Chapter
II
Peacetime Practices
and Plans
- During the years of peace, the War
Department and its General Staff proceeded, as was their duty, to develop
plans for the mobilization of manpower in the event of war. Plans for the
use of Negroes explored various organizational possibilities. Some of these
were derived from the recommendations of World War I commanders. Others
came from the study of historical and sociological treatises. Still others
were the, products of a priori reasoning. At times, the plans were ahead
of the contemporary thinking of comparable civilian institutions. Religious
denominations, public school systems, and industrial plants, like the Army,
had to deal with problems of racial adjustment on a broad scale. Many of
these, again like the Army, had developed separate methods and sub-institutions
for their relations with Negroes. At other times, Army plans fell behind
developing contemporary practices. But they always included social and political
considerations along with purely military problems.
-
- The major problem, generally recognized
in planning for the mobilization of Negro troops, was how best to build
efficient military units from a portion of the population which, in general,
had had little experience in the skills and responsibilities that go with
efficient military administration and leadership and which,
under existing peacetime conditions, had little opportunity to develop them.
Neither in civilian economic and political life nor in military pursuits
had Negroes generally attained positions of the type that required the development
of technical, managerial, and leadership skills. While the lack of opportunities
for the development of demonstrable native capabilities was certainly a
factor in the low status of Negroes in the general American society, the
lack of development itself, no matter what the cause, could not be overlooked
if the Army was seriously to attempt to create efficient Negro military
units on a large scale.
-
- Presumably, it could build such
units from the available material by removing the burden of military responsibilities
and leadership from the Negroes themselves and passing it on to white officers
and possibly to white noncommissioned officers. This method had been widely
used in the organization of the United States Colored Troops in the Civil
War and in Negro units in World War 1. A second method would be so to reduce
the numbers of Negroes called for military service that the importance of
the question would diminish to a near-vanishing point. A third method would
be to abandon altogether the attempt to build Negro units and place Negroes
in units along with white soldiers.
- [21]
- The first procedure would be ideal
from the point of view of providing units with more experienced leadership,
but almost every commentator was quick to see that, aside from the possibility
that through the subtle two-way interplay of racial prejudices Negro units
with all-white leaders might be no more efficient than in the past, this
plan would be attacked at once because of its implicit denial of opportunities
and incentives to all Negroes, whether qualified or not. Both of the other
approaches, it was felt, would be political and social dynamite. As for
reducing the number of Negroes to such a point that the problem of how to
employ them would become a small one, this might work in peacetime, but
in time of war, political and social pressures could be counted upon to
create demands from both Negroes and whites for increased rather than diminished
use of Negroes in the military services. If planned units for Negroes did
not exist, attempts to place them in existing white units might be made.
The majority of Army officers and War Department officials charged with
determining policy on the employment of Negro troops did not believe that,
within the existing social structure, there was any possibility of creating
units racially mixed on an individual basis. It might be customary for Negroes
and whites to work together in most parts of the country, but it was not
customary for them to live and play together. Nor was the working relationship
generally comparable to that which is required of men operating in a military
team.
-
- Where Negroes and whites worked
together in civilian life, Negroes were generally in subordinate positions
or in types of jobs traditionally reserved for them. They were the unskilled
workers and helpers where whites were the skilled workers and foremen; they
were the porters and janitors and watchmen in office buildings where whites
were the accountants and salesmen and managers; they were the domestics
and heavy laborers for white employers. The skilled and professional workers,
the tradesmen and craftsmen among them, though engaged in a broader variety
of pursuits than was generally realized, were few in comparison with the
vast majority of unskilled workers who held neither responsible nor leadership
positions in civilian life. Working relations between Negroes and whites
in the same plant were seldom characterized by the upward and downward flow
of both authority and confidence so essential to esprit in a military unit.
Army planners took note that the United States Navy no longer employed Negroes
in peacetime at all, except as mess boys, because of the problem of "mixing
the races" aboard ship. Even the Navy's traditional Negro mess boys
were giving way to Filipinos, Chamorros, and Japanese. Abandoning the separate
Negro units was not seriously considered by the Army at all.
-
- The Army recognized that large numbers
of Negro troops would have to be employed in another war. They would probably
have to be employed in separate Negro units which would fall heir to all
the difficulties experienced in World War I, where separate Negro units
with racially mixed leadership, especially in combat units, were the rule.
The question was how to minimize these difficulties while still maintaining
separate Negro organizations
- [22]
-
- In its planning for the future the
Army, as already noted, had a core of Negro Regulars to consider. Their
presence affected both military plans and the reaction of the Negro public
to the Army as an institution.
-
- The four Negro regiments, the 9th
and 10th Cavalry and the 24th and 25th Infantry, were established by legislation
enacted in 1866 and 1869. The first of these acts, under which the Army
was reorganized, increased the Regular Army to ten cavalry regiments and
forty-five infantry regiments. Of the four new cavalry regiments two were
to have Negro enlisted personnel, and of the thirty-five new infantry regiments
four were to be Negro. The act of 1869 ordered the reduction of the infantry
regiments to twenty-five as rapidly as a consolidation of the existing regiments
could be made. Under the terms of this act, two of the Negro regiments,
the 38th and 41st, were consolidated as the 24th Infantry and the other
two, the 39th and 40th, became the 25th Infantry.1
The Revised Statutes of 1878, Sections 1104 and 1108, provided that the
enlisted men of two cavalry regiments and two infantry regiments should
be Negroes. There was no express repeal of these sections of the Revised
Statutes in any later legislation concerning the Regular Army.
-
- Therefore, although the National
Defense Act of l920, under which the peacetime Army was organized, did not
require the continued existence of any of
the Regular regiments-it spoke of units and not of regiments-it was generally
considered within the Army and by the Negro public that the Negro regiments
were required by law. During the period of successive reductions of the
size of the Army after World War I, the judge Advocate General advised that
since repeals by implication were not favored and that since earlier opinions
had held that to alter the composition of an arm or service by increasing
or diminishing the number of Negro organizations would be an exercise of
legislative power by the Executive, Negro units would have to be retained.2
-
- The question was of importance in
1922 for two reasons. In the reduction of the size of the Army many white
regiments had been placed in an inactive status. With prospects of further
reductions in the total Army strength, other regiments might be made inactive.
"It seems to me an absurdity," the Deputy Chief of Staff wrote
to the judge Advocate General, "that with the reduction of the Army
the War Department should be obliged to maintain these four regiments of
colored soldiers. Carried to the logical extreme, if the Army were reduced
to four regiments, it would necessarily have to be an exclusively colored
army." 3
The second reason was that by law the 9th Cavalry, then in the Philippines,
was due to return 400 men to the United States. There had to be an
[23]
organization on the mainland which could
receive these men. The prospect for the 10th Cavalry was that it would become
a recruit depot for the shifting of men to and from the overseas regiment.
The need to retain these two regiments if their current assignments were continued
seemed strong. At the same time, further reduction of the Army appeared to
make it possible that the 2d Division might have to be broken up, making two
of its regiments inactive, and that the 24th and 25th Infantry might have
to be included in the 2d Division. This would be "contrary to the policy
heretofore held of not brigading the two colors together." 4
-
- While the Judge Advocate General
did not believe that any of the four Negro regiments could be inactivated
except by legislative action, he did suggest two practical solutions: portions
of them might be made inactive, as had been done in 1890 when two companies
of each infantry regiment and two troops of each cavalry regiment, white
and Negro, were skeletonized to effect an overall strength reduction; 5
or the incorporation of existing Negro non-regimental detachments into the
infantry and cavalry regiments might achieve an over-all
- reduction of Negro strength though
the regiments remained.6
-
- Further reduction of the Negro cavalry
regiments was not going to be an easy matter. Under a general reorganization
and reduction of the cavalry in 1921, six troops of the 9th and seven of
the 10th Cavalry had already been ordered demobilized.7
Enlistments of Negroes, other than those who had been in the Army before
April 1917, had ceased in 1919.8
A further general reduction of the Army was ordered by an act of 30 June
1922. The 24th Infantry's authorized strength was thus reduced, and the
regiment had to absorb the Colored Detachment at Fort Benning, Georgia,
acquiring a surplus of Negro infantrymen that could not be absorbed elsewhere.
The surplus was prorated among all infantry regiments, with each white regiment's
actual strength reduced by a proportionate share of the 24th'" surplus.
