Armed Forces: The Great Gripe

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"I've been a Democrat all my life," wrote an angry Army reservist to his Congressman, "but I led the booing when Kennedy's picture came on the newsreel." Last week other Congressmen were receiving scores of similar letters, and newspapers across the U.S. bloomed with headlines about the unhappy lot of reservists and National Guardsmen who have been recalled to active duty since the Berlin crisis began boiling. What was going on? The answer: nothing more snafu than usual in times of rapid military buildup.

Last summer, when Russia began to threaten war over Berlin, the Kennedy Administration decided that there was no time to beef up the armed forces with a draft or a recruiting campaign, turned instead to the reserves and the National Guard as the only available source of trained manpower. Since then, the Army has called up 119,000 men, the Navy 8,000, and the Air Force 28,000. The Air Force and the Navy have had relatively few gripes, mostly because they could recall men not as individuals but as members of well-trained units that needed little preparation for combat.

Falling Back on the Fillers. But the Army was different. Reserve units averaged only 61% of authorized combat strength, National Guard units 70%. To bring recalled reserve and National Guard outfits up to snuff, the Army had to fall back on some 40,000 "fillers"—stand-by reservists, who belonged to no particular unit and did not really think that they would ever be summoned short of actual war. From the fillers have come most of the squawks about the recall system. Of the 17,000 Army reservists' applications for deferment, fully 80% have come from the fillers.

When the fillers reach camp, they get even unhappier. The Army, after dislocating their lives, seems unprepared to get them back into uniform—if a uniform is to be had. Last week at Fort Lewis, Wash., a filler wearing slacks and a black jacket complained: "I've been here since Nov. 3, and I don't have a uniform yet. I've been down to supply several times, but they just don't have it."

Indeed, the Army has not had on hand the materiel to equip many of the recalled reservists. The lack of sheets, field jackets and cutlery touched off a rash of complaints. Asked Pfc. Jack Powell in Fort Polk, La.: "Have you ever tried to eat your corn flakes with a fork?" Wisconsin's Republican Congressman Alvin E. O'Konski charged that the 32nd Infantry Division of Wisconsin's National Guard had been mobilized at Fort Lewis without adequate food, clothing, bedding and fuel. Cried O'Konski: "The gallant 32nd has been betrayed and demoralized." In fact, most men of the crack 32nd were embarrassed by O'Konski's bleats, which had resulted in Fort Lewis career men calling the outfit the "crybaby division."

Little on the Shelf. By far the most legitimate complaint was the Army's lack of weapons and heavy equipment needed to bring reserve units up to fighting strength. As an example, the 15 2nd Medical Air Ambulance Company at Fort Ord, Calif., has none of its authorized HUiA helicopters, is trying to make do with a pair of less adaptable H-igs.