Mr. HOUSTON. Would it produce a practical army?

General CONNOR. You would have to make certain limitations to keep a noncommissioned officer and specialist corps.

Mr. HOUSTON. Then you would not recommend the transfer to the reserve at the end of one year as a mandatory provision?

General CONNOR. No, not as mandatory. I would say, in the general case, yes, for I do not believe in keeping men on and training them year after year and wasting your money in so training them. In my opinion, the interests of the Government would be best served by a yearly turnover of all except a small group of noncommissioned officers and experts that we call specialists.

Mr. HOUSTON. Why the choice of three years?

General CONNOR. It was originally written into the law after a great deal of thought, and I know that the committee discussed. many different figures and finally arrived at that term of enlistment. Mr. HOUSTON. Would you feel, from your present knowledge of the situation, that another figure might be better than a 3-year mandatory provision?

General CONNOR. Well, I would hesitate to say that it would be better. A 7-year enlistment, with 2 years with the colors and 5 years with the reserve, would give you more men. However, that would increase the number of new enlisted men you have to get every year. This arrangement of three years and four years does not disturb present conditions. General Bridges now knows how many men he has to enlist every year, and based on the same 3-year term he will not have to enlist any more men each year than he does now. A shorter period of service with the colors and a longer period in the reserve, however, would give you more men for about the same

money.

Mr. HOUSTON. You have a 50 per cent turnover now, or more, perhaps?

General CONNOR. More than that.

Mr. SPEAKS. General, take the case of the average young man of military age, liable for duty in case of an emergency. Assuming that 10 per cent represents the maximum figure of training desired, I mean in a practical way, not in an ideal way, how far will he advance toward that 10 per cent maximum figure with one year's training?

General CONNOR. I do not understand what you mean by 10 per

cent.

Mr. SPEAKS. Let the figure 10 represent the desired degree of training for the average young man of military age liable for military duty. How nearly will he approach the 10 maximum figure with one year's training experience?

General CONNOR. For the average run of soldier he could be made a perfectly well-trained soldier in one year, but he can not be made a key man.

Mr. SPEAKS. I understand what you mean.

General CONNOR. He can be made a good soldier.

Mr. HOUSTON. That was my idea.

Mr. WAINWRIGHT. I thank you very much, General.

Now, Mr. Chairman, I should like to call on General Bridges, The Adjutant General, for any observations that he may care to make in reference to this bill.

STATEMENT OF MAJ. GEN. CHARLES H. BRIDGES, THE ADJUTANT GENERAL

General BRIDGES. Mr. Chairman, there are just two features of this bill, in a general way, that have interested me. One is procurement and the other is keeping track of the reservist when he is furloughed to the reserve.

Recruitment of the Army, of course, is very difficult under present conditions. We have discharge by purchase, discharge on account of dependency, and discharge on account of minority.

With those three types of discharge it is very plain, I think, to everybody that it is very hard to keep the Army recruited to 118,750, or an average of that number throughout the year.

The matter that occurs to my mind is that procurement may be adversely affected by this 7-year enlistment, although that is problematical; I am not at all sure about it.

The Adjutant General will have to devise some means of keeping track of these reservists when they are furloughed to the reserve. That is quite a job. It is going to require probably more clerks, and that costs money.

The question there involved is, in case of an emergency whether a large enough proportion of those men furloughed to the reserve can be made to come back to the colors. When they are furloughed to the reserve they take up their occupations in civil life; they get married: they are in a different environment, and while there is still a tie with the Army, they are tied to the Army, when the emergency comes, they may be able to present many reasons why they should not come back to the colors; in other words, they will present many reasons why they should be exempted from further service.

For that reason I am dubious as to whether, notwithstanding the fact that we have a turnover of about 70,000 men a year-I am very dubious whether in case of an emergency we can call to the colors that many men. My personal opinion is that we shall have to depend in case of an emergency, as we did in the last emergency, on some draft act to get the men necessary to prosecute a war.

Mr. BOYLAN. General, my experience since I have been a Member of Congress is that in a case where a young man wants to be discharged from the Army I find that upon investigation the root of the trouble in many cases is due to the fact that you give them “the works" too soon when they go in.

Many of these boys are from high school and from good homes, and you give them the full-rigor of the discipline right at the start. and that takes something out of them. I think if you put a limit on it and give it to them in homeopathic doses, and start them off easy and not give them a big dose right at the start, you might keep more of them in and have fewer trying to get out.

That observation is simply based on my experience during the past six years, when I have found that the policy seems to be, "We have got you now, and we are going to give it to you," and you just hand it to them. I think if you would modify the handling of the recruits a little bit you would keep more of them in and you would have fewer discharges. That is merely a suggestion.

General BRIDGES. I think that that is quite true.

Mr. WAINWRIGHT. Notwithstanding your doubt as to the full potentiality of this measure, do you not think if you reduced by twothirds or less the number of men whom we talked about it would be very advantageous?

General BRIDGES. That is a little difficult to answer.

Mr. WAINWRIGHT. You are going to spend a good deal of money. It is a modest sum, too, over a long period of years before the emergency comes. Whether that money would be well expended in taking care of and keeping track of these reservists is a matter on which I am somewhat dubious myself. My office has made a great study of this matter for four or five years, and I can not help feeling dubious as to whether or not the money would be well spent.

(Thereupon the committee proceeded to the consideration of other business.)