This reduction in actual strength amounted to thirty men per regiment. Each
fullstrength white regiment was to cease recruiting until its strength reached
its authorized strength less thirty.9
A temporary cessation of new enlistments in the Negro regiments was ordered.10
-
- The Negro regiments were filled
to capacity-and remained so. Re-enlistments on the day following discharge,
- [24]
- or within twenty days for noncommissioned
officers, were regularly high. The Negro units lost few men through normal
discharges. Even before World War I these regiments had had a high percentage
of career soldiers; during the period of reductions nearly all men of these
regiments were professional soldiers. Vacancies and promotions became rarities
in most Negro units.
-
- In 1931 the Army found it necessary
to reduce further the strength of the Negro units. An expansion of Air Corps
units had been authorized by Congress in 1926. This expansion was to take
place in five yearly increments. The men for the Air Corps units were to
come from allotments to units of other branches. Negro ground units were
not required to contribute to the first four increments, but in the fifth,
or 1931 increment, they took their share of the reductions all at once.11
The reductions were coupled with the absorption of scattered detachments
by the regiments and with changes in locations which split the 10th Cavalry
and the 25th Infantry among several stations.
-
- The increase of Air Corps units
out of the Negro allotments meant more than the shift of men from one arm
to another. It meant a general reduction in the strength of Negroes in the
Army. Unlike the white units the Negro units had no new compensatory vacancies
available in the Air Corps, since the Air Corps did not accept Negro enlistments.12
The Negro units once more found themselves over-strength both in numbers
and in ratings. The War Department had to order a temporary cessation of
enlistments, re-enlistments, and promotions for Negroes. Because excess
men could be absorbed only by transfer among the few Negro units, the cessation
of enlistments and promotions, planned to last not more than six to twelve
months, persisted until 1934 in an acute form.13
Further, the strength of the Army was reduced at a time when, because of
economic depression, the demand by Negroes for enlistment was higher than
usual. Of the five years available for the Air Corps' increase, none, so
far as relations with the Negro public went, was worse than 1931.
-
- Although the original War Department
letter of instructions plainly indicated that the orders suspending recruiting
for Negro units were "Not for Press Release," 14
it was difficult to keep the news quiet. Before the month was out, the NAACP
had received copies of the orders from "two sources" and had written
President Herbert C. Hoover to inquire about their authenticity. "If
we interpret these facts correctly," the NAACP said, "it appears
. . . that it is the intention of the War Department to abolish the so-called
colored regiments." 15
- [25]
- The fact that the directive was
to receive no publicity added a note of deep and dark mystery. Within a
few weeks the Negro press was carrying articles suggesting that the Negro
regiments were being gradually disbanded. American Legion posts and civic
groups were writing their congressmen to obtain definite reports on what
the future of Negro troops was to be.16
The War Department answered certain of the inquiries, including those from
the White House, by saying:
-
- The War Department does not distinguish
between its soldiers and treats white and black absolutely alike. Apparent
effort is now being made to establish the principle that the negro soldier
shall receive preferential treatment over the white soldier. The War Department
wishes emphatically again to go on record that it believes it would be most
harmful to establish any differential treatment between soldiers of the
American Army because of difference of race or color.17
-
- This justification, based on the
equity of reductions in Negro units similar to previous ones in white units
and on the fact that over 40 percent of the white units were split among
several stations, enabled the NAACP to prepare a rejoinder in which it agreed
fully with the principle as stated. "It is our most earnest desire,"
Walter F. White, the NAACP secretary, wrote, "that Negro and white
soldiers receive the same treatment and the same consideration, with no
preference for either white or black units." On the surface, he said,
the present plan seemed fair and impartial, but in actual operation it created
the very preferential treatment which the War Department had disavowed:
-
- It is the conception of this Association
that non-preferential treatment for white and colored soldiers, if adhered
to by the War Department, would result in the Tenth Cavalry being kept together
at one post; in Negroes being enlisted in the Air Corps and every other
service of the Army; in full armament equipment being distributed to Negro
combat units, that is, trench mortars, howitzers, machine guns, etc; in
full staffs of colored noncommissioned officers in existing colored units;
in free and unobstructed admission of Negro cadets to the United States
Military Academy at West Point; and eventually in colored officers being
promoted and assigned to commands on the basis of their ability and not
their color.
-
- The letter was not answered, but
Maj. Gen. George Van Horn Moseley, Deputy Chief of Staff, noted: "This
is a very good letter. General MacArthur will probably be interested in
reading it when he returns." 18
-
- The dissatisfaction of Negroes continued.
President Robert R. Moton, successor to Booker T. Washington at Tuskegee
Institute, made impassioned pleas to President Hoover for the preservation
of the units, pointing out that, from his own observations at nearby Fort
Benning, the fate of the 24th Infantry had been a slow withering away. Moton
wrote:
-
- The original declaration was that
these Negro troops from the 24th Infantry were transferred to Fort Benning
as a special straining unit. Whatever the original intention, this program
has been entirely
- [26]
- abandoned. Negro troops at Fort
Benning are without arms or equipment of any sort that could be used in
training for combat service. They are called out twice a week for what are
virtually the rudiments of drill, the only elements of training which they
get.
-
- Continuing, Moton urged the President:
-
- I would respectfully ask you to
consider the long and honorable career of Negro troops in the service of
the United .States. It is the universal testimony that they are excellent
soldiers and possessed with eager willingness in the performance of their
duties under all conditions of service. It is more than unfortunate, it
is an injustice, that regiments that have distinguished themselves in the
way the 10th Cavalry and the 25th Infantry have done, should be reduced
from combat service to be menials to white regiments, without chance for
training or promotion and be excluded from other branches of the services.
It is merely a pretense that Negroes are accorded the same treatment in
the United States army as are given to white troops. It has never been the
case and is not so now. This applies both to the rank and file, as witness
the presence of the highest ranking Negro officer in the United States army
at Tuskegee Institute at the present time, who, by reason of his color is
denied service according to his rank and with his own regiment. 19
-
- Republican clubs and workers
suggested that it would help considerably in the coming campaign if the
matter could be adjusted .20
The President, having written
one personal note to the Secretary of War for information, now wrote another,
saying: "We do not seem to be able to get the thing quiet. I am wondering
if there is anything you can do in the matter." 21
-
- "The matter" was not helped
when The Cavalry Journal, which, in the opinion of laymen, ought to have
known what it was talking about, carried an epitaph for the 10th Cavalry.
Its text confirmed all the convictions of Negroes that the War Department
had so completely denied:
-
- The passing of the 10th Cavalry
as a combat regiment is an event of note and will come as a shock to many
distinguished officers and soldiers who have served with it. The 10th Cavalry
returns saber with a proud consciousness of duty well done. The past will
preserve for it a record second to none.
-
- For the future we can confidently
predict that it will carry on in its new role with the same loyalty and
high spirit that has given its motto a living meaning, "Ready and Forward."
22
-
- A photograph of 10th Cavalry master
and first sergeants accompanying the article bore the legend: "Vale:
The 10th Cavalry `Key Men' Returning Saber for the Last Time."
-
- Nor was the War Department's public
position on the necessity for splitting the 10th Cavalry improved when similar
orders for the 2d Infantry were revoked following vigorous protests, mass
meetings, and petitions from white residents in the vicinity of Fort Omaha,
Nebraska,
- [27]
- where two companies of the 25th
were to have been sent. The War Department declared that there was no connection
between the two events, but the Negro citizens of Omaha, who had been as
vigorously pressing for the location of the 25th's companies in their city,
could not be convinced that the Army had not given in to white protests
on the 25th while refusing to heed Negro protests on the 10th Cavalry. In
order to assure their city's receipt of part of the 25th Infantry, they
disavowed the NAACP's campaign to have both Negro units kept together and
urged the War Department to change no orders at all .23
-
- No matter what was done about the
splitting of the regiments among several posts, the strength problem would
have to be met. "In the adjustment of our military program," General
Moseley wrote to Claude A. Barnett, director of the Associated Negro Press,
"the fact is there is not enough Army to go around. This makes the
problem often very difficult. As you probably know, we are abandoning a
number of posts and this has brought down upon us violent protests from
our white brethren. Thus far we have been able to withstand these attacks."
24
-
- Even after the resumption of enlistments
in 1934, the tight vacancy situation in Negro units allowed for little recruiting.
Because enlistments could be accepted for vacancies only, a Negro who wished
to join the Regular Army could not present himself at a recruiting station,
make application, be examined, and be accepted or rejected. During the earlier
years of the depression, the same situation with regard to an excess of
applicants over vacancies existed for white units. White recruiting, however,
never came to a complete halt, and in the middle and late thirties recruiting
stations were nearly always able to accept well-qualified white applicants.
