Onglet ACU « Nasty Bravo » soutenu crochet et boucle - 4-17 Infanterie - 11B Infanterie, Buffalo

EUR 3,88 Achat immédiat, Cliquez pour voir les frais d'expédition, 30-Jour Retours, Garantie client eBay
Vendeur: tattoo_ink ✉️ (8.901) 100%, Lieu où se trouve: New Kensington, Pennsylvania, US, Lieu de livraison: US et de nombreux autres pays, Numéro de l'objet: 152046902661 Onglet ACU « Nasty Bravo » soutenu crochet et boucle - 4-17 Infanterie - 11B Infanterie, Buffalo. History of the Organization of t
History of the Organization of the Infantry

The Era of Revolution

When Congress, on 14 June 1775, moved to take  over the New England Army then besieging Boston as a Continental  establishment, it also authorized ten companies of riflemen to be raised  in Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia as part of the new Continental  Army. The next day, Congress appointed George Washington its Commander  in Chief. Before leaving their home state, the six rifle companies from  Pennsylvania were combined to form William Thompson's Rifle Battalion.  This battalion and the other new rifle units organized rapidly and  marched quickly to Boston.

The New England Army around Boston was  composed of citizen soldiers. From the earliest times that type of  soldier (male members of the community aged 18-45) had been required to  associate in military organizations called "militia," and to train to  defend his own locality. The militia system amounted to universal  military training for men of active ages, but it was for local defense  almost entirely. What is more, its enforcement rested altogether with  the colonies. At the outbreak of the Revolution, all the colonies had  military organizations operating, but their effectiveness was, in many  cases, slight. It was the general ineffectiveness of the militia system,  coupled with the need for centralized control, that brought about the  creation of the Continental Army. Even so, on account of the militia,  the colonies were able to utilize the experience of many veterans of  England's colonial wars, familiar with the British Army and with the  Indian modes of fighting it. These veterans were a very valuable asset.

In addition to the rifle units and the  besieging army, Congress later authorized the raising and maintaining of  Continental infantry battalions in the southern states. By December 1775  there were forty-nine infantry battalions (or regiments, for the two  terms were virtually synonymous) and several unattached companies in the  establishment.

The Continental Congress took the bulk of the  army besieging Boston in 1775 as it found it. Since most of the units  were enlisted only for the calendar year, General Washington had either  to attempt to re-enlist the soldiers already in service or to assemble a  new army. During the fall of 1775, he strove to retain the Continental  troops for the duration .of the war, but was only successful in keeping  part of them, and those for just one more year. A canvass of the  officers of thirtynine regiments in November showed that 751 officers  were willing to continue their service for one year while 406 were not.

The legislators set the size of the army  around Boston at 20,372 officers and men, to be organized into  twenty-seven regiments and some separate companies. In this scheme New  England, which had supplied forty-two in 1775, provided twenty-six  Continental regiments in 1776. These twenty-six were numbered from the  2d through the 27th. They were designated Continental infantry in an  attempt to transfer the men's loyalty from the states to the Congress.

The 1st Continental did not come from New  England, but was built around the nine companies of riflemen then in  William Thompson's Pennsylvania Rifle Battalion. Six of those companies  were among the original units of the Continental Army, while the other  three joined up later. All lost their specialization as rifle companies  and the "regiment" became a standard element of the line.

Diverse units entered the Continental service,  until by December 1776 there were eighty-two battalions of foot soldiers  in all. During the year 1776 the following new units of battalion size  were added to the establishment:

John Haslet's Delaware Regiment
James Livingston's Regiment, known as the 1st  Canadian.
Moses Hazen's Regiment; known as the 2d  Canadian, also as Congress' Own.
(The two Canadian regiments contained about  equal numbers of Canadians and New Englanders, but in January 1781 all  foreigners in the service were transferred to Hazen's.)
Seth Warner's Regiment, officered by men who  had participated in the invasion of Canada in 1775 and filled in part by  Green Mountain Boys.
Samuel Miles' Pennsylvania Rifle Regiment
2d-12th Pennsylvania
1st-3d Georgia
1st-3d New Jersey
1st-9th Virginia
William Smallwood's Maryland Regiment
Charles Burrall's Connecticut Regiment
Samuel Elmore's Connecticut Regiment
Andrew Ward's Connecticut Regiment
The German Battalion

Their officers were appointed by Congress upon  the recommendation of the Commander in Chief.

Late in 1776 it was once again necessary to  cope with the dissolution of the army, but this time Congress took a new  tack. It attempted to create a force to serve "during the present war."  The legislators, observing the size of the army in being, set the new  establishment at eighty-eight battalions, and apportioned these among  all the states, so that Massachusetts had to provide the greatest  number, fifteen, and Delaware and Georgia the smallest, one apiece. The  eighty-eight battalions thus authorized were raised, equipped, and  officered by the states. They were no longer known by Continental  numbers, but carried instead numbers in the several state organizations.  These state organizations were called "lines," the term used then for  the regular infantry or "foot" that made up the line of battle of an  army. The state lines together comprised the Continental Line. These  should not be confused with the occasional state regiments which were  raised on a permanent basis for local service only.

Although the regiments of the several states,  arranged in the Continental Line, replaced the numbered regiments of  1776 (for example, the 9th Continental of 1776 became the 1st Regiment  of the Rhode Island Line in 1777) , the change was mostly one of name.  The relationship of regiments to states remained about as it had been,  and the appointment of officers continued to be in practice a  collaboration between Congress, the Commander in Chief, and the states.  Some of the Continental regiments became units in the state lines, while  the men and officers of others transferred to the new regiments of 1777  without carrying the lineages of their 1776 outfits with them. The  reorganization of the winter of 1776 did not radically alter the way men  came into the Continental service or the manner in which regiments were  organized, but it did place responsibility for procurement, replacement,  and supply more squarely upon the states. This stimulated an increased  effort in some states: for example, Massachusetts and Connecticut  (although later overruled by Congress) voted to supplement the  Continental pay of their lines.

In December 1776, while the reorganization of  the American. Army was taking place, the British advanced into New.  Jersey. Faced with this threat, Congress authorized Washington to add  sixteen purely Continental battalions .to the foot establishment. This  action resulted in part from the fact that the states had been  unutterably slow in supplying their quotas for the eighty-eight line  battalions. The term of service of the new sixteen was the same as that  of the state lines, for three years or for the duration, but the  similarity ended there. Washington raised them wherever he could, and  appointed all their officers himself. The new Continental regiments were  usually recruited within one state and, like all other units, had a hard  struggle to reach full strength.

The organization established late in 1776 and  early in 1777-containing as it did the state lines coupled with the  sixteen additional Continental battalions-was a compromise between two  needs. The first need was to utilize the powerful authority of the  states, without which the conflict could not be prosecuted; the second  was to have at least some regiments subject only to the will of the  Commander in Chief.

All regiments sent out their own recruiting  parties to prescribed areas, but to keep the fighting army up to  strength was almost an impossible job. In consequence, during 1780, when  the theater of war had moved south, Washington had not enough troops to  act against the enemy with the part of the army that he commanded in  person. Indeed, Congress found it necessary to consolidate the sixteen  additional Continentals with the state lines, and, at the same time, to  fuse the separate corps and the German Battalion into them too. More  important, the infantry of the entire Continental establishment was  reduced to fifty battalions by 1 January 1781. Such a reduction of the  infantry was not dictated by strategy. On the contrary, it was the  result of a grave failure, the failure to be able to maintain a larger  number of regiments.

As in previous years, new units appeared in  the roster of the Continental Army during the four years beginning with  1777. They were often the result of the reorganization of earlier  outfits. From various sources came the following units:

1st-15th Massachusetts
5th New York
1st-6th Maryland
4th New Jersey
7th-10th North Carolina
10th-15th Virginia
The Corps of Invalids

These regiments and those in the preceding  list made up the spine of the Army after 1776. They were not static;  indeed some of the early ones provided elements of the others. Moreover,  they supplied companies to special corps such as the legions of Henry  Lee and Casimir Pulaski and the Corps of Light Infantry.

An understanding of the internal organization  of the Continental infantry regiments and their components requires a  short explanation of infantry tactics in the eighteenth century. To  begin with, the heart of a battle as fought in western Europe was the  line of infantry. It was this line which had to be broken if victory  were to be won; hence the heavy fire of the artillery and the maneuvers  of the cavalry were chiefly directed against it. It was common in Europe  for the battle line to be formed on an open plain just outside of  effective artillery range of the enemy. This meant that the two lines  took their positions within 500 yards of each other, a distance at  which, with modern firearms, few men would be left standing. This is the  fact which makes it hardest for moderns to visualize early warfare. The  effective range of the musket of the period was not over 100 yards and  was often nearer 50. Fighting at such ranges, infantry organization was  founded upon the need to form the line, control it in battle, renew it  when decimated, and maneuver it so as to place the enemy at a  disadvantage. But this was not the beginning and the end of infantry  tactics, particularly in the rough, wooded terrain of North America.

In the colonial wars of the eighteenth  century, the need had grown for infantrymen to precede the battle line.  Their purpose was to screen the advance or retreat of their own main  body, to break up the power of the volley from the enemy's line, and  otherwise to soften that line for an assault with bayonets. Such an  assault commonly began at a distance of fifty yards or less from the  foe. As a result, one of two things took
place: either a savage hand-to-hand encounter,  or a collapse and retreat by one of the lines, In any case, the  infantrymen who moved out ahead of the line were trained to aim at  individuals, to protect themselves by using cover, and to operate with  an interval of several yards between them. They came to be called "light  infantry." In contrast to their action, the line fired by volley without  taking individual aim, remained standing unless ordered to do otherwise,  and advanced with the men in it actually elbow to elbow up to the moment  of the assault.

In the American service, as in the British,  battalions and regiments were usually one and the same. An English  regiment had ten companies in it, eight of them (the "battalion  companies") for the line, the other two for special uses. These were the  elite or "flank companies." One called the "grenadier company" was  composed of men picked for their strength acrd courage. As often as not  (for instance, at Bunker Hill) the grenadier companies were detached  from their regiments and used together in provisional grenadier  battalions. These were given the most difficult assignments, and the  posts of honor (that is, of greatest danger) if used in the battle line.

The tenth company in a British battalion was  called the "light company." Light companies were also detached and  consolidated into provisional battalions, but as often they were  assigned a truly light mission, that is, to advance ahead of the line,  screen it, and demoralize the enemy. This mission of light infantry in  the American service was usually performed by rifle units, which fanned  out in front of the army and, with their accurate fire, galled the enemy  severely.

At first there was no counterpart to flank  companies in the Continental infantry. Beginning in August 1777,  however, General Washington directed that 108 men and 9 officers be  drawn from each brigade and formed into a temporary Corps of Light  Infantry. When winter came this corps was disbanded, but. it had proved  so useful that Washington urged Congress to authorize one light company  for each battalion to be formed into a separate corps during every  campaign thereafter. It was with the Light Corps, which resulted, that  Anthony Wayne stormed Stony Point on 16 July 1779 in the most celebrated  night attack made by Americans during the Revolution.

Like the British Grenadiers, the American  Corps of Light Infantry became the elite body of the Army. Command was  eagerly sought in it by the most enterprising officers and places in the  ranks by the men. Although the Corps as a whole continued to be  disbanded each winter and raised afresh for every campaign, one light  company became permanent in each Continental battalion after mid-1780.  Prior to that time American battalions had contained only eight  companies, those of the line, so that the addition brought the total up  to nine, still one short of the British. The Corps of Light Infantry  received special training in the use of the bayonet. During July 1780 it  was put under the command of Lafayette, and made the chief American  assaults the following year upon the enemy's works at Yorktown.

One of the distinctive features about the  Revolutionary War was the use of rifles and rifle units in it. The rifle  was virtually unknown in the New England Army that opened the war.  Indeed, throughout the conflict, muskets were the armament of the troops  of the line. At 100 yards, the best musketeers could hit a man-sized  target only four shots out of every ten. In contrast, expert riflemen  could kill a man with every shot at 100 yards and do good execution at  twice that range. The chief limitations on the use of riflemen were the  scarcity of expert shots and the fact that the rifle could not carry a  bayonet. Although the latter deficiency was somewhat overcome through  the use of tomahawks and knives, riflemen remained vulnerable to a  determined bayonet attack. Accordingly, riflemen were not useful in the  line, but both sides made extensive use of them as sharpshooters ahead  of and around the main fighting force.

As already mentioned, the rifle companies from  Pennsylvania in William Thompson's Battalion soon lost their  specialization and became an element of the line, armed with muskets.  Nearly as short-lived as a rifle unit was the Maryland and Virginia  Rifle Regiment, composed of the original Continental rifle companies  from Maryland and Virginia plus some later ones from the same states.  This unit was captured at Fort Washington on 16 November 1776 and was  never re-formed. Just at the time of its capture, Daniel Morgan received  a commission as Colonel of the 11th Virginia. He recruited 118 riflemen  and joined the Continental Army with them at Morristown, New Jersey,  early in April 1777. Very soon Washington drew 500 picked riflemen from  the regiments of his Army and put them under Morgan's command. Thus  began the most famous of the rifle corps which persisted intermittently  throughout the Revolution.

Sometimes Washington referred to Morgan's unit  as a rifle corps, sometimes as "rangers." The latter term requires a  little elaboration. Rangers were a species of infantry that the British  had developed to cope with the methods of the French and Indians in  North America. They were scouts who ranged the forests spying upon the  enemy, gathering intelligence on his strength and intentions, and  harassing him when they could. Units of rangers had to be made up of men  who understood woodcraft and who could match the Indians in stealth.  Also, they had to be trained shots. Actually, corps like Daniel Morgan's  were rangers a good deal of the time. In addition, there were certain  units, such as Thomas Knowlton's Connecticut Rangers, which regularly  bore the title.

From time to time the size of Continental  units was fixed by resolve of the Congress. Thus during the  reorganization which took place at the end of 1775, regiments were  authorized to contain 728 officers and men, companies 78 enlisted men.  These strengths were much larger than the British counterparts which  were 477 and 38, respectively. Although Continental units always  exceeded equivalent British units in strength, they varied widely from  authorized size. For example, nine months after the first directive  appeared, some companies had 67 men in them, others 88. This was, of  course, the result of the unequal fall of casualties upon different  outfits and the variation in the effectiveness of the recruiting systems  of the several states. The Delaware Regiment illustrates a typical case  of shrinkage. It was so decimated after the battle of Camden in 1780  that it had to be combined with Maryland companies to form a regiment.  Later still, with the Maryland remnants, it was reorganized as a light  company, commanded by Robert Kirkwood.

In closing this section on the organization of  Continental infantry during the Revolutionary War, nothing should be  stressed more heavily than the confusion which chronically prevailed in  it. At all times Washington and his staff were obliged to improvise new  organizations from the remnants. of those that had been cut up in battle  or had served out their short terms and gone home. Moreover, at all  times it was also necessary to assimilate thousands of citizen soldiers  for brief periods into some sort of working team with the Continentals.  This had to be repeated over and over again with new increments because  militia terms of service were very short. The attempt to utilize the  militia, and put it into good enough order to be effective for at least  one campaign, was perhaps the hardest of the Commander in Chief's almost  insupportable duties.

In spite of its burdensomeness the effort was  well placed. Indeed, John W. Fortescue, historian of the British Army,  declared that the militia was the decisive factor. Be that as it may,  the militia formed around the Continental Army as a nucleus, and would  not have turned out had that often ragtag force not been in the field.  Most of the estimated 164,000 militiamen who took up arms for terms from  a day up to three months were infantry. In addition to them were other  infantrymen, raised and maintained on a relatively permanent basis by  the several states, who, with the militia, rallied on the Continentals  and abetted the cause.

When the British surrendered at Yorktown on 19  October 1781, there were sixty battalions of infantry in the Continental  establishment. Afterwards, as time passed and it appeared that the  British intended no new attack, that number was steadily reduced.  Finally, in November 1783, after a peace had been formally ratified,  only one foot regiment remained, commanded by Henry Jackson. Then, on 2  June 1784, the end came even for that unit, leaving as the only  authorized vestige of the Continental Army still in service fewer than a  hundred men to guard military stores at West Point and at Fort Pitt.

Through the Second War With England

Congress nevertheless realized the need for at  least enough infantry to replace Jackson's regiment. Accordingly, the  day after the latter was directed to be discharged, the legislators  established a regiment which was to be raised and officered by obtaining  volunteers from the militia of four of the states. This nonRegular unit,  called the First American Regiment and commanded until 1 January 1792 by  Josiah Harmar of Pennsylvania, gradually turned into a Regular outfit.  It became known as the 1st Infantry in 1791, and in 1815 was  redesignated as the 3d Infantry. From 1784 to 1787 Harmar's regiment was  a hybrid, containing eight companies of infantry and two of artillery.

Although England was a constant threat to the  new nation after the War for Independence, the Indians presented the  most immediate menace. Accordingly, the First American Regiment was  stationed on the frontier. In October 1790, the Miami Indians and their  allies defeated the first field army, commanded by Harmar, to be  organized by the government of the United States acting under the  Constitution. This defeat caused the raising of another regiment of  infantry in 1791, and the numbering of the old one as the 1st and the  new one as the 2d. As a result of the radical reorganization after the  War of 1812, the latter became the 1st Infantry.

Serious trouble with the Indians of the  Northwest continued; indeed, in the very year the 2d Infantry was  organized, the Miamis defeated the second force sent by the Federal  government against them. The army defeated in 1791, led by Arthur St.  Clair, consisted of the Regular establishment augmented by militia and a  new species of foot troops known as levies. Goaded by defeats, Congress  gradually increased the military establishment from 700 men in 1784 to  5,104 in 1793. As the size of the entire Army increased, so did the  strength of the infantry elements. Regiments rose from 560 to 1,140  enlisted men, companies from 70 to 95. Regiment and battalion remained  one and the same.

Two beatings inflicted by the Northwest  Indians brought about an experiment in organization which had precedents  in certain European corps and in some of the Continental Army. The  entire military establishment was converted in 1792 into a legion, that  is, into a field army in which the three combat branches, infantry,  cavalry, and artillery, were combined in the same organization. The  legion consisted of four sublegions. Each sub-legion contained infantry,  riflemen, cavalry, and artillery; indeed it was the forerunner of the  twentieth century regimental combat team.

Although Congress had authorized a total of  five regiments on 5 March 1792, when the Legion of the United States  came into being, none but the 1st and 2d Infantry were actually  organized. Hence it was necessary to go out and recruit infantry for the  3d and 4th Sub-Legions. Likewise it was necessary to recruit the rifle  units for all the sub-legions.

Command of the new Legion fell to Anthony  Wayne, who had been a successful leader of light troops during the  Revolution. Wayne did not employ the sublegions as such to any important  extent; on the contrary, he combined the infantry from all of them,  likewise the artillery, and so forth. However, he instituted so stern a  system of discipline that he forged an army which, in 1794, finally beat  the Indians of the Northwest and defied the power of England which had  fostered Indian unrest.

Once the threat in that quarter was reduced,  the need to hold a field army together seemed to diminish. What was  needed instead, statesmen believed, was an organization which could  easily be split up and parcelled out to guard the frontiers and the  seacoast. As long as Henry Knox remained Secretary of War, the legionary  form had a stout champion, but he left office at the end of 1794. The  Legion persisted for another year and a half, then went out of existence  by act of Congress effective 31 October 1796. In the new establishment  the infantry of the four sublegions became the 1st, 2d, 3d, and 4th  Infantry.

Peace promised to prevail, so that during 1796  and 1797 the entire Army was reduced, and the size of regiments and  companies as well. For scattered use, a large complement of officers and  small companies filled the bill.

All too soon the sense of security evaporated  as war loomed with France. In consequence, the establishment swelled  precipitately, and the strength of units with it. By 1799 a total of  forty infantry regiments was authorized, although none but the 1st  through the 4th ever attained the required strength. Only 3,400 men were  raised for the 5th through the 16th, and none at all for any others.  Fortunately, the war with France never took shape; by 1800 the crisis  was over and the immediate need for more infantry gone. In addition, a  new administration took office in 1801, an administration that almost  pathologically feared a standing army. Accordingly, under Thomas  Jefferson the infantry was cut back in 1802 to two regiments, the 1st  and 2d.

Jefferson's administration had only a brief  chance to test its convictions regarding a strong militia and a small  standing army, for war clouds were gathering once more. The United  States almost began the second war with England when the British warship  Leopard attacked the American Chesapeake in 1807. This aggression caused  Congress to add five Regular infantry regiments in 1808, the 3d through  the 7th, and also to constitute the Regiment of Riflemen. The latter was  a product of the Revolutionary experience and the first rifle unit since  the end of the Legion in 1796. Rifle elements re-entered the service  through the agency of Brig. Gen. James Wilkinson, commanding the army,  and Henry Dearborn, Secretary of War, both of whom had had firsthand  experience with them in the last war.

Aside from the augmentation of April 1808  there was no further preparation for a fight until just six months  before the second war with England. At that time, that is, in January  1812, Congress constituted ten new regiments of Regular infantry. The  act of 11 January 1812 which created them was remarkable in at least two  ways: first, it provided for the largest regiments and battalions  authorized in the United States before the Civil War and, second, it  established an organization that was at variance with the seven existing  regiments. As a result, in the first six months of 1812 there were three  different-sized infantry regiments, besides one of riflemen. The 1st and  2d regiments made up the infantry of the "military peace establishment,"  and they had ten companies in them of seventy-six enlisted men. The 3d  through the 7th regiments, authorized in 1808, were called the infantry  of the "additional force," and comprised ten companies with two more  officers and two more enlisted men each than the 1st and 2d had. The 8th  through the 17th in no way resembled the others, for they had eighteen  companies of 110 enlisted men, arranged in two battalions.

Although some of the bulky eighteen-company  regiments were raised, several never acquired their second battalions.  Recruiting was so difficult that they lacked the time to raise many men  before Congress voted a fresh reorganization. Late in June 1812, the  legislators changed the law. According to the new arrangement there were  to be twenty-five regiments of infantry, exclusive of the rifle  regiment, each containing ten companies of 102 men. Thus all the  infantry regiments were made uniform on paper, and a standard of  organization was established that persisted throughout the conflict.  This standard was more often than not honored in the breach. Once  constituted, all the twenty-five regiments organized and recruited  actively, but during the first two years of the struggle their efforts  brought in less than half of the total number of infantrymen authorized.

Regulars at first could only enlist for five  years, but late in 1812 newcomers were given a chance to enroll "during  the war." All the while the states competed with the Federal government  for soldiers, and the shorter "hitches" they offered drew men into their  service. To combat this Congress directed the creation, in January 1813,  of twenty new infantry regiments enlisted for just one year. Nineteen of  them were raised and designated as the 26th through the 44th Infantry.  Later, they were converted into long-term outfits (five years or the  duration) , but all the units constituted after 1811 had men in them  enlisted for different terms. For example, there were in a single  regiment one-year regulars, eighteenmonth men, three- and five-year men,  and some in for "during the war."

Early in 1814 four more infantry regiments and  three more regiments of riflemen were constituted. Finally, therefore,  forty-eight infantry regiments, numbered from the 1st to the 48th, came  into being, plus four rifle regiments, the 1st through the 4th. This was  the greatest number of infantry units included in the Regular Army until  the world wars of the twentieth century. A mighty effort was made in  1814 to raise the Army to strength, and nearly 27,000 men came in, but  in spite of this, four of the regiments had to be consolidated because  they were too small. The 17th, 19th, 26th, and 27th were joined to form  a new 17th and a new 19th, while the two highest numbered, the 47th and  48th, were redesignated the 27th and 26th, respectively.

