Department of the Army Historical Summary: FY 1973

VI.

Personnel

Military Personnel

As fiscal year 1973 opened, Army strength was just under 811,000. Although the President's budget had specified a year-end strength of 825,000, and even though this had been reduced to 815,000 following the cease-fire in January 1973, the Army's strength as the year closed had dropped to 801,015. This coincided with the expiration of the draft on 30 June 1973 and the long-range target date for achieving the all-volunteer force on 1 July 1973.

A ceiling of 60,000 had been set on calls for the final year of draft authority. Since enlistments in the early months of fiscal year 1973 proved to be greater than had been anticipated, only 36,000 men were drafted, and in December 1972 call-ups for the second half of the fiscal year were canceled. When Army strength dipped below desired levels in the closing weeks of fiscal year 1972, the expanded early release program was suspended to permit strength adjustments; this program was resumed in the fall of 1972 and gradually adjusted to the levels before the phase-down. Fluctuations in strength, enlistments, draft calls, and early release actions reflected the turbulence that attended the end of the war in Vietnam, the termination of the draft, and the adjustment to peacetime constraints.

Operation Homecoming

Shortly after the Vietnam cease-fire took effect, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and the Provisional Revolutionary government of Vietnam released the names of U.S. personnel being held as prisoners, seventy-seven of them members of the U.S. Army. They were released to U.S. military control in five increments over a 64-day period and were aeromedically evacuated through Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines to designated Army hospitals for medical and administrative processing and debriefing. All were granted ninety days of convalescent leave and were medically evaluated. By 30 June 1973, thirteen had been released to new assignments or released from active duty.

The Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs conducted the public affairs aspects of Operation Homecoming for the DOD Prisoner of War/Missing in Action Task Group. His office issued detailed guidance which the military services used in developing their own plans. The

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Adjutant General served as the point of contact for the Army and headed the Army PW/MIA Task Force. The Army provided eight public affairs officers to act as representatives of the Department of Defense at Army hospitals where returning prisoners of war were processed. These officers were supervised by the joint Services Homecoming Information Center in Washington, D.C. The Army's Office of the Chief of Information furnished a representative for the Information Center staff and also provided escort officers to accompany returnee evacuation planes from their points of entry into the continental United States to final hospital destinations. Press and public queries were handled at the Information Center and Army hospitals. A press conference was arranged for returnees who desired one, and public affairs guidance was provided as necessary. (For the intelligence aspects of Operation Homecoming, see Chapter V.)

Readiness and Trained Strength

The Army's base-line force structure for the post-Vietnam period included thirteen combat divisions plus supporting forces and essential headquarters. As fiscal year 1973 opened, the 101st Airborne Division (Airmobile) and the 25th Infantry Division had only recently been reorganized (January and February 1972 respectively), while the 9th Infantry Division had just been activated in May. At the end of fiscal year 1972 there had been a shortfall of 36,000 in trained strength, a condition ameliorated by the Unit of Choice enlistment program and the ability of participating units to fill gaps in the lower enlisted grades during fiscal year 1972. The 101st Airborne Division (Airmobile) set a promising pace in recruiting in fiscal year 1973 with its unexpected success in enlisting 2,000 men during June 1972.

The impact of personnel policy changes instituted in fiscal year 1972 began to be felt in fiscal year 1973. Stability was the central theme of these policies. Reduction in the frequency of permanent changes of station and termination of the early release program lowered personnel turnover in the combat divisions and, along with personnel assignment priorities for the active divisions, brought them to appropriate personnel readiness levels. It was apparent, however, that with the termination of the draft personnel readiness in these divisions would be dependent upon Unit of Choice and Special Unit Enlistment recruiting efforts. Oversea divisions were dependent upon U.S. Army Recruiting Command efforts in their behalf, supported by canvassers sent to the continental United States by the major oversea commands.

Trained strength improved by the middle of fiscal year 1973, although there were still imbalances in military skills. Shortages and overages in military occupational specialties were gradually corrected by cross-training and reclassification actions. The termination of draft calls

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at the end of December 1972 closed off one line of supply of potential specialists—the skilled draftee. Lacking skilled people supplied by the draft, the Army was faced with the question of whether it could attain and sustain balanced strength through recruiting alone. In the transition period, with holdovers from the draft and through successful recruiting, strength levels were maintained and personnel readiness improved. By the close of the fiscal year, eleven of the Army's thirteen divisions had met their personnel readiness objectives.

The Modern Volunteer Army

The decentralization of the functional management of the Modern Volunteer Army, begun with the disestablishment of the Office of the Special Assistant for the Modern Volunteer Army on 30 June 1972, continued during fiscal year 1973. Various elements of this office were moved into the appropriate functional areas of the departmental staff, and the Deputy Chief of Staff for Personnel was assigned to monitor the program.

As decentralization proceeded, soldier-oriented programs funded from the Department of the Army budget were emphasized, and actions to enhance professionalism, improve Army life, and strengthen recruitment and re-enlistment were accelerated and expanded. Funds from the Department of Defense made some innovations possible.

The VOLAR (Volunteer Army) experiment, begun on 4 January 1971 and completed on 30 June 1972, was conducted at thirteen continental U.S. installations and three oversea commands. It provided selected commanders with limited funds to explore new approaches to attract and retain volunteers for the combat arms and to raise living, working, and professional standards throughout the Army. A final VOLAR report (An Analysis of the Modern Volunteer Army's Field Experiment on Soldier Attitudes and Army Career Intentions—DA Report No. 72-1, June 1973) indicated that the VOLAR program improved the soldier's attitude toward the Army and increased re-enlistments, especially among the enlisted group with less than two years of service.

The Secretary of Defense's announcement in January 1973 to discontinue draft calls before the expiration of the draft authority on 30 June 1973 showed that actions begun in fiscal year 1971 (January-June 1971) were bearing fruit. As had been projected in 1971, the Army came to sustain its strength through voluntary enlistment. By the spring of 1973, the services were notified that Project Volunteer funds would be integrated into the regular budget beginning with the formulation in 1973 of the fiscal year 1975 budget. As of 30 June 1973, the Army ended the centralized management of the Modern Volunteer Army and simultaneously discontinued the use of that term.

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Leadership, Motivation, and Recruitment

For the first time in thirty-three years, the Army faced with the long-term prospect of developing and maintaining a force through volunteer recruitment. This required an organizational climate that would attract, develop, and retain professional soldiers. A Directorate of Human Resources Development was therefore established on 15 August 1972 within the Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Personnel to help create this climate and to address ways of integrating soldiers, their tasks, and the work environment in a way that would enhance individual motivation and unit effectiveness.

During the past year Army schools have increased the hours devoted to leadership instruction. New courses in human behavior, race relations, discipline, drug abuse, and counseling have been added. Leadership instructor qualifications have been enhanced through seminars, workshops, and graduate education. Special leadership courses (for instance, the Senior Commander Orientation Course) have been established, and the leadership field manual, FM 22-100, was revised to cover methods for dealing with human and social problems.

Leadership programs in the field were also expanded. Installations initiated their own leadership courses, seminars, and workshops (for example, the USAREUR Company Commander Course). Several new division-level NCO academies were established.

A Motivational Development Program was set up to examine leadership development and training as a part of personnel management. Several pilot projects were begun, among them: an Assessment Center to provide officers and NCO's with personalized appraisals of their strengths, weaknesses, and career options—an evaluation that can also be used for promotion, schooling, and assignment selection decisions; a Survey Feedback System that uses questionnaires and group problem-solving to help commanders view unit conditions and improve troop welfare and effectiveness; Management by Objectives, a process whereby superiors and subordinates identify common goals, define areas of responsibility, and use these measures to operate the unit and determine individual contributions; Job Enrichment, a process for improving task efficiency, unit effectiveness, and individual job satisfaction; and Team Building, a technique designed to strengthen the chain of command by improving individual and group communication skills and problem-solving processes.

The recruiting advertising program, which increased substantially in fiscal year 1972, continued in fiscal year 1973 at a funding level of $26.7 million. Continuity of advertising appeals and messages to the target au-

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dience was emphasized. There were several main objectives of the program. One was to influence the target audience of 17- to 21-year-old high school graduates, or those about to graduate, to seek enlistment in the Army; another, to obtain sufficient enlistments for the combat arms for jobs requiring medium and hard skills and for special programs (such as officer candidate school and the Women's Army Corps) ; a third, to enhance general public knowledge of the Army. Still another objective was to obtain congressional approval for the use of paid radio and television advertising and to get broadcasters to donate public service time for Army recruiting. Little progress was made along either line. As a result, other forms of media support were used throughout the year—newspapers, magazines, transit space, and billboards, as well as coupon inserts and a direct mail campaign.