But a Negro seeking to join the Army had to find out what posts had elements
of a Negro unit, discover where vacancies existed, apply to the commanding
officer of the post or unit where service was desired, and present himself
at the post at his own expense once enlistment was authorized. The Army
explained that it had no funds for transporting recruits over the great
distances outside their own corps areas which many Negroes had to travel
to reach posts where vacancies existed .25
Often a trip from the east coast to Arizona, where the 25th Infantry was
stationed, was involved. As a result, few prospective enlistees got beyond
the stage of making inquiries at a recruiting station. But the popularity
of prospective military service was such that requests for enlistments in
the old regiments sometimes came from great distances-even from as far away
as the Philippines.
-
- The restrictions on size, number,
and types of Negro units, added to the high proportion of re-enlistments
and the consequent inability to take many recruits, made it difficult for
the Negro units to prepare themselves for the job
- [28]
- of providing a nucleus of young,
trained Negro men who might be valuable in an expanded wartime Army. Because
all elements of the regiments were seldom assembled and stationed at the
same posts, and because so many of the elements and detachments were used
for housekeeping duties, training beyond the level of the disciplined life
of the garrison soldier was difficult. The regiments, or those portions
available, did participate in field exercises with other units of the Army
from time to time, but for the most part they had little save ceremonial
and rudimentary training duties to perform. The Negro press and public,
in their long campaign for increased enlistment opportunities, did not overlook
the ready opportunity to cite the disadvantages of a situation in which
recruiting posters and stations were in evidence in the business sections
of most cities while potential Negro trainees lacked vacancies in which
they could be placed. The young Negro who successfully found his way into
the Regular Army as an enlisted man was looked upon as an extremely fortunate
young man.
-
- The opportunity for the young Negro
to become a Regular Army officer was even more limited. Between 1920 and
1940 only one Negro was graduated from the Military Academy at West Point,
though others were appointed.26.
In 1940 two other cadets, in the classes of 1941 and 1943, were enrolled
at the academy. The total number of Negro Regular Army officers was five,
of whom three were chaplains.
-
-
- During the period between world
wars several large cities had National Guard units allotted to Negroes;
most of the units had existed before World War I and some before the War
with Spain. Only one of these, the 369th Infantry (New York) was maintained
with all of its elements. The 8th Illinois Infantry was maintained minus
one battalion. The 372d Infantry, with two battalions and one company of
a third, was split among Massachusetts, Ohio, and the District of Columbia,
with a New Jersey unit added just before mobilization in 1940. Maryland
had a separate company, which became the Service Company of the 372d in
1940. The regiment's headquarters, band, and medical detachment were un-allotted;
agreement among the states concerned was necessary before a commanding officer
and other field officers could be appointed. Split as it was, among four
states in four corps areas, supervision of this regiment for peacetime training
as a unit was practically impossible.
-
- Senior infantry units of the Reserve
Officers' Training Corps (ROTC) were established at Howard University in
Washington and at Wilberforce University in Ohio. Although Negro students
at other Northern universities were permitted to take ROTC training in mixed
units provided that they could qualify, Negroes in ROTC units outside of
Howard and Wilberforce were rare. Charges were made in peacetime that at
certain schools "qualifications" included being white. Despite
investigations,
- [29]
such charges were difficult to prove,
for the decision on academic qualifications rested with the school authorities.
27
-
- Negro Reserve officers, numbering
353 eligible reservists in 1940,28
were assigned to regiments of the Organized Reserves and were given summer
camp training when they requested it. The only Negro Reserve regiment which
was even nearly staffed was the 428th Infantry (District of Columbia). Correspondence
and lecture courses were open to Negro reservists and, where their numbers
were large enough, separate lectures were organized for them. Junior ROTC's,
"55c" units, and high school cadet corps were available to Negroes
in certain schools, such as Hampton Institute in Virginia, Tuskegee Institute
in Alabama, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College, and Prairie
View College in Texas, and in certain public
high schools, notably in Washington, D .C.,29
Chicago, and Gary.
-
- Citizens' Military Training Camps
were organized and located on the basis of applications received. There
were
- periodic criticisms of the Army
for not operating camps to which Negro youths could be assigned in each
corps area.30
At various times, these camps were operated in the Third, Seventh, Eighth,
and Ninth Corps Areas. In the late thirties the Third Corps Area camp was
staffed by Negro officers.
-
- Relatively few Negroes were directly
affected by the opportunities in the civilian components for military experience.
The Reserve elements and the National Guard units were so distributed geographically
that the vast bulk of the Negro public hardly knew of their existence and
had no means available for taking advantage of them. After being guaranteed
retention of their National Guard units and after the establishment of ROTC
units, most Negroes paid little attention to the training activities of
the civilian components, although there were sporadic signs of concern over
limited ROTC and Citizens' Military Training Camp opportunities. Like the
rest of the population between wars Negroes were disposed to think of the
Army primarily in connection with parades, veterans' organizations, and
new and sensational weapons discussed in Sunday magazine supplements.
-
-
- The Army in the meantime was developing
its plans for employing Negro manpower in the event of war. The central
theme of this planning was that types of units must be found in which
Negroes could serve with greatest profit to the country, the Army, and
themselves. Since cultural considerations the Army's estimate of the state
of domestic race relations, an estimate strongly supported by most social
and political institutions in the twenties made separate Negro units an
undisputed reality, maintaining a workable balance between white and Negro
units
- [30]
- was of prime importance to the
development of a citizen army capable of defending the country without
unduly offending either Negroes or whites. To this assumption several
others were corollaries. It was generally assumed that Negro troops would
respond to the training techniques that were effective with white troops,
although it was frequently stated that their training period might have
to be longer. Because of their civilian backgrounds and the reports from
World War I, it was generally considered that they would be more useful
as service than as combat troops. It was expected that they would respond
to the same types of motivation and methods of leadership which were effective
with white troops, although much emphasis was placed on the use of white
officers if the best was to be obtained from Negro units. Any marked departure
from the normal training standard for purposes of increasing the efficiency
of Negro troops, it was felt, would be considered discriminatory.
-
- Since most of the reports from
World War I did not emphasize training or leadership deficiencies, except
in relation to the use of Negro officers, the problems of leadership and
training did not loom large in comparison with those of the formal organization
of Negro troops for effective military service. It was assumed that no
matter how Negro units were organized, they would have to be used as integral
parts of corps and armies and not as units grouped separately into corps
or armies of their own.31
How Negro units could best be organized for use with white units as part
of a unified military team was an important issue but it was lost sight
of in the attempt to find the answer to the primary question: How could
the Negro portion of the nation's manpower best be employed in time of
war? And then: How could Negro manpower be used with the least stress
on military effectiveness and on social customs?
-
- Units and numbers became the important
considerations, while training, leadership, and, utilization techniques
became secondary. The provision of Negro units in "proper" proportions
would satisfy the major requirements. No serious attempt was made to use
the existing peacetime Negro units as laboratories for experience in methods
of training or leading Negro troops, nor was a serious attempt made to
insure the development of adequate leadership or of improved training
methods through the use of the Reserve components available to the Army.
It was assumed that these problems would be no greater than in the past.
-
- Most of the proposals outlined
in plans made for the utilization of Negro troops were put into effect
in one way or another during the course of World War II. Many of the administrative
and organizational problems of the employment of Negro troops therefore
may be better understood in light of both the World War I testimony and
the developing plans of the War Department General Staff. In the unfolding
story of the employment of Negroes in World War II, many details of plans
made after
- [32]
- World War I and then virtually
forgotten may be discerned. From the evolving policy it is also possible
to see reasons for certain developments, such as the initial choice of
particular types of units for Negroes, the imbalance existing between
Negro and white inductions in the early period of mobilization, and the
uncertainty which attended such questions as the provision and assignment
of Negro officers and the commitment of Negro units to overseas duty.
-
-
- The basic features of the policy
on the use of Negro manpower in time of war were formulated in 1922. The
plan distributed at the end of that year remained essentially the same
until it was rescinded in 1938. No expansion of the four Regular Army
regiments, except to war strength, was provided. The formation of Negro
National Guard units was left entirely to the states. Any Negro units
requested by the states were to be separate organizations in addition
to the eighteen National Guard divisions which had been authorized. The
establishment of Reserve units for Negroes was left entirely to each corps
area commander. Only two corps areas, the Fourth and Fifth, had provided
any Reserve units for Negroes and none had made provision for Reserve
combat units. The 1922 plan, therefore, had to provide an entirely new
outline of what was needed if mobilization plans were to be representative
of manpower as it existed in the population of the country.