No sooner was war over than Congress scrambled  to rid itself of its more than 30,000 infantrymen. An act of 3 March  1815 set the peace establishment at 10,000 men, divided among infantry,  rifle; and artillery regiments. Cavalry was eliminated, and eight  infantry regiments and one rifle regiment arose from the ruins of the  forty-six and four in existence. The rifles were consolidated and the  infantry, after many rearrangements, settled as follows:

1st Infantry formed by consolidation of the  2d, 3d, 7th, and 44th
2d Infantry formed by consolidation of the  6th, 16th, 22d, 23d, and 32d
3d Infantry formed by consolidation of the  1st, 5th, 17th, 19th, and 28th
4th Infantry formed by consolidation of the  14th, 18th, 20th, 36th, and 38th
5th Infantry formed by consolidation of the  4th, 9th, 13th, 21st, 40th, and 46th
6th Infantry formed by consolidation of the  11th, 25th, 27th, 29th, and 37th
7th Infantry formed by consolidation of the  8th, 24th, and 39th
8th Infantry formed by consolidation of the  10th and 12th

The eight remaining infantry regiments were  smaller than their war predecessors because, although the number of  companies in each remained at ten, every company contained 78 men  instead of 103. There was no effort to preserve the honors or  traditional numbers of any of ,the prewar regiments. The 1st was merged  with other regiments and redesignated the 3d, and the old 2d, 3d, 4th,  5th, 6th, and 7th were likewise lost in the remains of disbanded  regiments. The new numbers were founded on the seniority of the  colonels, the senior colonel commanding the 1st, and so forth. As a  consequence of the reduction, 25,000 infantrymen were separated from the  service. Another consequence was that the form of the infantry  establishment was set roughly for the next thirty years. Not until the  Mexican War, thirty-one years later, was it substantially expanded.
The Germinal Period., 1816-1860

After the reorganization of 1815, the Regular  infantry fluctuated in size with the whole military establishment.  Prospects of peace appeared to improve, and in 1821 Congress felt safe  enough to cut expenses by disbanding the Rifle Regiment and the 8th  Infantry. Having reduced the infantry establishment to seven foot  regiments, which were thought adequate to meet all contingencies, the  legislators next sliced the size of companies to fifty-one enlisted men,  the smallest ever. This arrangement endured for fifteen years when, as  usual, the Indians forced an enlargement.

At all times there was trouble with the  Indians on the frontier, but two affairs assumed the magnitude of war.  The first in 1831 and 1832 against the tribes of the Iowa, Illinois, and  Wisconsin area, known as the Black Hawk War, was easily won by a force  composed mostly of militia. The whole affair had no permanent impact on  the Regular infantry. Not so the second of the several scraps against  the Seminole Indians in Florida, which began in December 1835 and lasted  until 1842. Volunteers and militia bore the brunt of the Florida War at  first, but Regulars gradually replaced them. As a result, after more  than two years of inconclusive fighting, Congress was obliged to augment  the Regular infantry (in 1838) by adding thirty-eight privates and one  sergeant to each company, and by raising a new 8th Infantry, the fourth  unit to go by that number. At one time or another, every one of the  eight regiments of infantry served in the Florida swamps.

As quickly as the war in Florida was over in  1842, although all were retained, regiments and companies were reduced  to minimum size. However, by a fluke, the Regular infantry actually  increased. This came about because in the spring of 1843, to save money,  the 2d Dragoons were converted into a rifle regiment. They thus became  the first rifle corps included in the establishment for two decades,  that is, since the Rifle Regiment had been disbanded in 1821. The  erstwhile horsemen, who felt degraded on foot, clung hard to their  dragoon organization, but they received rifles and, as far as is known,  trained as riflemen. Agitation to remount them was continuous, and  within a year they became the 2d Dragoons again. When they were  reconverted, rifle corps disappeared once more from the Army, except  that the President received authority from Congress to convert two or  more infantry regiments into rifles if he thought it expedient. He never  exercised this authority. .

In May 1846 a new rifle unit, the Regiment of  Mounted Riflemen, was constituted. This regiment had initially been  designated for use on the Oregon Trail but was diverted at its origin  into Mexican War service. Its animals were lost on the way, so only two  companies, mounted on Mexican horses, acted as cavalry. The rest, armed  with Model 1941 rifles, bayonets, and flintlock pistols, fought on foot.

At the start of the Mexican War, Congress  tried to get along with just eight infantry regiments of Regulars, but  in doing so gave the President power to expand their companies to one  hundred enlisted men during the war. Ten months after hostilities  commenced, it was necessary to change this policy and add nine new  regiments-with the same organization as the old ones-to the Regular  infantry. Eight of them, as was customary, bore numbers, the 9th through  the 16th; but the other got a name. It was called the Regiment of  Voltigeurs and Foot Riflemen. Half of this unit was to be mounted, the  other half on foot, and each horseman was paired with a foot soldier who  was to get up behind him for rapid movements. This arrangement was never  executed, and the Voltigeurs became in fact a regiment of foot riflemen,  armed with the same rifle (a muzzle-loader) as the Mounted Riflemen.  Quite by chance, the regiment included a company of mountain howitzers  and war rockets, but it was not linked with the riflemen tactically, nor  were the rockets and howitzers ever used together.

Although raised as Regulars, the nine new  infantry regiments created during the Mexican War were disbanded when  the war was over. Their dissolution left a peace establishment of eight  foot regiments. This structure seemed less adequate than it would have  before 1846, for "Manifest Destiny" had entered the reckoning of the  legislators. The inescapable need to protect, at least partially, the  vast area taken from Mexico, and to help settlers across the great  plains to California and Oregon, caused Congress to add the 9th and 10th  Infantry in 1855, the fourth of both numbers in United States service.  The ten regiments in existence after 1855, the 1st through the 10th,  made tip the foot establishment until after the actual opening of  hostilities in 1861. The Regiment of Mounted Riflemen remained active  after the Mexican War, but in 1861 it was redesignated as the 3d  Cavalry.

The new 9th and 10th Infantry organized in  1855 were the first infantry units to receive rifle muskets instead of  smoothbores as their standard arm. The rifle issued to them was built to  utilize a new type of ammunition, known as Minie bullets. Because these  conoidal bullets expanded when fired, they could be made small enough to  be rammed easily down the barrel of a rifle. When the propellant  exploded, the ball expanded into the rifling which imparted to it the  spin that made rifle fire superior to that of muskets. The principle  implicit in the Minie bullet worked a true revolution in the use of  small arms by enabling accurate rifles to replace inaccurate muskets as  standard firearms for the infantry.

A regiment of ten companies-with regiment and  battalion one and the same-was standard throughout the period. For  training and for battle purposes, the eight battalion companies were  placed in line by a complex arrangement according to the seniority of  their captains, which seems to have had its origin in the protocol of  medieval armies. It had no functional basis, since once lined up, the  companies were renumbered from right to left. For official designation,  however, a new system began in 1816. Under this system the companies  were known by letters, instead of by numbers or by the names of their  commanders. The two flank companies received the letters A and B, and  the others C through K. There was no Company J, because J was too easily  confused with I in writing.

At this point it is necessary to remember that  there had been only one flank company per battalion during the  Revolution. The addition of a second company had occurred in 1798 when  war with France seemed certain. Its adoption brought the American  battalion into conformity with those of England and France, the  potential European foes. But whereas their flank companies received  special weapons, those in the United States infantry did not. As a  result, the latter had less chance to develop techniques apart from the  line. They were simply composed of men picked for their strength and  courage.

The truth is that conditions in America did  not favor the specialization of particular companies. Indian wars had to  be fought by whatever troops were available; there was no time to await  the arrival of elite corps, whether called grenadiers or something else.  Nor did fights with Indians give much opportunity for infantry to assume  the formal line of battle with light units out front. Finally, the  scattering of the companies of Regular regiments made specialized  training impossible.

Nevertheless, the drill manuals of the United  States infantry after 1825 called the two flank units grenadier and  light infantry companies. The latter term had some application, the  former none at all. The acceptance of European designations resulted  from the dominance of French military arrangements throughout the world  in the decades after the wars of Napoleon. More specifically, it came  from the fact that American drill manuals were in reality translations,  only slightly modified, of French regulations.

It was during this epoch that Americans  borrowed a verb from the French to describe the operations of light  flank companies. That verb was "to skirmish." It grew in use and  importance because the extended order of light or skirmishing infantry  was very slowly challenging the tighter formations of the line. In the  United States the challenge had not proceeded far at the time of the  Mexican War. Rather, it was the introduction of the Minie ball, and  other advances in firearms, which in the fifties forced infantry all  over the world toward wider use of skirmish tactics. The trend was to  give all infantrymen training as skirmishers. As a result, the Tactics  adopted in 1855 discarded the distinction in name among the ten  companies of a battalion. All ten took their places in line, and all  were prepared, when called on, to move ahead of the line and skirmish  with the foe.

In the Mexican War, light battalions of  Regulars were often formed for specific missions by temporarily  detaching companies-not necessarily the flank ones-from different  regiments. Composite battalions of this sort usually did not do as well  in battle as established ones, in which men and officers understood each  other and regimental pride was an active stimulant. There was, however,  more distinction between flank and line in volunteer regiments. Two  companies out of ten were specifically organized as light and given a  choice between rifles and muskets. The flank rifle companies which  resulted were often detached from their regiments and used together for  'special sharpshooting assignments. This was the case in the fighting on  the mountains to the left of the American position at Buena Vista.

Throughout this period there was a growing  emphasis on the use of segments within a company. This emphasis resulted  from the increase in the power of firearms which followed adoption of  the Minie principle and the extensive experiments under way on repeating  and breech-loading rifles. In order to offset the mounting vitality of  firepower, professional soldiers began to stress dispersion in the  official drill manuals. Dispersion, of course, strained the ability of  officers to control large bodies of men, and consequently highlighted  the need to organize smaller elements within units. Applied to a  company, this meant an increased use of platoons (half companies) ,  sections (half platoons) , and the beginning of the fighting squad.

The earliest suggestion of the squad was a  file of two men, the two being taught to stick together during a fight.  Later, for purposes of training, squads gradually changed from being  irregular knots of men, in the drill manual of 1815, to being specified  fractions of a company in 1841. The latter were to be quartered and  exercised together. There was no expansion of their use in combat until  1855 when the new manual prescribed "Comrades in Battle" (two files,  totaling four men) who were to work together in battle.

There is another point about this period which  deserves emphasis: the frequency with which the other two combat arms  served as infantry. In the Florida War, artillery fought on foot and  dragoons did likewise more often than not. During the Mexican War, the  bulk of the Regiment of Mounted Riflemen fought on foot and only ten  artillery companies had cannon, while the other thirty-eight served as  infantry. They carried musketoons instead of muskets, and swords instead  of bayonets; but they were trained for infantry service, and made an  impressive record fighting as such.

Under the provisions of the Constitution, the  United States received complete control of the Regular Army-the  descendant of the Continental Army-but not of the militia. Most of the  power over the latter remained with the states, and the extent to which  the Federal government could use state militias became a matter of  endless controversy. Worse by far, from the standpoint of efficiency,  was the fact that militiamen could only be held to serve for three  months and that they were not liable to do duty very far from home. What  is more, militia training differed widely from state to state, so that  it was hard to fuse units from the several states into one army.

When obliged to wage war as a nation, the  United States was caught between the fear of a standing army and the  inadequacies of a militia controlled by the several states. Some sort of  compromise was necessary, and that proved to be an old type, volunteer  soldiers organized into provisional wartime regiments. There were also  peacetime volunteers- quite distinct from those raised for a war- at  hand in the militia.

In the large seaboard cities there were  independent or chartered companies of citizen soldiers apart from the  common or standing militia. They were composed of men who liked military  exercise well enough to buy their own uniforms, drill regularly, and  hold together in peace as well as war. These units usually received  charters from the states, and they very soon constituted an elite corps.  This corps became the parent of the National Guard of the twentieth  century. The title "Volunteers" with a capital V was applied to them  early in the nineteenth century, and it is used here to distinguish them  from individuals or units who volunteered only for the duration of a  given war.

Volunteer infantrymen, when associated with  the compulsory militia, took the posts of honor and their units were  consequently often referred to as flank or light companies. Sometimes  they had special weapons and actually trained as light infantry. When  war came they sometimes volunteered to go as units or they became a  relatively trained cadre around which some provisional regiment was  built. By the 1850's, the standing militia had deteriorated so far, and  the Volunteers had become so stable, that many of the states abandoned  the idea of compulsory service, and accepted the Volunteers as their  constitutional militia. This done, they began to organize the scattered  companies into battalions and regiments, a grouping that was well  advanced in some states in the decade of the 1850's.

Volunteers were supposed to be organized and  to train according to the discipline of the Regular infantry, but this  was rarely the case. The Tactics of the Army were not widely enough  disseminated, and were too voluminous for general use by the state  militias anyway. As a result, Volunteers and militia used whatever  manuals they could come by, which ranged from Steuben's Regulations of  1779 to the latest translations of the French system.

In the Mexican War, most volunteers reached  the seat of war with little or no training; but some of them, once  arrived, were associated with Regular brigades and quickly introduced to  the Army drill. Like the training, the organization of citizen soldiers  of all types was required by law to conform to the United States'  standards, but much latitude existed. The Maryland and District of  Columbia Battalion of the Mexican War, for example, reached the combat  area with only one field officer of the three required in the Regular  service. Also, the size of regiments at that time varied from 923 on the  under side of the Federal standard of 1,004 enlisted men, to 1,423, on  the upper. In general, the Volunteers of the cities came closest to  adhering to U.S. standards, both for training and for organization.

The wide use of militiamen and volunteers  carried with it an inevitable flabbiness in discipline. Citizens  temporarily turned soldiers had no sense of unquestioning obedience to  anyone and were usually not in service long enough to acquire more than  a shade of it. Moreover, they almost always elected their own officers,  which did not make for stern authority.

Frequently, the lack of training and of  discipline resulted in rout in battle, as happened on part of the field  at Buena Vista. On the other hand, citizen soldiers often showed  remarkable fighting ability, as was true, for example, of the  Mississippi Rifles, commanded by Jefferson Davis, on another part of the  same battlefield. In all instances, training and leadership were the  ingredients that made the difference. Lack of training caused trouble  less often in combat than in the intervals between, when life grew very  dull. It must be remembered that a hitch in wartime was a lark for many  a citizen, during which he left his inhibitions at home. Citizen  soldiers made relations with the people of Mexico difficult because, as  General Zachary Taylor said, ". . . it is impossible effectually to  control these troops [for they lose] in bodies the restraining sense of  individual responsibility."

Whatever the quality of U.S. Army foot troops,  figures show quite well the change that was taking place in their source  during wars. Nine out of ten infantrymen in the War of 1812 were  militiamen. Only one out of ten foot soldiers was a militiaman in the  Mexican War; three were Regulars, and six were war volunteers. This  trend continued until the adoption of conscription in the twentieth  century. The point to stress is that infantry doctrine and standards  were set by the Regulars, but the mass of American infantrymen in  wartime were citizen soldiers.

The Civil War

The infantry, both North and South, was far  from ready for war in 1861. There were but ten Union foot regiments, and  they were largely in the West, scattered by companies over thousands of  miles. Until assembled, which would take time, they could be counted on  for very little. Many of the Regular officers, the core of any  expansion, had served in the Mexican War fifteen years before, but few  had commanded any sizable body of troops. Moreover, although a small  number had kept abreast of world military developments after their  services in Mexico, they were not in a position to dictate policy in  Washington.

To add to the problems of the infantry early  in the war, virtually no preparations had been made, apparently because  statesmen hoped until the last minute that conflict could be averted.  They believed that military adjustments would damage the chances of  peaceful compromise. Thus, when war began, the foundations of what was  to become a huge infantry establishment had to be commenced hastily and  without real planning.

Since Congress was not in session, President  Lincoln began the war buildup in May 1861 with a proclamation of  doubtful constitutionality. On the strength of his executive authority,  he summoned thirty-nine regiments of volunteer infantry and one of  cavalry to serve for three years. His next step was to authorize an  addition of eight infantry regiments to the Regular Army. Somehow a  ninth got included. Thereafter, the nineteen regiments in being- the 1st  through the 19th- were the whole of the Regular infantry during the war.  So neglected a part of the whole establishment were these nineteen that  they were never able to attain their full authorized strength.

Prior to issuing his call, the President  consulted the War Department as to the best. organization for the new  Regular units. The Secretary of War, being overburdened, turned the  matter over to Salmon P. Chase, Secretary of the Treasury, and loaned  him three officers as technical advisors. The result was a  recommendation in favor of the French structure. This included regiments  of three battalions instead of one. Two battalions were supposed to take  the field, the third to maintain a regimental depot for collecting and  training recruits. Battalions of 800 men in eight companies were adopted  as the most efficient fighting units because they were thought to be  small enough to maneuver and to be controlled by the voice of the  commanding officer, yet large enough to withstand attack by cavalry.

A battalion in the French system was the  fighting unit, a regiment the unit of administration. The French felt  that a regimental headquarters could administer more than one battalion,  an arrangement which appealed to Americans because it eliminated some  field officers and thus saved money. The new three-battalion  organization, however, was not extended to the ten old regiments, which  continued to comprise ten companies each, with regiment and battalion  one and the same. The men in authority felt that there was no time to  bother with reorganizing outfits already extant, when so many remained  to be organized from scratch. Furthermore, the old, single-battalion  regiment was hallowed by age and tradition. This meant that two  different regimental organizations were tolerated in the Regular  infantry, a dualism that might have caused much confusion had the  Regular regiments loomed larger than they did in the whole infantry  establishment.

The number of men in all Regular companies was  raised at once to the maximum authorized by law, that is, 84 enlisted  men in the first ten regiments and 97 in the other nine. Even so, the  regiments never reached full strength because they could not compete  with the volunteers for enlistments. By December 1861, some 30,000  Regular infantrymen were authorized, but barely 11,000 enlisted, while  during the same period 640,000 volunteers entered the service. The third  battalions of the 12th, 13th, 14th, 17th, and 19th Infantry were never  organized, and not all the companies were raised for the third  battalions of the other four new regiments. In fact, the 11th, 12th, and  13th only imperfectly organized their second battalions. Each battalion  of the new regiments designated its companies by letters beginning with  A, so that, if fully raised, there were three A companies, three B  companies, and so on in each regiment.

Since replacements came more slowly than  losses to the Regular regiments, all of them grew smaller as the war  continued. By July 1864, as an illustration, the 2d Infantry had shrunk  to 7 officers and 38 enlisted men, who were, thereafter grouped into one  company and assigned to guard duty. Moreover, by 1 November 1864 all the  Regular outfits of the Army of the Potomac were so reduced that it was  necessary to withdraw them from the field. Such shrinkage was, of  course, not confined to the Regulars. The average strength of  regimentsmost of which ought to have contained 1,046 officers and  men-was as follows in the battles named:

Shiloh (6-7 April 1862) 560
Fair Oaks (31 May-1 June 1862) 650
Chancellorsville (1-5 May 1863) 530
Gettysburg (1-3 July 1863) 375
Chickamauga (19-20 September 1863) 440
Wilderness (5-7 May 1864) 440

The comments so far have referred mainly to  Regulars, but this should not obscure the fact that most infantrymen  were volunteers. These volunteers were members of regiments raised and  officered by the several states. Initially President Lincoln called for  thirty-nine such outfits, but before the war was over more than 1,700  volunteer regiments served. This was not far from one hundred times as  many as there were units of Regulars. The three-battalion organization  was not extended to the volunteers because the states, which raised  them, were thought to be too much accustomed to the old system to  change. As a result, the volunteer units, like the first ten Regular  regiments, contained ten companies in one battalion.

These regiments were variously numbered and  designated by the several states, but in practice came to be called  merely the "8th Indiana" or the "45th New York." Although patterned  after the old regiments in overall organization, the state regiments  borrowed their company structure from the new, that is, they had  ninetyseven enlisted men, instead of eighty-four, plus one wagoner whom  the Regulars did not have. As matters were arranged, therefore, there  were three different regimental organizations in the infantry. The  volunteer regiments aggregated 1,046 officers and men; the 1st through  the 10th Infantry, 878; and the 11th through the 19th, 2,367. Actually  the battalions of the latter ought to be .compared with the old  regiments, since they were designed to act independently and  approximated the size of the others. They contained a few more than 800  enlisted men.

Even though most of the volunteer infantrymen  were raised and officered by the states, a few hundred units were not.  Several types of volunteers were more directly linked to the United  States than to any state, the earliest of these being two regiments of  U.S. Sharpshooters (1st and 2d) organized in 1861. These two contained  companies from several states, raised by the states. Their origin in  more than one state was an uncommon attribute, but their real  distinguishing feature was the manner in which they were officered.  While the states appointed the company and field officers in ordinary  volunteer units, the Federal government appointed them in the  Sharpshooters and similar outfits.

The next type appeared when large-scale  acceptance of Negro troops began in 1863. A number of battalions had  started as state units, but with the exception of two Massachusetts  regiments, all Negro outfits were finally mustered directly into Federal  service, and were organized and officered under the authority of the  United States and not of any particular state. Known at first as the  Corps d'Afrique and by other names, these units came to be called U.S.  Colored Troops by the spring of 1864. Indian regiments (1st-4th Indian  Home Guards) were handled in the same way. In all, there were 138  regiments of Negro infantry and 4 of Indians. Except for these two  races, diverse nationalities could and did intermingle in infantry  units, although men of German, Irish, and Scandinavian extraction  proudly associated together in exclusive regiments.

Yet another type of Federal volunteer emerged  because casualties had reached such proportions that provision for the  incapacitated, and replacements for them, had become critical problems.  To solve these problems, the Invalid Corps was established in April 1863  and classed as infantry. It was composed of men who in the line of duty  had become physically unfit for combat. Those who could handle a gun and  make light marches were put in the 1st Battalion and were used for guard  duty. The worse crippled formed the 2d Battalion and were used as nurses  and cooks around hospitals. Six companies from the 1st Battalion and  four from the 2d made up a regiment in the Corps after September 1863.  In all, 24 regiments and 188 separate companies of invalids did duty,  thus releasing able-bodied soldiers for combat service. In March  1864-because the Corps' abbreviation, "IC," was confused with  "InspectedCondemned"-the name was changed to Veteran Reserve Corps.

Finally, in 1864 six infantry regiments of  U.S. Volunteers (1st-6th) were recruited for service on the frontiers  (not against the Confederacy) from Confederate prisoners of war. Then in  1865, nine infantry regiments of U.S. Veteran Volunteers (1st-9th) were  raised directly by the United States. Although all types of United  States volunteers made up only a small fraction of the foot troops who  served for the Union, they merit attention because of the intimate  relationship between them and the Federal government, and because of the  lack of vital connection between them and any state. This relationship  foreshadowed the National Army of the twentieth century.

The Confederate Army arranged infantry units  pretty much as the Union did, except that all regiments contained ten  companies. Authorized company strength was 64 privates minimum and 125  maximum. Around 642 infantry regiments served at some time or another,  along with 9 legions, 163 separate battalions, and 62 unattached  companies. Many of the Confederate units were the forbears of Army  National Guard elements existing today.

In the heat of the conflict, no changes were  made in regimental organization, despite the fact that it was soon  recognized as unsuitable. Improved firearms forced regiments and their  companies to disperse to such an extent that officers could not  effectively exercise control over them. Once .a regiment deployed, it  was too big for one man and his staff to control. This fact helped to  cause a high casualty rate among general officers, since the only way  they could influence an assault, or rally a broken line, was to place  themselves where everyone in the command could see them. At such times  the enemy's sharpshooters saw them equally well.

Years after the Civil War, Maj. Gen. John M.  Schofield, who had commanded the Army of the Ohio under Sherman, said  that the cumbersome regimental organization had only worked in the  course of the war because the replacement system was faulty. What he  meant was that the unwieldy regiments at the beginning of the conflict  dwindled through casualties until they reached a size which a colonel  and his staff could handle. The same attrition, of course, applied to  the control of companies.

Companies were also unwieldy yet were. not  reorganized. On the contrary, the promise of wide use of platoons,  sections, and squads- a promise that may be detected in the infantry  manuals of the 1850's- was not fulfilled during the war. As a result,  notwithstanding the fact that the need was far greater, there were no  more officers in an infantry company than there had been forty years  before.

The reason why types of organization were  retained that had been designed for use under different conditions  stemmed from the great haste with which the armies were assembled in  1861. There was no time to make a wide canvass of professional soldiers,  and those consulted were deceived by their belief that the conditions of  the wars of Napoleon had not been radically modified. Few foresaw, and  perhaps could not have foreseen, the full impact of the Minie ball upon  warfare.