Since a high percentage of all initial enlistment contracts require the government to provide training for a particular military occupational specialty, the process of reserving training spaces to satisfy these contractual requirements was automated by providing an electronic data terminal to the Army career counselor at each Armed Forces Examining and Entrance Station. These terminals provide direct access to a central computerized data base and provide near-instantaneous quota information and training space reservations. The system matches job requirements with applicant qualification and desire. Called the Automated Recruit Quota System (REQUEST), the service was tested during fiscal year 1973 and is expected to be installed at all recruiting stations in the continental United States during the first quarter of fiscal year 1974.

Recruiting for the volunteer Army was not without its problems. A U.S. Army Audit Agency investigating team found a number of irregularities during an examination of recruiting practices during fiscal year 1972. In a report issued in April 1973, the agency listed a number of recruiting malpractices such as improper coaching to assist volunteers to pass entrance examinations, acceptance of medically substandard individuals, and inadequate police checks on some applicants. The report indicated that 29,217 men and women—16 percent of those accepted by Armed Forces Examining and Entrance Stations during fiscal year 1972—had to be discharged later because they were found to have been unfit mentally, physically, or morally when first accepted. Of these, 10,252 were Army enlistees. The Audit Agency estimated that the acceptance and discharge of first term personnel for unsuitability or medical problems which existed prior to service cost the Army $73 million in fiscal year 1972.

The Army investigated the irregularities exposed by the Audit Agency. Allegations of criminal violations by Army personnel were re-

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ferred to the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command for action, and procedures were tightened up throughout the recruiting system.

Enlisted Personnel

In fiscal year 1973, a total of 170,413 males with no prior service were enlisted in the Army, as compared to 154,459 during fiscal year 1972. The true volunteer rate for males with no prior service (true volunteers were those completely invulnerable to the draft) was 79 percent, or 133,861, as opposed to 70 percent, or 107,572, in fiscal year 1972. Women's Army Corps enlistments of personnel with no prior service totaled 8,696 in fiscal year 1973 against a fiscal year 1972 total of 5,667.

All applicants for Army service, whether voluntary or involuntary, were required to meet established mental, moral, and physical standards Applicants were placed in four mental categories depending upon education, aptitude, and qualification for service in various areas of specialization; the groupings range from high Category I to low Category IV for acceptable personnel. The percentages of personnel in the mental categories of enlisted male accessions for fiscal years 1973 and 1972 are shown below

PERCENTAGES IN MENTAL CATEGORIES FOR ALL ENLISTED MALES

PERCENTAGES IN MENTAL CATEGORIES FOR TRUE MALE VOLUNTEERS

Among males with no prior service who were enlisted in fiscal year 1973, 58.2 percent were high school graduates compared with 69.5 percent in fiscal year 1972. The high school diploma percentage (not counting those holding equivalent status as a result of General Educational Development testing) for males with no prior service was 56.5 percent in fiscal year 1973 and 57.5 percent in fiscal year 1972. The high school graduate percentage among true volunteers with no prior service was about 54.4 in fiscal year 1973 compared with an estimated 50.9 in 1972.

The enlisted grade structure was relatively stable in fiscal year 1973 except for substantial decreases in grades E-4 and E-5, attributable to insufficient time-in-service requirements for promotion of those in lower

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grades. The strengths in the various grades as of the close of fiscal years 1972 and 1973 were as follows:

COMPOSITION OF THE ENLISTED GRADE STRUCTURE

Enlistment options were increased in fiscal year 1973. In August 1972, a WAC Choice of Training/ Station Enlistment Option was implemented, offering qualified Women's Army Corps applicants a choice of ultimate assignment to a continental U.S. (CONUS) installation or activity, or an oversea area, and a choice of short-duration training courses. In October 1972, a CONUS Station of Choice Enlistment Option was implemented, offering qualified men the choice of assignment to one of forty CONUS installations and training in one of over 250 entry level military occupational specialties. Also in October, a Berlin Brigade Enlistment Option was introduced, offering qualified applicants assignment to the U.S. brigade in Berlin, Germany, and a choice of training. In the same month, a special procurement program to increase enlistments for Europe was initiated for a sixty-day period. U.S. Army, Europe, furnished approximately 200 unit canvassers to work with representatives within the Recruiting Command to raise the visibility of U.S. Army, Europe, in the recruiting market.

In May 1973 a U.S. Army Training and Cash Enlistment Option was implemented for a two-month test. Terminated on 30 June, this option offered high school graduates in Mental Category III and above

a $2,500 bonus for enlisting in one of twenty-one hard-to-fill occupational specialties. The existing U.S. Army Cash Bonus Enlistment Option for combat arms was changed to offer a $2,500 enlistment bonus to high school graduates in Mental Category III and above for enlisting for four years in the combat arms.

In light of the continuing cutback in over-all strength, the Army Re-enlistment Program emphasized the retention of the best qualified personnel to staff the all-volunteer Army. In July 1972 the first Army conference on re-enlistments was held in Washington, D.C., and attended by representatives of the major commands and departmental staff agencies.

The re-enlistment option program was revised to provide a more visible package to present to prospective re-enlistees. Two new options

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were established: one permitted re-enlistment for assignment to the 3d Infantry (The Old Guard) ; the other authorized re-enlistment in the Berlin Brigade.

The Army's re-enlistment regulations were revised. The requirement for parental consent was discontinued, and the age requirements for men and women were equalized at eighteen years. Also, the ineligibility point-in-service for personnel in grade E-3 was changed from three to five years; this permitted E-3's who were not recommended for promotion to E-4 to re-enlist during a three-month period only—between twenty-one to twenty-four months in service. The bar-to-re-enlistment procedures were standardized so that they could be applied Army-wide, and all requirements for men and women were equalized.

The eight-month point-in-service re-enlistment eligibility provision for first-term personnel was changed to twenty-one months to permit more accurate strength forecasts and provide more time to evaluate a soldier's potential for continued service.

The following tables compare re-enlistment rates by type and by grade over approximately the last decade.

UNADJUSTED RE-ENLISTMENT RATES SINCE FISCAL YEAR 1963¹

¹Computed by dividing re-enlistment actions by number of members eligible to re-enlist. Prior to 1970, data includes immediate and two- to ninety-day enlistments only; for 1970 and after, extensions of two or more years were included as re-enlistments. WAC data are included in rates.

² Excludes Reserve, National Guard, and former officers and warrant officers; also excludes extensions.

RE-ENLISTMENT RATE (PERCENT) BY PAY GRADE

Officer Personnel

In fiscal year 1973, a total of 11,845 officers and warrant officers were procured through various sources. The following tables provide a breakdown of officer and warrant officer procurement and the totals of each category by grade structure.

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FISCAL YEAR 1973 OFFICER PROCUREMENT BY SOURCE

OFFICER GRADE STRUCTURE IN FISCAL YEAR 1973

Officer promotions to all grades declined in fiscal year 1973 as authorized strength diminished. Excluding the medical and the dental corps, a total of 763 officers were promoted to colonel, 1,671 to lieutenant colonel, 962 to major, 1,461 to captain, 261 to CW-4, and 1,028 to MV-3. Time in service ,and time in grade at the end of fiscal year 1973 were as follows

For officers, the Secretary of the Army authorized up to 15 percent of the promotion list to field grade to come from the secondary zone. A 7.5 percent rate was established for CW-4 and CW-3 grades. Zones of eligibility are being designed to allow all officers at least two secondary zone considerations prior to eligibility in the primary zone.

The President declared ;a promotion and civilian-hire freeze from 10 December 1972 through January 1973, and only those promotions contingent upon successful completion of a training program were exempted. The Department of Defense directed that the promotion phase points for first lieutenant and captain, AUS, be extended to twenty-four and forty-eight months, respectively, by January 1974.

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The House Appropriations Committee in its report of September 1972 raised tae "grade creep" issue. All services were accused of increasing the number of senior officers (lieutenant colonel and above) and noncommissioned officers and warned that unless the situation was corrected Congress would dictate how many officers would be authorized in the various grades. As a result, grade percentages were reduced below those at the end of fiscal year 1972, and numerical strengths were brought below what was authorized under the Officer Grade Limitation Act.

It was expected that the termination of draft legislation in July 1973 would reduce the pool of physicians and dentists available to the military by lowering medical student enrollment under the Berry Plan. Fiscal year 1974 procurement levels for both the Medical Corps and the Dental Corps were therefore raised to take advantage of the current pool. The increases were accommodated by the Department of Defense through an increase in authorized medical and dental strengths and through trade-offs with other officer procurement programs.