-
- The 1922 staff study on which
the plan was based made several primary assumptions which eventually became
- part of Army doctrine on the subject
of the employment of Negro troops.32
Among these were:
- 1 . The use to be made of Negroes
of military age in the event of complete mobilization is a basic problem
in mobilization planning.
- 2. If mobilization plans do not
include "a comprehensive policy in this regard that will be sound
and fair and will appeal to intelligent judgment," political pressures
will ensue that will force the War Department to shoulder the responsibility
alone. "The possibility of arriving at a satisfactory solution under
such circumstances is slight."
- 3. For the general social and
economic good of the country, Negroes must be utilized in combat as well
as in service units. "To follow the policy of exempting the negro
population of this country from combat service means that the white population,
upon which the future of the country depends, would suffer the brunt of
loss, the negro population, none; the rising white generation 34 percent,
and the rising negro population, nothing." 33
- 4. Military realities and not
"social, ethnological and psychological" theories must be the
deciding factors in determining the use to be made of Negro manpower.
"Briefly, these [military realities are: that the negro is a citizen
of the United States, entitled to all of the rights of citizenship and
subject to all of the obligations of citizenship; that the negro constitutes
an appreciable part of
- [32]
- our military manhood; that while
not the best military material, he is by no means the worst;
that no plan of mobilization for the maximum effort can afford to ignore
such a fraction of the manhood, especially in these times when war makes
demands upon the physical defectives and the women; and finally, that
in a democracy such as ours political and economic conditions must be
considered, and that decision must rest upon these two considerations
alone."
-
- The study offered solutions for
the three major controversial questions raised by World War I: the use
of Negroes as combat troops; the size and nature of Negro units; and the
race of officers for Negro units.
-
- On the question of the employment
of Negroes as combat troops, the study concluded that, from World War
I examination records, at least half of the Negro effectives were eligible
for combat service and should be so assigned. Psychological test data
from World War I showed that Negroes ranked lower than whites. But there
were "some Negroes in all intelligence grades." The 1922 study
concluded that: "As a matter of fact, we have to sift our white population
for suitable combat material. The fact that the sifting would result in
relatively fewer Negroes for combat duty is not an excuse for not sifting
the Negro population at all."
-
- As far as the size of Negro combat
units was concerned, the paper agreed that' smaller units led by white
officers and operating "either separately or in conjunction with
other white troops" had achieved a greater measure of success in
the past than large Negro units. The study therefore recommended: ".
. . to play safe . . . Negro units should not be grouped exclusively in
organizations as large as a division, but smaller units should be grouped
with white units. We know that white regiments and negro regiments have
operated successfully side by side, and, this being the case, there appears
no good reason why they should not be brigaded together." Since there
was no past experience in grouping Negro and white battalions in the same
regiment, this type of organization was not recommended.
-
- The use of Negro officers was
the third controversial question which the study attempted to answer.
The lack of success of Negro divisional troops in World War I may have
been due to the "preponderance of Negro officers," but, the
study pointed out, "the record of Negro regiments which operated
with the French is not discreditable, even though in the case of at least
two regiments, the Negro officers greatly predominated." 34
While the successful performance of Negro troops was dependent upon "proper
leadership" by "white officers or by white officers in command
of principal units," the study warned that
-
- "it is not reasonable to
expect that the negro will be willing to serve in the ranks with no hope
of a commission. Moreover, it cannot be fairly stated that no negro possesses
the necessary qualities of leadership to make him an efficient officer
. . . . Not all our white officers are selected from the ranks of the
most intelligent. As a matter of fact, we commission many white officers
of only average intelligence. It follows that there must be some negroes
of intelligence equal to some of the whites
- [33]
- whom we commission. The trouble
in the past has been that we have not demanded from the negro the same
standard of intelligence, grade for grade, as from the white.
-
- Even in separate training camps
giving identical courses "there was no means of comparing results."
The only solution, the study concluded, was "to establish a rigid
standard and to require whites and negroes alike to measure up to it."
-
- Since the composition of National
Guard units was under state control and the study argued that it should
so remain-and since the four Regular regiments already provided for representation
in the Regular Army, the 1922 plan confined its attention to the provision
of units in the Organized Reserves, the only remaining component of the
Army. Reserve units, thought of as "moulds into which the draft should
be poured," were allotted to corps areas, whose commanders were to
organize these units with a full complement of Reserve officers and a
cadre of noncommissioned officers and specialists.
-
- A major feature of the 1922 plan
was the recommendation that corps area commanders, after "a careful
study of the distribution of the Negro population," should block
out regimental and battalion areas, properly subdivided into subordinate
unit areas. From the units allotted to the corps areas, commanders would
provide units for Negro troops. These units were not to be developed "for
the present" except where properly qualified Negro officers were
available to command them. Where no officers existed, units would remain
unorganized until officers were developed.
-
- The 1922 plan was approved by
the Secretary of War, John W. Weeks, on 23 December and its provisions
were communicated confidentially to corps area commanders on 27 December,
with instructions that each corps area should make plans and recommendations
for the use in initial mobilization of about 50 percent of the Negro effectives
available in its area, half of these to be placed in combat organizations
and the remainder in noncombatant organizations.35
Negro units were to be taken from unit allotments already made to the
corps areas, except that extra infantry units might be formed if needed.
All were to be non-divisional units. The instructions included sample
suggestions for individual corps areas. For example, it was suggested
that the First Corps Area (New England) might form an infantry or field
artillery battalion, or several batteries of coast artillery for harbor
defense. The Third Corps Area (Pennsylvania, Maryland, District of Columbia,
Virginia) might form from its 24,000 Negroes available for combat duty
one infantry regiment in the vicinity of Philadelphia and another in Washington.
Non-divisional combat units could absorb the remaining 17,000 men. The
Fourth Corps Area (southeastern states) , which contained the greatest
number of Negroes, might provide ten or twelve extra infantry regiments,
while the Ninth Corps Area (west coast and mountain states), with a small
number of effectives, might provide a regiment of artillery or companies
of harbor defense troops. All units were to have Negro officers, except
that where they could not be obtained white officers might fill vacancies,
provided that no
- [34]
- Negro officer should command a
white officer.
-
- Corps area commanders submitted
their own plans for the use of the Negro manpower in their areas as requested.
The only objections to the general plan came from two corps area commanders
who felt that the Negro units should be in addition to their current allotments
in order to prevent disruption of units already set up for white personnel.
Extra cavalry units recommended by corps area commanders were not approved,
but units of other arms and services were included in the authorized lists
of units for Negroes. To prevent an unduly large number of extra infantry
units, commanders were authorized to clear allotted artillery units of
white personnel "if, in their opinion, it can be done without injury
to morale" and then set these units aside for Negroes. The plans
submitted by the commanders and the policy itself were approved and confirmed
on 12 July 1923.36
-
- The only large question concerning
the use of Negro troops in service units of the Organized Reserves was
raised by the Engineers. The Chief of Engineers, in 1921, and again in
1923, opposed the allocation of Negroes to general service units, pointing
out that these units required officers and men with considerable technical
skill and that their duties "compel these troops to be exposed to
the same conditions of fire and all the severe circumstances of front
line fighting . . . without the opportunity to relieve the nerve strain
by returning the fire of the enemy." He recommended that the War
Department adopt and "promulgate" the policy that all engineer
units, except auxiliary (separate) battalions, be white or, "if troops
of other colors, that the personnel be specially selected . . . ."
The War Department answered that it did not plan to restrict the use of
Negroes to "any particular types of organizations in any branch of
the service" so far as corps area assignment to the Organized Reserves
was concerned. The Engineer objection was nevertheless filed for consideration
in future revisions of mobilization plans. Though general service units
were not entirely removed, the majority of them were replaced by auxiliary
and, later, by separate battalions.37
-
-
- Later mobilization plans did not
generally follow the 1922 policy so far as the ratios of combat to non-combat
units was concerned; nor did they provide for the employment of Negro
manpower in proportion to the general effective population available for
military service. In addition to Reserve units, moreover, provision was
made for Negro inactive Regular Army units which could be organized at
specified periods after the beginning of mobilization. A 1928 plan, for
example, provided for Regular Army inactive field artillery units among
the combat arms; the bulk of Negroes were allotted to Regular Army inactive
am-
- [35]
- munition trains, engineer auxiliary
battalions, and quartermaster units. 38
- During the 1920's the subject
of the future employment of Negro troops came to be considered so sensitive
that it was felt that it was not in the best interest of the service to
disseminate information concerning it too widely. The policy of cloaking
plans for the use and designation of Negro units in secrecy went so far
in the late twenties that Negro units, as such, virtually disappeared
from all except the War Department's own plans. After 1928, corps area
commanders were not permitted to show on their mobilization plans those
units which were to receive Negro troops. These instructions were not
rescinded until 1938, when corps area commanders and chiefs of arms and
services were directed to indicate "appropriately" the Negro
units in their plans .39
As a consequence, it was widely assumed both outside and inside the Army
that no comprehensive plan for the employment of Negro troops in time
of war existed.
