to be stampeded by the Secretary of Defense who, he asserted, had taken over the direction of Project 80 from them.15

At his second briefing on 21 December General Taylor expressed greatest concern over technical service officer personnel management, reflecting the lack of precise information on the division of responsibility for this function in the Hoelscher Committee report. Like the technical service chiefs, General Taylor asked how the proposed Officer Personnel Division of OPO would improve the quality of technical service officer personnel management. Lt. Col. Lewis J. Ashley, Project 80's veteran on personnel management, said that the officer personnel branches of the technical services would be transferred intact. They would retain their separate service identities but under larger control groups "combat, combat support, support, and colonels," permitting greater flexibility in career management than had been possible under technical service control. A separate Specialist Branch would manage careers of officers assigned to the Army's nine specialist programs of which aviation and logistics were currently the largest. Technical

15 (1) Memo for Record, Colonel McGregor, 8 Dec 61, sub: Discussion With Chiefs of Technical Services Concerning the Proposed Reorganization of the Department of the Army on 8 December 1961. Colonel Kjellstrom drafted this Memo for Record. (2) Memo for Record, Colonel Ashley, 8 Dec 61 as revised on 26 Dec 61, sub: Project 80 Presentation to Chiefs of Technical Services. Both in DARPO Briefing files. (3) Memo, General Kjellstrom for Hewes, 21 Sep 71.

service officer personnel management under OPO would be "branch-oriented, but not branch-tied." The proposed assignment of officer personnel to OPO, from all branches of the Army, would also promote greater flexibility on the career management of officers based on the interests of the Army as a whole rather than its separate branches.

Colonel Ashley also stressed that officers would continue to be assigned on the basis of their technical service branch and that there would continue to be technical service units identifiable as such in the field. All that really was eliminated was the "command functions" of the technical service chiefs. In the 1942 Marshall reorganization the chiefs of the combat arms had been abolished, but officers continued to be assigned as infantrymen or artillerymen to infantry and artillery units. Under the Office of Personnel Operations this concept would be extended to the technical services with the advantage that positions associated with particular services or as "branch immaterial" with no particular service could be filled by the best-qualified personnel regardless of their assigned branch.

Second only to officer personnel management was General Taylor's interest in testing new equipment in the field and on maneuvers. His particular concern was that, under the proposed Combat Developments Command, the "consumers" or "users," the combat arms, would not have sufficient voice in deciding the weapons and equipment they would have to use. He thought a combat arms officer should command the new Test and Evaluation Agency under the Army Materiel Command. When General Taylor was told that under Project 80 combat arms officers would serve with technical service officers on tests boards and in the environmental or field maneuver testing center and that it was intended that a combat arms officer command the Test and Evaluation Agency, he appeared satisfied.

Eleven other topics were discussed at this second and final briefing of General Taylor. General Traub said the proposed reorganization affected Army headquarters only and would not have any direct effect on the Army's combat formations or on their combat readiness. Mr. Vance, speaking for Secretary McNamara, outlined the alternative organizational patterns considered for Army logistics. He said the Secretary believed the

Army took too long to make decisions and that the technical services were a major cause for this delay. Those alternatives which left the technical services intact with only one or two major functions removed did not seem much of an improvement over existing conditions. A return to the holding company concept of ASF was rejected for similar reasons and because it would leave a number of services and functions that properly belonged at the Army staff level under a subordinate command. Alternatives which would remove more than two functions from the technical services seemed just as drastic as "functionalizing" them entirely. In the end, Mr. Vance said, it seemed "better to go all the way," although he admitted it was "radical surgery."

General Taylor indicated his approval of the over-all reorganization, but he also wanted a summary of the problems anticipated in dealing with Congress, the public, and within the Army itself. Mr. Vance said OSD wanted approval from the President to notify Congress of the proposed reorganization as soon as possible according to the terms of the McCormackCurtis amendment to the Defense Reorganization Act of 1958, which allowed Congress thirty days to reject or amend the plan. But for this provision Secretary McNamara's proposals would have had to run the usual gamut of hearings and action in both houses of Congress, including the possibilities of amendment and rejection. Those opposed to the changes involved, especially the technical services, might have organized their forces successfully to scuttle the project as they had in the past. 16

From the middle of November 1961 to the end of January 1962 Colonel McGregor and his staff prepared over seventyfive formal briefings besides those for General Taylor and the technical service chiefs, including the White House staff and key Congressional leaders such as Chairmen Carl Vinson and Richard B. Russell of the House and Senate Armed Services Committees. They also prepared a summary, Report on the

16

18 (1) Memo for Record, Colonel Ashley, 26 Dec 61, sub: Briefing of General Maxwell D. Taylor, Special Assistant to the President, Concerning Reorganization of the Army, with two inclosures. Kjellstrom Briefing files. (2) From the personal observation of the author, who was then serving in the Transportation Corps, many technical service personnel mistakenly believed abolition of the offices of the chiefs of the technical services still required positive action by Congress under the Army Organization Act of 1950.