The keystone of the whole matter was the  heightened firepower which the infantry had to face and which it could  wield. The foot soldier's rifle musket, although a muzzle-loader, was  vastly more effective than the weapons infantrymen had handled before  1855. It was accurate from 200 to 400 yards, and capable of killing at  800 to 1,000. Nor was it the only improved weapon. Scattered among the  soldiers were many types of breech-loading repeating rifles which did  great execution.

Except for being unwieldy, regiments and their  components proved otherwise adaptable to wartime conditions. For  example, heightened firepower more than ever before demanded skirmishers  in front of the battle line. These the regimental organization was able  to supply simply by assigning any of its companies to the duty.  Likewise, regimental organization lent itself well to the attack  formation which became characteristic of the Civil War. This was a  succession of lines. Each line was composed of two ranks with a  prescribed distance of thirty-two inches between them. Of course, the  lines varied greatly in length and in the distance at which they  followed each other. Some were as long as a whole brigade lined up in  two ranks, others only as long as a company. If there was a usual  length, it was that of a brigade, since attacks by divisions in column  of brigades were most frequent. In any case, regiments as organized were  easily utilized in that type of attack formation, as they were in  others.

New means began to work during the Civil War  to knit armies together and to speed their movements. For the first  time, railroads were used extensively to move infantrymen to and from  battle areas. This employment gave the foot soldier greater speed than  he had in the past. In the field of communications, signal flags were  first used. These enabled the parts of a force to keep contact with each  other and to pass on information about the enemy. Newer still was the  use of electricity, in the form of the telegraph, to link the components  of a large force and to connect field elements with the Commander in  Chief at Washington. The new modes of communication did not much improve  the connection between units of the same army on the battlefield, but  their indirect influence on the use of infantry was very great. The  Signal Corps was constituted during the conflict to handle the new media  of communication. Its service was great, but its relation to the  infantry was only a tiny fragment of what it was to become in the  future.

In conclusion it must be said that the Civil  War occurred in one of those periods, common in history, when weapons  outdistanced organization and tactics. It is true that deadly fire  brought about modifications in the use of infantry, one of which was the  use of a succession of lines in the assault, another the regular  employment of temporary field works. But even after taking these into  account, it .seems clear that the rifle musket was more modern than the  organization of the infantry and the resultant formations used in the  assault. Otherwise stated, organization and tactics were basically those  of the beginning of the nineteenth century, while the weapons were fifty  years more modern. This discrepancy between weapons and minor tactics  accounts in part for the shocking destructiveness of the Civil War.

A Diverse Half Century, 1866-1915

Four years of war, and the large army built up  during them, conditioned the nation in 1866 to the biggest increase in  the Regular infantry since the War of 1812. The result was a postwar  military peace establishment of twenty-six more Regular regiments of  foot soldiers than had served for the Union. The total was forty-five.  All regiments were formed on the prewar pattern with ten companies, and  with regiment and battalion one and the same. The new companies were  strong in noncommissioned officers and specialists, having a total of  nineteen, and privates totaled between fifty and one hundred at the  discretion of the President.

The expansion of the infantry worked out as  follows. The 1st through 10th Infantry retained their numbers. The first  battalions of the 11th through the 19th expanded into regiments of the  same respective numbers, and the second battalions into the 20th through  the 28th Infantry. The first ten regiments needed no expansion, but the  converted first and second battalions, being composed of just eight  companies, required two more companies apiece. The 29th through the 37th  Infantry were supposed to come from the third battalions of the Civil  War units, but, since these had never been raised for the 12th, 13th,  14th, 17th, and 19th regiments, and only imperfectly for the other four,  the postwar units had to be recruited. The other eight regiments were  new. Negro personnel, commanded by white officers, staffed the 38th  through the 41st, while men from the Veteran Reserve Corps, wounded but  still able to do active duty, filled up the 42d through the 45th.

During 1866, twenty-six of the forty-five  regiments remained in the area of the Confederacy, while twelve were  sent west into Indian country. To the men who personally fought the  Indians, there never seemed to be enough soldiers, but the level of  forty-five regiments was altogether too high for the rest of the nation  when the stimulus of the great conflict had worn off. In consequence,  recruiting was stopped, and in 1867 the companies were directed not to  replace their losses until only fifty privates per company remained. Two  years later, on 3 March 1869, Congress reduced the infantry to  twenty-five regiments. This set off a reorganization which, for  disrupting the history and traditions of regiments, almost rivaled the  upheaval of 1815. The following consolidations resulted:

43d consolidated with the 1st to form the new  1st
16th consolidated with the 2d to form the new  2d
Half of the 37th consolidated with the 3d to  form the new 3d
30th consolidated with the 4th to form the new  4th
Half of the 37th consolidated with the 5th to  form the new 5th
42d consolidated with the 6th to form the new  6th
36th consolidated with the 7th to form the new  7th
33d consolidated with the 8th to form the new  8th
27th consolidated with the 9th to form the new  9th
26th consolidated with the 10th to form the  new 10th
24th consolidated with the 29th to form the  new 11th
12th Infantry not affected
13th Infantry not affected
45th consolidated with the 14th to form the  new 14th
35th consolidated with the 15th to form the  new 15th
11th consolidated with the 34th to form the  new 16th
44th consolidated with the 17th to form the  new 17th
25th consolidated with the 18th to form the  new 18th
28th consolidated with the 19th to form the  new 19th
20th Infantry not affected
32d consolidated with the 21st to form the new  21st
31st consolidated with the 22d to form the new  22d
23d Infantry not affected
38th consolidated with the 41st to form the  new 24th
39th consolidated with the 40th to form the  new 25th

Twenty-one outfits emerged from the  reorganization bearing the same numbers they had borne through the war,  but the new 11th, 16th, 24th, and 25th Infantry were not so fortunate.  They had no connection with the war units of the same numbers. However,  the 24th and 25th-created by consolidation of the 38th through the  41st-carried on the tradition of the Negro regiments begun during the  Civil War.

The Regular infantry stood unchanged at  twenty-five regiments for thirty-two years, and was at last altered only  because of the need to hold the territory outside the continental United  States acquired from Spain in 1898. Within the regiments the size of  companies fluctuated. In the trough of economic depression the number of  men authorized per company dropped in 1876 as low as thirty-seven.  Infantry officers pointed out that when sickness and desertion occurred;  these little companies were much too small to do their duty in the  Indian country where 180 out of 250 of them were stationed in the  1870's. The severe cut that reduced the companies to skeleton strength  came about in the following manner. One month after the famous massacre  of Custer's troops in June 1876, Congress reduced the enlisted strength  of the Army from 30,000 to 25,000. Then in August the legislators  allowed existing cavalry units to be augmented by 2,500 men, since  cavalry was considered the chief reliance against the Plains Indians. As  a result, the reduction of 5,000 fell almost entirely upon the infantry.

By 1890 the long fight against the red man was  practically won. This made it possible to abandon some of the small  posts, held by one or two companies, and to concentrate the units under  regimental control. The shift, however, was not made easily, and as late  as 1912 the Secretary of War complained that dispersion made of the Army  nothing but a scattered constabulary. In any case, in 1890 it seemed  sensible to make the whole infantry establishment more compact without  increasing it.. In consequence, Companies I and K of each regiment were  stripped of all personnel, and their men and officers used to fill out  the remaining companies. Thus, fifty infantry companies existed only in  name with their records and trophies preserved by the regiments. The two  hundred companies that survived had one sergeant and four corporals  fewer than formerly, and a total of forty-six privates each. Within a  year, however, the War Department directed that Company I of nineteen of  the regiments be filled out with fifty-five Indians, but because it was  unsuccessful the, project was soon dropped.

While these changes were taking place,  observers were pointing out that the ten-company, one-battalion regiment  was obsolete. The increased accuracy of firearms, they said, had forced  dispersion so that no one man could control ten companies in battle.  Accordingly, the Secretary of War in 1890 urged that a regiment of three  battalions of four companies each be adopted. Such an arrangement was  backed by statistics, for wars in Europe had demonstrated that one-third  of a regiment now occupied the same front in battle as an entire  regiment once had. This being so, a single leader could hardly be  expected to direct more than four companies in action. In the next few  years, the Secretary's successors repeated the request, but without  success.

Throughout the period under consideration,  there was ceaseless experimentation with infantry small arms; but, even  so, changes came slowly. The reason for this was that the Army had to  practice the strictest economy. Accordingly, Ordnance sought for the  last refinement before standardizing any model, since once a rifle was  adopted, it could not soon be discarded in favor of a new one costing  large sums. As a result, the rifle musket of the Civil War remained in  general use for a few years after the return of peace.

When at last the almost hallowed old piece  made way for a new one in the early 1870's, the United States infantry  took a forward stride as great as when it had adopted the Minie  principle in the 1850's. The new gun, the celebrated Springfield Model  1873, embodied several indispensable improvements. It was the first  official infantry rifle to load at the breech. Next, it operated without  a touch-hole- an essential in all previous American foot soldiers' guns-  because the primer was included as part of a brass cartridge which had  replaced paper cartridges. Last but not least, it dropped .13 of an inch  in caliber, being .45 instead of .58 across the bore.

The Springfield '73 remained the official  shoulder arm of the infantry for nineteen years. Actually it served  longer than that, for citizen soldiers used it in 1898 and 1899, and the  Philippine Scouts even later. When finally it was superseded in 1892,  its replacement embodied an advance that had been widely used for  decades. Called the Krag-Jorgensen, it was the foot soldier's first  standard repeating rifle. In addition, it continued the trend toward  smaller bullets, being .30 caliber instead of .45. The Krag lasted nine  years before yielding to the Springfield Model 1903. The latter remained  standard for almost forty years, that is, to the outbreak of World War  II. Although it was not a new departure as the '73 and the Krag had  been, it utilized the latest improvements, and was as fine a rifle as  infantry had anywhere in the world.

All of a sudden, in the spring of 1898, the  United States jumped into a war with Spain. There were then 26,000  enlisted men, in round figures, in the Regular Army, of whom half were  infantry. A threebattalion organization was put into effect at once by  the following arrangement. The existing eight companies in each regiment  were divided into two battalions, while the two skeleton companies were  filled out and combined with two new companies to make the third  battalion. Also, the size of companies rose from around 50 to 106  enlisted men. The result was a substantial regiment of 1,309 enlisted  men. However, it still contained 1,000 men fewer than the authorized  strength of the 11th through 19th Infantry in the Civil War and 2,400  less than the 3,700-man units of World War I.

Conflict with Spain did not add even one to  the total of twenty-five Regular infantry regiments, for, as in the  Civil War, chief reliance was not placed upon Regulars. No sooner was  war declared than Congress passed an act putting a second component  beside the Regulars. This was called the Volunteer Army of the United  States. The regiments of this force were raised and officered by the  states, and in the main sprang from existing organized militia units.  Officers of the Regular Army were at liberty, without losing Regular  status, to accept commissions for field grades in state units, provided  there was no more than one Regular in any volunteer regiment. Congress  also ruled that state units had to conform to the organization of the  Army, and that general and staff officers for corps, divisions, and  brigades be appointed by the President.

Before the end of May, President William  McKinley made two calls for troops, requesting a total of 141 regiments,  20 separate battalions, and 46 separate companies of infantry, all of  which were raised quickly. Most of the regiments came into Federal  service with around 950 enlisted men, but three or four contained as few  as 650. Nearly all of them recruited up before the war was over,  although none reached the 1,309 prescribed. This was not surprising when  one considers that, except for the regiments that went to the  Philippines, all the volunteer infantry units were released by 8 June  1899, having served in most cases less than a year.

It was decided, in the second month of the war  (May 1898) , to organize ten regiments of volunteers not related to any  state, an action for which there was precedent in the United States  volunteers of the Civil War. The latter had been raised from special  groups such as sharpshooters or Confederate prisoners of war. The  earliest regiments of United States Volunteer Infantry in the War with  Spain were also made up from a special group, that is, from men who were  immune to tropical disease: five regiments of Negroes and five of  whites. They were authorized to contain only 992, instead of 1,309,  enlisted men, and all had close to that number when they were mustered  in.

As early as March 1899, the use of United  States Volunteer Infantry was carried beyond the employment of the  10,000 immunes. By September 1899, twenty-four new regiments, not to  remain in service beyond 1 July 1901, had been authorized to be raised  from the country at large. Their designating numbers started where the  Regular infantry's left off (that is, at 26) and ran through 49. The  36th and 37th were recruited from men already on duty in the  Philippines, the 48th and 49th from Negroes. Practically all the  officers of field grade for the new outfits came from the Regular Army.

In March 1899, companies went up in size to  112 enlisted men and regiments to 1,378. Three months later, companies  in active areas, such as the Philippines, increased to 128. Thus  enlarged, twenty-four regiments of United States Volunteers and  twenty-five of Regulars made up the infantry which garrisoned the  Philippines, Cuba, and Puerto Rico, as well as the United States itself.  Soon it was necessary to make new provisions, since after 1 July 1901  the authorization for Volunteers and for the increases in Regulars ran  out. The new arrangement, dated 2 February 1901, gave the number of  Regular infantry regiments its first boost since 1866. Five new ones  were authorized, the 26th through the 30th. These were the fourth units  with these numbers to have been in the Regular service, the first having  existed during the French crisis in 1798-99, the second during the War  of 1812, and the third from 1866 to 1869.

This and other legislation of 1901 set the  upper limits of the military establishment, but allowed the President to  increase the size of companies by 6 noncommissioned officers and to  raise the, privates up to a total of 127 if he thought it necessary.  Under this discretion, the authorized size of the Army fluctuated by  executive order until World War I. Also, two new nationalities joined  the infantry establishment, for the law sanctioned up to 12,000  Philippine Scouts and a provisional regiment of Puerto Ricans.

Native Filipinos had been organized into  companies as early as September 1899, but having no official sanction,  had been paid as civilian employees of the Quartermaster. Their official  organization, which took effect on 1 October 1901, provided for fifty  companies. The officers were from the Regular Army except for the 1st  and 2d lieutenants, who could be selected from qualified natives. A  battalion organization was introduced in 1904, and in the following  decade thirteen Philippine Scout battalions came into being. After World  War I these battalions, most of which had been parts of provisional  regiments during the war, were grouped into permanent regiments and  given numbers. They became the 43d, 45th, 57th, and 62d Infantry  (Philippine Scouts).

As with the Filipinos, there had been an  earlier organization in Puerto Rico, a battalion which had begun to  operate during March 1899. This was combined with a battalion of mounted  infantry, organized in 1900, to make a regiment. Its companies were  smaller than those of the Regulars and of the Philippine Scouts, and it  contained two instead of three battalions. The Puerto Rico Regiment was  manned by natives of, that island but commanded by officers from the  continent. In 1908 this outfit was incorporated into the Regular Army,  and in 1920 it was redesignated as the 65th Infantry.

The organization of infantry regiments into  three battalions of four companies each-finally brought about by the War  with Spain-persisted as a permanent alteration. It is interesting to  note, that with this change the Army returned to the regimental  organization used from 1790 to 1792. This 100-year reversion, however,  did not arise from a study of the earlier period-rather it sprang from  the experience of the. Civil War, coupled with that of the later wars in  Europe. Experience had demonstrated that the old regiments were far too  big to be effectively controlled in battle. As long as the system in  which battalion and regiment were one and the same was followed, the  regiment was a fighting subdivision in the line of battle. On the other  hand, in the shift to more modern practice which the infantry was  making, the battalion was a fighting subdivision while the regiment  exercised administrative control over three battalions. The fault in the  shift was that the American battalion was too small to perform its work.  This may be illustrated by comparing the new organization with those in  Europe. The French and Prussian infantries both used regiments of three  battalions, but the battalions were far larger. The Prussians had 1,000  enlisted men in theirs, the French close to 700, wile Americans had no  more than 425.

One of the major trends in military  organization during the second half of the nineteenth century had to do  with the organization of infantry below company level. Within two years  after the Civil War, a new United States manual on infantry tactics was  issued. Prepared by Maj. Gen. Emory Upton, it based all troop evolutions  on movement by fours. Since a front of four men in proper line had a  rear rank, the basic subdivision of the new system was really a squad,  although that term was not used.

Upton's Infantry Tactics remained official for  twenty-four years. During these years organization within companies took  form. Accordingly, the Infantry Drill Regulations (the first manual to  bear that name), issued in 1891, defined a squad more sharply than  before. A squad contained seven privates and one corporal, and was made  the basis of drill in extended order. Since extended order was gradually  displacing close order, the squad gained new importance. Likewise, as  the duties and the organization of a squad became clearer, those of half  companies (that is, platoons) also took firmer form. Indeed, the fire of  an advancing infantry line was carried out, according to the manuals, by  platoon.

Throughout the half century the movement was  toward the refinement of organization further and further. This meant  giving small knots of men, and combinations of such knots, cohesion and  special leadership. The development that launched this movement was the  gradual replacement of line tactics by skirmish tactics. Along with it  came changes in training and techniques, such as a set of arm signals by  which company officers and their subordinates could control their men.  All the changes, whether in organization or techniques, stemmed from the  growing deadliness of firearms.

A weapon that would change the character of  warfare, the machine gun, was being developed during this period. The  first important model, the Gatling gun patented in 1862, was purchased  by the United States during the Civil War. Tests made in the 1870's  showed the Gatling to be equal to seventy Springfield rifles well aimed  at 150 to 200 yards. Interest in the weapon increased and the United  States bought several lots of it in the years after the Civil War.

As a result of the intercession of 1st Lt.  John H. Parker, an independent battery of four Gatling guns, directly  under the corps commander, took an active part in the Santiago campaign.  The guns were directed against entrenched Spanish infantry with telling  effect, and even against artillery. Parker contended they could do  anything necessary to support infantry, but believed they would be more  effective if made lighter (they weighed two hundred pounds). He also  recommended that some sort of mounting, other than the awkward cannon  carriage, be devised for them. Not infected with Parker's enthusiasm,  higher commanders were inclined to look at the Gatlings as artillery,  and not very good artillery at that.

The machine gun made its greatest advance when  Hiram Maxim, an American inventor, patented one in 1883 which eliminated  the need for a hand crank by operating on the energy of its own recoil.  The United States experimented with it as early as 1888 but did not  adopt it officially until the first decade of the twentieth century.  Tests made in 1910 showed that one machine gun was equal to sixteen  riflemen at ranges up to 600 yards; to twenty-two men from 600 to 1,200;  and to thirty-nine men beyond 1,200 yards. Comparing these figures with  those given for tests in the 1870's, it is clear that the repeating  rifle had reduced the discrepancy between shoulder arms and machine guns  a good deal. In any case, on account of the unwieldiness of the weapon  and for other reasons,, official doctrine on the machine gun remained  very conservative.

This did not, however, prevent experiments in  organization to utilize it. In 1906, for example, a provisional machine  gun platoon of twenty-one men and two Vickers-Maxim guns was added to  each regiment. Although the Secretary of War reported three years later  that this arrangement had not worked well, the salient fact is that  infantry regiments were never again without machine guns. In February  1908, an experimental company was constituted, headed by John H. Parker,  now a captain. This company, although it went through several changes in  organization, was the forerunner of the machine gun companies of  infantry regiments in World War I.

There were other experiments in organization  besides those dealing with machine guns. A headquarters detachment of  seventeen enlisted men and fifteen mounted scouts was added to each  regiment in 1912 for trial. With the machine gun platoon, it made up a  regimental detachment the parts of which were trained intensively in  their specialized duties. By 1915 the headquarters detachment had grown  into a headquarters company "provisionally provided" for each regiment  of infantry. (There had never before been headquarters companies in  them.) In the same way, the machine gun platoon became a machine gun  company, while a third new company, a supply unit, was also under trial.

The size of infantry regiments varied, within  the limits imposed by law on the President, according to the duty  performed. Regiments in the United States in 1912 had 65 enlisted men  per company and a total of 870; those in the Philippines, 150 and 1,836;  those in Hawaii and the Canal Zone, 72 and 954; the Puerto Rico  Regiment, 65 per company with 591 total. The beginning of World War I in  Europe added to the variety, for the possibility of American involvement  caused the preparation of alternate tables of organization, one for  peace, the other for war. Thus in June 1915, the peace strength of an  infantry regiment was set at 959 officers and enlisted men; the war  strength at 1,945.

Once the nation had become a colonial power on  account of the War with Spain, the study of war grew more important, and  Americans turned to a review of what they had to fight with. It was  clear that the Regular Army was too small to make up the whole defense  and that stimulation of the militia was therefore necessary. As a  result, one phase of the reform of 1903 was to replace the Federal  militia law which had been on the books since 1792. This reform was  particularly significant for the infantry because it comprised the bulk  of the militia force. When the revised law went into effect, there were  107,422 enlisted men in the organized militia and 93,314 of them, or 8 7  percent, were foot soldiers.

The Militia Act of 1903 attempted to draw the  National Guard (as the organized militias of the several states were  coming to be called) closer into the military force controlled by the  Federal government. This implied better training in peace time. When the  act was passed, the improved training began to operate, and this, plus  the beginning of war in Europe, accelerated the drawing together.  Initially, according to the act of 1903, the United States could retain  National Guard forces in its service for just nine months, whereas by  1908 Federal power had so enlarged that the President could specify the  length of their service. Also, National Guard units volunteering for  Federal service in 1903 could keep the officers they had; but by 1914  the power to appoint all officers, when the Guard was on active duty,  had fallen to the President with the advice and consent of the Senate.

The great reforms in the Army which took place  in 1903 affected the Regular infantry only indirectly. Creation of a  General Staff and Army War College brought about co-ordinated thinking  which, of course, touched the infantry. Very early, it was seen that,  because of the great preponderance of infantry in the National Guard,  the forces of the United States were out of balance. The Secretary of  War hoped to offset the imbalance by maintaining a high proportion of  cavalry and artillery in the Regular Army. Also, some foot units of the  National Guard in seaboard states were converted into coast artillery.  This does not mean that there was an excess of Regular infantry. On the  contrary, in 1909 the Secretary asked that both ipfantry and artillery  be increased. He fixed the proper proportion of infantry at 50 percent  of the whole; but in the decade from 1901 to 1911, the ratio actually  dropped from 50 to 35 percent.

Finally, it is necessary to mention the  growing role of the Signal Corps in support of infantry. During the  Civil War, the Corps had provided strategic communication, but by the  time of the War with Spain it gave some tactical communication as well.  This was accomplished by means of signal flags and, to an ever  increasing extent, by telephones. Telephone lines began to follow the  infantry very close to the firing line. This was but a beginning, for  telephones supplemented by radios were to be the medium which in the  twentieth century would link units of the same force on the vast  battlefields, and link them better than they had once been linked by  close-order formations.



The First World War

A full ten months ahead of the formal entry of  the United States into World War I, the National Defense Act of 3 June  1916 erected the framework on which to expand the military establishment  if conflict should come. At the time, there were thirty-one regiments of  Regular infantry, counting the Puerto Rico Regiment of two battalions,  plus thirteen battalions of Philippine Scouts. In addition, the National  Guard contained around 110 regiments of infantry.

The National Defense Act raised the authorized  size of the Army from 100,000 to 175,000, and provided that the increase  be made in five annual increments, beginning 1 July 1916. The first  increment included seven new infantry regiments, the 31st through the  37th. The 31st was organized in the Philippines, the 32d in Hawaii, the  33d in the Canal Zone, and the other four were organized in the  continental United States. All seven of them expanded from cadres  supplied by specified existing regiments. As soon as the United States  entered the war, twentyseven new infantry regiments were constituted and  organized by the transfer of cadres from the other thirty-seven. When  this process was completed, the Regular infantry comprised sixty-five  regiments, seventeen more than ever before in American history.

The National Defense Act recognized four  elements in the land forces: the Regular Army, the National Guard, the  Reserve Corps, and in wartime the Volunteer Army. Once the nation  actually went to war, the character of the latter element changed, for  volunteering was scrapped except in the Regular Army and in the National  Guard. The Volunteer Army became the National Army, which was raised by  conscription. All in all, the wartime Army contained 297 infantry  regiments of one kind or another and 165 machine gun battalions classed  as infantry.

Infantry regiments and machine gun battalions  together totaled 462 in World War I, a figure which is dwarfed by the  1,700-plus infantry units that served in the Civil War. One of the  reasons for the contrast was the fact that regiments had increased three  times in size; but the chief reason was that the units of the later war  remained to the end, while those of the earlier one came and went.