-
- The basic assumptions of the 1922
plan nevertheless remained in operation. Four introductory points of a
- summary of existing plans prepared
in 1931 by the War Department Personnel Division (G-1) for the Deputy
Chief of Staff are representative of those elements of peacetime planning
for the utilization of Negro manpower which remained constant:
- 1. The negro being a citizen of
the United States must, in a major emergency, bear his proportionate share
of the war burden.
- 2. The negro manpower is 10-73%
Of the whole.
- 3. Lack of policy regarding the
use of the negro manpower caused the War Department to adopt during the
World War, a course in regard to its use that was dictated more by political
and racial conditions than sound military policy.
- 4. Unless our mobilization plans
provide for the use of the negro manpower in combat units the War Department
will be forced to do so after the emergency arises. This may be a cause
of great embarrassment.40
-
- Fractional percentages for Negro
strength shifted during the period, as new census figures and estimates
became available. But the available proportionate Negro manpower remained
slightly above or below 10 percent of the population throughout the two
decades between wars, and this percentage was used in policy papers. Providing
for the full use of this proportionate share of population was a central
theme in manpower studies and plans of the peacetime period.
-
- In 1931 a new study of the Negro
manpower problem provided a plan which emphasized the desirability of
deferring the organization of Negro units until after an emergency was
well under way. No units larger than a battalion were to be organized
in the first year of mobilization. The advantages to be obtained by this
procedure were: fewer officers would be required for Negro units at a
time when capable officers would be in great demand elsewhere; more rapid
mobilization would be achieved by minimizing the problem of
- [36]
- where to locate and house large
Negro units; greater latitude in employment would be obtained through
attachment of small Negro units to larger white or Negro organizations;
41
and the importance of the failure of a large Negro unit in combat would
be minimized. The battalions would be inactive Regular Army units,42
making them available for staffing by Regular Army officers and obviating
any legal or ethical necessity of assigning Negro officers to them. Thirty-six
battalions of infantry, six squadrons of cavalry, and twenty-four battalions
of field artillery were to be provided. They were allotted to the corps
areas and remained so allotted until 1900, although they had disappeared
from mobilization plans by 1938. They were not to be organized until an
emergency had arisen. To organize them earlier, it was felt, would present
problems of administration and invite political pressures which would
be less likely after M-day, the date of the beginning of mobilization
for war.
-
- For the first twelve months of
war, these units were to operate with white regiments, "arousing
friendly rivalry and increasing racial pride." At the end of the
first year of a war, they were to be supplemented by the mobilization
of the Negro regiments of the Organized Reserves. Negro officers would
be eligible for assignment to these Reserve regiments. Any larger units
to be formed of Negro enlisted men could be grouped from the existing
smaller units in the theater of operations once the smaller units had
proved their combat efficiency.43
-
- For initial mobilization, a plan
of 1933 showed four infantry regiments (including two National Guard regiments),
the separate combat battalions, two companies of infantry, two regiments
of cavalry, nine engineer separate battalions, and two quartermaster service
regiments. This provided for far less than a proportionate share of the
manpower in the initial mobilization. Out of a total of 1,526,380 men
in the initial mobilization, only 31,245 or 2.05 percent would be Negro,
while current estimates of the available manpower showed that 9.45 percent
would be Negro.
-
-
- The War Department Personnel Division,
again studying the manpower problem in 1937, pointed out that failure
to provide larger percentages of Negroes in initial mobilization would
result in the repetition of mistakes made in World War I. The study described
certain of the errors which it hoped to avoid. In the first registration
of manpower between 21 and 30 years of age in 1917, 9,562,518 (89.87 percent)
were white while 1,078,333 (10.13 percent) were Negro. Of these, 3,110,659
(32.53 percent) of the whites and 556,917 (51.65 percent) of the Negroes
were placed in Class I (unlimited service). During the period of the first
registration (5 June to 11 September. 1917) , enlist-
- [37]
- ments in this age group were approximately
650,000 whites and 4,000 Negroes. This disproportion was the result of
an almost total prohibition on the voluntary enlistment of Negroes because
of the failure to provide units to which Negroes could be sent. Therefore,
when selective service calls began in September, the percentage of Negroes
called was necessarily higher than that for whites (36.23 percent as compared
with 24.75 percent up to 15 December 1917) . The result of this situation
was that at first white citizens objected to the removal of large percentages
of whites from regions in which Negroes, though heavily represented in
the population, were not being enlisted at all and Negroes objected because
they were being refused enlistment by the Army. After the operation of
selective service began, the complaints were reversed: Negroes objected
to their higher draft rates and whites objected to the removal of disproportionate
numbers of Negro agricultural workers as well as to heavy concentrations
of Negro soldiers in Southern camps. The system produced an unbalanced
force within the Army, with Negroes, who could be expected to require
a longer time for training, entering the Army later than men who were
presumed to require less.44
-
- To avoid the development of a
racially unbalanced army in time of war, the G-1 plan of 1937 proposed
that, from M-day on, Negroes and whites should be mobilized in proportion
to population. In order to do this, mobilization plans should be required
to provide enough Negro units for the initial period of expansion to guarantee
a racially proportionate Army. To achieve this result, Negroes would have
to be enlisted in the early stages of mobilization at a rate in excess
of their proportion in the population, for in the existing Regular Army
and National Guard they were below proportionate strength. Unless their
initial disproportion were compensated for at the beginning of mobilization
by a higher rate of enlistment and induction, they would remain below
proportionate strength. Not only must additional units for Negroes be
provided in mobilization plans, but also a greater opportunity for Negro
citizens to volunteer during the enlistment period must be provided if
a racially proportionate Army were to be achieved from M-day on. A greater
number of units than those shown in current mobilization plans would have
to be earmarked for the receipt of Negro volunteers and drafted men if
the errors of 1917 were not to be repeated. In 1937 the strength of the
Regular Army and the National Guard stood at approximately 360,000. Of
this number 6,500 or approximately 1.8 percent were Negroes. To mobilize
a million men, an additional 552,000 whites (86.25 percent) and 88,000
Negroes (13.75 percent) would have to be called if a proportion of 90.55
to 9.45 was to be attained. Thereafter, mobilization could proceed in
an approximate ratio of 90.55 to 9.45 in all future stages of expansion.45
-
- The 1937 G-1 study resulted in
changes in basic War Department policy on the mobilization of Negro manpower.
Not the least of these was the approval of the recommendation that all
policies concerning Negro manpower, with one
- [38]
- exception, be removed from the
"Secret" classification and the resulting air of mystery which
had surrounded the question for more than a decade. The exception was
the recommendation that Negro combat units have 50 percent more company
officers attached than called for in tables of organization. This recommendation
arose from the conviction that Negro troops, in addition to requiring
more intensive training, would also require closer supervision in operations-supervision
which their noncommissioned officers would be unable to insure unless
far larger numbers of highly qualified noncommissioned officers were available
than was the case in World War I. While the 50 percent officer over-strength
policy was to be followed, it was not to be published. 46
-
- Policies on the utilization of
Negro manpower were to be announced in the same way that all other policies
were announced, so that everyone concerned would understand what the full
attitude of the War Department was before the beginning of an emergency.
The 1937 plan implied that full publication in sources to which the public
would have access was desirable. But, in addition to reservations which
War Department agencies had about the full and free publication of any
of the general plans for an emergency, there were special and continuing
misgivings about publicizing basic policies on the use of Negro manpower.
The Army War College commandant gave a representative summary of objections:
-
- I doubt the wisdom of the War
Department announcing this policy at large. Its early announcement will
give time for its careful
study by those seeking political capital, for points on which the War
Department may be attacked, or embarrassed. For example, to announce that
there will be no discrimination against the negro race in the question
of opportunity to bear its proper share of combat and non-combatant duties;
to announce that the negro population of the United States is approximately
9%; and then say . . . that "Existing units of the Regular Army and
National Guard contain approximately 1.8% negroes," might serve as
the basis for a drive for additional colored regiments in the Regular
Army, or for the replacement of white regiments by colored, to make the
proportion correct.47
-
- Though the 1937 Policies were
removed from the "Secret" classification they did not become
readily available to either the public or to the Army.