Reorganization of the Department of the Army, explaining the proposed plan. Known as the Green Book, this was the document through which the Army and the public at large learned of Project 80.17

On 10 January Secretary McNamara issued an executive order on the reorganization of the Army which abolished the statutory positions of the technical service chiefs and transferred them to the Secretary of the Army subject to Congressional approval. The same day he forwarded to the President identical letters for Congressmen Russell and Vinson explaining Project 80 and including copies of the reorganization plan. President Kennedy formally transmitted Secretary McNamara's letters to Congress on 16 January.18

Careful preparation of Congressional briefings under the direction of Mr. Horwitz helped ensure favorable Congressional reaction to Project 80. Chairman Vinson's public endorsement on 5 February seemed to indicate this. "I am satisfied in my own mind," he said, "from the information I have received, that this is an important and forward moving step on the part of the Department of the Army and that its adoption will lead to more efficiency, particularly in procurement activities and in personnel planning in the Army."

19

Some adjustments were required. In response to protests from Michigan's congressmen and governor, Secretary McNamara personally decided not to transfer functions from Detroit's Ordnance Tank-Automotive Command to the proposed new Weapons and Mobility Command at the Rock Island Arsenal. As a consequence the Weapons and Mobility Command was separated into a Weapons Command with headquarters at Rock Island and a Mobility Command with headquarters in Detroit.20

17

No formal objections arose in Congress to Secretary Mc

(1) Interviews, Blumenson with Colonel McGregor, 1 Mar and 10 Sep 62. (2) Public Information and Congressional Briefings Folders, DARPO Pre-planning files. (3) Summary of Major Events and Problems, OCA, 1 Jul 61-30 Jun 62, p. 34.

18 Ibid., DARPO Weekly Activities Report to ODOM, 4 and 12 Jan 62.

19

1o (1) DARPO Weekly Activities Reports for 28 Dec 61, 4, 12, and 26 Jan 62, and 9 and 21 Feb 62. (2) DARPO Congressional Briefing file.

20 (1) Copy of Ltr, Secretary McNamara to Congressman James G. O'Hara and others, 24 Feb 62. DARPO Congressional Inquiry file. (2) Memo, Secretary of Army for Secretary of Defense, 21 Mar 62, sub: Organization of Subordinate Structure of Materiel Development and Logistics Command; Memo, Secretary McNamara for Secretary of Army, 28 Mar 62, same subject. In DARPO MDLC file.

Namara's reorganization plan and it went quietly into effect at 1115 on 17 February.21

Carrying out the reorganization was the responsibility of the Department of the Army Reorganization Project Office. This was another name for the Management Resources Planning (MRP) Branch of the Comptroller of the Army's Directorate of Organization and Management Systems (ODOMS). Brig. Gen. Robert N. Tyson, the Director of ODOMS, had created this office on 10 November 1961 under Colonel McGregor as chief so that Project 80 would have a formal organization base. The formal functions of the new branch involved "broad basic research" in the fields of management and organization and long-range Army planning in these areas. Temporarily its mission was to provide administrative support for Project 80 until final decisions had been made and then to direct and supervise the resultant reorganization under General Traub. DARPO's location within the Comptroller's Office instead of the Chief of Staff's Office was to create awkward problems of co-ordination in dealing with other, coequal General Staff divisions.22

From a small staff of eight people with only two clerks during the hectic days of November, the DARPO headquarters staff had expanded by March 1962 to twenty people, including six clerks and technical assistants.23 As finally organized, under a TAGO letter of 26 January 1962, the Department of the Army Reorganization Project Office operated under the direction of a Project Planning Council, consisting of General Traub as chairman and the newly appointed chairmen of the reorganization planning groups, one each for Army headquarters, Continental Army Command, Combat Developments Command, Office of Personnel Operations, and Army Materiel Command, who provided the detailed planning required to carry out Project 80. (Chart 30) In the Project Office one section, an Operations Office, was responsible for briefings, Congressional relations, and other special assignments, while a

"For administrative purposes the effective time of the reorganization within the Army was made retroactive to 2400, 16 February 1962. DARPO Weekly Activities Report, 21 Feb 62.

22

2 (1) Blumenson, Project 80 History, pp. 83-84. (2) General Traub's Remarks on Reorganization of ODOMS, c. Nov 61. In DARPO Organization file.

(1) Blumenson, Project 80 History, pp. 61-63, 81-89. (2) DARPO Administrative and Personnel file.