Special Remuneration Programs

There were a number of developments during the year in the areas of variable re-enlistment, enlistment, and proficiency pay.

On 1 August 1972, the Army delegated to major commanders the authority to ,approve requests on a quota for lump-sum payments of the Variable Re-enlistment Bonus. This accelerated payment of $45 million in bonuses and allowed career counselors to advise potential re-enlistees that the bonus could be paid at the time of re-enlistment if a quota was available. The Combat Arms Enlisted Bonus Test, which was expanded for two months to determine its impact on critical hard skills, proved to be successful in attracting quality enlistees into hard-to-fill skills for longer periods of service. The bonus was increased on 1 May 1973 from $1,500 to $2,500 because the lower rate did not attract enough high school graduates into the combat ;arms. Combat arms specialties were made more attractive by having a geographical preference added to the bonus, an advantage also available in several other enlistment options.

The Army obtained authority from the Office of the Secretary of Defense to increase the rate of Superior Performance Pay from $30 to $50 per month starting 1 July 1973. This will add $4 million in payments to outstanding soldiers. At the same time, Shortage Specialty Proficiency Pay continued, but the number of skills affected declined from 154 military occupational specialties in fiscal year 1972 to 92 in fiscal year 1973. A reduction to 75 is anticipated for the coming year.

The Army supported the Department of Defense legislative proposal, submitted to the Congress on 17 May 1973, to restructure the flight pay system to make it more economical. The proposal responds to congres-

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sional criticism of the existing system as expressed in Public Law 92-570, which terminated flight pay for colonels and higher grades in noncombat assignments effective 31 May 1973. The principal features of the proposal provide that flight pay be based on the years of aviation service, rather than by grade and longevity, for the first eighteen years of active officer service; the highest rates of flight pay begin after six years of aviation service; pay rates gradually decline after eighteen years of active officer service; all flight pay be terminated after completion of twenty-five years of active officer service (except warrant officers) ; a three-year transition period with save-pay provisions be established for those faced with pay reductions or denial of pay; and provision of flight pay for officers in the grade of colonel and above.

The Army also supported the Department of Defense legislative proposal, submitted to the Congress on 28 March 1973, to modernize the military nondisability retirement system. This legislation is an important element in the over-all effort to modernize the military compensation and personnel management systems and to achieve and maintain an all-volunteer force. The plan provides for a two-step retirement rate for retirees with less than thirty years of service—a reduced rate until they would have reached thirty years of service; use of high one-year salary averaging instead of terminal basic pay for computation of the retirement rate; integration of military and social security retirement benefits at sixty-five; payments to personnel who are separated, voluntarily or involuntarily, prior to retirement eligibility; sand transition and save-pay provisions where a possible diminution of benefits would occur in the retirement annuity compared to the present system.

Another Department of Defense legislative proposal, supported by the Army, led to the enactment of a new Survivor Benefit Plan (Public Law 92-425) signed by President Nixon on 21 September 1972. The new plan permits retirees to leave to their spouses and dependent children up to 55 percent of their retired pay. With the federal government paying a substantial part of the over-all cost, reductions in retired pay will be considerably lower than those for the same protection under the former plan, the Retired Serviceman's Family Protection Plan. The new plan is open to current and future retirees, including those of the Reserve forces.

A recent decision of the United States Supreme Court (Frontiero v. Richardson) addressed the right of a female member of the uniformed services to claim her spouse as a "dependent" to obtain allowances and medical and dental benefits under 37 U.S.C. 401 and 403 and 10 U.S.C. 1072 and 1076 on an equal footing with male members. The Court concluded that, by according differential treatment to male and female members of the uniformed services for the sole purpose of achieving administrative convenience, the challenged statutes violate the Due

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Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment insofar as they require a female member to prove the dependency of her husband. Put in effect 14 May 1973, this decision allows a female member to claim her civilian husband as a dependent, without regard to actual dependency, to receive the allowance for quarters and medical and dental benefits. As the year closed, the impact of the Supreme Court decision on such other areas as travel, transportation, and family separation, allowances was under review by the Comptroller General of the United States.

Personnel Management

In January 1973, the U.S. Army Military Personnel Center was established (see Chapter IV) to manage the Army personnel system worldwide more efficiently. Its creation reduced the number of offices through which personnel actions flow; centralized the control of activities with similar functions; and grouped some activities to deal with career management, design and maintenance of the over-all personnel management system, and the various support elements required to operate the system.

Within the departmental staff, an Operations Center was established on 24 October 1972 in the Office of Personnel Operations (OPO) to control the necessary movements and assignments of military and civilian personnel as required by the 1973 reorganization. In carrying out its mission, the center sought to hold down change-of-station costs by keeping to a minimum reassignments within and between commands and installations; reduce personnel hardship; retain qualified people; and fill authorized positions on time with qualified people. On 30 October 1972 the OPO Operations Center was redesignated as the Personnel Coordination Center and continued until 1 June 1973, when, with the reorganization near completion, its members were reassigned to the Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Personnel and the Military Personnel Center.

During fiscal year 1973 the Military Personnel Center made several changes in military occupational specialties (MOS's). Eighteen enlisted MOS's were added, 4 deleted, and 42 revised; 3 were added to the officer list, 5 deleted, and 6 revised. A number of studies were also undertaken to adapt the classification system to the post-Vietnam, volunteer environment. One study, which was implemented on 1 January 1974, improved personnel management by regrouping enlisted MOS's into occupationally related career fields and establishing logical progression to grade E-9 within each field.

The Military Occupational Data Bank (MODB) administered over 30,000 occupational questionnaires to enlisted personnel working in 143 different MOS's to provide Department of Defense, Department of the Army, and Army service schools with reliable data on what soldiers

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do, or must know how to do, on the job. Work also began on the conversion of the MODB system from collecting "frequency of performance" data to "relative time spent" data. This conversion will allow the MODB to take advantage of the DOD-sponsored series of sophisticated analytical programs called Comprehensive Occupational Data Analysis Programs (CODAP).

In November 1968, a concept was approved for an enlisted personnel career program, titled Management of Enlisted Careerists, Centrally Administered (MECCA). The concept was designed, in conjunction with the goals for a volunteer Army, to provide career management for enlisted careerists and emphasize individual professional development through assignments, education, promotion, classification, evaluation, and quality control. The manpower spaces and funds to introduce the first two phases of this program were made available in fiscal year 1973. The first phase provides for career management of enlisted personnel in grades E-8 and E-9; the second extends it to grade E-7, with development of career management files for grades E-6 and E-5.

In January 1973 the Enlisted Personnel Directorate assignment divisions were restructured to meet MECCA requirements and an Education/Professional Development Division was established. Five new assignment divisions were formed, each responsible for the professional development of careerists and the assignments of all enlisted personnel in the MOS's under its control: Combined Arms, Engineering and Transportation Operations and Maintenance, Communications /Supply Operations and Maintenance, General Support, and Special Categories. The latter controls personnel with such skills as military police, automatic data processing, intelligence, command sergeant major, and enlisted aide. The responsibilities of the Education/ Professional Development Division also include the professional training of soldiers in the basic and advanced Noncommissioned Officer Education System and at the Sergeants Major Academy and the reclassification of career soldiers.

Beginning in January 1973, the location of enlisted selection boards (except standby advisory boards) was changed from the Secretariat for DA Selection Boards in Washington, D.C., to the U.S. Army Enlisted Records Center at Fort Benjamin Harrison, Indiana. Since the Enlisted Official Military Personnel File is at Fort Harrison, the cost of annually shipping some 150,000 records to Washington will be saved. An officer from the Secretariat for DA Selection Boards was stationed at the Enlisted Records Center to serve as recorder for the boards.

The expanded early release program in fiscal year 1972 demonstrated that manpower management models available to the Army were incapable of coping with wide-ranging policy decisions. During fiscal year 1973, new computer models for projecting losses and determining gain requirements were therefore developed both by the contracting agencies and the

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Army. These new models provide a better analysis of the impact of Army policies on losses, re-enlistments, and gains.

On 2 August 1972, the Chief of Staff approved a plan to increase the enlisted strength of the Women's Army Corps during fiscal years 1973-78 to 23,800. By the end of fiscal year 1973 there were 16,457 enlisted Wacs, an increase of about 4,000 over the opening strength of 12,349. A later decision raised the strength goal to 47,300 by 1978 and higher by 1979.

