The CHAIRMAN. What is the proposed increase of the WAAC's? The CHAIRMAN. You expect if it is increased to 150,000 that it will release 150,000 soldiers? General WHITE. Not quite, no, sir. The CHAIRMAN. When will you reach the saturation point, the point where one for one will be released? General WHITE. I doubt if we ever would be able to release one for one. The CHAIRMAN. You have been able to do it so far. General WHITE. Not entirely. The WAAC's carry their own overhead. You always have that to consider. I said in some places, in Some activities, they had released one for one, depending upon the type of duty they are put on. I think the corps people estimate, that for example, on the motor drivers, the automobile drivers, a woman was equal to three-fourths of a man. I believe that was the ratio they used. Especially in very bad weather they probably cannot work as long hours as you can keep the soldiers out. Some of the men drive automobiles 12 to 14 hours a day. Senator DoWNEY, Mr. Chairman, may I ask a question, please? Senator DowNEY. General, in selecting the women for this service, is any attention given to the different States from which they are drawn? Are they numerically allocated in any way to the different States? General WHITE. Senator, we allot quotas for recruiting purposes, just as we did when we were recruiting the men for the Army. It is a common practice to allot to each service command a certain quota. That is their recruiting objective. That is usually based on a population ratio. You give the big quota to the place where the people are. To what extent that is followed in the actual recruiting of the WAACS I do not know. I had hoped to have Director Hobby here. I think she could probably give you that information. Senator DowNEY. Do you happen to know the number that the Navy expects to recruit? General WHITE. No, sir. Their present program I think is 25,000. Whether they expect to go above that, I do not know. Senator DowNEY. May I ask this? To what extent, if any, might it be expected that these auxiliary women in the Army might perform duties that might otherwise be performed by civil-service civilian women in the Army? General WHITE. To a very limited extent, Senator. We do not plan in the War Department, to use women to replace civil-service employees, except in those rather unusual cases where we simply cannot get the civilian employees. As you know, as the manpower situation becomes worse, it becomes increasingly difficult to get civilian employees. A good illustration of that is in the post exchanges. In Some of the camps that are more or less isolated we cannot get civilians who must travel 30 or 40 miles to get to work in those post exchanges, and in such circumstances we probably will use auxiliaries to operate the exchanges in those places. If you have in mind such positions as the secretaries, stenographers, and file clerks in the War Department, we have no plan for using them in that manner. In fact, we have been quite insistent that where we use WAAC's they must be placed there to release enlisted men, and we do not now use enlisted men for such duty. Of course, that is not true on an Army post or station. The clerical personnel there is largely military, and the WAAC's will do that kind of work there. Senator DowNEY. I might just make this comment for the benefit of the committee. I do not know whether it is entirely relevant, but I was informed, upon apparently authentic authority, when I was recently in California, that the Army and Navy expect to need in California, in the next 12 months, 75,000 to 100,000 additional civilian employees under civil service, and the civil-service head out there says he just cannot conceive of where those employees are going to be found. But whatever that may be, this number would be additional to that number, would it not? General WHITE. Yes, sir. I cannot imagine how the Army would have any such requirements for additional civilian employees in California as that. Senator DOWNEY. Well, your San Bernardino air base for one thing, one of the officials told me that air base would take 20,000 civilian workers. At Hunters Point, where they are going to put in one of the greatest drydock repair plants in the world, it is going to take 20.000. Sacramento is short 10,000. Mare Island is short 5,000, and so on. I can give you itemized figures if you are interested. General WHITE. I question whether the WAAC's would have any effect on that particular thing, although we can use them at some of the depots where they are doing repair work, maintenance work. They are perfectly capable of being used for that duty. Senator JOHNSON. What about a waiting list? Do you have a waiting list? General WHITE. You mean now not on active duty? Senator JOHNSON. Yes. General WHITE. Of the 31,000 that I mentioned, which is the present strength, about 7,000 are not yet on duty. They are put on just as rapidly as possible. Senator JOHNSON. Does that comprise your full waiting list? Senator JOHNSON. That 31,000 is the over-all number? General WHITE. The 31,500 is the over-all number. Senator JOHNSON. So you have 24,000 actually in active service? General WHITE. 