-
-
- The approved recommendations of
the 1937 plan were incorporated into Mobilization Regulations then being
rewritten .48
While this method of publication removed the plans for Negro participation
from their former "Secret" classification, Mobilization Regulations
had a restricted circulation. They were distributed in limited numbers
to the highest headquarters only: to the chiefs of arms, services, and
bureaus, and to the commanders of corps areas, armies, and departments;
and to general and special service schools. Neither the general public
nor the majority of the Army had ready access to them. No one was given
authority to publicize or discuss
- [39]
- any part of their contents with
individuals either in or out of the Army who were not directly concerned
with mobilization planning. Moreover, from six to twenty-four months were
needed to process, edit, and publish these regulations. As portions of
the regulations were prepared, mimeographed copies were distributed to
the higher headquarters of the Army for use and comment. This procedure
created a time lag between the approval of the major features of the 1937
plan and their promulgation to even the restricted audience that they
finally reached in their printed form. Thus, despite the decision to publish
the Negro policy in detail in Mobilization Regulations-an advance over
previous procedures in which only the most general statements were made-the
Army's specific plans for the use of Negro troops remained an esoteric
subject so far as the general public and most of the Army were concerned.
By 1940 when the regulations were all completed and in print, the Army
had already begun to move into its initial period of expansion, and mobilization
had moved out of the realm of theory and into the realm of practice. References
to the use of Negro troops in the new regulations represented a generally
unabsorbed and unfamiliar policy.
-
- The approved features of the 1937
War Department G-1 plan, as published in the Mobilization Regulations
as they made their successive appearances, included the following provisions:
- 1. Negro manpower was to be indicated
in mobilization plans, "when applicable," at a percentage of
the total mobilized strength approximately equal to the ratio between
the Negro man-power of military age and the total manpower of military
age. 49
- 2. Each corps area was to furnish
manpower approximately in the ratio of the total manpower mobilized, period
by period, which the area's male population of military age bore to the
total population of military age. "In the application of this provision
whites and negroes will be computed separately." 50
Each corps area would therefore provide Negroes in a ratio equal to the
ratio of its Negro manpower of military age to the total Negro manpower
of military age.
- 3. "Unless conditions require
modification in the interests of national defense, the ratio of Negroes
mobilized in the arms as compared with those mobilized in the services
will be the same as for white troops." 51
- 4. "Where desirable for training
or other purposes, the War Department will provide for the early mobilization
of negro units at war strength." 52
- 5. Negroes, except when assigned
to pools, were to be placed in Negro organizations. 53
All warrant officers and en-
- [40]
- listed men of Negro organizations
were to be Negroes. 54
"Negro personnel requirements for units are provided for and established
by the negro units scheduled for mobilization by the War Department."
55
Warrant officer and enlisted personnel of another arm or service attached
to Negro units were, except as otherwise prescribed by the War Department,
to be Negroes. 56
- 6. Reserve officers for Negro
units of the Organized Reserves, officers for Negro organizations in installations,
and chaplains for Negro Regular Army units might be Negro.57
For National Guard units, Negro officers were to be restricted to those
positions in Negro units authorized for Negro officers. Whether such authorized
positions were to be filled by Negro officers would depend upon the availability
of qualified personnel.58
- 7. The number of Negro officer
candidates would not exceed the number required to provide officers for
organizations authorized to have Negro officers, account being taken of
the necessary loss replacements and of the number of Negro officers already
available on initiation of mobilization. "The actual number procured,
trained, and commissioned will depend, as for all other eligibles, upon
the number who qualify under the prescribed standards." 59
"The prescribed standards will be rigidly applied on the basis of
individual
- merit, without exception as to
such factors as race, religion, financial status, or social position."
60
- 8. Negroes were to be assigned
to service command and War Department overhead installations in a percentage
"not less than" the percentage of Negroes in the total male
population of military age within the corps area in which these installations
were located. In overhead installations controlled by the chiefs of arms
and services, Negroes were to be employed in a percentage "at least
equal to the percentage of Negroes in the total male population of military
age." Rare exceptions might be made by the War Department on the
basis of the merits of each case.61
- 9. So far as practicable, Negroes
assigned to zone of interior installations such as reception centers,
replacement centers, and unit training centers for processing, training,
or permanent duty during mobilization, were to be assigned to installations
in the general areas where they were procured.62
-
-
- to a letter supplementing the
issuance of the new Mobilization Regulations, the percentage ratio of
Negroes to whites for the United States at large and for the installations
under the control of chiefs of arms and services was fixed at approximately
g percent. For the several corps areas and installations of the War Department
not under the control of chiefs of arms and services located therein the
percentages were fixed as follows: First Corps Area, 1.26 per-
- [41]
- cent; Second Corps Area, 4.26
percent; Third Corps Area, 11.25 percent; Fourth Corps Area, 33.37 percent;
Fifth Corps Area, 6.45 percent; Sixth Corps Area, 4.25 percent; Seventh
Corps Area, 5.58 percent; Eighth Corps Area, 10.52 percent; Ninth Corps
Area, 1.03 percent. 63
These percentages were approximately the ratios of Negro to white manpower
in each corps area. They provided a forecast of the distribution of Negro
enlisted men by geographical area.
-
- The 1937 plan provided that Negroes
should be organized into the following types of units:
- Infantry regiments, GHQ Reserve
- Cavalry regiments, GHQ Reserve
- Artillery regiments, heavy, long-range
calibers, GHQ Reserve
- Harbor defense troops
- Corps and army ammunition trains
- Engineer general service regiments,
separate battalions, and dump truck companies
- Quartermaster service, remount,
and truck regiments; service and port battalions; railhead and salvage
companies; and pack trains
- Ordnance companies (ammunition)
- Corps area service command units
- War Department overhead
-
- Significantly, the list omitted
the separate battalions of the combat arms which had been authorized in
1927 and which had appeared in the 1933 mobilization plans,64
thereby effectively rescinding the provision for separate battalions of
Negro troops which could be attached to larger white units.65
-
- The 1937 plan and policy, as outlined
above, was the one in effect in 1940, the first year of active preparation
for defense through a general peacetime expansion of the Army. But
policy and
- practice, again, were not identical.
