Army & Navy - COMMAND: Minding Manners

• Share

In conformity with time-honored Army custom the bristling new brooms of Gen erals Eisenhower and Devers swept through each other's former command. In North Africa General Devers, fresh from England, bore down on "reports," especially "lazy reports," demanded action in the flesh rather than on paper. In Britain General Ike, fresh from Africa, ordered the well-pressed Military Police into still sharper uniforms.

The M.P.'s − walking show-windows for the Army − burgeoned with new white hel mets, white webbing belts, white leggings, and snow-white gloves which made even the peerage envious. For this glistening grandeur, the stiff-necks got an extra al lowance, but murmured through stern lips that the upkeep, especially of gloves, was terrific. The Provost Marshal called the new equipment an aid to dignity and blackout identification. The G.I.s called its rednecked wearers a distasteful new name: "snowdrop." Easy-going General Ike, who has a spit-and-polish West Pointer inside, decided the whole European Theater of Operations personnel needed sprucing up. He decreed snappier and more frequent saluting, and an end to the unsoldierly practice of looking away on crowded city streets, when a salute was to be given or acknowleged.

Officers were instructed to halt non-saluting G.I.s, take names and numbers, put them on report. G.I.s were told to halt any officer failing to return a salute, give him the same treatment. One ugly rumor was that G.I. provocateurs, who had previously saluted only officers with packages, were hunting the unthinking.

One major, on a typical two-block walk in London, where Army foot traffic is heavy, found he had returned salutes 212 times. Next noon he made the distance with his arm simply frozen at the proper angle.