Numerous restrictions upon female service, such as those on flight training, were lifted during the year, and additional specialties were opened to them. Although Wacs had served in Army law enforcement as criminal investigators for a number of years, the basic military police specialty had been restricted to men. Then in the fall of 1972, a pilot program was conducted to test the concept of using Wacs as military police; twenty-four volunteers were trained, and twenty-one completed a course consisting of standard advanced individual training, including weapons firing and unarmed defense. The Wacs were assigned to seven continental U.S. installations to perform a variety of law enforcement tasks as MP desk, patrol, traffic control, and investigative activities. As a result of the Wacs' performing as well as their male counterparts, MOS 95B was opened to qualified women, and up to 180 Wacs will be trained as military police during fiscal year 1974.

The development of the Officer Personnel Management System (OPMS) that began in fiscal year 1971 continued through fiscal year 1973. Major accomplishments included the centralized selection of colonels for troop command, development of forty-seven specialties, identification of specialty requirements in Army authorization documents, and expansion of the command selection for colonels to include logistics commands and district engineers.

Also under way at the end of the year were the revision of the officer career planning pamphlet, a study of the Army's system of officer education and training to align it with OPMS concepts, plans to designate specialties for lieutenant colonels, and the revision of procedures for officer distribution and assignment. All told, the Officer Personnel Management System is the most comprehensive study of officer personnel management since the Officer Personnel Act of 1947.

A study completed late in 1969 disclosed a number of problems in deficiencies in the Officer Evaluation Reporting System and in the Officer Efficiency Report Form (67-6), which had been used since July 1968. The study recommended restructuring management information requirements to acquire more useful data concerning character, job performance, and aptitude; furnishing a copy of the evaluation to the rated officer; restoring numerical scoring and recording it on the form; design-

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ing the form to permit conversion of selected data to ADP; periodically publishing average scores by grade as bench marks for rating and endorsing officers; and identifying special skills on the evaluation form. Based upon these recommendations, the Army began work on a new Officer Evaluation Reporting System the following year. New forms were designed, staffed, and tested from fiscal year 1970 to fiscal year 1972, and the revised form, supporting regulations, and ADP systems were approved early in fiscal year 1973. During October-December 1973, teams were dispatched to brief Army personnel worldwide, and the system went into effect on 1 January 1973.

Research into the Officer Evaluation System will continue on, under a Master Management Plan, through the 1970s. Priorities will be established to improve and identify evaluation indexes compatible with a "whole officer" concept, and peer ratings will be introduced into the officer basic courses at Fort Benning, Georgia, and Fort Belvoir, Virginia. During fiscal year 1973 logistic career programs for civilians were improved by strengthening command, subcommand, and installation functional channels of communication and emphasizing the role of the career program manager. Departmental specialists visited field installations in the continental United States and overseas to brief careerists, managers, and civilian personnel office representatives on career program matters. Reduction-in-force and equal employment areas received special attention.

On 6 March 1973 a Foreign Area Officer Program was established, replacing the Foreign Area Specialty and Military Assistance Officer programs. The consolidated program is designed to provide the Army with a pool of officers professionally qualified—through language proficiency, knowledge of foreign areas, politico-military awareness, and other special skills—for military assistance advisory groups and other positions related to international security affairs. As of 30 June 1973 there were 1,061 members in the Foreign Area Officer Program, and over 713 positions worldwide had been approved, including 126 instructors, 138 in security assistance, 111 in attaché, and 47 in command.

Race Relations and Equal Opportunity

The objective of the Army's Race Relations Education Program is to help maintain the highest degree of combat readiness through the creation of harmonious relations among military personnel. This continuous program has three elements: instruction conducted in basic training and in service schools, the Racial Awareness Program (RAP) for units, and special race relations training for Army leaders at all levels.

In basic training and in professional development courses conducted in the service schools, four hours of race relations instruction is manda-

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tory. Many of the service schools, however, have increased the amount of instruction and have integrated this training with other subjects.

The Racial Awareness Program for units includes all activities directed toward improving interracial communications and promoting racial harmony. Mandatory race relations seminars, conducted annually in every Army unit according to a standard format, are the heart of the program. These seminars stress unit teamwork, and suggested topics address both minority and majority views. In addition to the mandatory seminars, there are other activities that stimulate racial understanding and harmony, such as cultural awareness groups, observance of special events of significance to minority groups, and racial and cross-cultural exhibits.

Top Army managers and leaders receive formal race relations training at the Command and General Staff College, the Army War College, the Sergeants Major Academy, and the Senior Commanders Orientation Course conducted for prospective battalion and brigade commanders. A special orientation and seminar program was conducted for all general officers to insure that they are aware of the extent and causes of racial tensions, and a special orientation was prepared by the Infantry School for use in conducting race relations training for officers and senior NCOs. Instructors to support the Army's race relations education program are trained at the Defense Race Relations Institute (DRRI) and in Unit Discussion Leaders courses conducted by the Training and Doctrine Command and major commanders overseas. The total Army requirement for DRRI graduates is 483 teams (an officer and an NCO) which operate full-time at brigade or comparable level and in all Army service schools and training centers. Specific policies governing the race relations education program were published in December 1971, January 1972, and January 1973.

On 27 November 1972, the Secretary of the Army approved 2,012 race relations and equal opportunity staff positions for brigade or higher levels. Such staffing extends to the top levels of the Department of the Army and includes a general officer position in the Office of Equal Opportunity.

Of particular significance in race relations was the decision of the Secretary of the Army on 24 September 1972 to change the discharge status of some 167 black soldiers of the 1st Battalion, 25th Infantry (Colored), to honorable. The precipitating event was a shooting incident in Brownsville, Texas, early in the century. Around midnight on 13 August 1906, some sixteen to twenty horsemen rode through Brownsville firing weapons at homes and stores, leaving one person dead and two wounded. Witnesses alleged that the riders were "colored soldiers" of the 1st Battalion, stationed outside the town.

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When military investigations and a county grand jury failed to establish the identity of the riders, Companies B, C, and D of the 1st Battalion were assembled and the guilty parties asked to step forward or the entire battalion would be discharged without honor. Maintaining their innocence, the men stood fast and were thereafter discharged without honor. Subsequent courts of inquiry failed to recommend remedial action, and relief legislation introduced on behalf of various individuals was never enacted.

An internal Army review of administrative and judicial policies brought this instance of mass punishment to the attention of Secretary of the Army Froehlke. Although the practice had been occasionally invoked under extreme circumstances during frontier times, it has been contrary to Army policy for decades. At the time the Secretary of Army corrected the injudicious handling of the Brownsville incident by awarding honorable discharges to the men of the 1st Battalion, only one survivor remained.

Alcohol and Drug Abuse

In June 1972, DA Circular 600-85, Department of the Army Alcohol and Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Program, was distributed to all major commands. This circular, which was a refinement of the initial plan issued in September 1971, spells out the Army's approach to the prevention of alcohol and other drug abuse through education and training, law enforcement, and community and recreational efforts that provide alternatives to drug abuse.

Several formal education and training courses were initiated. At the Medical Field Service School, Fort Sam Houston, Texas, the United States Army Alcohol and Drug Abuse Team Training Course, conducted in two-week cycles, provides a general overview of alcohol and drug abuse problems for personnel involved in installation programs. During nine cycles 432 military and civilian personnel were trained.

A United States Army Drug and Alcohol Rehabilitation Training Course was also started during fiscal year 1973. Providing additional training for counselors in the rehabilitation program, it graduated 260 during six cycles.

In addition to Army training, military and civilian personnel have attended alcohol and drug education courses conducted by civilian institutions. The majority of this civilian training has been done in courses sponsored by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) in participating universities in California, Florida, and Oklahoma. The National Drug Education Center, University of Oklahoma (NIMH-sponsored), conducted three two-week training cycles in U.S. Army, Europe, for program counselors and commanders. One hundred commanders and

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150 counselors were trained. At Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, a special course in alcohol counselor training was conducted for more than 100 personnel.

Identification of drug abusers includes a urinalysis program and a voluntary identification program, both supported by the exemption policy, as well as other command and police methods of identification. In fiscal year 1973 random urinalysis screening resulted in 15,185 laboratory positives out of 617,641 tests, a rate of 2.5 percent; subsequently, 7,858 cases, or 1.3 percent, were clinically evaluated as drug abusers.