-
- From the listing of Negro units
in the Protective Mobilization Plan (PMP) of 1940, as shown in Table 1,
it is obvious that, even within the limits of planning, in which inactive
units could be shifted as necessary, the published mobilization planning
policy as it affected Negroes was not being adhered to. The 1937 policy
required that Negro manpower be maintained at a ratio approximately in proportion
to the total manpower available, that is, from 9 to 10 percent. The units
provided in the 1940 PMP contained 5.81 percent Negroes in the total of
enlisted men.66
The policy required further that the ratio of Negro combat troops to service
troops be the same as that of white troops. Of the 5.81 percent Negro personnel
in the PMP, by far the largest proportions were assigned to the Infantry,
the Engineers, and the Quartermaster Corps. Other arms had no Negro units
or disproportionately small numbers of Negro units. None of the revisions
of the PMP since 1938 had complied with the provision on the ratio of combat
to service troops. In those
- [42]
- (Continental United States) a
-
Unit |
Corps Area |
Status b |
Enlisted War Strength |
Total |
|
|
44,537 |
24th Inf Regt |
IV |
RA-PA |
2,660 |
25th Inf Regt |
VIII |
RA-PA |
2,660 |
369th Inf Regt |
II |
NG-A |
2,660 |
8th Illinois Inf Regt (less 1 Bn) |
VI |
NG-A |
1,910 |
372d Inf Regt |
|
|
|
2d Inf Regt |
V |
NG-A |
750 |
3d Inf Bn |
I |
NG-A |
750 |
Rifle Co A |
III |
NG-A |
188 |
1st Sep Inf Rifle CO |
III |
NG-A |
188 |
9th Cav Regt |
VII |
RA-PA |
1,272 |
10th Cav Regt |
|
RA-PA |
1,244 |
94th Field Arty Regt (8-in. How) |
IV |
RA-I |
1,968 |
44th Coast Arty Regt (155-mm. Gun TD) |
III |
RA-I |
1,865 |
41st Engr Regt (Gen Service) |
IV |
RA-I |
1,176 |
59th Engr Bn (Sep) |
IV |
RA-I |
1,079 |
66th Engr Bn (Sep) |
IV |
RA-I |
1,079 |
65th Engr Bn (Sep) |
V |
RA-I |
1,079 |
99th Engr Bn (Sep) |
IV |
RA-I |
1,079 |
62d Engr Bn (Sep) |
III |
RA-I |
1,079 |
63d Engr Bn (Sep) |
IV |
RA-I |
1,079 |
67th Engr Bn (Sep) |
IV |
RA-I |
1,079 |
69th Engr Bn (Sep) |
V |
RA-I |
1,079 |
70th Engr Bn (Sep) |
VI |
RA-I |
1,079 |
98th Engr Bn (Sep) |
VI |
RA-I |
1,079 |
16th Engr CO(Dump Truck) |
II |
RA-I |
150 |
17th Engr CO (Dump Truck) |
V |
RA-I |
150 |
21st Engr CO (Dump Truck) |
VII |
RA-I |
150 |
47th QM Regt (Truck) |
VIII and IX |
RA-PA |
1,300 |
48th QM Regt (Truck) |
IV and V |
RA-PA |
1,300 |
354th QM Regt (Service) |
IV |
RA-I |
2,518 |
255th QM Regt (Service) |
IV |
RA-I |
2,518 |
201st QM Regt (Gas Supply) |
II |
RA-I |
388 |
202d QM Regt (Gas Supply) |
VI |
RA-I |
388 |
203d QM Regt (Gas Supply) |
V |
RA-I |
388 |
204th QM Regt (Gas Supply) |
V |
RA-I |
388 |
205th QM Regt (Gas Supply) |
IV |
RA-I |
388 |
206th QM Regt (Gas Supply) |
IV |
RA-I |
388 |
207th QM Regt (Gas Supply) |
VII |
RA-I |
388 |
208th QM Regt (Gas Supply) |
VII |
RA-I |
388 |
209th QM Regt (Gas Supply) |
III |
RA-I |
388 |
210th QM Regt (Gas Supply) |
III |
RA-I |
388 |
- [43]
TABLE 1- NEGRO UNITS IN PROTECTIVE MOBILIZATION PLAN
1940
- (Continental United States) a--Continued
-
Unit |
Corps Area |
Status b |
Enlisted War Strength |
211th QM Regt (Gas Supply) |
VI |
RA-I |
388 |
212th QM Regt (Gas Supply) |
VI |
RA-I |
388 |
391st QM Bn (Port) |
II |
RA-I |
807 |
394th QM Bn (Port) |
IX |
RA-I |
807 |
86th QM CO (Railhead) |
II |
RA-I |
100 |
88th QM CO (Railhead) |
IV |
RA-I |
100 |
92d QM CO (Railhead) |
VII |
RA-I |
100 |
-
- branches which contained both combat
and non-combat types of units, Negro troops were placed principally in the
non-combat types, such as engineer separate battalions. Aside from the active
units of infantry and cavalry in the Regular Army and the National Guard,
the number of combat units in the PMP yeas limited to one field artillery
and one coast artillery regiment.
-
- This condition was brought about
largely by objections on the part of chiefs of arms and services who opposed
the assignment of Negro personnel to their branches.67
Many of the objections of the branches may be traced to the legacy of World
War I. To these must be added two other considerations influencing decisions:
first, a large residue of popular beliefs and stereotypes concerning Negroes,
many of which appeared in "documented" tracts and pseudoscientific
studies of the first decades of this century, and second, imperfectly understood
theories of intelligence and adaptability.
-
- Student officers, many of whom later
occupied policy making positions in their respective branches, absorbed
the materials of successive school studies, adding to them whatever new
materials might be readily available, producing by agglutination new school
studies to be used in like manner by later classes. Out of these studies
and accompanying discussions came a semiofficial credo matching in many
ways beliefs widely held among the general public. Some of the more elaborate
school studies were occasionally borrowed for use by staff divisions; their
more important influence, however, was in molding the attitudes of the students
who produced and used them. In the absence of other materials, their use
was frequent.
-
- One of the most complete of the
brief summaries appearing in such a study, one produced at the Army War
College by a committee of field grade students,
- [44]
- most of whom were to play important
parts in World War II, provides a representative summary example of the
personality problem which commanders expected to meet in the employment
of Negro troops:
-
- As an individual the negro is docile,
tractable, lighthearted, care free and good natured. If unjustly treated
he is likely to become surly and stubborn, though this is usually a temporary
phase. He is careless, shiftless, irresponsible and secretive. He resents
censure and is best handled with praise and by ridicule. He is unmoral,
untruthful and his sense of right doing is relatively inferior. Crimes and
convictions involving moral turpitude are nearly five to one as compared
to convictions of whites on similar charges.
-
- On the other hand the negro is cheerful,
loyal and usually uncomplaining if reasonably well fed. He has a musical
nature and a marked sense of rhythm. His art is primitive. He is religious.
With proper direction in mass, negroes are industrious. They are emotional
and can be stirred to a high state of enthusiasm. Their emotions are unstable
and their reactions uncertain. Bad leadership in particular is easily communicated
to them.68
-
- "Intelligence" as a factor
in the employability of Negroes was especially stressed by branches which
considered their duties to require relatively high skills and considerable
specialized training. By World War I "intelligence" test scores,
nearly 80 percent of all Negroes were grouped in the two lowest classes.
The conclusion was reached, in certain studies, that here was proof of the
innate lower intelligence of Negroes.69
But within the range of information afforded by these tests, doubts that
general racial conclusions of this sort could be drawn soon arose. Later
studies pointed out that the test scores of Negroes varied within and among
groups from different sections of the country. The example of Negroes from
Northern industrial states, where both economic and educational opportunities
were highly developed, who scored higher than whites from Southern agricultural
states, where similar opportunities were less well developed, was often
cited to show that opportunity and environment evidently had much to do
with the
- [45]
- scores made on World War I tests
.70
The more advanced Army studies took these factors into consideration. Some
predicted that, as opportunities improved, so would test achievements, but
most reached the conclusion that the reasons for the differentials in test
scores did not alter the fact that Negroes, rated by the same standards
on the same tests, generally scored lower than whites.
-
- Therefore, it was reasoned, the
chances of producing efficient military units with Negroes were considerably
lower than with whites. As a result, even though the General Staff might
approve an equitable representation of Negroes in all branches, the chiefs
of branches who had immediate responsibilities for the production of trained
units were reluctant to designate units in mobilization plans, or later,
in troop bases, for their reception. Long and detailed justifications for
their inability to do so were a commonplace. The continuing reluctance of
all arms and most services to provide units for Negroes was a major deterrent
to the application of War Department policies on the utilization of Negro
troops throughout the first half of World War II.
-
-
- In the summer of 1940, the War Department
Organization and Training Division (G-3) sought to correct flaws in the
application of the 19,17 policy to the Protective Mobilization Plan. Certain
of the provisions such as the authorization of Negro personnel for corps
and army ammunition trains were outmoded, since these units had been eliminated
from the Army. The problem of the lack of balance between Negro combat and
service troops remained. To solve it, G-3 recommended that the list of units
authorized Negro personnel be expanded and that all arms and services,.
except Air Corps and Signal Corps, be required to accept for assignment
in appropriate units a "reasonable proportion" of Negroes. Restrictions
on Negro separate battalions, G-3 pointed out, should be relaxed, since
in the future separate battalions might prove desirable in certain arms,
such as coast artillery harbor defense and antiaircraft units. Moreover,
separate battalions would lessen the problem of the absorption of Negro
officers should it be decided to replace them with white officers after
the beginning of mobilization. G-3 recommended that the new policy provision
read: "The largest unit of any arm or service to be organized of Negro
personnel is the regiment." This would allow for the organization of
separate battalions or smaller units and, at the same time, block any efforts
of Negro civilian organizations to effect a brigade grouping of infantry
regiments in the National Guard. "Otherwise," G-3 felt, "difficulty
may be experienced during mobilization in absorbing negro general officers."
71
-
- Both the Personnel Division and
the War Plans Division disagreed with G-3 on that part of its proposal which
would exempt the Air and Signal Corps from providing units for Negro troops.
War Plans indicated that, in its opinion,
- . . . it is neither desirable nor
practicable in a major mobilization to exclude Negro
- [46]
- manpower per se from any Arm or
Service. Furthermore, it is the opinion of this Division that Negro manpower
can be as successfully employed in some capacities in both the Air Corps
and the Signal Corps as it is in the other Arms and Services . . . . Any
limitation in the use of Negroes in the Arms and Services must be predicated
upon the actual availability of personnel with required qualifications rather
than upon any arbitrary elimination of the Negro as a whole on the grounds
of lack of technical capacity. Our greatest difficulty with the Negro troops
in the World War came not primarily from a lack of technical capacity, but
from psychological factors and from faulty leadership.