The War Department came 11 July 1917 set up a  system by which infantry units were to be designated. The designating  numbers for all segments of the Regular Army began with 1. Regiments ran  from 1 through 100, but these slots were never all filled. Just  sixty-five Regular infantry regiments, in twenty divisions, came into  being, and the higher numbers allocated to the Regulars were finally  used by National Army units. No 66th was raised, but during July,  August, and September 1918 the 67th through the 90th were organized  around cadres from the first sixty-four. None of them (67th-90th)  reached the theater of war. The numbers reserved for infantry regiments  of the National Guard began at 101 and ran to 300, those for the  National Army began with 301. Actually, the Guard regiments never used  the numbers beyond 168, nor the National Army those past 388. The 376th  through 378th, 381st, 382d, 385th, and 386th never came into being.

Late in the conflict, on 7 August 1918, the  distinction between National Guard, Reserve Corps, Regular Army, and  National Army was legally abrogated and all four elements were fused  into one organization, the United States Army. This was the first time  in American history that career soldiers, citizen soldiers, and drafted  men of the infantry found themselves on the same legal basis.

Three years of observation of the war in  Europe had convinced the General Staff that American tables of  organization were obsolete. Accordingly, a series of changes in them  began. The first one altered the existing triangular division,  containing elements grouped by threes, to a square one. In this change,  the three brigades of a division and the three regiments of a brigade  gave way to two of each. The final result was a much larger division and  brigade than any used by the nations of Europe. At the time of the  armistice on 11 November 1918, an American division contained 28,105  men, nearly twice the number in European units. Firepower in both  division and brigade was greatly augmented.

In the transition from triangular to square  divisions, and in the consequent alteration of regiments and battalions,  the elements of the National Guard were seriously dislocated. Since out  of the 367,223 enlisted men of the Guard originally inducted, 242,000  (66 percent) were infantrymen, it was believed necessary to break up  many infantry units. As a result, old regiments and other units were  consolidated and broken up, thereby losing their identity and their  proud state designations.

A typical example of the dislocation took  place in the infantry elements of the state of Massachusetts. The old 2d  Infantry was fortunate enough to remain intact under a new number as the  104th Infantry. The three other regiments, however, provided men for  three infantry regiments (the 101st, 102d, and 103d) as well as for the  101st Engineer Train, the 101st Supply Train, the 101st Train  Headquarters and Military Police, and the 3d, 4th, and 5th Pioneer  Infantry.

Several of the newly constituted regiments of  pioneer infantry drew their personnel from the breakup of National Guard  units. Resembling standard infantry regiments only in size (3,551 men) ,  they were in reality a labor force used primarily to repair roads and  bridges. Thirtyseven regiments were organized in all, the 1st through  the 6th, 51st through 65th, and 801st through 816th. National Guard  personnel went into the 1st through the 59th regiments and drafted men  into the 60th through the 65th. The outfits in the 800 series were  formed of Negro personnel in 1918 to relieve the 1st through the 61st  regiments, so that the latter could reorganize for service as combat  infantry.

Regimental organization underwent some  changes, but the National Defense Act forbade increasing the number of  companies in a regiment beyond fifteen. Among the fifteen, a  headquarters, a supply, and a machine gun company received permanent  status for the first time. In any case, the changes reflected the  requirements of trench warfare in Europe. Hence, an infantry regiment  jumped from 2,002 to 3,720 enlisted men with an even larger increase in  firepower.

The increase in size resulted from the need  for deep formations in both attack and defense. In the attack, two  battalions abreast might make up the first wave and the companies within  them would be arranged also in depth. Behind the attack wave would come  a support wave, perhaps the third battalion, and behind it would be  elements withdrawn from the three battalions operating as a reserve.  Likewise, successive positions in depth were the standard formation in  defense. Such formations to be adequate required large regiments. As had  been the case since the War with Spain, infantry regiments contained  three battalions of four companies each.

At the root of the organizational changes  listed, and others that took place, were the demands of weapons. The  machine gun led the list. The necessity to develop a proper  organizational framework for the best use of that lethal arm raised a  thorny problem, a problem which was heightened by the great increase in  the number of guns. In May 1917 there was but one machine gun company  for each infantry regiment, while by July the number had risen to one  per battalion. The ideal arrangement, after July, was to include three  machine gun companies in every infantry regiment. Unfortunately, this  could not be done-because of the way the National Defense Act was  worded-without cutting some rifle companies out of the regiment.  Accordingly, it was necessary to create machine gun battalions that were  elements of brigades and divisions, leaving just one company organic to  infantry regiments. In numbering, the machine gun battalions followed  the general rule. Battalions of Regular divisions and brigades were  given numbers from 1 through 60; those of the National Guard from 101  through 151; and those of the National Army from 301 through 366. Since  the 6th, 46th, 352d through 357th, 361st, 362d, 364th, and 365th were  not organized, there was a total of 165 active infantry machine gun  battalions during World War I. These units had to be put together from  diverse segments of others that were broken up, hence their histories  have not been passed down to modern outfits except in the National  Guard.

The brigade battalions of machine guns  contained three companies, while the division battalion was at first  organized with four. This made a very awkward arrangement since machine  gun companies had to be drawn from three sources-regiment, brigade, and  division-in order to work with infantry battalions. Although the  arrangement remained awkward throughout the war, and brigade and  divisional battalions continued to exist, the division machine gun  battalion was finally reduced to two companies. These were motorized and  used as a highly mobile element of the divisional reserve.

It was easier to alter organization in order  to include machine guns than it was to supply these weapons. Although  machine guns had been included in American arms since 1862, World War I  expanded their use so much that manufacturers in the United States could  not at first supply enough of them. As a result, American doughboys  employed Chauchat automatic rifles and Hotchkiss heavy machine guns made  in France, as well as some British and American Vickers machine guns.  The new American .30caliber heavy machine guns and automatic rifles  invented by John M. Browning were not used against the enemy at all  until September 1918, only a few weeks before tie armistice.

Of all the weapons an infantryman handled, his  rifle changed the least. For supply reasons, the British Enfield became  standard. It did not differ very much from the Springfield Model 1903,  which the soldier knew. Likewise, the bayonet of the Enfield, a knife  seventeen inches long, resembled the one it temporarily replaced. In  short, the standard rifle required no changes in the organization of  units, but its power, coupled with that of other weapons, enforced  changes. in fighting formations.

Trench warfare brought with it a pressing need  for weapons that were decisive in close combat. Out of this need came  hand grenades, rifle grenades, and more extensive use of pistols and  revolvers. Such short-range fireweapons tended to supersede cold steel  and rifle butts as the tools of shock action, but American doctrine  considered proficiency with the bayonet as still indispensable because  it gave confidence and aggressiveness to foot soldiers.

In addition to the weapons that infantrymen  handled as individuals, there were two served by crews. One, also a  creature of trench warfare, was the Stokes mortar, which could lob  projectiles into enemy trenches and shell holes. Another was the  one-pounder cannon, an antitank and antimachine gun piece. These two  weapons were placed together in a platoon of the headquarters company of  every infantry regiment.

The weapons mentioned above, coupled with  artillery, gas, tanks, and aircraft, dictated the minor tactics of  infantry and slaughtered the troops of commanders who failed to heed  their dictates. Indeed, machine guns are credited with having created  the war of position and the accompanying stalemates which prevailed  during 1915, 1916, and 1917. General John J. Pershing carried this  interpretation farther. He said that trench warfare had caused the  belligerents in Europe to embrace a faulty doctrine. They placed too  great a reliance on artillery and on mechanical aids. Pershing insisted,  in contrast, that the basis of a sound army remained, as it had always  been, a sturdy infantry. Accordingly, he required that American foot  soldiers be trained primarily for open warfare, and only incidentally  for duty in the trenches.

As already noted, depth was necessary to  infantry formations. In the attack this meant successive waves of men;  in defense, numerous positions, staggered irregularly one behind the  other. Thus, all units from division down to platoon were organized to  give the required depth within their respective sectors. The war  confirmed the trend toward refining the organization of infantry units.  Squads and platoons proved to be indispensable in twentieth century  combat. Frequently the outcome of a fight depended on the integrity of  those elements since they, and they alone, could be controlled  personally by their leaders when under very heavy fire.

In addition to being organized to give depth,  units at all levels were formed to give effect to the new weapons and to  avoid losses from them in the hands of the enemy. It has been noted that  the expanding use of machine guns required reorganizations which reached  from divisions down to companies. The other weapons exacted changes, but  they were not quite as widely disseminated. For example, infantry  mortars and one-pounder guns found a place in the headquarters companies  of regiments. Hand grenades, rifle grenades, and automatic rifles caused  many changes in the organization of companies and their components. The  question as to their best arrangement was never definitely settled  during the war. All were included in a rifle company, but sometimes the  automatic riflemen were formed together, as were the grenadiers and  rifle grenadiers, other times they were scattered among the squads. As  late as November 1918, in the Meuse-Argonne campaign, the specialists  stayed together in combat groups, but *the trend was toward dispersion  so that every squad contained at least one automatic rifleman, one good  grenade thrower, and one rifle grenadier.

Whatever the organization, extended order  became necessary in combat. Men could not bunch up and live. Therefore,  close formations had to break up when they came within artillery range.  Approach to the enemy resulted in a progressive extension, and this in  turn threw a greater burden on the commanders of platoons and squads.  Small units of men inched themselves forward, taking advantage of shell  holes and other cover.

It remains to mention briefly two allies of  infantrymen that virtually revolutionized their combat methods. The  first was the motor truck, which gave foot soldiers greater mobility  than they had ever before had. The second was a miscellany of signal  equipment. This helped the infantry to operate with some degree of  co-ordination on huge battlefields where arm signals could no longer be  seen and noise drowned out the human voice. It aided in making foot  troops an effective instrument of the will of the commander, and served  to rectify, at least a little, the disorganization that resulted from  the necessity for soldiers to disperse widely in order to survive.




Between World Wars, 1919-1941

During the two decades between world wars, the  infantry underwent startling changes that exceeded any in its previous  history. The greatest of these was in speed. In 1919 a prime object had  been to secure trucks to replace horses, so that foot soldiers could  move toward the battlefield at fifteen to twenty-five miles an hour. In  contrast, twenty years later the equivalent object was to use aircraft  so that doughboys could hurtle toward fields of battle ten times as  fast.

These twenty years were as contradictory as  they were revolutionary. In them, the foot establishment declined  steadily for the first seventeen years, and then soared to great heights  in the last two.

During the first of the two decades, the  impact of World War I was naturally dominant. Civilian Americans were  determined to retrench from the unheard of costs of world war and, while  they were at it, to forget warfare altogether. As a result, the  authorized strength of the Regular infantry slid from 110,000 in 1920 to  40,331 in 1932. The proportion of foot soldiers to the whole  establishment likewise dropped from near 50 percent to slightly less  than 25.

So great a cut in the infantry-it amounted to  63 percent-of course played havoc with the regiments. Of the sixty-five  in the Regular service, eighteen were inactivated in 1921 and eight  during 1922. None of these were revived until 1940 and after. This heavy  pruning left the block of regiments from the 1st through the 31st  intact, with scattered numbers thereafter. The 33d, 34th, 35th, 38th,  42d, 45th (Philippine Scouts) , 57th (Philippine Scouts) , and 65th  (Puerto Rico) Infantry survived, but the 42d was inactivated in 1927.

Even after twenty-seven infantry regiments had  been inactivated, it was necessary to lop some battalions from those  that survived. In consequence, by 1938 there were fourteen regiments out  of the thirty-eight with but two battalions apiece. Nor was the whole  reduction yet complete. Next, it was necessary to modify the tables of  organization so that in peacetime all but two regiments had headquarters  detachments instead of companies, while only one had a howitzer company,  the rest having howitzer platoons. Also, rifle and machine gun companies  contained two instead of three platoons. Thus reduced, they were hard  pressed to turn out one war-strength platoon for purposes of training.

It is apparent from the figures just given  that the thinking of Congress and of the people was more isolationist  than before World War I. This fact, reflected in the emaciation of the  Army, enforced a defensive psychology on the officers in the service.  Accordingly, during the 1920's strategic planning was based on the  assumption that if a major war came, it would be waged against the  United States by some first-class power fighting in the Western  Hemisphere.

The squeeze was aggravated by the expansion of  the Air Corps, whose growth could only proceed at the expense of the  other arms. By mid-1931 the infantry had already given 2,656 enlisted  men to the growing air arm, and was soon to be drawn on for more. It was  necessary to inactivate five battalions in 1930 to meet the quota.

A sharp pinch persisted until 1935, when the  government's policy of spending to combat the Great Depression finally  reached the Army and resulted, among other things, in an increased  appropriation for personnel. This policy was abetted by the troubled  state of Europe. At first the growth was slow, so that by 1939 the  infantry had risen 17,000 from its 1932 low. That year the overall  policy changed. Whereas before 1939 the Army had been recognized as no  more than a cadre, afterwards there was official recognition that an  army-in-being was needed, and $1,000,000,000 appropriated to implement  its creation.

Beginning in 1940, some of the Regular  infantry regiments, inactive for eighteen or nineteen years, were  reactivated. That same year, forty regiments of National Guard infantry  were inducted into Federal service, and the next year, thirty-six more.  Hence, by mid-1941, there were 379,845 infantrymen of all types in  service, organized in 136 regiments (including 18 armored) , 32  battalions (15 of them tank) , and 34 separate companies.

Even this number did not seem adequate to the  Chief of Infantry, whose office was created in 1920. He pointed out that  combat infantrymen made up less than 25 percent of the whole Army under  the expansion plans, as contrasted with 50 percent in the German  establishment. Such a proportion, he said, was not justified. It  resulted from the fact that certain elements had been brought into the  Army which tended to squeeze the infantry out. One of these was the  heavy siege elements introduced during World War I for reducing  trenches; the other was the armored element brought in afterward for use  in distant maneuver. If the high command shared this view, it did not  show the fact by altering the ratio of infantry to the whole Army.  However, basic doctrine as late as 1939 restated the old principle that  infantry was the prime element in combat, and that rifle and bayonet  were still the chief weapons.

The experience of World War I was distilled  into one document that cut across every phase of military life. This was  the National Defense Act of 1920. It touched the infantry in many ways,  but the principal way was in the creation of a Chief of Infantry. For  some years agitation to provide the combat arms with chiefs had been  growing. As a result of the National Defense Act, the doughboys after 1  July 1920, for the first time in United States history, had a chief who  was the peer of the chiefs of the cavalry, coast artillery, field  artillery, and of the technical services.

Another consequence of that comprehensive act  was the assignment of tank units to the infantry. Thereafter for twenty  years, development of tank materiel and doctrine was a responsibility of  the Chief of Infantry. Tank units were known as "infantry (tanks)." A  Tank Board and a Tank School were transferred in 1920 from the abolished  Tank Corps of World War I, along with a number of tank companies. In  1929 some of these companies were formed into two newly constituted  regiments, designated the 1st and 2d Tank Regiments. In 1932 they were  redesignated as the 66th Infantry (Light Tanks) and 67th Infantry  (Medium Tanks), respectively. The next year saw the constitution of two  additional light tank regiments, the 68th and 69th, which were kept  inactive. In 1940 the 69th was disbanded and the other three regiments,  together with the former divisional tank companies, were assigned to the  new Armored Force.

Lean as the infantry establishment was between  world wars-even with the tanks in it-it nonetheless benefited from more  careful planning and study than ever before. A few months prior to the  appointment of a Chief, an Infantry Board designed to guide and plan  developments in weapons and organization came into being at Fort  Benning, Georgia. This body reported to The Adjutant General through the  Infantry School. Attached to it was a Department of Experiment whose  mission was to subject weapons and equipment to extensive tests.  Naturally, when the Chief took office these units became responsible to  him.

The Chief of Infantry, the Infantry School,  the Infantry Board, the Department of Experiment, the Tank Board, and  the Tank School engaged vigorously in the development of infantry. Their  earliest contribution was a complete revision of the tables of  organization. In this alteration, made during the twenties, the square  division survived, but some of its infantry components were considerably  modified. The most extreme change took place in infantry battalions,  where one rifle company was eliminated and replaced by a machine gun  company. This corrected the confusion of World War I in the use of  machine guns by placing heavy machine guns under the control of infantry  battalion commanders. Almost as extreme was the reduction of the number  of platoons in a rifle company from four to three. Both these changes  were in the direction of what was later called "triangularization,"  although it was not yet accepted as a broad principle.

Such changes, of course, reduced the firepower  actually carried forward by infantrymen in an assault. No one claimed  that the heavy machine guns, now organic to a battalion, could keep pace  with the attacking doughboy. The reduction stemmed in part from the  experience of the recent war which had shown that the number of rifles  in a regiment was close to impossible to control. Also, it stemmed from  the shrinking quantity of manpower available to the Army. In any case,  two types of tables of organization were prepared, one for war, the  other for peace. This dualism persisted to the very eve of the next war.

By the early thirties, improvements in weapons  had made it possible for fewer men to deliver the same volume of fire.  As an example, experts tinkered with the Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR)  in an effort to correct its known weaknesses. By adding a butt plate, a  small bipod, and a cyclic rate regulator, they greatly augmented the  value of the weapon. The improvements, unfortunately, added five pounds  to its weight.

The automatic rifle remained located within  the rifle squad where it had come to rest at the close of the war. In  1930, one more was added provisionally to build up infantry firepower,  making two to every squad. This arrangement did not last long but gave  place to the older order in which one BAR was in every squad. Not until  1 February 1940 was this organization disturbed. Then, at the express  request of the Chief of Infantry, who thought the added weight of the  gun had put it out of the class of arms to be carried forward by  riflemen, the BAR was removed from the rifle squad and put into a  separate squad within the rifle platoon.

The BAR was not regarded as the decisive  element in infantry firepower. American emphasis remained on the  individual doughboy's shoulder arm. Accordingly, in the effort to  substitute firepower for manpower there was a continuous search for an  efficient self-loading rifle. Experiments by the Infantry Board soon  made it clear that a semiautomatic rifle could increase the  infantryman's rate of fire from ten or fifteen aimed shots to twenty or  thirty per minute. What is more, the rounds could be better aimed  because the marksman did not have to unsettle his aim to operate a bolt.

The Garand rifle, designated Ml, was selected  for development. By 1934 there were eighty Ml's on hand, and by the fall  of 1938 they were replacing the 1903 Springfield at the rate of 150 per  week. Even so, the new rifle did not replace the old until after war had  begun. Since the new rifle could deliver twice the fire of its  predecessor, it made possible reductions in other weapons. For example,  the total of automatic rifles in a regiment dropped from 189 to 81 in  1943. Although the figure subsequently rose, it never again, not even in  war, attained the earlier level.

Likewise, the M1 influenced fire tactics.  Notwithstanding that arms like it were known and used in Europe, they  did not affect doctrine the same way as in this country. On the  continent, firepower was increased principally by augmenting the number  of light machine guns, while in the United States the increase came  principally from the faster shooting shoulder arm of the individual  rifleman. Thus in Europe, fire superiority depended on a gun served by a  crew; in the United States it depended on the individual doughboy and  his weapon.

It is not implied that the American Army  slighted light machine guns. On the contrary, the World War I weaknesses  of the BAR, together with its limitations, provoked much research to  develop a suitable light machine gun. During the twenties and part of  the thirties, the BAR was included in infantry armament only as a  substitute for a hypothetical light machine gun which experts expected  to be developed. Finally, in February 1940, at the suggestion of the  Chief of Infantry, a true light machine gun appeared for the first time  in the table of equipment. As this weapon was in very short supply, the  improved BAR was made the official substitute. As a result, for the time  being, BAR's were found in two different portions of an infantry  company. They were standard armament in each rifle squad, and in  addition, they were substitute armament in what was called the weapons  platoon.

This weapons platoon (new in 1939) was part of  a trend to integrate all necessary weapons except artillery and tanks  into the basic tactical unit, the battalion. That trend .made every  element of an infantry battalion, even the squad, a more complex  organization than before, and at the same time vastly increased its  firepower. The heightened complexity, of course, brought with it the  need for better communications, better training, and above all better  leadership.

The improvements in portable weapons were  important, but by no means as sharp a break with the past as the  development of the arms that have come to be known as heavy weapons.  These were first used during World War I; hence there was much to be  done toward improving them and adjusting organization to use them most  efficiently.

The first change to accommodate organization  to the heavy weapons was the creation in 1920 of a howitzer company in  each regiment to utilize the Stokes mortars and one-pounder cannon.  Since the Regular infantry had not enough men to maintain the new  howitzer companies, they were reduced to platoons. The National Guard,  however, continued to support full companies. Into the howitzer unit,  whether platoon or company, from time to `time went various heavy  infantry weapons devised between the wars. Among these were 81-mm.  mortars, which were first used in very limited quantities in 1932; the  various types of 37-mm. cannon, which replaced the one-pounder cannon;  and .50-caliber machine guns.

The howitzer company was always more of an  aspiration than a reality. Its name gave no clue to the weapons in it.  Rather the name indicated the desire for a howitzer to accompany the  infantry, a need which combat in World War I had seemed to reveal. In  the years between wars no adequate accompanying cannon was developed.  Finally, in the sweeping revision of 1939, the howitzer company was  eliminated and its 37-mm. cannon put into a new antitank company in each  regiment.

In the same broad revision, the old machine  gun companies of infantry battalions were reorganized to become heavy  weapons companies. They absorbed the .30-caliber heavy machine guns of  the older company and, in addition, acquired two 81-mm. mortars and two  .50-caliber machine guns. The creation of the battalion heavy weapons  company was part of the trend to include all weapons within a battalion  that it would need to use whether attacking or defending. The process  added greatly to the firepower of a battalion.

All the changes in organization and all the  vigorous experiment with arms did not actually produce the weapons that  were needed for training. Everything was in very short supply. In  consequence, as late as 1941 mortar crews went through maneuvers with  stove pipes and the crews of light machine guns set up and aimed  broomsticks. These harsh facts caused the Chief of Infantry to state on  the eve of war that a consciousness of obsolescence in all their arms  had seriously damaged the morale of American infantrymen.

After 1939, battalion heavy weapons companies,  regimental antitank companies, and weapons platoons within rifle  companies were largely manned by soldiers, who required some side arm  other than the heavy Garand rifle. The ideal weapon for the crews of  mortars, machine guns, and antitank guns had to be light, have a rapid  rate of fire, and yet have greater range and accuracy than a pistol. As  a result, the number of pistols authorized declined steadily, while new  light side arms multiplied. One of the latter was the carbine, which  came into general use in 1942. Another was the submachine gun, which had  been used experimentally since 1922.

World War I had displayed two very pressing  needs in warfare. One was for protection from devastating fires, the  other for greater mobility. When applied to infantry, the two were  contradictory, for the more protection the infantryman had, the heavier  and slower he tended to become. After the war, tanks were made part of  the infantry. They offered foot soldiers some added mobility and some  protection. Accordingly, infantry doctrine took tanks into account, and  the American infantry division included a company of light tanks in its  organic structure. Indeed, in the basic theory expressed in the Field  Service Regulations of 1939, armor was given the primary mission of  helping the infantry advance. This being so, one can understand why the  Chief of Infantry strongly protested when in July 1940 armor was removed  from infantry control. As of 1939, tanks dropped out of infantry  divisions, and never re-entered organically until after World War II.

Mobility was slowly increased in the infantry  by the use of trucks. Hardly anyone doubted the value of motor vehicles  to speed the movement of foot troops, but lack of funds restricted their  use. Beginning in 1922 trucks replaced animals in the field and combat  trains of four regiments. Later, other regiments received vehicles for  the same purpose. By 1932, twelve were partly motorized. The trucks,  however, were mostly worn-out leftovers from World War I.

It was the priming of the economic pump that  finally secured some new vehicles for the infantry. In 1936 Congress  authorized the purchase of 1,000 trucks and cars. With these, division  and regimental headquarters could have autos, and six regiments could  motorize their machine gun companies and howitzer and communications  platoons.