Rehabilitation measures are directed to restore drug abusers to full duty status. Seventy-three military hospitals receive and provide initial care for identified drug abusers. Other medical facilities, halfway houses, and rap centers are used for transitional and outpatient assistance for those undergoing rehabilitation. Monitoring of personnel in the rehabilitation program continues for one year or until the individual is separated from the Army. Personnel who are incapable of or unwilling to respond to rehabilitation efforts are transferred, while on active duty, to a Veterans Administration hospital near their home prior to separation from the service.

Department of the Army assistance teams, Surgeon General field evaluation teams, and periodic reports are used to evaluate and improve the program.

Medical and behavorial research in alcohol and drug abuse prevention and control was conducted during the past year within the Army and through outside contracts. For example, Information Concepts, Inc., studied the extent and patterns of alcohol use and abuse in the Army and verified that alcohol abuse more adversely affects duty performance than all other drugs combined. With this in mind, the Army has increased its assistance to personnel with alcohol problems and has taken steps to limit its use.

Military Justice, Discipline, and Legal Affairs

During fiscal year 1973 there was a sharp decline in courts-martial throughout the Army, primarily the result of an over-all reduction in strength. The magnitude of the decline is evident in a comparison of general, special, and summary courts-martial in fiscal years 1972 and 1973

PERSONS TRIED BY COURTS-MARTIAL IN FISCAL YEAR 1972

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PERSONS TRIED BY COURTS-MARTIAL IN FISCAL YEAR 1973

During fiscal year 1973 the level of indiscipline or misconduct in the Army, as measured by the traditional indicators—general, special, and summary courts-martial, absence without leave, desertion, and separation under less than honorable conditions—was below that of the previous year. The downward trend was more discernible for courts-martial than for nonjudicial punishment and separation under less than honorable conditions. This could be attributed in part to the complexities of judicial processes and the increased disciplinary powers afforded commanders in nonjudicial punishment. The downward trend in absenteeism could be attributed to fewer soldiers being sent overseas, stabilization of assignments, management improvements at personnel control facilities, and greater command emphasis on corrective measures.

In addition to programs designed to enhance professionalism in the Army, there were other related programs, in varying stages of development during the fiscal year, that are expected to contribute to a disciplined and secure military environment. Among them are the Army Crime Prevention Program and programs in leadership development, stabilized tours for commanders, research to identify absentee-prone soldiers and provide counseling, and quality control over enlistments.

From 1 December 1971 through 30 November 1972, there were 32,279 cases in which members of the U.S. Army overseas were charged with offenses that were subject to the jurisdiction of foreign courts. In 16,215 of these cases, the offenses charged were solely violations of foreign law and thus subject to exclusive foreign jurisdiction. The remaining 16,064 cases involved alleged violations of both United States military law and foreign law, with the foreign country having the primary right to exercise jurisdiction. In 15,244 of these cases foreign authorities waived their primary right to exercise jurisdiction. All told, 12,400 members of the U.S. Army were tried by foreign courts; of these, only 89 received sentences to unsuspended confinement.

As a result of the recommendations of the Matheson Committee, which evaluated the effectiveness of the administration of military justice, the concept of the military legal center, mentioned in last year's report, was tested in U.S. Army, Europe. Under the concept, legal offices in a common geographical area are consolidated, using the staff judge advocate office as a nucleus. The center then furnishes complete legal services

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to Army units in the region, including the processing of courts-martial proceedings, administrative discharges, and nonjudicial punishment. Resulting advantages are better manpower utilization, rapid administrative processing, and expanded legal services for all military personnel.

In fiscal year 1973, the Department of Defense Task Force on the Administration of Military Justice in the Armed Forces submitted its report. The task force, composed of various civilians and military officers, held hearings, visited military installations throughout the world, and interviewed servicemen and servicewomen of all ranks. It found that despite improvements in military justice a few remaining military environmental factors contributed to discrimination against minorities. The task force therefore recommended that military judges be granted the power to suspend and defer sentences, summary courts-martial be abolished, a separate defense counsel corps be created, the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) be amended to specifically prohibit discrimination, and revisions be made in nonjudicial punishment.

Realizing that full implementation of the task force's recommendations would require a major revision of the UCMJ, the Army made internal changes to avoid discrimination in the administration of military justice. Following the task force recommendations, it amended the military justice regulation (Army Regulation 27-10) to increase the procedural rights of personnel processed under Article 15, UCMJ. As amended in Change 12, Army Regulation 27-10 now provides for the availability of legal advice to the ;accused prior to the imposition of nonjudicial punishment; the opportunity for a public hearing before the officer who imposes punishment; the right to present evidence to the imposing officer, including the calling of witnesses; the right to a spokesman at the hearing; and the automatic stay of certain punishments upon the timely filing of an appeal. To help allay doubts about fairness in the administration of military justice, the Army has also directed that the office of the defense counsel be separate from those of the trial counsel and staff judge advocate.

Fiscal year 1973 was a period of further evaluation and expansion of the Army's Pilot Legal Assistance Program, whose establishment and testing have been covered in this report for the past two years. Between 1 February 1972 and 31 January 1973, the test program, initially introduced in New Jersey, was extended to Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, and Missouri. Specifically, additional projects were established at Fort Huachuca, Arizona; Fitzsimons General Hospital and Fort Carson, Colorado; U.S. Army Weapons Command, Rock Island, Illinois (for the state of Iowa) ; Fort George G. Meade, Aberdeen Proving Ground, and Edgewood Arsenal, Maryland; Fort Devens, Massachusetts; and Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri.

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Program cases fall within four general categories: small claims, domestic relations, landlord /tenant, and criminal. Based on program criteria, legal assistance is limited to those who are clearly indigent; a case was not accepted if the client could afford to pay a civilian attorney. To illustrate, some 45,000 persons sought advice from legal assistance offices participating in the program during the test period, and but only a few more than 1,700 qualified for full representation.

In New Jersey, Forts Dix and Monmouth have accepted just over 1,700 cases since the program began in February 1971, and almost 600 of these were fully litigated by military lawyers on behalf of soldier clients. With the enthusiastic support of the New Jersey bar and the zealous pursuit of program objectives by military lawyers, the program has succeeded and the majority of clients have been pleased with the expanded services provided by military lawyers.

A supplemental report on the Army Pilot Legal Assistance Program was sent to the Secretary of Defense on 2 February 1973, recommending that the program be adopted and, as resources permit, expanded to other state jurisdictions at the discretion of The Judge Advocate General. The Judge Advocate General's Corps (JAGC) has maintained an active minority lawyer recruiting program since October 1971, and recently a black captain in the corps was assigned as program co-ordinator and minority recruiting officer. Substantial progress has been. made. At the beginning of the program, only 15 of 1,600 attorneys in the judge Advocate General's Corps were black. Of 1,500 officers now in the corps, 29 are black, 12 are of Spanish descent, 5 are Oriental Americans, and 16 are women.

In addition to the annual recruiting trips made to each law school approved by the American Bar Association, extra recruiting trips were made to law schools with a substantial minority enrollment. As a result of these efforts the number of applications from minority law students rose from four in October 1971 to forty-three at present. Of that number, thirty-two were black. Thirty-nine applicants were selected to enter the corps following admission to practice.

In 1972 a summer intern program was established with the authority to hire a hundred law students for employment in CONUS and USAREUR. In fiscal year 1973, ninety-six students participated in the program, of which approximately 30 percent were minority law students, and 25 percent were women.

The advertising campaign has been expanded to include an advertisement depicting minority group and female attorneys in the roles of judge and counsel. The advertisement will appear in the October, November, and December 1973 issues of several legal magazines and other publications that appeal directly to the black community.

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Communication has been established through the National Bar Association and the Black American Law Students Association to the 4,000 black lawyers and 3,700 black law students in the United States, and for the past two years the judge Advocate General's Corps has been invited to participate in the National Bar Association and Black American Law Students Association conventions. For instance, at the latter's convention held in Los Angeles in March 1973, The Judge Advocate General took part in a seminar on military justice with The Judge Advocate Generals from the Navy and Air Force and the Director of the Marine Judge Advocate Corps. At each convention materials on the corps were distributed from an information booth to the minority lawyers and law students in attendance. In addition to an active role in such conventions, the judge Advocate General's Corp has made contact with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, National Urban League, and the National Conference of Black Lawyers, soliciting their ideas on increasing the number of minority lawyers.

