.

But I don't believe there has been a time in history, although I can't go back farther than 1942, but I am sure somewhere along the line it has been testified in this committee, that there has never been a time when retired personnel were not increased when the active duty personnel were increased, except in 1949 there was an election as to whichever would be the larger amount.

Other than that, there has never been a time.

Mr. HARDY. I want to be clear on that.

We are continuing a precedent rather than establishing a precedent. General NELSON. I believe that is correct.

Mr. BLANDFORD. May I pursue this a little further with General Nelson, because this issue that has been raised could become troublesome on the floor in this respect: We increase the pay of a second lieutenant in this bill in order to make the service more attractive for him to remain on active duty.

We increase that by 25 percent. We increase the pay of a first lieutenant by 22 percent, and let us just arbitrarily take the pay of a lieutenant colonel which we increase by 11 percent with over 16 years of service.

Supposing we are faced with this question on the floor. You are passing this legislation in order to make the career more attractive for people who are going to get out if you don't increase their pay for their next increase, next promotion.

Why should you increase the pay, we will say, of a retired first lieutenant by 22 percent? He received the pay for the responsibility he assumed at the time he served as a first lieutenant, at a time when you didn't have the problem of trying to make the service that attractive.

Now, you come along and say you are going to increase his pay by 22 percent; you don't have to increase his pay because he is already retired. You are trying to make it attractive for somebody in the future.

General NELSON. Mr. Blandford, the pay increases are designed to be a just compensation for service rendered. The fact that the pay increases happen to come at a certain time to induce a person to remain in service, is a function of the bill that is before you. It does not alter the fact that it is an adjustment.

Mr. BLANDFORD. Here is what bothers me, General, because I can see this coming up. We have warrant officers today on the retired lists who were warrant officers prior to the time there were four pay grades established.

Now we didn't give a lot of these retired officers, these warrant officers, retired many years ago, the pay of a W-4 on the theory there was no such grade in existence as a W-4. Somebody will translate that same theory to this pay scale and say these people did not have that responsibility at that time; why should you give them varying increases in their retired pay because of a career incentive act?

In other words, and I am serious when I make this point: This whole bill varies all the way from 3 percent up to twenty-some-odd percent. Now, it just happens that if a man retired for disability at one particular phase of his life, he would get a much less increase in pay than if he had stayed on active duty for another 2 years.

So it is not a percentage increase for that retired man; it happens to be when he was retired, and that is particularly true for the man who is retired for disability.

Mr. KILDAY. Are you talking about warrant officers?

Mr. BLANDFORD. No, sir, about all officers.

It is a tough question to answer.

Mr. WILSON. Specifically, along that line, Mr. Chairman, in looking at this scale, to support Mr. Blandford's position here, a sergeant with over 22 years' service would have a 2.04-percent increase, and that means his retired pay would go up 2.04 percent if you went by the same scale, whereas a master sergeant would get 10.10 with the same years of service.

Looking over into the officers we have a second lieutenant retired after 30 years would get 14.83 percent, a major general with 30 years would get 8 percent. And I can see just worlds of problems coming with that condition.

Mr. BLANDFORD. With respect to the retired list: I think the services have got to explain it, and I think there is a very good explanation for it, but I think we had better get it in the record so everybody will know it, and know it thoroughly, so we can answer that question, because it is going to come up.

Mr. BENNETT. Let me ask the general. It seems to me that possibly two lines of reasoning may be helpful along this point. One of them is, of course, this bill does have some bearing on the rise in the cost of living, and therefore, that applies just as well to retired personnel as it does to people who are on the job at this time.

But more important than that, it seems to me and I hope you agree with that, General, that the personnel who are going to make a career of the armed services are certainly going to observe the type of treatment which is given to retired personnel and if they get the idea that as soon as the Government can turn their back on them, as soon as they are retired personnel they can shuttle them around any way they want and forget about them.

And just think that their duties have already passed and we don't have to think about them in the future. Don't you think that that would have a very bad effect on the morale of people who might now be thinking of going into

General NELSON. That is very true, that is the thought I had when I said increasing retired pay was a most important feaure of this bill.