Experiments with organization, motorization,  weapons, and equipment were continuous in the decades between the wars,  but the culminating experiments took place in 1937, 1938, and 1939.  These were brought about by a growing belief among military leaders that  the square divisional organization of World War I was too large and too  unwieldy. Experts did not expect the static warfare of 1915-17 to recur;  hence they no longer saw the need for the great power of penetration  possessed by the square division. On the contrary, mobility was rising  in importance, and it was hampered by large numbers. Regimental  organization was in such confusion that there were five different types  in the United States, while no two regiments serving overseas were  alike. This was another consideration which prompted attempts to  reorganize.

The object sought was an infantry division  that was smaller and faster than the old one but with as much firepower.  To obtain it the infantry establishment, from squad up to division, was  given the most thorough examination it had ever received. Not everyone  engaged in the examination agreed as to the means to the end. Most  accepted three infantry regiments to a division, but differed as to  their composition. The Chief of Infantry, for example, proposed four  instead of three platoons to a rifle company, and a fourth rifle company  in each battalion.

In any case, in 1937 the 2d Division was  formed into a provisional unit to test the various proposals. For  several months it tried out the suggested arrangements in the field. The  trials were remarkably thorough, although they were handicapped by  shortages of weapons and vehicles. For example, no light mortars were  available, while only one regiment could be completely equipped with the  M1 rifle. There were not enough .50-caliber machine guns and, of course,  no light machine guns at all.

What emerged from the tests was a full new set  of tables of organization which became effective during 1939. The new  tables were built upon a triangular basis in which elements within an  infantry division, from squads up to regiments, were associated by  three's. Two levels of organization in the infantry were eliminated  altogether, one large and the other small. These were brigades and  sections. Triangularization made possible a simple and effective  tactical doctrine, but some experts belittled this aspect. They said  that the real reform in 1939 did not come from embracing a triangular  organization but from the modernization of weapons that accompanied it.

The cornerstone of all infantry organization,  the squad, was enlarged for wartime from eight men to twelve. This was  done in spite of the evidence produced in the field tests that seven or  eight men were all one corporal could hope to control in battle. The  Chief of Infantry strongly urged the increase. The command weakness of  so large a squad was corrected late in 1940 when the leader was made a  sergeant and his assistant a corporal. With two noncoms in charge of it,  the infantry squad would remain at twelve throughout the coming war.

One fact that made smaller divisions feasible  was the fixed principle that divisions would usually operate as parts of  larger units, that is, corps and armies. As parts, they could draw upon  pools established in the big elements whenever they needed more men or  more equipment than was normal. In other words, they would retain as  organic only the units they needed for normal operations. The War  Department called this arrangement "pooling," and put it into effect  wherever practicable. The new grouping of heavy and crew-served weapons  into battalion heavy weapons companies was a practical application of  pooling. Also, the antitank weapons of regiments were pooled in antitank  companies, and light machine guns and mortars in the weapons platoons of  rifle companies.

The regiment adopted in 1939 was much smaller  than before, containing but 2,542 men. According to the Chief of  Infantry, such a regiment was too small by several hundred for effective  combat action, and he vehemently protested. This protests resulted in  new tables of organization the next year which raised the strength of a  regiment by 907 men, and battalion and company proportionately.

The new triangular organization was put into  effect in the Regular Army during 1939. Within the National Guard,  however, the square organization, somewhat modified, persisted even  after many units had entered Federal service in 1940.

All in all, the Chief of Infantry contended,  and rightly, that in the years from 1937 to 1941 American infantry had  undergone a real revolution. The foot establishment had been arranged  along lines that were more carefully tested than ever before in  peacetime. As for weapons, they were turned over completely, except for  the .30-caliber heavy machine gun. The 60-mm. mortar (first adopted as  standard in 1937, but remaining scarce) had replaced the old Stokes and  its successors, while the heavier 81-mm. mortar had been introduced. A  light machine gun had actually been adopted, and the BAR was so much  improved as to be virtually made over. Finally, the 1903 Springfield  shoulder rifle had yielded its place to the semi-automatic M1. In  addition, new small arms such as carbines and submachine guns had  entered infantry armament, together with a larger machine gun, the  .50-caliber.

As a result of the revolution, the Chief of  Infantry believed his branch to be organized on sound principles. The  battalion, he said, was now a complete combat unit which contained  within itself all elements, save armor and artillery, necessary to  attack or to defend. Its weapons could be employed in direct or indirect  fire and for high angle missions, or, if needed, for those requiring  flat trajectories and high muzzle velocity. It was no longer dependent  on attachments from regimental units for its firepower, needing to draw  on pools only under unusual conditions.

Moreover, the elements of infantry were  arranged according to mobility. A squad had the standard mobility of a  rifleman; a platoon that of a BAR man. Platoons contained no crew-served  weapons, and none requiring continuous resupply of ammunition. No weapon  in the platoon served as a focus for hostile fire. At company level, the  heaviest weapons (light machine guns and 60-mm. mortars) could be  carried by hand; even a battalion contained no guns which could not be  manhandled for several hundred yards. All weapons needing prime movers  were placed in regimental units.




The Second World War

The coming of war resulted in the largest  expansion of the infantry ever undertaken. During the three years,  1941-43, it increased 600 percent. Although this was 100 percent more  than the field artillery, it fell far short of some of the newer arms,  for example the antiaircraft artillery, which expanded 1,150 percent and  later had to be cut back. In any case, before the conflict ended  sixty-seven infantry divisions saw overseas service, plus one mountain  and five airborne divisions, as well as a cavalry division which fought  as infantry. Even the creation of armored divisions expanded the  infantry, since they contained substantial foot components.

There were in all, at some time during the  war, 317 regiments of infantry of various kinds. Among these were types  unknown before the war, such as three mountain, twelve glider, and  sixteen parachute infantry regiments. In addition there were 99 separate  battalions, some of which were also very highly specialized.

Among the remarkable separate battalions were  the 1st-6th Rangers. These were light infantry trained to slash deep  into enemy-held territory in order to demoralize the foe in every way  they could. Although the ranger battalions were not created by  redesignating existing infantry outfits, and so not given any official  history before the time of their constitution in 1942, they were  nevertheless heirs to a very old and proud tradition. That tradition  went further back than the American Revolution; indeed the rules drawn  up by Robert Rogers in 1757 for his famous ranger companies that served  for England in North America were reprinted for use in training the  rangers of World War II.

The rangers were not the only infantry  constituted to perform commando missions. A comparable unit was the 1st  Special Service Force, established in July 1942. This force was designed  to operate behind enemy lines when snow covered Europe. Accordingly, all  its men were volunteers whose civilian aptitudes seemed to prepare them  for swift operations in snow. Among them were lumberjacks, game wardens,  forest rangers, and professional skiers. The 1st Special Service Force  was remarkable also in another way; its personnel were drawn about  equally from Canada and from the United States. It was an early  experiment in international co-operation, and it worked well. After  vigorous campaigning-but not much of it in snow-the unit was disbanded  in January 1945 and most of its American personnel transferred to a new  regiment, the 474th Infantry.

Still another commando-type outfit was the  5307th Composite Unit (Provisional), which was organized in October  1943. Its specialization was operation in Burma along the Ledo Road, and  its personnel were drawn from men who knew jungle fighting. This unit  was commanded by Brig. Gen. Frank D. Merrill and became very famous  under the nickname of "Merrill's Marauders." Like the men of the ranger  battalions and of the 1st Special Service Force, the Marauders were  volunteers. At length, on 10 August 1944 the unit was reorganized and  called the 475th Infantry.

Another type of specialized infantry was that  intended to provide the foot elements of the new armored divisions. It  was called "armored infantry." The first unit of this type in the United  States Army came into being when the old 6th Infantry was reorganized as  armored.on 15 July 1940. In addition to the 6th, certain regiments which  had been on the inactive list since just after World War I were  reactivated to become armored infantry. These were the 36th, 41st, 46th,  48th-52d, 54th-56th, 59th, and 62d Infantry. Most of the armored  infantry regiments were broken up during World War II to form separate  armored infantry battalions, but the 41st and 36th Armored  Infantry-assigned to the 2d and 3d Armored Division,  respectively-retained the regimental structure throughout the war.

Armored infantry differed very little from  standard infantry, and Lt. Gen. Lesley J. McNair, Chief of Staff,  General Headquarters, objected to its differing at all. The chief  variance was that armored troops had enough organic vehicles to move all  of their men at once. They shared this characteristic with motorized  infantry (an element of motorized divisions), which came into existence  in August 1940 and lasted only until July 1943. Unlike motorized,  armored infantry had vehicles that could operate cross-country and that  were lightly armored to repel small arms fire.

Several types of light infantry were also  extensively tested. One was specialized for jungle action. This type,  embodied in the regiments of the 71st Light Division, never had a chance  to prove itself in combat. It had not shown to very good advantage in  training; hence it was converted to standard infantry in the early  summer of 1944. In consequence, it was the ordinary doughboy who,  beginning in the fall of 1942, did the jungle fighting in the Southwest  Pacific. Another specialized type was organized for use in mountains. It  was embodied in the regiments of the 10th Mountain Division, which,  unlike the jungle division, enjoyed a brief opportunity to practice its  specialty. The 10th Division reached Italy late in 1944 and took part in  the fight. Its arrival, however, did not preclude many other infantry  outfits from having to fight in the mountains the best way they could.

The last of the nonstandard types of infantry  units to be considered here was the most specialized. It included the  foot soldiers who were trained and equipped to reach the combat zone by  air and to assault from the air. Their primary mission was to land  behind the enemy's main line of resistance and there employ commando  tactics. This type, new in the United States, like armored infantry, was  first organized in 1940. As with armored, General McNair objected in the  beginning to so high a degree of specialization, but by 1942  acknowledged the need for airborne troops.

Some foot troops that assaulted from the air  were dropped behind the enemy's line by parachute. Numbers above 500  were reserved for the designation of paratroops. Thus the lowest  numbered paratroop infantry regiment was the 501st Parachute Infantry.  In addition, there was a second type of airborne foot troops, called  "glider infantry." According to the doctrine, these landed by glider in  the airheads cleared by the paratroops to reinforce the latter and to  widen the assault upon the rear of the foe. The numerical designations  for glider units were drawn from the whole range of numbers below 500.  This was the result of an effort to perpetuate earlier history, as in  the case of the 88th Glider Infantry, which descended from the 88th  Infantry of World War I. Likewise, the 325th-328th Glider Infantry were  redesignated from the infantry regiments of the same numbers which had  made up the 82d Division in World War I. The same was true of the 401st  Glider Infantry of the 101st Division. Both the 82d and the 101st  Divisions became airborne on 15 August 1942.

The World War II infantry also included a few  units that were made up of Americans of different racial or ethnic  extraction. There was ample precedent-for such outfits. Indian.and Negro  infantry regiments were the oldest, but Puerto Rican and Filipino units  came close behind. Added to these during the war were several separate  battalions, the most conspicuous of which was the 100th Infantry  Battalion because it contained soldiers of an enemy race. Its men were  American-born Japanese. The 100th Battalion was organized in June 1942,  and two years later was absorbed as one of the battalions of a  Japanese-American regiment designated the 442d Infantry.

Another unit of this type was the 99th  Infantry Battalion, which was made up of Norwegian-Americans and marked  for use in Scandinavia. Although the 99th did not get to the  Scandinavian Peninsula until the Germans there had surrendered, it did  distinguish itself in the fighting in Europe. Finally, early in 1945,  when its use as a separate battalion seemed to be over, it was made one  of the battalions of a newly organized regiment designated the 474th.  The latter was a remarkable hybrid. It contained many men from the  disbanded 1st Special Service Force, some from the 1st, 3d, and 4th  Ranger Battalions, as well as the entire 99th Battalion. Another hybrid  was the 473d Infantry. Also created early in 1945, it absorbed no groups  of nationals but rather the veterans of four antiaircraft battalions  coupled with the headquarters of an armored group.

Early in the war, the organization of scores  of new units proceeded along the lines laid down in the reorganization  of 1939. The National Guard, however, entered Federal service in square  combinations and retained them until directed to triangularize during  the first four months of 1942. As in World War I, the reorganization of  the National Guard for Federal service wrecked many old outfits and  associations. For example, in each of the square divisions one whole  regiment of infantry had to be cut away and broken up or associated  elsewhere.

In spite of the wrench it gave the National  Guard, triangularization brought with it important benefits. Not the  least of these was a very simple tactical doctrine which had the  advantage of being applicable to the use of units of any size from squad  up to division. This doctrine was developed and well established by the  time the National Guard was triangularized. Its essence was that one of  the three elements of every level, say one regiment, should, in the  assault, fix the enemy in position; a second was to maneuver around him,  once fixed, in order to strike a decisive blow; while the third element  acted as a reserve. This doctrine gave great flexibility to American  infantry.

During the five years before Pearl Harbor, the  position of the doughboy's champion, the Chief of Infantry, weakened.  The Chief himself felt that his office was being bypassed in important  matters, while the Chief of Staff inclined more and more to the opinion  that all of the heads of combat arms fostered schisms within the Army.  In any case, during the grand revision of the late thirties, the General  Staff, more often than not, overruled the recommendations of the Chief  of Infantry. Moreover, the latter had less control over his branch than  he thought necessary. For example, in the revamping of the infantry  division, his responsibility was held to the preparation of tables of  organization and equipment for brigades and below. The end came in the  spring of 1942 when the top command was completely reorganized. In that  great realigning the Chief of Infantry, together with the other chiefs  of combat arms, was eliminated. Thereafter, the problems of the infantry  were considered by special branches of the newly created Army Ground  Forces.

General McNair became Commanding General of  the new organization. He had been chief of staff of the provisional  division that had tested triangularization in 1937, and he believed in  the basic principles of the revision that had resulted. Foremost among  these was pooling. Its natural corollary was to keep all units lean,  because, when extraordinary needs arose, those units could draw from the  pools maintained at the next higher level. Another of the important  principles embraced by McNair was that which gave the best of men and  equipment to the offensive portions of units, and cut the other segments  to a minimum. The application of these austere principles was sharpened  by the urgent need to conserve shipping space; McNair, therefore, caused  infantry organization to be finely combed for excess personnel and  equipment.

A general revision of the tables of  organization and equipment (TOE'S) took place in the spring of 1942. For  the most part, McNair's principles prevailed, but he was unable to  prevent two significant changes in a contrary direction. The first of  these was the substitution of headquarters companies for detachments in  all battalions. In spite of this alteration the total strength of a  battalion dropped by sixteen, the cut occurring in the rifle companies  and in heavy weapons. The second change brought a new company, the  cannon company, into the regiment. In it were at last to be found the  accompanying cannon that officers had been seeking since World War I. As  first equipped, the new cannon company contained six self-propelled  75-mm. howitzers and two selfpropelled 105's. It added 123 men to each  regiment, but since the other regimental companies were cut at the same  time, a regiment was actually enlarged by only 23 men. The TOE's of 1  April 1942 moved automatic rifles for the last, time. These weapons,  which were proving themselves more and more valuable, went back to the  rifle squad where they had been placed prior to February 1940. They had  gone into a separate squad at the insistence of the Chief of Infantry,  and they returned to the rifle squad when that office was eliminated.

The pinch for shipping space continued so  great that the War Department requested cuts in the April tables.  Accordingly, a Reduction Board was established in November 1942. Before  its recommendations were approved, General McNair strove to reduce the  infantry regiment by 400 men, a slice which he believed could be made  without diminishing the number of front-line riflemen to any great  extent. His proposal was made into a new TOE published on 1 March 1943.  The chief casualty was the cannon company, which was eliminated  altogether; its howitzers were put into headquarters company. This  arrangement was shortlived, since the final work of the board resulted  in a cut of only 216 which, when finally approved, was embodied in  tables dated 15 July 1943. Most of the 216 came from administrative  elements and from heavy weapons. The cannon company was back, but this  time with towed howitzers. The sharpest reduction in arms that  accompanied the drop in personnel fell upon BAR's. These were eliminated  from every echelon except the rifle squad, where there was one per  squad. This change removed very little automatic rifle fire from the  firing line, but it did reduce the number of BAR's in a regiment from  189 to 81 (there being 81 rifle squads in a regiment).

If a regiment lost any firepower by the cut in  automatic rifles, it made it up by the addition of twenty-five  .50-caliber machine guns plus one hundred and twelve new 2.36-inch  rocket launchers, nicknamed "bazookas." The bazookas, which had splendid  attributes for antitank and antipillbox use, were extra weapons; that  is, no specific men were designated to operate them. In consequence,  each regiment made its own organizational modification to use the new  arm. Later the orphan situation of rocket launchers was officially  corrected.

Bazookas and .50-caliber machine guns fitted  into General McNair's theory of antitank and antiaircraft defense for  infantry regiments. He held that such defense should center on weapons  which individual infantrymen, not crews, could operate. Once again, he  did not win out 100 percent, for he failed to eliminate either the towed  antitank guns from the armament of regiments or the mine platoon from  antitank companies: There were, however, changes in the antitank guns:  their caliber was increased from 37-mm. to 57-mm., while the number of  guns in the regiment dropped from twenty-four to eighteen. Half of the  remaining guns were in the regimental antitank company, the other half  divided evenly (three each) among the battalions. Considering the mine  platoon as strictly defensive, General McNair strove to eliminate it  altogether. Accordingly, it did not find a place in the TOE of 26 May  1943; but was back on 15 July, thirty-one strong.

Removal of tanks from the infantry and the  creation of an armored force in 1940 had left unsolved problems in the  relationship of foot soldiers to tanks. The principle of pooling took  care of the association of tanks with infantry units, for tank elements  were simply attached in the quantities needed. This, however, did not  help to determine how much infantry ought to be organic to armored  divisions. Since these divisions, as first set up, did not include  enough foot soldiers, General McNair created pools of separate armored  infantry battalions (AIB's) from which the divisions could draw. Later  his solution was scrapped, and in the TOE of 15 September 1943 the  proportion of organic infantry to armor doubled. In consequence, all but  one of the separate AIB's were inactivated.

Each of the studies of infantry organization,  made in the first three years of the war, had to take vehicles into  account. The number of motors allowed to units was closely related to  the shipping space then available. Shortage of shipping was one of the  factors which caused the elimination of motorized infantry in the summer  of 1943, since the planners felt that more economical means of moving  standard infantry by motor were at hand. The first such means was to  attach truck outfits to the infantry for specific movements. This method  remained standard until divisions developed the field expedient of  piling their doughboys onto their tanks, tank destroyers, and howitzers.

All these complications were faced by Army  Ground Forces during the year from October 1942 to October 1943, and the  organization developed for infantry in that year persisted for the  duration of the war in Europe with only minor changes. However, when  redeployment to the Pacific area became necessary, Ground Forces once  more examined the tables of organization and equipment. This time three  factors were decisive in the appraisal. The first one was the wealth of  combat experience accumulated in Europe; the second, that the scarcity  of shipping space had eased; and the third, the death of General McNair.  These new factors resulted in a general enlargement of infantry units.

The new tables were dated 1 June 1945. They  carried the implication that the earlier arrangements had been too lean  for greatest efficiency. For example, they increased the total strength  of an infantry regiment from 3,256 to 3,697, and added weapons and  vehicles. Most of the increase took place in rifle companies, which  jumped from 193 to 242 men. Indeed, two new sections were added to them,  both in the weapons platoons. The first one, called an assault section,  was based on the 2.36-inch bazooka (the number of which increased to six  per rifle company). With this change, rocket launchers ceased to be  orphans. They became the principal weapons of the men in the new  section. The other, a special weapons section,. employed a revolutionary  type of new arm, the 57-mm. recoilless rifle.

Further use of the recoilless technique  occurred at battalion level. Here a 75-mm. rifle was added to the  armament, and a gun platoon was created in the heavy weapons company to  operate it. The two new types of recoilless guns, which combined the  effect of artillery with the mobility of soldier-carried arms, gave an  unheard of weight of fire to the infantry.

Yet another remarkable change related to the  infantry regiment's artillery. All towed guns were at last eliminated  from the regiment. The 57's of the regimental antitank company gave  place to tanks which mounted 90-mm. guns, while those in battalions went  out with the antitank platoons. The cannon company became in effect a  tank unit equipped with heavy tanks mounting 105-mm. howitzers. The  pieces of the antitank and the cannon companies, mounted as they were on  tanks, were much more mobile than their predecessors, and they threw  much more metal.

The organization established in June 1945,  slightly modified from time to time, was the one that governed to the  end of the conflict. There was, however, one development which went  forward apart from the tables of organization. This was an ever widening  use of regimental combat teams (RCT's). An RCT was a grouping of combat  units around an infantry regiment in order to accomplish a special  mission. A typical combat team contained a regiment of infantry, a  battalion of 105-mm. artillery, a company of combat engineers, a medical  collecting company, and a signal detachment. But, because its very  essence was flexibility, any element needed to accomplish the special  mission might be attached. RCT's proved of great value in adapting  organization to all types of terrain and conditions of combat. They  remained, however, temporary arrangements without official history or  lineage, and were discontinued when their special mission had been  accomplished.

Before concluding the discussion of infantry  organization during World War II, it remains to record a few  generalizations relating to the use of infantry in that war. First, it  is clear that no earlier conflict had sent American infantrymen into so  many different parts of the world. Although specialized units were at  first created to fight in extreme zones, mountain, jungle, and arctic  foot soldiers carried, in fact, a very small part of the fighting in  extreme climates and terrain. As a result, the standard doughboy took  over the job.

The doctrine of fixing the enemy, maneuvering  to strike him in flank or rear, all the while holding an element in  reserve to exploit an ad- vantage or cover a retreat, applied in all  terrains. Naturally the details of using it varied with geography. Thus  in Normandy the hedgerows obliged the infantry to work out a team play  with tanks and engineers. Likewise, in the jungles of the Southwest  Pacific, the coral atolls of the Central Pacific, the desert of North  Africa, and the mountains of Italy, it was necessary to develop the  exact means by which the doctrine was applied. But in all cases it  required closer-than-ever co-operation with the other arms.

Furthermore, never before had the doughboys  been required to use so bewildering a complex of weapons. Perhaps the  most confusing of the latter to adjust to was the greatly enlarged class  of defensive weapons, which included land mines and boobytraps. These  insidious manglers complicated an infantryman's task and introduced a  new type of terror into his campaigning. He dared no longer even trust  the ground, which had always been his close ally. As a result, it was  necessary to learn not only to detect and disarm the enemy's mines and  traps, but to lay some effectively for his own protection. Also, he had  to learn to use demolition charges and often to improvise them out of  materials at hand.

To add to the confusion, types of grenades  (hand and rifle) were multiplied. What is more, their use vastly  increased. Whether the enemy lurked in rocks or in dense vegetation,  grenades helped to root him out. To supplement them in the business of  dislodging the foe from strong positions, new weapons developed. The  most notable of these, not already mentioned, was a flame thrower which,  carried by foot soldiers or mounted on tanks, did terrible execution.

Tank and air enthusiasts, observing the Nazi  blitzkrieg, had jumped to the conclusion that infantry could be used  only to hold ground taken by armor or by air bombardment. This did not  prove to be the case. Although foot soldiers, more than ever before, had  to learn to co-operate with tanks and with planes, this did not spare  them from having to be in the forefront of almost all important  assaults. In short, while they could not advance against the enemy  without the aid of tanks, artillery, and air, neither could those arms  gain ground or destroy the enemy's will to fight without the aid of the  infantry. What was required was not a reshuffling of the importance of  the several branches, but the development of better techniques by means  of which they could work together. Such techniques were far from perfect  when the conflict came to an end.

Battlefield communication continued its  trend-which stretched back to the Civil War-toward improvement. For the  first time there was radio communication between the elements of a  company. By the end of World War II eight radios were included in the  rifle company's equipment. Radios and telephones knit companies tighter  together, but by no means made them act as one man. Dispersion to avoid  the deadly effects of enemy fire threw, squads, or fractions of squads,  on their own in combat, particularly in dense foliage, in the mountains,  and in night operations. This put a heavier-than-ever burden on the  ingenuity of squad and platoon leaders, and even on the individual  doughboy.

Probably the most important technique to come  out of the war had to do with landing an attacking force on hostile  shores. The doctrine for such operations had been in the process of  development by the U.S. Marine Corps since the 1920's. Marine theory  worked well, but it required the assistance of special amphibious  equipment ,which was not developed until war had commenced. Indeed, in  the early landings in 1942, landing forces were obliged to use the  vessels that were ready at hand. Gradually, however, landing craft were  developed, such as LCI's, LST's, LCT's, amphibious tanks, and DUKW's. In  the greatest amphibious operations of World War II, these craft were as  essential to success as the weapons of the infantry.