In the field of litigation, there were a number of significant developments in fiscal year 1973. The services are still struggling with unresolved issues arising out of the 1969 decision of the United States Supreme Court in O'Callahan v. Parker (395 U.S. 258). This case held that as a prerequisite for court-martial jurisdiction the offense must be "service connected." During fiscal year 1973 the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit held that O'Callahan did not have extraterritorial application (Wimberly v. Laird), and the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit upheld a district court decision holding that off-post drug offenses by a serviceman are not "service connected" and restrained a trial by general court-martial (Councilman, v. Laird). A similar district court holding is on appeal to the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit (Sedivy v. Laird). Of major importance was the decision by the United States Supreme Court in Gosa v. Mayden on 25 June 1973, which held that O'Callahan is not retroactive in. effect.

There have also been other major cases whose long-term impact is not yet clear, although it appears that substantial changes in courts-martial practice may result. In the Navy case of Avrech v. The Secretary of the Navy, the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit held that the first two clauses of Article 134 of the Uniform Code of Military justice were unconstitutionally vague. The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit followed shortly in the Army case of Levy v. Parker, holding that both Article 133 and Article 134 were unconstitutionally vague in their entirety. Notice of appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court has been filed in both cases.

The commander's authority to control his post, particularly where dissident activity is involved, has been the subject of severe challenge. This area was opened up to active litigation by the Supreme Court's

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Flower decision (Flower v. U.S., 407 U.S. 1972), wherein the court found that the post commander at Fort Sam Houston had abandoned any interest or authority he might have had to control access to or activities (in this case, leafletting) on a city street that traversed the post. Subsequent cases have confirmed the relief granted leafleteers and political campaigners who desire access to military installations. These include Spock v. David at Fort Dix, New Jersey, Burnett v. Tolson at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, and CCCO-Western v. Fellows at the Presidio of San Francisco, California. At the same time, the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit found no plain duty to open the Fort Eustis, Virginia, base chapel to servicemen who wanted to conduct an antiwar memorial service (McGaw v. Farrow).

Perhaps the most publicized challenges to personnel procedures were the three suits brought by West Point cadets (Hagopian, Brown and White) seeking to enjoin their separation from the school for deficiency in conduct. So far no major change has been required in the military academy's administrative regulations, and the changes which were made create no problem in future operations. At present, the Army is also in Federal District Court defending a suit by some present and former inmates challenging the procedures of the Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth (Berenguerv.Froehlke).

On 21 June 1973, an important decision limiting judicial review of activities committed to military discretion was handed down by the Supreme Court in Gilligan v. Morgan. The Army filed an amicus curiae brief in this case which grew out of the Kent State shootings because the issue of reviewing the training, weaponry, and orders of the National Guard was a matter of direct concern to the active Army.

The end of the fiscal year was highlighted by the filing of a broad-scale attack on the Army's drug abuse control program in Europe in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia (the Committee for GI Rights v. Froehlke, et al.).

Contract litigation continued unabated, the Army caseload continuing to average around 260 open files. During the year contractors continued to file bid protests, although most courts still find no standing to sue despite the previous discussion of the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in Scanwell Laboratories v. FAA. Some examples of unsuccessful bid protests were Page Communications Engineers, Inc. v. Resor, Leeds Travelwear v. U.S. Army and Air Force Exchange Service, Pioneer Recovery Systems v. United States, and MDM, Inc. v. United States. Litigation in the Page case also involved damages arising out of bid protests to be awarded the United States. On 12 March 1973, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia held that the lower district court had discretion to refuse to award damages to the govern-

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ment and that this discretion was not abused by the court's refusal to assess damages. This holding came despite the fact that the Court of Appeals had earlier found that the lower court had erroneously enjoined the award of a contract to operate the communications system in Vietnam.

On 18 January 1973, the Court of Claims rendered a very important decision in government contracts law in the case of Astro-Science Corp. v. United States. This case established a standard of acceptability for preproduction samples that are intended to be counted toward the total number of items furnished as an "end" product. The court held that the preproduction sample must be in substantial compliance with the contract specifications, or otherwise the contracting officer may properly terminate the contract for default on the part of the contractor.

During the year a number of cases were filed under the Freedom of Information Act, but it is felt that the amount was insignificant in view of the tremendous number of requests for information handled each year by the Army. The Army successfully defended a suit brought by Congressman Les Aspin for release of the Peers Report and another brought by four college professors for release of the "Operation Keelhaul" file (Aspin v. Froehlke and Wolfe, et al. v. Froehlke).

In the area of environmental litigation, the federal government has long taken the position that it is not obligated to apply for state pollution permits to operate its facilities, although federal facilities must comply

with state-established pollution control standards under the Clean Air Act. In the suits that involved Redstone Arsenal, Alabama (Alabama v. Seeber, et al.) and the three Army installations in Kentucky (Kentucky v. Ruckelshaus, et al.), the states had attempted to force the Army to apply for state permits in order to operate air contaminant sources on Army installations. The court, apparently agreeing with the Army's position that the supremacy clause of the Constitution prohibits such a permit scheme, granted the government's motions to dismiss.

The Medical Care Recovery Act underwent close scrutiny by the courts this year. In one case, the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit allowed the United States to collect from the defendant the value of medical care and treatment supplied to her husband, who was injured because of her negligence (United States v. Leta Moore). The court held the government's claim independent of the vagaries of a state intraspousal immunity doctrine.

In a decision which had the opposite effect of diminishing the independent nature of the government's rights, the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit subjected the United States to the one-year statute of limitations of the California uninsured motorist law United States v. Hartford Accident and Indemnity Company. It held that the United

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States must give notice of its lien within one year of the accident in order for its right under the statute to accrue, regardless of the three-year statute of limitations of the Medical Care Recovery Act.

There were several serum hepatitis cases in the medical malpractice suits filed in fiscal year 1973 under the Federal Tort Claims Act. Two instances, Mercedes W. Cantu v. United States and Claire M. Maglio v. United States, involved the contraction of this disease through transfusions of blood. Lucy McElroy v. United States involved the contraction of hepatitis through the alleged use of an unsterile instrument for a blood test. In the Cantu case, the plaintiff alleged an implied breach of warranty theory which, since it is a theory of strict liability, is not cognizable under the Federal Tort Claims Act. Also, since the imposition of warranty liability requires a finding of a sale, the theory of implied warranty fails because most states hold that the furnishing of commercial blood is a service rather than a sale.

Several of the malpractice cases involved the failure to diagnose heart problems. In Hazel Bryan v. United States, the deceased had suffered an acute myocardial infarction immediately after returning home from the emergency ward at Madigan General Hospital, where his complaint of having stomach cramps had been diagnosed as a stomach ailment. A recent case in this area was Rogerson v. United States. Ten days before his death, a retired Army major who complained of having an episode of chest pains was examined at Madigan. He was sent home to rest and treated for mild hypertension. The major subsequently developed crushing chest pains and was again taken to the emergency room at Madigan, where he went into cardiac arrest and died.

The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in the case of McBride v. United States continued a trend in malpractice cases away from the "locality rule" to a more liberal "minimal" general standard rule. In the McBride case death occurred, too, as the result of a major coronary. A young resident on duty at the emergency room of Tripler Army Hospital erroneously interpreted the decedent's electrocardiogram as normal and told him that his pains probably resulted from a gastrointestinal disturbance. In its written opinion, the Ninth Circuit pointed out that there was uncontroverted expert medical opinion that had the electrocardiogram been properly interpreted the decedent's chances of living would have been improved at least 50 percent by immediate admission to Tripler.

There were a number of important developments in fiscal year 1973 in military law and order, crime prevention, protection, and correctional affairs. On 8 February 1973, for example, the Army's Provost Marshal General and the Acting Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation completed an agreement for a computerized criminal history (CCH)

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control terminal at Headquarters, Department of the Army; installation was deferred, pending a study of the Army's requirements for computerized criminal history records and further refinement to the system. The Army joined other federal agencies as an active contributor to the CCH system by revising its criminal fingerprint card system to furnish final arrest and disposition data to the FBI on certain Army offenders. Criteria and procedures concerning criminal fingerprint records were issued, stipulating that extraordinary and valid criminal justice needs for CCH records must be submitted in letter form to departmental headquarters, where they will be processed and monitored in accordance with the recommendations of the Security and Confidentiality Committee of the National Crime Information Center Advisory Control Board.

In late 1971, the Army conducted a study to evaluate the Blue Bell system under which serious incidents are reported. It was concluded that information on serious incidents was not being received in a timely manner, and that guidance concerning suspected criminal conduct, wrongdoing, or mismanagement was inadequate and contributed to the general ineffectiveness of the system. In February 1972, The Provost Marshal General was given staff responsibility for policy relating to reporting procedures for all Army serious incidents, and in July 1972 new reporting procedures were announced. The primary objective of the new procedures is to insure that pertinent information concerning an event involving Army personnel or facilities is reported immediately to Headquarters, Department of the Army, for rapid evaluation and action to avoid potential embarrassment to Department of the Army and Department of Defense.

