Evening star., 1932-05-12
Killing the r. O. T. c.

When, under Gen. PerShings active
direction and in light of his experience
in France, Congress enacted the Ma
tional Defense Act Of 1920. the provision
for an adequate supply OF trained Army
officers for national emergencies was
regarded as almost the keystone Of the
whole new structure. 1t was based on
the fundamental proposition that an
army without leaders is no army at all.
1t sprang from the theory, obvious to
sehoolboy, that bravery without intel
ligent command Is as powerleSs against
we'll -ofhcered foe as if that foe were
to be attacked with broomsticks and
popgunS.
Precisely to that sort of futility would
congressional foes of preparedness now
condemn the United States Army. The
War Department appropriation bill re-
ported to the House of Representatives
week ago bristles with assaults on ma
tional defense, i'll conceived in the name
of economy. In no single particular
does the pacifist thrust deal deadlier
damage than its threat to wipe out the
Reserve Officers Training Corps.
BY deleting an appropriation of $2,109,-
1853, for suspension Of the fourteen-day
training pay hitherto available for R.
o. T. C. officers, the proposed 'econo-
mics" would make impossible the in
valuable fortnight's training which
some twenty thousand young men an
nually receive These men form the
nucleus of the corps of officers upon
which the Nation must depend, along
with its Regular Army officers, for
leadership in the field should the dire
fate OF war suddenly overtake this
peace-loving country.
The congressional sssailants Of ma
tional defense do not stop short OF I'M
poverishing the r. o. T. c. They
propose, at q picayunish saving Of ST.
O8O, T73, to abolish the camps at which
Reserve officers go through their brief
Midsummer training. The entire OFF,
cer-training system, in other words, Is
to be put out of business, lock, stock
and barrel. The anti-preparedness
zealots do not shrink from yet another
stab at defense. They would suspend
for one year the Citizens Military
Training camps from which, annually,
a group of youths is graduated for
eventual inclusion in the Reserve Off,
GERS Training Corps.
Will the American people, like the
Bourbons of France, never learn any
thing? Did it not soak into the ma
tional consciousness that the main
reason 1t required the United States
more than year to throw its full
weight into the scales of the World
War, after declaring war, was our
hopeless state of military unreadiness?
Does not every man and woman in
the country today, old enough to re-
member 1917 and 1918, realize that we
were almost fatally slow in sending an
army to the firing line because OF our
lack of a sufficiently large number of
officers grounded, at least, in the fun
QdIAIcAboIo VI AcaNClSllAp AL wal
Gen. Douglas Macarthur, chief of
staff, has just told Congress that 'in
the last analysis, our whole defensive
system rests upon the efficient per-
Torrance of corps of regular officers
numerous enough to carry out the
vitality essential duties imposed upon it
by the act of 1920" The men on Capt.
tol Hill now gambling with national
safety propose not only to reduce the
total of regular officers from $4,000 to
10 900, but to annihilate the possibility
of dependence upon a reserve supply In
emergency.
The current session reeks with inepti-
tude and ignorance Ineptitude and ig-
norance in responsible statesmen are
bad enough under any circumstances,
as the country is now painfully discov-
ering with respect to the economic sit
uation. When they go the length OF
undermining the Republics dearest con-
cern-national defense-it is time to
speak plainly, and to say that these
things must not and shall not be.
The r. o. T. c. must be preserved.