24,000 actually in active service, either in training or in the field. Senator JOHNSON. I would like to have your definition of the waiting list of 7.000. They have all been approved, they have been accepted and qualified? General WHITE. They have been accepted, enrolled, but not yet ordered to duty. Senator JOHNSON. How many more do you think are trying to get into the service? General WHITE. We are accepting them as fast as they apply. Last week we recruited something over 4,000. Senator JOHNSON. That 4,000 is included in this 7.000? General WHITE. Yes, sir. One difficulty we now have is in providing housing so as to bring them on to duty rapidly. We do not like to keep them waiting. We think we will have that situation solved in the very near future, by the first of March. We are trying to avoid additional construction. We are using available facilities by shifting troops. We do not anticipate accumulating a big backlog of women not on active duty. The CHAIRMAN. What about equipment? There is some talk about the shortage of clothes, uniforms. General WHITE. As far as I know, Senator, the equipment situation is all right. The CHAIRMAN. You are equipping them as fast as you can get them? General WHITE. We are equipping them as fast as we can get them; yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. Do you think you will be able to get 150,000 this year? General WHITE. Well, if the present recruiting rate is any indication, we will; yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. Four thousand a week? General WHITE. Four thousand a week. We should by July 1 be pretty close up to our 150,000. Senator DOWNEY. Mr. Chairman, if I might ask one further question, please? The CHAIRMAN. Certainly, Senator. Senator DOWNEY. General, I understand that the Army at the present time is planning for 8,200,000 personnel, including the men and officers, by the end of this year. General WHITE. That is right. Senator DOWNEY. Whatever that figure may be. If the Army is successful in recruiting this 150.000 into the Women's Auxiliary, would that in any way tend to diminish that figure fixed for Army enlistment? General WHITE. No. In arriving at the 1943 figures, we contemplated that we would have the 150,000 women. Any additional number over that, Senator, I think, would materially affect any consideration for future troop bases. It might develop that these women, becoming as effective as it is now apparently evident they are going to be, will enable us to effect some economies within the figure you mention. In other words, we figure the strength of 7,500,000 enlisted men, 675,000 officers, and 150,000 WAAC's. I do not recall the figure as to the nurses. I think the nurses may be 40,000. Senator DowNEY. I regret I was not here at the private hearing. Does the 8,200,000 that I have seen include the WAAC's? General WHITE. No, sir. Senator GURNEY. General, as I understand it, you are trying to set up a program for training the WAAC's, the new ones coming in. General WHITE. Yes, sir. Senator GURNEY. Without additional construction? General WHITE. Without additional construction. Senator GURNEY. It is your plan to disperse them over the country in places where you can put them in quite large units, training units, from 1,000 to 2,000, or do you go down to 500 or what? General WHITE. Senator, I am sorry I cannot answer that. Right now we have three fairly large training centers at Fort Des Moines and Daytona Beach, where they use hotel facilities, and Fort Oglethorpe, where they use existing facilities. We moved the troops out and put the WAAC's in. Now, for the basic training of the WAAC's, we are 82866-43- -2 Mr. BARNETT. They were paid out of the original appropriation. That did not have the limitation on. Senator LODGE. So the head man is not subject to confirmation, but the subordinates are? Mr. McNUTT. That is right. Senator O'MAHONEY. There is no uniform policy with respect to the confirmation of the regional and State directors in the various agencies. Mr. McNUTT. Mine is the only war agency where appointments are subject to confirmation. Senator O'MAHONEY. Mr. Chairman, if the hearing has been concluded, I want to ask a question with respect to an altogether different subject, and off the record. Senator KILGORE. Let us do something with this. I would like to get the reaction of the members of the committee on this, as to this particular list that is up for confirmation now. For instance, Senator Bridges said he would like to have a chance to read the histories of these men. Some of them have been sent to the Senators from the States from which the men came. Those Senators have been notified, and the others in the region have not. The history of each man is on file in the Military Affairs Committee. If the committee has no objection, we will pass the question of confirmation until the Monday session, and notify every member of the committee that the history of every man involving his region is on file in the office here and he can come up here and look at it. Senator O'MAHONEY. Do I understand that means the committee will act on the confirmations on Monday? Senator KILGORE. The committee will act on the confirmations on Monday, giving an opportunity to every member of this committee in the interval to come in and see the history of every man that he wants to see. Senator HILL. I move we adjourn. Senator KILGORE. If there is nothing further, then, gentlemen, we will adjourn. (Whereupon, at 12:30 p. m. the committee adjourned.) |