In fiscal year 1973, the Military Police Investigator (MPI) Program was expanded and further formalized. Standard credentials were issued, which replaced locally produced ones. MPI spaces were identified in tables of organization, and steps were taken to validate personnel requisitions for MPI skills. In December 1972, commanders were authorized to use MP investigators to conduct searches on the possession and use of marijuana and dangerous (nonnarcotic) drugs, thus freeing Criminal Investigation Division special agents to carry out investigations of narcotics offenses and drug trafficking.

Based on the philosophy that crime prevention is a command responsibility and everyone's business, actions were taken during the year to develop a sound program to assist commanders in achieving a uniform attack against crime, with the recognition that effective crime prevention requires continuing and concerted action by commanders using all of their resources to eliminate or reduce the opportunity or the motivation to commit or conceal criminal acts and to detect, apprehend, try, and dispose of offenders.

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In December 1972 the U.S. Army correctional system was modified to provide commanders with more effective programs for military offenders, insure the maximum use of highly skilled correctional and professional services personnel, and provide modern confinement facilities. Under the new system, correctional treatment of convicted military offenders is conducted at either the United States Disciplinary Barracks or the U.S. Army Retraining Brigade (formerly the U.S. Army Correctional Training Facility). All other confinement facilities provide services for commanders by receiving and orientating prisoners and transferring selected prisoners who have been tried to the appropriate facility. Prisoners sentenced to confinement for six months or less without punitive discharges, or the punitive discharges were suspended by proper authority, are sent to the Retraining Brigade. Those whose sentences include a punitive discharge, dismissal, or confinement in excess of six months, with thirty days' confinement remaining to serve upon arrival, are sent to the Disciplinary Barracks.

Installation stockades have been redesignated as confinement facilities. The correctional treatment mission previously performed at installation level was transferred to the Retraining Brigade and the Disciplinary Barracks. There are three types of confinement facilities: transient installation confinement facilities' (TICF), installation confinement facilities (ICF), and area confinement facilities (ACF). The first type has the mission of providing services on a short-term basis for installation prisoners; programs are aimed at keeping prisoners gainfully employed while awaiting courts-martial at the installation or transfer. Programs at the ICF are designed also to keep prisoners fully employed during their stay; emergency counseling is available as well. The ACF provides services on an area basis for Army and other service personnel awaiting trial or pending transfer to correctional facilities; meaningful training and work programs at the ACF help to prepare prisoners for the transition to correctional and rehabilitative facilities.

Along other military police lines was the passage of the Highway Safety Act of 1966, which led to added emphasis on reducing deaths and accidents on U.S. highways. In October 1972 the Secretary of Transportation took action to make the Highway Safety Program standards promulgated under the act applicable to areas in which federal agencies control the highways or supervise traffic operations. The Office of the Provost Marshal General, as proponent agency for the joint service regulation on Motor Vehicle Traffic Supervision, revised the joint directive by including standards applicable to safety programs of the military services, such as policies and procedures concerning vehicle inspection, motorcycle safety, driver education, codes and laws, alcohol in relation to highway safety, identification and surveillance of accident locations, traffic

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records, traffic engineering, pedestrian safety, police traffic services, and accident investigation.

In September 1972, the military police working dog program was expanded to include patrol dogs. This type of dog has added a new dimension to military law enforcement. Patrol dog teams, consisting of man and animal, receive a twelve-week training course at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas.

In the Industrial Defense Program, a pamphlet covering industrial defense against civil disturbances, sabotage, and bombings was published in fiscal year 1973. A course on disaster planning for privately owned and operated facilities was taught at the Military Police School, and Army personnel participated in conferences on industrial defense. On 29 June 1973, the Deputy Secretary of Defense announced that all aspects of industrial defense and security would be consolidated under the Defense Supply Agency; the Army will transfer its functions and responsibilities to DSA during fiscal year 1974.

In November 1971 The Provost Marshal General assumed staff responsibility for the law enforcement aspects of customs laws and regulations, including technical assistance to the Deputy Chief of Staff for Logistics on policies and procedures concerning customs inspection and enforcement, serving as point of contact with the U.S. Customs Service for enforcement, and providing technical guidance to departmental agencies and major commanders on operational techniques and training standards for military police and other personnel assigned to customs operations. Both civil and military customs efforts were intensified in the United States and overseas.

The publication of Department of Defense Directive 5100.69, DOD Enemy PW/Detainee Program, 27 December 1972, designated the Secretary of the Army as the DOD executive agent for the program involving persons captured or detained by the armed forces during an armed conflict.

During the Vietnam War, the Army's Provost Marshal General monitored the activities of U.S. forces regarding enemy prisoners of war, supervised the 22d U.S. Prisoner of War/Civilian Internee Information Center at Fort Meade, Maryland, and provided staff and other technical assistance to Defense and State Department agencies. During the negotiations of the Paris Agreement of 27 January 1973, the Office of the Provost Marshal General provided advice concerning persons detained by U.S. forces in Vietnam. There were 17,258 U.S.-captured prisoners of war who were transferred to and interned in Republic of Vietnam armed forces prisoner of war camps. By the end of fiscal year 1973, all prisoners of war had been released or repatriated with the exception of eighty-seven

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retained by the South Vietnamese to complete civil sentences for felonies committed while interned.

Civilian Personnel

Civilian strength in the Department of the Army declined during the year by 8.6 percent, from 479,529 persons at the beginning of the year to 438,459 on 30 June 1973. The phase-out of operations in Vietnam accounted for a major portion of the decline in civilian strength. In a two-month period approximately 21,000 Vietnamese employees were separated. Early and skillful contingency planning resulted in over one-third of the Vietnamese employees being placed in other jobs in local government or private industry in Vietnam. Over five hundred U.S. citizen employees in Vietnam were transferred to jobs elsewhere.

The reorganization of major parts of the Department of the Army in the United States was the most important factor affecting U.S. citizen civilian personnel during the year. The elimination of a number of large organizations, the creation of several others, and the transfer of many functions to other locations were more far-reaching than the reorganization of 1962 and evoked keen political and union interest on behalf of affected employees.

Significant efforts were expended to ease the considerable personnel turbulence caused by the reorganization, and maximum assistance was given to employees affected by these actions. Early and intensive planning helped to insure that all civilian employees affected by the reorganization were treated equitably, provided maximum placement assistance, and spared unnecessary geographic dislocation. Extensive efforts were also made to keep employees and unions informed of the planned changes in order to maintain the efficiency and morale of the work force.

Registration in the seventeen Army civilian career programs providing for the orderly intake, training, placement, and progression of Army careerists declined during the year but still comprised over 35 percent of the work force. This reduction is attributed to the major reorganization in the Department of the Army and reduced budget and manpower allocations.

A major project was set up to improve the appraisal, screening, and referral systems now being used in Army-wide career programs. A Professional Review Committee was established to assist functional chiefs in the development and validation of professionally acceptable methods to measure skills, knowledge, abilities, and personal characteristics required for high-quality performance in the various career fields. This committee will approve all systems before putting them into effect at Department of the Army and command referral levels.

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During the year, recruitment of Army civilian career interns declined because of the retrenchment of Army's work force. Greater emphasis was placed on career program manager involvement in developing realistic projections of intern intake requirements and improvement of intern training and development. Reporting requirements were expanded to include data on the intake and retention of female interns and graduates of the programs. This information will be used by functional chiefs in assessing command progress in meeting department goals for equal employment opportunity.

The Army continued to make progress in assuring equality of opportunity to all employees, with more attention being given to the Federal Women's Program and the President's 16-Point Program for the Spanish Surnamed. Despite substantial work force reductions, increases in over-all employment of persons in minority groups were recorded, particularly in the number of individuals at the higher grade levels. Significant increases were also recorded in the number of minority group teachers in the Department of Defense Overseas Dependents School System as the result of greater efforts to recruit educators through contacts made with predominantly minority group schools, organizations, and newspapers. At the end of the fiscal year, nearly 17 percent of the total Army work force were persons in the minority and almost one-third were women.

On 10 November 1972 the Army's definitive regulation on Equal Employment Opportunity was published which contained a revision of the EEO complaint system that meets the requirements of the Equal Employment Opportunity Act of 1972. Much program guidance was also issued to the field and included guidelines for Federal Women's Program co-ordinator positions, a manual for equal employment opportunity counselors, and an award-winning Army-produced film intended for managers and supervisors, entitled "Games."