Whether in landing actions, in airborne  assaults, or in advances of a traditional type, infantry was better  prepared than in the past to fight on a circular perimeter. This was  true because of the many supporting mortars, machine guns, and rocket  launchers, made organic to infantry units, which enabled them to throw  fire quickly in all directions. Thus, the tendency was to be less  sensitive about the flanks than in earlier wars, and to push forward  with slighter concern for the progress of the units to the right and to  the left.

During World War II new terrains, new  climates, strange weapons, and unfamiliar peoples acted upon American  infantrymen. These destroyed thousands of men, put a lifelong mark on  others, and changed somewhat the techniques of fighting on foot;  nevertheless, in spite of everything, the basic characteristics of the  infantry hardly shifted. Foot soldiers continued to be the only carriers  of weapons who, in theory, were never exhausted, could always go another  mile, and who could be counted upon to move across any terrain in every  quarter of the globe.

World War II to Korea

With the end of World War II came the  difficult task of demobilizing the huge wartime military establishment  and of reorganizing the infantry for its peacetime role. The  demobilization was extremely hasty and, as General of the Army George C.  Marshall stated before a joint session of Congress, ". . . [it had] no  relationship whatsoever to the size of the Army in the future."  Furthermore, it was carried out on the basis of an individual point  system, not by units. The point system was designed to be fair to the  individual soldier and satisfied the insistent demands of Congress, the  public, and the press to "bring the boys back home" as soon as possible,  but its effects on unit integrity, efficiency, and combat capability  were disastrous. There were too few units left to meet all the worldwide  responsibilities the United States had acquired with victory, while  infantry organizations remaining active were so understrength and  suffered such constant personnel turnover that they seemed more like  replacement centers than combat units.

By 30 June 1947 demobilization was officially  completed. From a peak strength of 8,291,336 on 31 May 1945 the Army had  been reduced to 989,664 in only twentyfive months. During the same  period the infantry totals dropped at an even faster rate from 1,782,832  to 126,121. The number of infantry regiments decreased from 288 to 41,  and only seven separate infantry battalions remained active. More than  threefourths of the active infantry units were assigned to divisions: 8  infantry, 2 airborne, 1 armored, and 1 cavalry. With the exception of  the 88th, which was in the process of being inactivated in Italy, each  infantry division had three organic infantry regiments. The airborne  divisions had one glider and two parachute infantry regiments each, and  the armored division had three armored infantry battalions. Only the 1st  Cavalry Division still retained the square structure with four organic  regiments which, although reorganized in 1945 as infantry, kept their  cavalry designations. As of 1 July 1947, all separate infantry  battalions and eleven regiments were stationed in the United States. The  rest of the infantry regiments were overseas with nineteen in Japan and  Korea and the other eleven in Germany, Italy, the Philippines, the Canal  Zone, Puerto Rico, and Trinidad.

Although the first problem of the postwar  infantry was demobilization, even while that was going on plans were  being made for the reorganization of infantry units in the light of the  experience gained and the lessons learned during World War II. Since the  war had been won and infantry organization, weapons, and tactics had  proved to be effective in different theaters of operations and against  different enemy forces, there was no motivation for radical innovations.  The explosion of the atomic bomb was still too recent to influence  infantry organization at this time. Nevertheless, it did have an  indirect effect on infantry units, since in the general enthusiasm over  this ultimate modern weapon the infantry was sometimes forgotten or, at  any rate, overshadowed. Attempts to re-establish the office of the Chief  of Infantry failed, because Army leaders believed that chiefs of the  combat arms would tend to encourage undesirable branch consciousness and  interbranch rivalry. To the infantry this meant that it had no official  spokesman, nobody to look out for its interests, and no one to take care  of its problems.

Responsibility for the development and  preparation of infantry tables of organization and equipment, formerly  the function of the Chief of Infantry, had been passed in 1942 to  Headquarters, Army Ground Forces, which became the Office, Chief of Army  Field Forces, in March 1948. The postwar TOE's for standard and armored  infantry units were published between late 1947 and mid1948 after months  of careful study, evaluation,. and review. They reflected various  recommendations and suggestions, particularly those of the General  Board, United States Forces, European Theater, and of the Infantry  Conference which was sponsored by the Infantry School at Fort Benning,  Georgia, in dune 1946. Although they did not introduce any significant  new organizational concepts, the 1947-48 tables brought some changes to  all infantry units from the squad to the division. One of the most  important changes was made in the rifle squad. The consensus was that  the 12-man squad of World War II was too large and unwieldy. As a  result, the ammunition bearer and the two scouts were eliminated, and  the new unit had only nine men: a squad leader, an assistant squad  leader, a BAR team of two men, and five riflemen, one of whom was armed  with the sniper version of the M1 rifle. The M1, which had been highly  effective and very popular during the war, was retained as the basic  individual weapon of the infantryman, and a bayonet was issued with each  rifle.

With the reduction of the squad by three men,  the rifle platoon lost nine rifles, but its firepower did not decrease.  On the contrary, the postwar organization gave the platoon leader  greater firepower under his immediate control by adding a new 9-man  weapons squad to support the three rifle squads. The final World War II  TOE had placed the infantry company's 2.36-inch rocket launchers and  .30-caliber light machine guns in one weapons platoon. The postwar table  moved both of these weapons to the new squad in the rifle platoon,  leaving only 60-mm. mortars and 57-mm. recoilless rifles in the weapons  platoon.

The heavy weapons company, organic to each  infantry battalion, was also streamlined under the 1947 TOE. One of the  machine gun platoons was dropped and the 81-mm. mortars and 75-mm.  recoilless rifles authorized in June 1945 were both reduced from six to  four per company. Of its nine rocket launchers only six remained, but  the new ones were the more powerful 3.5-inch bazookas, whereas the old  ones had been 2.36-inch launchers.

Even more changes were made on the regimental  level. During World War II, the artillery provided such responsive and  effective fire support that the infantry regiment no longer needed its  own cannon company. Chemical mortar companies, on the other hand, had  been frequently and very successfully attached to infantry units. Combat  experience had also shown that the best antitank weapon was the tank  itself and that the infantry-tank team was an extremely effective  fighting unit. Accordingly, both the cannon and the antitank company  were eliminated, while a heavy mortar company (armed with twelve  4.2-inch mortars) and a tank company of 148 men and twenty-two tanks  became organic to the postwar infantry regiment. Additional tank support  for divisional infantry units was available from a tank battalion, which  was made part of the infantry division for the first time in the 1947-48  tables.

There was no special unit for air defense in  the infantry regiment, but the number of .50-caliber Browning machine  guns, employed primarily as antiaircraft weapons, increased from  thirty-three to forty-seven, and a newly created automatic weapons  battalion in the division artillery further improved antiaircraft  protection. The 1948 regiment also had a larger headquarters and  headquarters company, a larger service company, and an organic medical  company instead of an attached medical detachment. All of these changes,  which made the postwar infantry regiment a much more powerful and  sophisticated unit than its World War II predecessor, were accomplished  with only a slight gain in overall regimental strength from 8,697 to  3,774.

While three infantry regiments remained the  basic combat elements of the infantry division, as they had been  throughout the war, the postwar armored division had more organic  infantry units than either the "heavy" or "light" armored division of  World War II. The General Board, United States Forces, European Theater,  had concluded that there were not enough infantrymen in the armored  divisions, especially in those organized .under the "heavy" 1942 TOE's.  The board recommended that three composite tank-infantry regiments, each  comprised of one tank battalion and two armored rifle battalions, be  assigned to the division. Although this suggestion was not adopted in  the postwar organization, the ratio of infantry to tank units was  improved by authorizing four armored infantry battalions for each  division and four rifle companies for each battalion, thus raising the  total number of armored infantry companies in the armored division from  nine to sixteen.

The structure of the armored infantry  battalion (AIB) differed somewhat from that of the standard infantry  battalion. The 917-man infantry battalion consisted of a headquarters  and headquarters company, a heavy weapons company, and three rifle  companies of 211 men each. The AIB was larger by 152 men and had a  headquarters, headquarters and service company, a medical detachment,  and four armored infantry companies of 208 men each. The infantry  company's weapons platoon and three rifle platoons of three rifle squads  and a weapons squad paralleled the armored infantry company's mortar  platoon and three rifle platoons of three rifle squads and a light  machine gun squad. There were ten men in the 1948 armored infantry rifle  squad-one more than in its regular infantry counterpart. The tenth man  drove the squad's newly issued full-tracked armored utility vehicle,  M44, which replaced the half-track personnel carrier used during World  War II.

The basic weapons of the standard infantry and  the armored infantry were the same, although the quantity of the weapons  varied. Armored infantry units, however, were not authorized any  recoilless rifles. On the other hand, they had many more rocket  launchers and machine guns. In an armored rifle company, for example,  there were ten bazookas and nineteen machine guns, as opposed to only  three and four, respectively, in a regular rifle company. As a result,  the armored infantry was capable of providing greater automatic fire  support than other infantry units.

The first postwar airborne infantry TOE's did  not appear until 1 April 1950, but airborne units had been organized  earlier under draft tables similar to the final published tables.  Perhaps the main reason for this delay was the fact that there were more  changes made in airborne organization than in other types of infantry.  Despite their unique and highly specialized primary mission of seizing  and holding important objectives by attack from the air, airborne units  in World War II were frequently called upon to perform normal infantry  missions. Both combat experience and tests conducted after the war at  Fort Bragg, North Carolina, showed that they needed to be organized more  like standard infantry units in order to be self-sustaining in ground  operations over extended periods. The new TOE's, therefore, gave the  airborne infantry more staying power.and organized it along the same  lines as the regular infantry, while retaining its special air assault  capability.

During World War II there had been two types  of airborne regiments-parachute and glider. After the war both of these  units were eliminated, and the 1 April 1950 TOE's introduced an airborne  infantry regiment, which was capable of landing by parachute, glider, or  aircraft. Three of these new units were organic to the postwar airborne  division, and provisions were also made for nondivisional regiments. The  airborne infantry regiment had a strength of 3,376 men and contained a  headquarters and headquarters company, a service company, a support  company, a medical company, and three airborne infantry battalions. Its  structure was similar to that of the regular infantry regiment, except  that instead of a tank company and a heavy mortar company, the airborne  unit had a support company. The disadvantages of not having a regimental  tank company were somewhat offset in divisional units by the fact that  the airborne division was authorized two organic tank battalions, while  the infantry division had only one.

The support company consisted of a company  headquarters, two heavy mortar platoons armed with four 4.2-inch mortars  each, and an antitank platoon with six 3.5-inch rocket launchers, three  heavy .50-caliber machine guns, and six 90mm. antitank guns on airborne  carriages. It was a very powerful unit, completely motorized, capable of  landing by parachute or aircraft, with its own fire direction center and  its own communications system. The organization of the airborne infantry  battalion, company, platoon, and squad was almost identical to that of  the corresponding standard infantry units. Likewise, the weapons used by  both types of infantry were also the same, except for the airborne  antitank gun.

There was a considerable time lag between the  publication of the postwar TOE's and the actual reorganization of  infantry units under the new tables. Even after the reorganization had  officially taken place, there were still differences between the paper  organizations and the actual units, since most units were understrength  and not fully equipped. A separate reduced strength column, to be  effective in peacetime, was added to all TOE's in November 1950, but  until then special cut sheets or reduction tables were prepared for  infantry units by the Office, Chief of Army Field Forces.

On the eve of the Korean War, only one of ten  active combat divisions was being maintained at full strength. The  others averaged about 70 percent of their authorized strength and had  major shortages in equipment. For example, infantry units generally did  not have the organic armor provided by the new TOE's or were equipped  with lighter and older tank models than those authorized. Nor did they  have their full allowances of 57-mm. and 75-mm. recoilless rifles and  4.2-inch mortars, while the 3.5-inch rocket launchers were still in the  process of being tested. Many infantry battalions were short one rifle  company, and in most infantry regiments only two out of the three  battalions weie active. Since current infantry tactics were based on  triangular organization, such reductions were very serious handicaps.

Shortcomings in infantry personnel and  equipment were caused by budget cuts; strength ceilings, and other  limitations placed upon the postwar Army by an economy-minded Congress  and administration. These actions were supported by a war-weary public  traditionally opposed to a large peacetime military establishment and  overly dependent on the atomic bomb as a deterrent to future wars. Even  after demobilization had been completed and the Air Force had become a  separate service, the strength of the Army still continued to decline.  The crisis produced by the Soviet blockade of Berlin and the Allied  airlift of supplies to the isolated city brought about a temporary  increase in Regular Army personnel. By 30 June 1950, however, the actual  strength had dropped again to 591,487 out of an authorized total of  630,000. The active infantry at that time numbered 130,554 officers and  enlisted men.

In mid-1950 the infantry in the Regular Army  consisted of forty-six regiments and thirteen separate battalions. There  were seven infantry combat divisions with three organic infantry  regiments each, including the 1st Cavalry Division, which had finally  been triangularized in 1949. The 2d Armored Division was organized under  the 1947-48 TOE's that authorized four armored infantry battalions  (AIB's) per division. The 82d Airborne Division had three airborne  infantry regiments, while in the 11th Airborne Division only two of the  three organic regiments were active. In addition to the ten combat  divisions, there were four training divisions (three infantry and one  armored), which had nine infantry regiments and four AIB's assigned to  them. The eleven separate regiments were all organized as standard  infantry; two of the five nondivisional battalions were AIB's and the  other three were regular infantry battalions. There were no separate  airborne regiments or battalions, neither of the old parachute and  glider infantry nor of the new airborne infantry.

Besides having major shortages in both  personnel and equipment, the active infantry units were also  inadequately trained. At first the disintegration caused by rapid  demobilization had made effective unit training virtually impossible,  and the numerous administrative chores of occupation duty also  interfered with training programs. Occupation of the countries defeated  in World War II remained by far the single greatest responsibility of  the infantry throughout the 1945-50 period and was a heavy drain on the  Army's overall effort. Although the duties were gradually reduced  everywhere and troops were completely removed from some areas as peace  treaties were signed, on the eve of the Korean War about one-third of  the infantry was still on occupation duty.

Not until late in the postwar era was more  emphasis placed on training and readiness. In January 1950, General Mark  W. Clark; Chief of Army Field Forces, announced that the most extensive  and diversified peacetime maneuver training program in Army history was  then under way. In this program infantry units participated in various  joint and combined maneuvers with other Army units and with the U.S.  Navy and Air Force. Exercises were also held with the armed forces of  Canada, France, and other countries allied with the United States in  1949 under the provisions of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization  (NATO).

Infantrymen from the reserve components as  well as Regular Army infantry units took part in some of these  maneuvers. The National Guard and the Organized Reserve Corps, as  reorganized in the 1945-50 period, were considerably larger and somewhat  better trained than the reserve components of the 1930's. With many men  having World War II combat experience and with better participation in  paid drills, the Organized Reserve Corps' infantry was significantly  less of a paper organization than it had been in the prewar period. In  the National Guard, all of the twenty-five infantry divisions and twenty  regimental combat teams had been Federally recognized by 30 June 1950.  Also, the entire National Guard infantry had been reorganized under the  postwar TOE's, as modified by special reduction tables. Although all  units participated in some form of training, it took place under major  handicaps because funds were limited, armory facilities were inadequate,  and equipment shortages were estimated at over 50 percent. Even in  mobilization planning, the reserve structure was not expected to become  effective until one or two years after a general mobilization.

By June 1950 the infantry of all components  was better organized and trained than it had been at any time since the  hasty post-World War II demobilization had reduced it to near impotence.  Nevertheless, infantry units were far from combat ready for the war  which broke out suddenly in Korea.




The Korean War

When the North Koreans crossed the 38th  parallel and invaded South Korea on 25 June 1950, the only U.S. Army  personnel in the country were members of the United States Military  Advisory Group to the Republic of Korea. The last of the American  occupation forces had been withdrawn almost exactly a year earlier, when  on 29 June 1949 the final increment of the 5th Infantry Regimental  Combat Team moved from Korea to Hawaii. Thus as the war began, the  closest U.S. infantry units were the twelve regiments of the 7th, 24th,  and 25th Infantry Divisions and the 1st Cavalry Division (organized as  infantry), all of which were still on occupation duty in Japan. The  first American ground troops to arrive in Korea were the 406 infantrymen  of Task Force Smith from the 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry, organic to  the 24th Infantry Division, who were flown in from Japan on 1 July 1950.  After being reinforced by 134 artillerymen, they met the enemy four days  later at Osan in the first American engagement of the Korean War.

During July nine of the twelve infantry  regiments from Japan arrived in Korea, and the other three arrived in  September. The 2d and 3d Infantry Divisions, stationed in the  continental United States, were also ordered to Korea. Since the 3d was  greatly understrength, one of its organic regiments was replaced by the  65th Infantry from Puerto Rico. In addition to the divisional infantry  units, the 29th RCT from Okinawa, the 5th RCT from Hawaii, and the 187th  Airborne RCT from Fort Campbell, Kentucky, came to Korea in the first  few months of the war.

By the end of September 1950, four National  Guard infantry divisions had been federalized. The 40th Infantry  Division from California, the 45th from Oklahoma, the 28th from  Pennsylvania, and the 43d from Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Vermont  brought twelve more infantry regiments into the active Army. The 45th  and 40th Infantry Divisions later served in Korea, entering combat in  December 1951 and January 1952, respectively. The other two divisions  were sent to Europe to strengthen NATO forces. Later in the war, four  more National Guard infantry divisions with three organic infantry  regiments each were called into Federal service. These units were not  sent overseas but remained in the United States. Although three separate  RCT's were also federalized during the Korean War, none of the  nondivisional infantry regiments from the National Guard served in  Korea.

As for the Organized Reserve Corps, which was  redesignated as the Army Reserve in 1952, its contributions to the  Korean War consisted mostly of individuals, not units. An important  contribution came from the Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC)  program; many of the junior officers who led infantry units in Korea  were ROTC graduates. Some small support units were called in, but no  Army Reserve infantry regiments were ordered to active duty. They were  kept intact and retained as a final reserve in case of an emergency  developing elsewhere.

By the time the Korean armistice was signed in  July 1953, there were ninety infantry regiments in the active Army,  almost double the prewar total of forty-six regiments. Meanwhile,  separate infantry battalions had increased from thirteen to thirty-one.  The number of infantrymen in the active Army grew during the Korean War  from 130,554 in June 1950 to a peak of 344,143 in May 1951. In July 1953  the infantry total was 251,685 officers and enlisted men, of whom  146,052 were overseas. They were assigned to units stationed in Germany,  Japan, Alaska, Okinawa, Austria, Trieste, Iceland, Puerto Rico, and the  Canal Zone, as well as to twenty-three infantry regiments and two  infantry battalions serving in Korea.

In some ways Korea was a new kind of war for  the infantry. The limited nature of the conflict contrasted sharply with  the total warfare of World Wars I and II. The United States did not use  the atomic bomb and settled for a bitterly negotiated armistice instead  of complete military victory. The war was fought in a new geographic  area, against new enemies, and for the first time the American  infantryman acted as a representative not only of his own country but of  the United Nations as well.

In spite of these differences, infantry  organization during the Korean War was basically the organization  adopted after World War II, and infantry weapons used in Korea were by  and large World War II weapons. Several organizational changes were made  during the war, but there were no striking innovations. As the war  progressed, authorized strengths of infantry units were lowered.. The 15  November 1950 TOE strength of the infantry regiment was 3,781, on 15 May  1952 it was 3,662, and by 13 April 1953 it had dropped to 3,531. During  that same time period the infantry battalion decreased from 919 to 859  and the rifle company from 211 to 197. These reductions streamlined  units by eliminating nonessential personnel in administrative and  service positions but kept combat strength high.

The internal organization of the infantry  regiment, battalion, and company remained almost entirely the same  throughout the war. The only major change took place in the heavy  weapons company of the battalion and was the result of a new weapon, the  105-mm. recoilless rifle. Although 57-mm. and 75-mm. recoilless rifles  had been first used in combat during the last months of World War II and  were authorized for all infantry units by the 1 ,June 1945 TOE's, it was  too late to permit wide use of the new rifles before the end of the war.  Korea, therefore, became the first real testing ground for recoilless  weapons. "The infantry's personal hand artillery," as the recoilless  rifles were often called, proved to be hard-hitting, accurate, and  reliable, and the more powerful 105-mm. recoilless rifle, which had been  developed since the end of World War II, was adopted as a standard  infantry weapon. In September 1952 the organization of the heavy weapons  company was modified to include four of the new 105's, thereby  significantly augmenting the company's firepower.

Basically, the two new companies added to the  infantry regiment in the postwar reorganization remained unchanged  during the Korean War. However, several different tank models were used  by the tank company, and in the heavy mortar company a new model of the  4.2-inch mortar increased the maximum range from 4,400 to 6,000 yards.  The mountainous Korean terrain made employment of tank units difficult,  but it was natural mortar country, and infantry mortars of all types  (4.2-inch, 81-mm., and 60-mm.) were used extensively. Since the U.N.  forces retained control of the air over Korea, there was no special need  for improving the infantry's antiaircraft capability. Even the  artillery's multiple-fire antiaircraft weapons, the twin-40 and the  quad-50, were frequently and successfully employed in ground support of  infantry.

The organic firepower of the infantry rifle  company also increased 'during the Korean War; both the automatic rifles  and the light machine guns in the company doubled in number and its  2.36-inch bazookas were replaced by 3.5-inch rocket launchers. The small  bazooka was simply not powerful enough to stop the Soviet-built T34  tanks used by the North Koreans and the Chinese Communists. The 3.5-inch  launcher, on the other hand, which was rushed into production when the  Korean War began and quickly flown to Korea, was credited with knocking  out eight T34's on the first day it was used in combat. Described by one  infantry officer as "the answer to a rifleman's prayer for a tank  killer," the 3.5 was so effective that it was decided not to limit its  use to battalion level but to extend it to the rifle company as well. A  new TOE dated 15 May 1952 authorized three of these "superbazookas" and  placed them in the rifle platoon headquarters. The same table assigned  two machine guns to each weapons squad.

The nine additional BAR's did not become  organic to the rifle company until 13 April 1953, but many infantry  units fighting in Korea had used two automatic rifles per rifle squad  long before the official TOE change. Although the Chief of Army Field  Forces recommended that concurrently with the doubling of the BAR's the  rifle squad be increased to eleven men, the strength of the squad  remained at nine-at least for the time being. However, the suggestion of  an 11-man rifle squad was not completely dropped. It was eventually  adopted in the Pentomic reorganization subsequent to the Korean War.

The rifle, carbine, submachine gun, and pistol  carried by the infantryman in Korea were exact copies of the ones with  which he had fought in World War II. Only the carbine was criticized by  a majority of the men who used it, since it frequently misfired or  jammed both in the extreme cold of the Korean winters and in the dust of  the summers. The Ml rifle, on the other hand, was consistently  dependable. It remained the basic weapon of the infantry during the  Korean War, and contemporary surveys showed that the M I was regarded by  the troops "with a liking amounting to affection."

The bayonet became more important in Korea  than it had been during World War II. It was valued as a morale builder  and as a last resort weapon, although most infantry units never fought  with it. In general, infantrymen preferred the M4 knife bayonet, issued  to men armed with carbines and other weapons, to the M 1 bayonet, which  had been authorized for the M 1 rifle by every TOE since 30 January  1945. A knife bayonet, however, was not officially adopted for the rifle  until 1 February 1955.

Infantry units in Korea had more firepower  than World War II units, and their communication and transportation  equipment was also much better. Between 1 June 1945 and 13 April 1953  the number of radios in the rifle company increased from 8 to 14 and  telephone wire from 2%2 to 4 miles, while the various trucks and  trailers organic to the infantry regiment grew from 243 and 159 to 330  and 223, respectively.