-
- The only limitation to be placed
on the organization of Negro units should be that accomplished by a "strict
maintenance of equality between the qualifications" required for Negroes
and whites in similar units .72
The Personnel Division withheld its concurrence on different grounds. G-1
felt that under the action recommended by G-3, proper racial proportions
could not be maintained. G-1 believed that each arm and service should take
as its share of Negroes approximately g percent of its total strength and
that a proper proportion of this percentage should be placed in front-line
units so that "the negro manpower of the country may bear its proportionate
losses in the event of war." This could be accomplished, G-1 believed,
only by the assignment of "some Negro regiments of infantry and field
artillery to our infantry divisions." It recommended that this be done,
since the assignment of Negro units to the GHQ Reserve would fail to meet
the desired requirements in the peacetime Regular Army or under the mobilization
plan.73
-
- In support of its proposals G-3
cited the stands taken by the chiefs of the Air and Signal Corps. The Chief
of the Air Corps had indicated that no air units, combat or service, could
employ Negroes. The Chief of the Air Corps went on to say that when the
Air Corps expansion bill was before Congress, the matter was studied intensively.
The bill was so worded that the Civil Aeronautics Authority (CAA) was allotted
responsibility for the training of Negro pilots, and the Secretary of War
had adopted a policy that Negro pilots would not be trained by the Air Corps
but by the CAA at one of the schools used by the Air Corps. Negro pilots,
the Chief of the Air Corps continued, could not be used by "our present
Air Corps units" since this would result in the "impossible social
problem" of having Negro officers serving over white enlisted men;
and to organize an all-Negro air corps unit would take several years in
order to train the necessary enlisted men as competent mechanics.74
-
- The Signal Corps believed that "it
would be difficult to obtain properly qualified personnel, or personnel
who could be properly trained for duty with and function efficiently in
units such as Signal Battalions, Signal Companies, Signal Troops and Signal
Service Companies." The Signal Corps was willing to consider an exception
in the event that "a Negro Division is ever organized." Even then,
it felt, it would be difficult to obtain properly qualified men
- [47]
- such as radio electricians, telephone
technicians, and radio operators.75
-
- G-3 felt that further explanation
was unnecessary. It did not concur with G-1's proposal that Negro regiments
of infantry and artillery be assigned to white divisions because that would
mean the replacement of corresponding white units in each active division
of the Regular Army and the National Guard. If new divisions were organized
with a portion of their infantry and artillery composed of Negroes, G-3
said, "Not only would the training time of a mixed division be much
longer but the relative combat efficiency of white and negro units might
vary to such an extent as to affect adversely tactical - operations."
Moreover, G-3 continued, there was nothing to prevent a theater of operations
commander from attaching separate Negro regiments to divisions for combat
operations if he should so desire; this would be quite different from requiring
him to accept a mixed division with "doubtful combat efficiency."
Only the authorization of all-Negro divisions, G-3 concluded, would assure
the Negro's sharing of proportionate battle casualties. Such an authorization
G-3 did not advocate.
-
-
- The plans of 19.37 and 1940 indicate
not only the tenor but also the range of thinking within the War Department
on the subject of the employment of Negro troops in a national emergency.
Despite the 1937 provision that information on Negro troops should be disseminated
in the same manner as information
on other Army policies, little general knowledge of the Army's plans spread
beyond the confines of the Mobilization Regulations to either the military
as a whole or to the public at all. This was unfortunate, for up to the
beginning of World War 11 the impression was widely held that the Army probably
had no concrete plans for the use of Negro troops other than a grudging
admission that in time of war they would be useful primarily as laborers
and that they must be kept completely segregated from white troops. That
any thinking had been done on such questions as the types and sizes of units,
methods of employment of Negro troops, or the provision of opportunities
for Negroes as specialists and in positions of leadership was generally
unknown.
-
- Much of the public agitation and
questioning of the Army's purposes in regard to the use of Negro troops
might have been avoided by full and frank discussion of the question in
the years before the emergency had built itself to the high point of the
summer of 1940. Because so little of what the Army was planning was known,
racial and political pressure groups were unable to make concrete proposals
which might have benefited their own interests as well as those of the Army
and the nation. Of the Army's plans the public knew nothing except what
it could infer from small bits of information and a few examples of official
action. These, when added together, appeared to Negroes less than encouraging
so far as full and equitable use of Negro manpower was concerned. The fulfillment
of predictions concerning the effects of political and racial pressure,
concerning the difficulties in-
- [48]
- herent in any plan which did not
provide for a racially balanced Army from the beginning of expansion, and
concerning the relative difficulties of maintaining a fair and workable
balance among types of Negro units might also have been avoided had the
Army's own personnel been aware of the thinking and reasoning behind the
policy on Negro troop utilization. Instead, the Army's officers, as a whole,
were relatively unfamiliar with much of the reasoning behind the policies.
Many were unfamiliar with the policies as a whole or in significant part.
Proposals from individual commanders and staff agencies, many of which had
already been considered and discarded, made their appearance periodically
during the early period of preparations for national defense. Many of the
existing policies were misinterpreted, ignored, or sidetracked, usually
because of lack of familiarity with the whole fabric of which specific directives
formed only individual threads. Only if the general trends of high level
thinking had been known could this have been avoided.
-
- It should be kept in view also that
the Army, in its employment of Negro troops, did not consider itself a free
agent, psychologically, politically, or in any other sense. Aside from influences
of personal feelings, neither all agencies of the War Department nor all
field commands were at any one time fully agreed on the merits of current
policies on the use of Negro manpower. Though there were many inside and
outside the Army and the `war Department who felt that there was much that
could be done within the Army to provide for a fuller use of Negro manpower,
the War Department itself took the position that it was operating
within a social framework which it did not create and which it did not have
the power to alter in any significant manner. As G-1 expressed it in 1939,
and as other agencies echoed it throughout the war:
-
- The War Department has given serious
thought to questions involving the induction of Negroes into the military
service. However, the War Department is not an agency which can solve national
questions relating to the social or economic position of the various racial
groups composing our Nation. The War Department administers the laws affecting
the military establishment; it cannot act outside the law, nor contrary
to the will of the majority of the citizens of the Nation.76
-
- In general, the position of the
War Department on the subject of the utilization of Negro troops in the
summer of 1940-on the eve of the beginning of the greatest expansion which
the Army of the United States had known-may be summarized briefly as follows:
- 1. Negroes would be mobilized in
proportions equal to their representation in the nation's manpower of military
age. Preferably, they should be mobilized early, both to allow numbers to
be built up to and maintained at a percentage level approximating 9 plus
percent, and to provide earlier training, since adequate training might
take a longer period than normal.
- 2. Negroes would be utilized in
both arms and services and in all types of units for which they could qualify.
Combat arms assignments for Negroes should be in the same ratio as for whites.
Full agreement on their use in all arms and services had not been reached
among staff agencies or by the chiefs of all
- [49]
- arms and services, but a strong
stand on their proportionate use in all branches had been taken by the Personnel
Division.
- 3. Negroes would be utilized in
units with all-Negro enlisted personnel, but these units did not need to
be employed separately. A strong group believed that Negro units should
be kept small and used in attachment or assignment to larger white units.
A less widely held view was that only as parts of otherwise white divisions
could Negro combat units operate successfully and in a manner which would
guarantee their sharing proportionately in battle losses and in battle credits.
- 4. Officers for Negro units might
be Negro or white. They were to be assigned in 50 percent greater numbers
than to similar types of white units. Negro officers were to be chosen and
trained according to the same standards as white officers and, preferably,
trained in the same schools. Negro officers were to serve only with Negro
units and in overhead installations, and should command Negro troops only.
Specific units for which Negro officers were authorized would be designated.
Initially, these would include only the Reserve and National Guard units
and such service units as might be so designated. For that reason, most
Negro units in the Protection Mobilization Plan were designated "Regular
Army-Inactive."
- 5. In their utilization, Negro troops
were to be trained, officered, quartered, clothed, and provided with all
facilities in the same manner as white troops.
-
- In the working out of these plans,
many apparently minor points arose which grew into major ones. Though the
plans were well-laid, much intervened between planning and execution. Some
of the causes and results of the difficulties and the successes encountered
in the attempt to transfer plans to action will be discussed in succeeding
chapters. Vestigial remains of many of the alternate plans reviewed here
will be seen in many of the proposals and changes made during the course
of World War II.