In March 1973 the Secretary of the Army convened a worldwide Equal Employment Opportunity Conference to re-emphasize to commanders and EEO program officials the high priority which the department places on equal employment opportunity efforts. The conference was attended by officials at the highest levels and was highlighted by an address given by Secretary of Defense Elliot L. Richardson. Significantly, he chose this conference for his first public appearance as Secretary of Defense.

Also during the year, Army general officers were briefed on the EEO program through on-site visits by an Army team. Response to these briefings indicated a high level of commander interest in the EEO program and a firm commitment to action.

The Army worked to fulfill its special obligation to provide maximum placement assistance to veterans of the Vietnam era, particularly the dis-

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abled. Despite sharp reductions in hiring, almost 10,000 returning veterans were appointed to civilian positions. This represented 59 percent of all veterans preference appointments during the fiscal year and 22.5 percent of all new hires. Additionally, support was given to a major job fair for veterans in Europe as well as to U.S. Civil Service Commission efforts to develop a pamphlet promoting the employment of disabled veterans of the Vietnam War.

Special attention was also given by the department to the employment of the severely handicapped, such as the blind, the deaf, the cerebral palsied, and the mentally retarded. A report from the U.S. Civil Service Commission listed the Department of the Army as the leader among all federal agencies in the number of excepted appointments of severely handicapped personnel since the inception of the special appointing authority in 1964.

Designated co-ordinators for selective placement of the handicapped at Army installations have worked successfully with local vocational rehabilitation agencies and the Civil Service Commission and have made positive efforts to employ the severely handicapped. The Army Aeronautical Depot Maintenance Center and Tooele Army Depot were selected as "Government Employers of the Year" by the National Association of Retarded Children. The awards are given annually to government employers who have done the most to hire and train the mentally retarded.

The Army's program to employ youth during the summer period continued at a high rate in fiscal year 1973; 16,800 young people in the fifty states were hired, including 11,200 disadvantaged youth. An additional 3,900 were employed in oversea areas. This was almost as many as in the previous summer, despite sizable reductions in regular civilian employment.

Union membership among Army employees continued to grow but at a slower rate than experienced in the sixties. At the end of fiscal year 1973, there were 740 exclusive bargaining units at Army activities covering 221,852 civilian employees.

In his memorandum of 6 September 1972, the President called on heads of departments and agencies to join in a concerted effort to make the labor management relations program more effective. Using the guidelines developed by the Civil Service Commission and the Office of Management and Budget, the Army set up a plan for the labor management relations program. Most of the requirements of this plan were accomplished during the fiscal year. A centralized training fund was established to guarantee the accomplishment of needed training for both military and civilian managers and to provide a basis for a more thorough analysis of cost and effectiveness. A labor relations bulletin

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was issued to help commanders and activities assess the effectiveness of their efforts.

The staffing of professional labor relations positions at the command level received increased emphasis. Commands newly formed by reorganization established full-time positions for labor relations professionals to guide and assist their subordinate commands and activities. This procedure represented a significant departure from staffing the labor relations function as an added duty for staff officials having other areas of responsibility. Greater attention was also given to filling the positions with individuals who had clearly demonstrated their ability to meet the challenge of labor relations.

In 1972 the Corps of Engineers was delegated the authority to approve agreements negotiated with unions at the local level. Because this undertaking was successful, consideration was being given to extending the delegation of authority Army-wide.

Army, along with several other selected agencies, participated in the Civil Service Commission review of its policies and regulations which limited the scope of bargaining within departments and agencies. A number of important changes emanated from that review, changes that will allow increased bargaining in such areas as minimum charges for leave, withdrawals of retirement applications, incentive awards, performance rating appeals, and merit promotions.

The Army continued to stress quality in its labor relations training for managers and supervisors. Annual Army-wide inventories were taken to determine the kinds of training needed in labor relations and the managers, supervisors, and staff officials to attend such training. Based on the inventory results, training courses were developed and training schedules established. Currently, four centrally developed and administered courses are provided: basic labor relations, labor negotiations, collective bargaining, and labor relations for executives. In addition, there are two training courses in the Army's core curriculum on basic supervisory development and labor agreement administration which were centrally developed but locally administered. Labor relations is also included in the curriculum of the Army War College, Army Logistics Management Center, and Army Management Engineering Training Agency.

During the year a statutory prevailing rate system, known as the Federal Wage System, was enacted to cover the Army's blue collar wage grade employees. While incorporating the main features of a system developed under executive authority, new provisions in the act include establishment of uniform, nationwide night shift differentials and payment of differentials for hazardous duty, physical hardship, and unusual working conditions. The Secretary of the Army is responsible, within

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the policies and practices of the Federal Wage System, for fixing and administering rates of pay for wage grade employees of the Department of the Army.

Army nonappropriated fund employees working in morale, welfare, recreational, and certain religious and educational programs were also brought under statutory coverage of the Federal Wage System. Wages for individuals in the trades-crafts or skills positions are fixed in accordance with the prevailing rates paid in the local area to people engaged in activities similar to those of the nonappropriated fund activity for which the survey is made. Compensation for employees in managerial, executive, technical, or professional nonappropriated fund positions is administratively fixed commensurate with the rates of compensation for comparable General Schedule positions in the Civil Service. Employee benefits such as leave, retirement, and insurance will be made equitable and, to the extent practicable, uniform for all nonappropriated fund employees within the Department of the Army.

During fiscal year 1973 the Department of the Army continued to control excessive grade escalation and civilian personnel costs. Adhering to the Office of Management and Budget guidelines, the Army reduced its average civilian General Schedule grade to 7.5013—below the prescribed target of 7.5872. The grade reduction, aided by a record number of retirements at the end of the fiscal year, was achieved by reorganizing and restructuring positions, requiring selective temporary freezes on promotions, and hiring summer employees at GS-1 wherever possible.

Department of the Army participated extensively in the Civil Service Commission project to implement a new job evaluation system as recommended by the job Evaluation and Pay Review Task Force. The department furnished a member for both the working committee and the Interagency Advisory Group (IAG) Committee concerned with the design and testing of the system. The department also furnished "bench mark" descriptions covering 180 classes of positions. In addition, thirty Department of the Army operating officials participated in reviewing and ranking the key jobs.

In September of 1972, the Department of the Army's two-level classification appeals system was replaced by a single appellate level. This appellate authority was delegated by Headquarters, Department of the Army, to designated commands with the provision that this authority may not be redelegated. This single appellate level plan applies equally to General Schedule and wage grade employees except that wage grade employees must use Army's channel of appeal before going to the Civil Service Commission.

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During the year the Department of the Army issued its Guidelines for Executive Development which implement those issued by the U.S. Civil Service Commission. Functional chiefs of each Army-wide civilian career program have been assigned responsibility for developing specific plans to carry out the objectives of this program for their executive personnel. Major Army commands will continue their long-established role of drawing up and carrying out plans for developing those executives not covered by the Army's Civilian Career Management Program.

The Army's Guidelines for Executive Development place more emphasis on individual planning and adhere to the merit principles in selecting individuals for executive level training. A key feature of the Executive Development Guidelines is the establishment of the Executive Manpower Resources Board which will monitor the executive development efforts of the Department of the Army and periodically review progress being made in the program.

Specific objectives of the executive development program include participation of career program functional chiefs and top managers in planning and carrying out the program; involvement of career executives in developmental experiences; identification, development, and assignment of individuals with high potential to executive positions; and commitment of resources to accomplish these objectives.

Each fiscal year a significant number of civilian employees receive continuous, full-time training in excess of 120 days through the Department of the Army's Long-Term Training and Education Program. Since this program was established in 1964 by the Deputy Secretary of Defense, the level of participation has generally shown an upward trend. The following statistics show the number of employees assigned to long-term training for each year since 1966.

Although long-term training and education is normally a command responsibility, support from the DA central pool of funds and spaces may be made available for only the requirements which are beyond command resources. During fiscal years 1966-67 over 75 percent of the long-term trainees, Army-wide, received support from the central pool. While total Army-wide participation continued to increase, the number supported centrally declined to less than 50 percent for 1973.

In June 1972 the General Accounting Office (GAO) released a study of long-term training at selected DOD activities, including several

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Army activities, covering fiscal years 1966-70. The study recommended several changes in the administration of the program, particularly in the method of evaluation. As a result of the GAO study, the Army civilian training policy was revised, incorporating the GAO recommendations, and issued to commands and activities in February 1973. The revised criteria should result in improved administration of the long-term training program.

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