A new item of equipment added to the infantry  regiment during the Korean War was organic aircraft. Although a November  1945 change to the World War II TOE had given one airplane to the  headquarters company of the infantry regiment, it was not included in  the April 1948 table. In December 1948 a light aviation section  augmentation of five men and two fixed-wing aircraft was provided for  nondivisional regiments. Then, in May 1952, a 6-man light aviation  section became organic to all infantry regiments and a helicopter, as  well as a fixed-wing airplane, was authorized for the first time. In  Korea, however, the infantry regiments' aircraft were usually combined  with aircraft organic to other elements of the division for centralized  operations. Often provisional division aviation companies were  organized, although no such units were included in the TOE's. Organic  aviation was of great value to the infantry, since it was effectively  used for observation, surveillance, and reconnaissance, for quick  resupply of weapons and equipment, for transporting commanders,  outposts, and patrols over difficult terrain, and-most frequently-for  rapid evacuation of the wounded. Successful tactical employment of  helicopters was also a big step toward completely airmobile infantry  units, which would be capable of moving soldiers quickly into a battle  zone and flying them out again after their mission was accomplished.

It has been said that no new infantry lessons  were learned in Korea, but many old lessons were relearned. The  soundness of U.S. tactical doctrine was once again confirmed and no  basic changes in infantry tactics were introduced, although the growth  of Army aviation foreshadowed the development of the airmobile concept.  The Korean War, however, did highlight certain weaknesses in infantry  techniques, particularly in such areas as terrain analysis, night  operations, patrols, and defensive warfare over an extended front. As  soon as these deficiencies became apparent, the Infantry School adjusted  its training to include the neglected subjects. The school's activities  in general increased a great deal during the war. In the 1949-50  academic year, only 16 classes received tactical instruction at Fort  Benning; in 1951-52 there were 118 classes. Since Korean combat  experience showed that many infantrymen did not fully understand the  triangular concept of organization and its relationship to infantry  tactics, General J. Lawton Collins, Army Chief of Staff, directed the  infantry School to place more emphasis on these fundamentals in its  instruction and publications. In changes dated 2 and 8 December 1952, a  paragraph on triangular organization was added to each infantry unit  field manual. During the Korean War there was also a renewed emphasis  throughout the Army on the basic combat, principles of offensive combat,  often referred to as "the Four F's of Fighting"- FIND 'EM, FIX 'EM,  FIGHT 'EM, and FINISH 'EM!

Not only the regular infantry, but also some  of the specialized infantry units that had been organized during World  War II fought in Korea. The airborne infantry was represented by the  187th RCT. It participated in two combat jumps, one at Sukch'on and  Sunch'on on 20 October 1950 and the other at Munsan-ni on 23 March 1951.  Additional combat forces were almost always attached to the RCT for  ground operations, and additional transportation had to be attached for  any movement required. Artillery support, service units, and  particularly antitank defenses were found to be inadequate in airborne  operations. Various changes in the composition of the RCT and the  organization of the airborne regiment were therefore recommended to  correct these shortcomings. In the TOE changes actually adopted during  the Korean War, the airborne infantry company's machine guns were  doubled, four 105-mm. recoilless rifles were authorized for the  battalion's heavy weapons company, and all 2.36-inch bazookas in the  regiment were replaced by 3.5-inch rocket launchers. An organic tank  company and a larger service company, however, were not added to the  airborne infantry regiment until 1954, at which time the number of BAR's  was also increased from one to two per rifle squad and from nine to  eighteen in each airborne rifle company. Since gliders were not used in  Korea and the development of the helicopter made their employment highly  unlikely in the future, beginning on 1 January 1953 glider landings were  deleted from the capabilities of the airborne infantry.

No armored infantry units served in Korea,  because the terrain was unsuitable for their employment and there was an  absence of heavy enemy armor after the early stages of the war. Several  armored infantry battalions were nevertheless activated during the  Korean War; some went to Europe, others remained in the United States.  No major changes were made in armored infantry organization during this  period, but there were some changes in weapons. For example, the  .30-caliber heavy water-cooled machine guns were replaced by lighter  air-cooled models, the 2.36-inch rocket launchers by 3.5-inch bazookas,  and the 60-mm. mortars by 81-mm. mortars. A new armored personnel  carrier was also authorized as the basic vehicle for armored infantry.

Ranger units, which had fought in World War II  and had been dropped from the postwar organization, reappeared during  the Korean War. Whereas the World War II rangers had been organized in  battalions, the Korean War rangers were organized into separate  companies that were normally attached to infantry divisions. All rangers  were volunteers, airborne qualified, and specially trained for their  mission of infiltrating enemy lines and attacking command posts,  artillery positions, tank parks, communications centers, and other key  facilities. Since their highly specialized capabilities were not  utilized in Korea to the extent anticipated, the ranger companies were  inactivated by the end of 1951. Ranger techniques were perpetuated by  individual training. In the fall of 1951 a Ranger Department was  established at the Infantry School with the goal of providing one  ranger-qualified officer per rifle company and one noncommissioned  officer per platoon. Starting in July 1954, every newly commissioned  Regular Army officer assigned to the infantry was required to take  either ranger or airborne training.

The elimination of separate Negro units, some  of which dated back as far as 1866, was still another change undergone  by the infantry during the Korean War. Although both the executive order  and the Department of the Army directives on integration had been issued  in the late 1940's, the first real application of the new policy came in  Korea. On 1 August 1951 the 24th Infantry, the largest Negro unit in  Korea, was replaced by the 14th Infantry in the 25th Infantry Division.  Personnel of the 24th were transferred to other units, and the regiment  was inactivated on 1 October 1951. Other Negro units, including the 3d  Battalion, 9th Infantry, from the 2d Infantry Division and the 3d  Battalion, 15th Infantry, from the 3d Infantry Division, were integrated  by transfer of personnel and subsequent assignment of replacements  without regard to race. By the end of 1951, all units stationed in Korea  had been integrated. Originally spurred on by serious personnel  shortages and an acute need to increase the combat effectiveness of  units in Korea, integration eventually spread throughout the military  establishment. As of 30 June 1954, no separate Negro units were left on  the rolls of the Army, and all schools and training programs were open  without racial restrictions.

In addition to Negro units, there had been  other infantry organizations in the postWorld War II Army made up of  different racial and ethnic groups. Several Philippine Scout infantry  regiments were among them, but all were inactivated after the  Philippines achieved independence and before the Korean War began. There  was also the 442d Infantry, the famous Nisei of World War II, composed  of Japanese-Americans; this unit remained in Hawaii on reserve status  throughout the war and was not called to active duty. As for Puerto  Rican units, Army policy at the outbreak of the Korean War authorized  their use only in the Caribbean Command. In September 1950, however, the  65th Infantry (organized with Puerto Rican enlisted personnel) was  assigned to the 3d Infantry Division and sent to Korea to alleviate the  major replacement problem. Starting in October 1951, English-speaking  Puerto Ricans were made available for assignment on an Army-wide basis  and were no longer limited to separate Puerto Rican units or to service  in only one geographic area. The 65th Infantry returned to its home  island in November 1954 and in 1959 was allotted to the Puerto Rico Army  National Guard.

Another innovation, caused by the drastic  personnel shortages and heavy casualties in the early days of the Korean  War, was the integration of 100 South Koreans into each U.S. infantry  company. This Korean Augmentation to the United States Army (KATUSA)  took several different forms. Some units integrated the Koreans  according to the "buddy system" with one U.S. soldier for each Korean,  others organized separate Korean squads and platoons commanded by  Americans, still others combined both of these methods. Instituted as an  emergency measure, KATUSA presented major difficulties to infantry units  because of the language barrier, cultural differences, the Koreans' lack  of training, and their nonfamiliarity with U.S. Army organization,  weapons, and tactics. As American replacements became available, the  number of KATUSA soldiers declined and the South Koreans were used to  rebuild the Republic of Korea Army, but later in the war when U.S.  strength was reduced, an increase in KATUSA personnel was again  authorized. The longer the Koreans remained with American units, the  more effective they became, and many of the original difficulties were  overcome. As a rule, however, they were more successfully integrated  into service units than into the U.S. infantry.

Although South Koreans and Americans carried  the greatest part of the burden, twenty-one other nations also  contributed to the U.N. war effort in Korea. Most infantry units from  these countries were relatively small, and in combat they were  frequently attached to U.S. organizations. As the war progressed, a  technique was developed whereby a U.N. battalion was habitually attached  to the same American infantry regiment and, in fact, operated as an  organic fourth battalion of the U.S. unit.

In spite of all of these special infantry  organizations, it was the standard infantry that constituted the great  majority of infantry units in Korea. Infantry in general played a most  significant role in the Korean War. The first American ground troops to  arrive in Korea were infantrymen, and all eight U.S. divisions sent to  Korea were organized as infantry. As always, the combined effort of all  arms and services was necessary for success in Korea, and the infantry  depended heavily on their co-operation, particularly on artillery  support in the last two years of comparatively static warfare. But, even  then, it was the infantry that had the difficult mission of actually  capturing the numerous enemy-held hills and outposts. As Lt. Gen.  Maxwell D. Taylor, Commanding General of Eighth Army, put it, "the last  200 yards still had to be taken by a determined man on the ground with  his rifle and hand grenade." By far the heaviest casualties were  suffered by the infantry (out of an Army total of 109,958 casualties,  92,185 were infantrymen), while among the Army's seventy-eight Korean  War Medal of Honor winners, seventy came from infantry units.

The Pentomic Concept and the Combat Arms Regimental System

The armistice in Korea did not bring about the  rapid demobilization of infantry units that traditionally followed the  cessation of hostilities in American military history. President Dwight  D. Eisenhower gave the reason for this departure from the usual pattern  when he said: "We have won an armistice on a single battleground-not  peace in the world. We may not now relax our guard nor cease our quest."  There was, nevertheless, a gradual reduction of both personnel and units  throughout the mid-1950's. When the Korean armistice was signed, the  active Army had ninety infantry regiments, a year later the total was  seventy-four, and by the end of 1956 only fifty-four regiments were  active. The number of separate infantry battalions decreased from  thirty-one to twenty-six during the same period, while the infantry's  personnel strength dropped from 251,685 to 133,931.

By December 1954, all National Guard infantry  units that had been federalized during the Korean War reverted to state  control and were reorganized at their home stations. Several Regular  Army infantry regiments were activated to replace them in the active  Army. The number of these organizations, however, never equaled the  total of National Guard units released, and some of the Regular  regiments were inactivated as the authorized strength of the Army  declined. Although the number of units decreased, the responsibilities  of the infantry remained worldwide. In December 1956, in addition to  those in the continental United States, infantry units were stationed in  the Canal Zone, Alaska, Hawaii, Iceland, Italy, Berlin, West Germany,  Japan, and Korea. In Korea, two infantry divisions with three organic  infantry regiments each were still on duty.

The period immediately following the Korean  War was a difficult time for the infantry. The new administration  re-evaluated the national military policy, and with this "New Look" the  United States entered the so-called "Era of Massive Retaliation." The  doctrine of massive retaliation rested on the assumption that the threat  of instant and large-scale nuclear reprisals would serve as an effective  deterrent to future wars and, therefore, make large conventional forces  unnecessary. It emphasized the role of the Air Force in national defense  and relegated the Army with its infantry to an inferior position.

Unable to convince the administration of the  likelihood of small limited wars in the future and of the need for what  he called "a strategy of flexible response," General Maxwell D. Taylor  (then Army Chief of Staff) decided that it was necessary to reorganize  and modernize the Army to make it readily adaptable to the requirements  of the atomic battlefield. As a result, starting in late 1956 Army units  were reorganized under the Pentomic system. Two of the most salient  characteristics of this concept were reflected in its name-pentagonal  structure and atomic capability. Low-yield tactical nuclear weapons  became a mainstay of the Army, and an organization based on five major  subordinate units replaced the traditional three basic elements of the  triangular system.

Many features of the Pentomic organization  were dictated by the nature of atomic warfare as well as by a desire to  take full advantage of the tremendous technological advances of recent  years. For example, the absolute requirement for wide dispersion on the  nuclear battlefield to avoid offering the enemy any single lucrative  target was an important consideration in adopting an organization with  five small basic combat units, while new developments in the field of  communications made a broader span of control possible. Since the Soviet  Union had acquired an atomic capability in 1949 and from all indications  its nuclear arsenal had kept on growing steadily, an enemy with atomic  combat power was not entirely theoretical. In order to be successful in  a nuclear war, U.S. infantry units had to be small and lean, more  powerful and harder hitting, self-sufficient, and geared for long  periods of independent action on a wide and fluid battlefield. They had  to be capable of rapid and effective concentration in the attack as well  as equally rapid dispersal for defense. The Pentomic system attempted to  give the infantry all of these capabilities.

The reorganization went through several  stages. The Continental Army Command (CONARC), which replaced the  Office, Chief of Army Field Forces, on 1 February 1955, began studies of  the new concept in the fall of 1955. Test TOE's entitled "Reorganization  of the Airborne Division (ROTAD)," "Reorganization of the Current  Armored Division (ROCAD)," and "Reorganization of the Current Infantry  Division (ROCID) " were published on 10 August, 1 December, and 20  December 1956, respectively. By June 1958, all fifteen active Regular  Army divisions and their subordinate units had been reorganized under  these tables, and by mid-1959 all but one of the thirty-seven divisions  in the reserve components had adopted the new structure. Meanwhile the  system was being field tested and evaluated by CONARC, and the Infantry  School was revising infantry manuals to cover Pentomic organization and  warfare on the nuclear battlefield. In December 1958, a major Infantry  Conference, the first such gathering since 1946, met at Fort Benning,  Georgia, to discuss the radical changes that were taking place in  infantry organization, materiel, and tactics. The ROTAD tables were  superseded by the final TOE's for Pentomic airborne units on 31 June  1958, but the final D-series tables for elements of infantry and armored  divisions were not published until 1 February and 1 May 1960.

Pentomic was basically a divisional  reorganization and as such is beyond the scope of this narrative, but it  did introduce major changes in all infantry units. The single most  important innovation was the elimination of the regiment from the  infantry structure. It was replaced by a new organization called the  "battle group." Smaller than a regiment and larger than a battalion, the  new unit was commanded by a full colonel. Five battle groups were  organic to the Pentomic infantry division.

The strength of the ROCID battle group was  1,427, but this was reduced to 1,356 by the D-series TOE. Initially it  consisted of a headquarters, headquarters and service company; an  artillery battery, equipped with 4.2-inch mortars; and four rifle  companies, each having four rifle platoons and a weapons platoon. After  reorganization under the D-tables, the battle group had a headquarters  and headquarters company, a combat support company, and five rifle  companies composed of three rifle platoons and a weapons platoon. All of  the tactical support elements (including a radar section and  reconnaissance, heavy mortar, and assault weapons platoons) were located  in the combat support company. The radar section's two medium-range and  five short-range radar sets greatly increased the battle group's ground  surveillance capability, while the heavy mortar platoon brought the  4.2-inch mortar back to the infantry. The assault weapons platoon  introduced the first operational infantry guided missile, the  French-manufactured SS10, a lightweight, long-range, and accurate  weapon, employed primarily against tanks.

The weapons platoon in the Pentomic rifle  company became a much more powerful unit since it no longer used 60-mm.  mortars and 57-mm. recoilless rifles. It now had 81-mm. mortars and  106-mm. recoilless rifles, which prior to ROCID were classified as  battalion-level equipment. The 106-mm. rifle had been adopted in October  1954 as a replacement for the 75-mm. and 105-mm. recoilless rifles in  the infantry battalion's heavy weapons company. This was the only  significant change in infantry weapons between the Korean armistice and  the Pentomic reorganization. The ROCID and I)-series TOE's made the  106mm. recoilless rifle a standard rifle company weapon, giving the unit  highly effective antitank protection.

The tank company organic to the pre-ROCID  infantry regiment was not continued in the Pentomic structure. The  divisional tank battalion, however, was reorganized to consist of five  tank companies, so that a company of seventeen tanks was available to  support each of the five battle groups. Other divisional elements,  normally providing direct support for battle groups, were also organized  pentagonally.

The Pentomic infantry rifle squad had eleven  men, two more than the squad of the Korean War era. This increase  represented more than just a gain of two additional rifles. It  introduced the concept of two fire teams within a squad and gave the  unit not only increased firepower, but also greater maneuverability, the  ability to withstand more attrition, a greater capacity for sustained  combat, and more effective control over individual riflemen. Under the  1960 TOE, a portable radio set was issued to each of the three rifle  squads and to the weapons squad. These radios were part of a newly  established platoon net linking together, for the first time, all  subordinate elements of the rifle platoon and making them immediately  responsive to the platoon leader's orders. Communications were improved  on other organizational levels as well, because a rapid and efficient  communications system was an essential ingredient of the Pentomic  concept.

Since a high degree of mobility was another  requirement of Pentomic units, transportation equipment was also  improved. In addition to employing its own organic transport, the battle  group could depend on the divisional transportation battalion, which was  added to the structure under ROCID. This unit's two armored personnel  carrier companies were capable of moving an entire infantry battle  group. By also using its light truck company, the transportation  battalion could move two battle groups simultaneously. As for organic  aviation, the battle group did not inherit the regiment's 6-man aviation  section. All of the aircraft, both rotary and fixed-wing, authorized for  the Pentomic infantry division were centralized in one combat aviation  company. The company was organized to give direct support to battle  groups when needed as well as to furnish general support for the entire  division.

When organized for combat, the infantry battle  group often had other units attached. These were usually a tank company,  an engineer company, and a field artillery battalion. A battle group,  reinforced in this manner, was a balanced combined arms force and,  although considerably smaller, greatly resembled the regimental combat  teams of World War II and the Korean War. Most infantry battle groups  were divisional units. There were, however, some nondivisional groups  which were assigned to higher commands or served as school troops.  Others were organic to a new organization, the separate infantry  brigade. Two such brigades, the 1st and 2d, were activated in the  Regular Army in 1958. In the Army National Guard, the 29th, 92d, and  258th Infantry Brigades were organized in 1959 with their respective  headquarters in Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and Arizona.

The airborne infantry was also reorganized  under the Pentomic system. The units organic to the 101st Airborne  Division were the first in the Army to be evaluated and tested under the  new concept. In September 1956, the 101st was reorganized in accordance  with the ROTAD TOE's, and the following month tests of the new structure  began at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, and Fort Bragg, North Carolina, in a  series of exercises called JUMP LIGHT. The name given to the exercises  reflected one of the most important characteristics of ROTAD units-their  relative lightness. The entire division, with the personnel and  equipment of all of its elements, including five airborne battle groups,  was completely transportable by Air Force medium transport aircraft (the  C-119, C-123, and C-130) . Some of the equipment provided by the TOE's  was not yet available and interim items authorized did not meet all of  the airlift criteria, but it was understood that these items were only  temporary issue and would be replaced as soon as possible.

The airborne battle group was similar to the  corresponding unit in the regular infantry. Under ROTAD it contained  1,584 men, organized into a headquarters, headquarters and service  company, a heavy mortar battery, and five airborne infantry companies.  With the adoption of the D-series TOE, total group strength increased by  only one man and its basic structure remained the same. Each of the five  rifle companies had four rifle platoons and a weapons platoon, which was  equipped with 81-mm. mortars and 106-mm. recoilless rifles. The rifle  platoon consisted of a weapons squad and three rifle squads, composed of  eleven men and organized into two fire teams. The group's organic fire  support was provided by an artillery battery, armed with eight 4.2-inch  mortars, while its assault gun platoon was equipped with six 90-mm.,  selfpropelled, fulltracked antitank guns, which could be transported and  landed by C119 or C-123 aircraft or dropped by parachute from the C-119.

In recognition of the importance of  communications on the modern battlefield, the signal equipment of the  airborne battle group was made greatly superior to that of the former  airborne infantry regiment. Although the total strength of the battle  group was less than half that of the regiment, the group was authorized  the same number of radios and even more telephones than had been organic  to the regiment. In addition to its 100 percent air transportability,  the Pentomic airborne battle group also had increased ground mobility.  The most significant development in this field was the adoption of the  infantry light weapons carrier, M274, better known as the mule or  mechanical mule. By taking some of the load off the paratrooper's back,  the mechanical mule improved the mobility of airborne infantry units in  ground operations.

In comparison with the almost complete  transformation of standard and airborne infantry units during the  Pentomic era, changes in armored infantry structure during the same  period were minor. With the battalion as its basic element, the armored  infantry was already organized into small, powerful, flexible, and  highly mobile units, capable of the rapid concentration and wide  dispersion which would be essential in nuclear warfare. The armored  division's combat command organization was also well suited to the  atomic battlefield. Therefore, although the armored division gained an  atomic capability under the ROCAD and D-series TOE's, it did not adopt  the pentagonal structure. The division retained both its three combat  commands and its four organic armored infantry battalions. Each  battalion continued to have four rifle companies consisting of three  rifle platoons and an 81-mm. mortar platoon. The total strength of the  battalion, however, increased somewhat from 978 to 1,027, and the unit  was designated an armored rifle battalion.

Two BAR's had been authorized for each rifle  squad in the regular and airborne infantry during 1953 and 1954, but the  second automatic rifle was not included in the armored infantry rifle  squad until the ROCAD TOE of December 1956. At the same time the squad  increased from ten to twelve men and, like its 11-man standard and  airborne infantry counterparts, was subdivided into two fire teams. The  extra man drove the squad's organic M59 armored personnel carrier (APC),  a fulltracked amphibious vehicle with ground mobility equal that of a  tank and having great agility in water. Meanwhile, a lighter and less  expensive amphibious armored personnel carrier, M 118, was being  developed. Although designed primarily to give the armored infantry  mobility, the M113 could also be employed as a self-propelled heavy  weapons carrier, an ambulance, a command vehicle, a cargo carrier, or a  fire direction center. Under the 1960 TOE's, there were seventeen APC's  in each armored infantry company and a total of seventy-seven in the  armored rifle battalion. The battalion had enough organic transportation  to make it 100 percent mobile, and its communications system was more  extensive and more efficient than ever before.

One very important item, authorized by the  D-series TOE's for all types of infantry units, was the new M14 rifle.  The result of more than ten years of experimentation arid testing, the  M14 was almost a pound lighter than its predecessor, the M 1 rifle, and  held a 20-round magazine instead of the Ml's 8round clip. Since it fired  the 7.62-mm. cartridge adopted by the other NATO countries, standard  U.S. rifle ammunition became interchangeable with that of major allies.  A selector for automatic or semi-automatic fire increased the M 14's  versatility and enabled it to serve as a replacement not only for the M  1, but also for the carbine, the submachine gun and, when used with a  bipod, for the much heavier BAR. Because any rifleman could now become  an automatic rifleman with little additional training, the rifle squad  and other small infantry units acquired greater tactical flexibility.  Although the M1 and the BAR had served the infantry well for many years  and most soldiers were sorry to see these "old reliables" go, the M14  was adopted as the new standard weapon of the rifleman and began to be  issued to infantry units in 1960. Shortly thereafter, TRAINFIRE, the  official rifle marksmanship course since 1957, designed to simulate  actual combat conditions and featuring a pop-up silhouette target known  as "Punchy Pete," was modified for use with the M-14. At about the same  time, a new general purpose machine gun, the M60, was adopted as a  replacement for both the heavy water-cooled and the light air-cooled  Browning .30-caliber machine guns. The M60 fired 7.62-mm. NATO  ammunition at a rate of 600 rounds per minute, weighed only twenty-three  pounds, and could be fired from the shoulder or hip, from an attached  bipod, or from a newly developed aluminum tripod. Other infantry weapons  and equipment were meanwhile being developed and tested by the Infantry  School and by CONARC's Infantry Board. Among them were a lightweight  rifle, a shoulder-fired air defense guided missile, an improved model of  the 81-mm. mortar, a new grenade launcher, more powerful and lighter  radar sets, the Claymore antipersonnel mine, and better radios,  including an experimental combat helmet model. Thus, although the  spectacular advances made during the Pentomic era were in the fields of  nuclear weapons, giant guided missiles, and huge rockets, there was also  solid progress in the development of conventional small arms and  equipment for the individual rifleman.

