Evening star., 1941-07-07
Realistic War Games
Planned 10 Weed Out
inefficient Officers
Commanders Face
Custer if They Fail
Tests in Muneuvers
BY JOHN GROVER,

It's likely that officers will be the
only casualties this year in the
United States Army's new, all-war-
Notwithstanding maneuvers.
The guys in the ranks will dc
as they're told. The big brass hats
who do the telling are on the spot.
What's more, they know it.
1t. Gen. Lesley j. McNair, gen.
eral headquarters slightly deaf chief
Of staff, has ordered a new kind of
war game, one that puts it squarely
up to ranking officers to prove they
know their stuff, or else.
There's more than a suspicion
that some Army officers-this goes
for Regulars, National Guards and
Reserves-are ill-equipped to COM
mand.
The new maneuverS are frankly
planned to weed out dead wood.
Old-tvpe maneuvers were a sort
OF cross between a chess game and
o couple Of innings of make believe.
They pretended scant brigades we're
whole divisions. Colored pins repre-
sented this and that.
The forces declared Kings X at
night in the old maneuvers. En-
listed men headed for the nearest
juke joint: officers of both sides
gathered for friendly argument to
justify sticking this pin here and
that one there. 1t was all very
chubby. 1t bore about as much re-
lation to war under field conditions
as a bean bag battle between picked
teams of the Girls Friendly So
ciety.
Big Time Maneuverx.
It wasn't the Armys fault, Be-
fore the people got hep to defense
needs, the Army couldn't get money
for equipment. Congress, playing
politics, insisted on keeping small
units stuck uselessly around at out
posts of Indian war days. The
brass hats couldn't bring troops to-
gether for full-scale maneuvers.
It's all different now. There's to
be S24 100000 available for these
maneuvers. and Gen. McNair's do
your-tsuff rules are in force.
keynote of the McNair plan is
realism. There won't be any Kings
x stuff. Wars are run on a 24-hour
basis. and that's the way these
naneuvers will go. If commander
wants to slam five divisions at the
enemy flank. that means moving
5000 actual men, not colored pins.
Doughboys eat more than pins. too
That means the brass hats have to
plan for $4,000 meals three times
dav.
The opposing forces will have
fronts and flanks and rears to pro-
teot, too-real square miles of
ground, not Tets pretend areas
on a map.
It'll be actual warfare. as near
as human ingenuity can make it,
with the single exception that bull
lets will be blanks.
How 1t Works.
Suppose Gen. Marmaduke Puffer
and Gen. j. S. Blank command op-
posing forces. The games start.
Old Jughead Fuffers transport
breaks down. His troops don't get
their rations on time. His guns
don't get new supplies of ammu-
milton, Tactical forces, incompe-
tently deployed, are surrounded and
sobbled up by Leatherpuss Blanks
smartly- units.
1t won't make any difference
Gen. McNair hopes. that Jughead's
got drag back in his home State.
where he got his appointment as
National Guard commander because
his brother-in-law delivered those
five crucial counties to the Governor
last election. Jughead just hasn't
got what it takes to command troops
In force. Therell be new recruit
In the ranks Of retired generals
when the Redistribution Board
considers his sloppy record in ma
heuvers.
The same thing will happen to
subordinate officers. On the bright
er side, the officers who know their
business will get a break.
Break for Good Men.
low-standard officers can get
by in peacetime. The cream of the
offlcers' corps comes to the TOP in
war. Battle stress and emergency
bring out your Napoleons and
Grants and FORESTS. They NAV
be awkward in a drawing room.
they may have no political pull:
they may be, like Grant. the last
man you'd pick for a soldier.
It's fatal to wait until war comes
TO md out. France was cut to
pieces before they learned clioues
and politics had riddled the officer
personnel with dry rot.
That's why Gen. McNair has made
the maneuvers as much like real
war as possible. The actual deploy-
ment, provisioning and supplying
OF war-strength troops under field
conditions will show up the unfit.
What's more. they'll be shown IN
a. incompetent before their incom-
petence kills men and loses battles