The Pentomic concept brought about the most  drastic reorganization of infantry units since triangularization. When  the square divisions became triangular, one infantry regiment had to be  dropped from each division. Pentomic affected all of the infantry  elements organic to the infantry and airborne divisions, leaving only  the infantry battalions in the armored division relatively unchanged.  Since both regiments and battalions were eliminated in the regular and  airborne infantry,. the chain of command went directly from the division  headquarters to the five new battle groups and from there to the company  level. The combined strength of the three regiments under the last  triangular TOE was 10,560 in the infantry division and 10,088 in the  airborne division. Under ROCID the five infantry battle groups totaled  7,185 men, while the five ROTAD airborne battle groups had a strength of  7,920. In both cases, therefore, the Pentomic reorganization caused a  significant reduction in infantry personnel. By eliminating the  traditional regiment, it also raised the question of what the new  infantry units were to be called, how they were to be numbered, and what  their relationship to former organizations was to be.

If some means of perpetuating the history of  infantry and other combat regiments had not been combined with the  tactical reorganization, hundreds of independent units would have been  created with no historical affiliation. The numerical designations of  such a multiplicity of separate units would have run into three or  possibly four digits. At the same time, the failure to pass regimental  lineages and honors to the new Pentomic units would have brought an end  to the history and traditions acquired by U.S. Army combat regiments in  the past. Such difficulties were avoided by the adoption of the Combat  Arms Regimental System (CARS), a plan developed by the Army Staff on the  model of the British regimental system and approved by the Secretary of  the Army on 24 January 1957. CARS was designed to maintain the  continuity of the Army's distinguished combat units and to provide an  organizational framework that would remain stable in spite of  fluctuations in strength and tactical structure. It also gave every  combat soldier the opportunity of being a member of a traditional unit,  one of which he could be genuinely proud, thereby improving troop morale  and esprit de corps.

The system was built around the regiment for  two reasons. First, the regiment had always been the principal  repository of unit history and tradition in the United States Army.  Second, since it was becoming obsolete as a tactical unit, the regiment  would no longer be subject to periodic reorganizations and could serve  as a permanent vehicle for perpetuating unit lineage, honors, and  customs without restricting future organizational trends. Consequently,  a number of distinguished infantry, artillery, armor, and cavalry  regiments were selected and designated as so-called parent units. Each  infantry parent regiment was capable of providing a base for a variable  number of tactical elements, which could be battle groups, battalions,  or companies. Their number and size varied according to the needs of the  Army, but each element traced its lineage back to one of the organic  companies of the parent regiment. When the element was a battle group or  battalion, its headquarters was the direct descendant of one of the  former regimental companies, while its own organic elements were  constituted as new units.

Elements of the same parent regiment could be  assigned to different divisions or other commands and could be allotted  to either the Regular Army or the Army Reserve. These two components  shared their CARS regiments, while the Army National Guard had its own,  those traditionally associated with a given geographic area. The Regular  Army and Army Reserve parent units were selected on the basis of a point  system which credited one point per year since original activation and  two points for each campaign credit and American decoration. Initially,  fifty-five infantry regiments were chosen: the 1st through 23d, 26th  through 32d, 34th, 35th, 36th, 38th, 39th, 41st, 46th, 47th, 48th, 50th,  51st, 52d, 54th, 58th, 60th, 87th, 187th, 325th, 327th, and 501st  through 506th. Because of their airborne backgrounds, the last nine  designations on this list were reserved for airborne units; the 6th,  36th, 41st., 46th, 48th, 50th, 51st, 52d, 54th, and 58th Infantry became  parent regiments for the armored infantry with which they had been  associated in the past; the remaining thirty-six were for the regular  infantry. The infantry elements of the 1st Cavalry Division were not  assigned to infantry parent units but had cavalry parent regiments,  which they shared with cavalry reconnaissance units. (Their lineages are  included in the Armor-Cavalry volume of the Army Lineage Series.)

In 1959 eighteen more infantry regiments, all  with Army Reserve backgrounds, were added to the list of parent units,  since reservists felt that it was detrimental to the morale of the Army  Reserve not to have any parent regiments of its own. The 59th, 305th  through 307th, 313th through 315th, 357th through 359th, and 442d  Infantry were chosen because of their outstanding records, and the 100th  Battle Group, 442d Infantry, from Hawaii was permitted to retain the  number under which it had distinguished itself during World War II. The  seven other infantry regiments selected (the 322d, 345th, 381st, 383d,  409th, 410th, and 411th) had special ties with certain communities. They  were organized with only one element each, their lineages differing  somewhat from those of other CARS units.

The reorganization of airborne and standard  infantry units under CARS was a relatively simple procedure because they  had retained the regimental structure up to that time. The former  armored infantry regiments, however, had been broken up into battalions  for many years, and it was necessary to restore them to their original  regiments. Many battalion designations made famous in World War II  combat were lost in the process, but their honors were perpetuated by  the new CARS units. Under CARS there were two kinds of honors, earned  and shared. All elements of the parent unit shared the regimental  campaign credits and decorations. Color bearing units identified their  own contributions to the regiment's honors by special devices on  campaign and decoration streamers and by asterisks on their official  Lineage and Honors Certificates. Company-sized units, which were  authorized guidons, displayed only those honors that they themselves had  earned. Provisions were also made for recognition of honors awarded  subsequent to the adoption of CARS.

As originally planned, Phase V of the system  had provided for the establishment of a regimental headquarters, not as  it had existed prior to CARS, but as a home for all members of the  regiment. The headquarters would be assigned to a permanent location and  would maintain regimental history and traditions, keep records, display  colors, trophies, and other properties, and perhaps conduct regimental  recruiting and operate regimental training units. A proposal to  centralize all infantry regimental headquarters at the Infantry Center  at Fort Benning, Georgia, was tentatively approved by the Army Staff in  1959, but it was rejected the following year because of lack of funds,  personnel, and appropriate on-post facilities. As of 31 December 1969,  Phase V of CARS had not yet been implemented. Headquarters of former  infantry regiments remained at zero strength under Department of the  Army control and, pending their establishment, the lowest numbered or  lettered active element of each regiment was designated as the custodian  of the regimental colors. It was also the unit which usually displayed  regimental historical properties and co-ordinated the selection of a  regimental unit day. Members of all elements of a CARS parent regiment  shared the regiment's distinctive insignia, although they could wear  different shoulder sleeve insignia, depending upon the division or other  command to which their unit was assigned.

In general, redesignation of infantry units to  conform to CARS was accomplished simultaneously with their  reorganization under the Pentomic concept. Only the elements of the  101st Airborne Division, which became Pentomic in 1956 prior to approval  of CARS, had to be reorganized again in April 1957 to include the proper  new designations. In June 1956, just before the Pentomic reorganization  began, there had been fifty-nine infantry regiments (with three  battalions each) and twenty-three separate infantry battalions in the  Regular Army. By June 1958 they had been replaced by seventy-six  Pentomic battle groups and nineteen armored rifle battalions, all of  which were elements of fifty-five infantry and five cavalry CARS parent  regiments. CARS and Pentomic were not limited to the Regular Army; all  Army National Guard and Army Reserve infantry units were also  reorganized according to the new historical and tactical organizational  systems. The only exceptions were the training regiments of the thirteen  training divisions in the Army Reserve, which were organized under  entirely different TOE's and were neither Pentomic nor CARS units.

ROAD and Flexible Response

The Pentomic battle group had a rather brief  existence as the basic unit of the infantry. From its inception, the  Pentomic system had been considered an interim measure by the Army  Staff. It was intended as the first step, not the last, in the Army's  adaptation to the nuclear battlefield and to the increasingly  complicated military situations that might be expected to arise in the  future. Planning for a new combat structure began even before all  infantry units had been reorganized under the D-series TOE's. In  December 1960, CONARC was directed to re-evaluate the current  organization and to make recommendations for necessary changes. The  result of this re-evaluation was not another modification of the  existing Pentomic system but a major Army-wide reorganization under an  entirely new concept called ROAD (Reorganization Objective Army  Divisions). ROAD was approved by the Secretary of the Army in April 1961  and was publicly announced by President John F. Kennedy before a joint  session of Congress on 25 May 1961. The first ROAD units were organized  in February 1962 under draft TOE's. The final tables were published on  15 July and 15 August 1963, and by the end of June 1964 the  reorganization was completed both in the Regular Army and in the reserve  components.

The fundamental assumption behind the Pentomic  organization had been that atomic war was the most likely form of future  warfare and that tactical nuclear weapons would definitely be used. The  new Kennedy administration questioned this assumption and was seriously  concerned about limited conflicts and the ability to handle situations  short of nuclear war. General Maxwell D. Taylor, long-time champion of  what he called "flexible response," was appointed Military  Representative of the President in the Office of the Secretary of  Defense and later Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Pentomic, a  product of the era of massive retaliation, did not fit into the strategy  of flexible response, which now became official national policy. ROAD,  on the other hand, was specifically designed to carry out such a policy.

The single most important characteristic of  the new system was its flexibility. Under ROAD each division had a fixed  base, common 'to all divisions, but the number and type of its infantry  and armor elements varied according to its mission, geographic location,  and strategic as well as tactical requirements. By different  combinations of organic maneuver elements, divisions could be tailored  to fit any environment or situation. Without reducing the Pentomic  division's tactical nuclear weapons, ROAD increased conventional  firepower and personnel strength. As a result, ROAD units had a genuine  dual capability and greater staying power on the non-atomic battlefield.  The new system had the additional advantage of introducing an  organization that was more compatible with that of major NATO allies.

ROAD, like Pentomic, was primarily a  divisional reorganization. It did, however, affect the infantry as a  whole by changing the structure of infantry units of all sizes down to  and including the squad. Among the most serious shortcomings of the  Pentomic organization was the fact that the battle group, which had been  planned as a lean, highly mobile, scaled-down regiment, was too small  and not powerful enough to be an adequate substitute for the regiment;  it was much more like an oversized and reinforced battalion. Nor was the  combat capability of all five Pentomic battle groups equivalent to that  of the three regiments of the triangular division. ROAD, therefore,  dropped the battle group from the infantry structure, but it did not  bring back the regiment. Instead, it made the battalion the basic  tactical and administrative unit of the infantry.

Command and control also posed major problems  in the Pentomic system. With the elimination of infantry regiments and  battalions and the introduction of the pentagonal, as opposed to the  triangular organization, only one echelon of command remained between  the division commander (a major general) and the company commander (a  captain). As a result, the commanding general was burdened by having  five major independent combat elements under his immediate control.  Experience showed that even with modern communications this span of  control was too wide for efficient operations. Furthermore, infantry  majors and lieutenant colonels had extremely limited command  opportunities, since only about 5 percent of them could expect to  acquire command experience in peacetime under the Pentomic system. ROAD  improved both the command and control structure and infantry officer  career opportunities by dropping the pentagonal organization and by  establishing three brigades in each division to serve as intermediary  headquarters between the division commander and the combat battalions.  Contrary to the fixed structure of the five Pentomic battle groups and  of the old infantry regiments with three identical battalions, the new  brigades could control a variable number and type of units. The  brigades, which were made organic to all divisions, were similar to the  combat commands that the armored division had since World War II, but  they provided greater flexibility.

Battalions were attached to brigades according  to what was appropriately described as the "building-block" concept. In  order to facilitate interchangeability of maneuver elements between and  within divisions and to simplify training, a certain degree of  standardization of structure was introduced. Thus not only did different  types of infantry battalions resemble each other more than ever before,  but even tank battalions were organized along similar lines. This  similarity was accompanied by a renewed emphasis on the employment of  combined arms teams, and new techniques were developed for task force  formation of infantry and armor elements on brigade, battalion, and  company levels. Under ROAD, divisional brigades with their infantry and  armor elements were capable of operating independently when reinforced  by support and service units from the division base. In such cases, the  brigades were comparable to the infantry RCT's that had been employed  with great success during World War II and the Korean War.

The ROAD infantry battalion differed  considerably from the Pentomic battle group, but it had several things  in common with the infantry battalion of the preROCID period. Like the  earlier battalion, it was organized with three organic rifle companies.  In both units each rifle company had three rifle platoons and a weapons  platoon; the rifle platoon consisted of three rifle squads and a weapons  squad, and. the weapons platoon had a mortar and an antitank section.  Unlike the pre-Pentomic battalion, the ROAD unit had no separate heavy  weapons company; all the organic support elements were included in the  headquarters company. This company also contained a mess section, which  for the first time consolidated company mess teams on the battalion  level. Furthermore, the ROAD infantry battalion was tactically  self-sufficient and thus had a greater degree of independence than the  battalions which had been organic to the infantry regiment.

The new rifle squad contained ten men. It was  larger by one man than the squad of the post-World War II and Korean War  period but smaller than the 11-man Pentomic squad. It consisted of a  squad leader, two 4-man fire teams (team leader, automatic rifleman,  rifleman, and grenadier) , and an extra rifleman, who could be used to  reinforce either fire team or assist the squad leader. Organizationally,  the squad reflected ROAD's characteristic flexibility down to the very  last man.

The M 14 rifle, introduced in the D-series  TOE's, remained the infantryman's basic weapon; with a selector and  bipod it also served as an automatic rifle. The ROAD tables provided a  new knife-type bayonet for the M14 instead of the former carbine  bayonet, which had been temporarily issued with the M 14. The M79  grenade launcher was also authorized as a new individual weapon.  Designed to close the gap between the maximum range of a hand grenade  and the minimum range of a mortar, the lightweight M79 fired a 40-mm.  highexplosive fragmentation projectile to a range of approximately 400  meters. With. two launchers per rifle squad and a total of eighty-five  in the battalion, the M79 helped to improve the capabilities of small  infantry units.

Several new antitank weapons, both close-in  and long-range, were introduced by the ROAD TOE's. The 90-mm. recoilless  rifle, M67, replaced the 3.5-inch rocket launcher in the weapons squad  of the rifle platoon, and the ENTAC (ENgin-Teleguide Anti-Char) became  the new weapon for the battalion's three antitank squads. A  French-manufactured wire-guided missile with a range of 2,000 meters,  the ENTAC was a considerable improvement over the SS10 antitank missile  which was being phased out. Some 3.5-inch rocket launchers were still  found in the ROAD infantry battalion, but the TOE clearly stated that  they were to be issued only until the new fib-mm. high explosive  antitank rocket, M72, became available. Commonly known as the LAW (Light  Antitank Weapon), this weapon was designed to be carried and operated by  one man. Although the rocket together with its launcher weighed only  about 4.75 pounds and was only 25 inches long and 3 inches in diameter,  the LAW had an effective range of 200 meters and was capable of  penetrating armor of the heaviest known tank.

For the first time under ROAD, the portable  flame thrower was made organic to the infantry battalion. Flame throwers  had been used by infantry units before, but they had been considered  special purpose weapons and as such had to be requested in advance from  ammunition points. Nine of them were included in the ROAD battalion's  TOE equipment. With three in each rifle company headquarters, flame  throwers were immediately available whenever needed. The ROAD TOE's also  returned the .50-caliber heavy machine gun to the infantry battalion.  The number of these guns, used primarily as antiaircraft weapons, had  been drastically reduced under ROCID, and they were completely  eliminated from the battle group , by the D-series tables. Under ROAD,  thirteen .50-caliber machine guns were again authorized for each  infantry battalion. All of the guns were located in the headquarters  company, although they were not grouped in any one section within the  company. Meanwhile, the new Redeye air defense missile was being  developed and tested and its availability for distribution to infantry  units was being projected for the near future.

All of these weapons gave ROAD units much more  conventional firepower, and thus helped to correct one of the major  weaknesses of the Pentomic organization. Although ROAD emphasized  conventional capabilities, it did not neglect atomic power. On the  contrary, even the infantry-had its own nuclear weapons system, the Davy  Crockett, which could be employed in either a direct or indirect fire  support role against a wide variety of targets-primarily massed enemy  personnel. While the weapon was being developed, CONARC had proposed and  tested several different organizations for its employment, including  separate TOE platoons and sections organic to the heavy mortar platoon  in the battle group's combat support company. Selected personnel began  special training at the Infantry School in October 1961. In the final  ROAD TOE, there was a 12-man Davy Crockett section augmentation in the  headquarters company of the infantry battalion. It could be organized  only by special authorization from the Department of the Army, but  should that authority be given, the battalion commander would have four  low-yield nuclear weapons under his direct control and the capability of  initiating a nuclear fire mission within minutes.

The ROAD infantry battalion was not only more  powerful than the ROCID battle group; its firepower was also much  greater than that of the pre-Pentomic infantry battalion. The battalion  that had fought in Korea ten years earlier had no M14 rifles, M60  machine guns, M79 grenade launchers, 90-mm. or 106-mm. recoilless  rifles, ENTAC's, or Davy Crocketts. Although it could depend on close  support from the regimental heavy mortar company, the Korean War unit  did not have organic 4.2inch mortars, whereas the ROAD battalion had  heavy mortars in its own headquarters company. The 3.5-inch rocket  launcher, .50-caliber machine gun, and 81-mm. mortar used by the earlier  infantry battalion were still authorized for the ROAD unit. However, the  LAW was being tested as a substitute for the bazooka, the Redeye was  being designed to replace the machine gun in the antiaircraft role,  while the 81-mm. mortar being issued was a new and improved model.

Only the .45-caliber automatic pistol was the  same in both the older and newer battalions. All other weapons organic  to the Korean War unit had either been replaced or were scheduled to be  replaced in the near future by more sophisticated and powerful weapons.  As a result, the ROAD battalion's total firepower was significantly  greater than that of its Korean War predecessor, in spite of the fact  that its personnel strength was less by fifty-seven men. The  communication and transportation equipment of the ROAD infantry  battalion was also considerably better. The number of radios and  telephones had increased from 66 and 29 to 176 and 149, respectively;  trucks had more than doubled from 49 to 115. Neither helicopters nor  fixed-wing airplanes were authorized for the infantry battalion, but  there was an aviation battalion in the division base of each ROAD  division with enough organic aircraft to airlift an entire infantry  company at one time.

In keeping with the new trend toward  standardization, the ROAD airborne infantry battalion was almost  identical in structure to the regular infantry battalion. There was only  one significant difference: the airborne unit had six instead of three  antitank squads armed with ENTAC's in its headquarters company. ENTAC's  were also authorized for the antitank squads of airborne infantry  companies, while the standard infantry used the 106-mm. recoilless rifle  at company level. More ENTAC's were authorized because the airborne ROAD  division usually had only one tank battalion assigned to it and  consequently needed a greater antitank capability in its infantry units.  The airborne battalion TOE also provided for thirteen infantry light  weapons carriers or mechanical mules, which were not included in the  standard battalion's equipment. The regular infantry unit, on the other  hand, had more heavy trucks and trailers. In general, the airborne  battalion was a little lighter than the standard infantry battalion and  was 100 percent transportable by medium aircraft. The capabilities of  the ROAD airborne battalion were the same as those of the regular  infantry battalion, with one important exception: the airborne unit was  organized and trained for frequent airborne assault by parachute or  assault aircraft.

The third type of infantry battalion under  ROAD was called "mechanized infantry." It replaced the former armored  infantry battalion (AIB) and armored rifle battalion. Mechanized  infantry units were characterized by their high cross-country mobility  with light armor protection and multiple communications. In addition to  sharing the capabilities of the regular infantry, the mechanized  infantry battalion could provide a highly mobile exploitation force when  suitably reinforced, exploit the effects of mass destruction weapons,  and complement and enhance the inherent capabilities of tank elements  when employed in tank-infantry task forces. AIB's and armored rifle  battalions had been organic only to armored divisions; mechanized  battalions were assigned to armored divisions as well as infantry and  mechanized infantry divisions.

The mechanized division was a new organization  created under ROAD which, although not as heavy in armor as the armored  division, was particularly suitable for employment in such terrain as  the plains of Europe or against an enemy with highly mechanized forces.  All three types of ROAD infantry battalions were also assigned to  separate brigades, which became more numerous during the 1960's.

The organization of the mechanized infantry  battalion was very similar to that of standard and airborne infantry  units. Having a strength of 901, compared to 880 for the regular and 828  for the airborne battalion, the mechanized battalion was the largest  unit. Additional drivers and maintenance personnel were required for the  extra organic vehicles that made the mechanized unit 100 percent mobile.  Signal equipment was also more numerous and, because of the mobility  factor, wireless communication was more essential. Although there were  fewer telephones in the mechanized battalion, the number of radios was  twice that of a regular infantry battalion. Each rifle squad, for  example, was authorized a vehicular radio set in addition to its  portable radio. In the draft TOE the mechanized infantry rifle squad had  only ten men, like the standard and airborne squads; one of the riflemen  was expected to double as the driver of the squad's M 113 armored  personnel carrier (APC). In the final table another rifleman was added,  thus permitting the driver to remain with the APC at all times.

In the process of adopting an organization  similar to that of the regular infantry, the mechanized infantry  battalion lost the fourth rifle company that had been organic to the AIB  and to the armored rifle battalion ever since the post-World War II  reorganization. However, the battalion did gain an improved antitank  capability. The only antitank weapon in the AIB and armored rifle  battalion had been the 3.5inch rocket launcher, while the ROAD  mechanized battalion was also authorized 90mm. and 106-mm. recoilless  rifles, the ENTAC guided missile, and finally the LAW. The number of  machine guns was reduced by the ROAD TOE's, but in spite of this  reduction there were still more 7.62-mm. and .50 caliber machine guns in  mechanized infantry units than in other infantry organizations.

With the adoption of ROAD, the designations of  different types of infantry units became standardized. The official  designation for all infantry battalions consisted of the battalion and  the parent regiment, and descriptive terms such as mechanized or  airborne were now put in parentheses after the battalion. Also placed in  parentheses, following the parent unit, was the traditional or  distinctive designation of the regiment, shared by all of its elements.  For example, the 1st Battalion (Airborne), 506th Infantry (Currahee),  organic to the 101st Airborne Division, and the 3d Battalion  (Mechanized), 118th Infantry (Palmetto Regiment), a unit of the South  Carolina Army National Guard, were officially designated as the 1st  Battalion, 506th Infantry, and the 3d Battalion, 118th Infantry. Thus  while official designations were standardized and simplified for  efficiency's sake, provisions were made for retention of descriptive  terms and historical nicknames.

Although the number and types of infantry  battalions assigned to any given division depended on its mission and  geographic location, the particular units were selected on the basis of  their historical association with the division. The parent regiments of  most of the infantry battalions organic to a ROAD division had fought  with that division in World War I or II or in the Korean War. Whereas  under the Pentomic system each of the organic infantry elements came  from a different parent unit, under ROAD two or more battalions from the  same parent regiment were usually assigned to each division. This change  involved some reassignments and reshuffling of units and was made  concurrently with reorganization under the new TOE's.

CARS adapted very well to ROAD, proving its  ability to provide a stable historical and traditional background for  combat units in spite of major tactical reorganizations. Except for the  addition of five more infantry parent regiments-the 61st, 188th, 508th,  509th, and 511th-no changes were made in the system. Separate parent  units were not created for the new mechanized infantry battalions. Those  that were organized from former armored rifle battalions had parent  regiments with armored infantry backgrounds, but since there were far  more mechanized units, many of them shared parent regiments with the  standard infantry. The airborne parent regiments had only airborne  elements. The only exception was the 509th Infantry, whose 1st and 2d  Battalions were organized as airborne /mechanized, that is, as  mechanized units with parachutequalified personnel. Two airborne  regiments, the 188th and 511th, were added to CARS in order to furnish  organic elements for the 11th Air Assault Division, newly organized at  Fort Benning, Georgia, with the special purpose of testing the airmobile  concept.

The greater emphasis on limited war  capabilities and flexible response, which had set the stage for the ROAD  reorganization, also helped to bring about an increase in Army and  infantry strength in the early 1960's. The number of infantrymen had  been gradually reduced since the Korean armistice and kept on declining  after the adoption of the Pentomic organization. Reaching its lowest  point in August and September 1958, infantry strength had dropped to  less than 100,000 and to approximately 11 percent of the overall Army  strength, which also continued to decrease. At that time there were  ninety-three infantry units of battle group or battalion size in the  active Army. Three-fourths of them were organic elements of divisions  and about half were stationed overseas. After this low point, infantry  personnel strength began to grow gradually, but it was the Berlin crisis  of mid-1961 that brought about a significant gain in both infantry  personnel and units.

The increase was at first mainly the result of  federalizing two Army National Guard divisions. The 32d Infantry  Division from Wisconsin with five organic infantry battle groups and the  49th Armored Division from Texas with its four armored rifle battalions  were federalized on 15 October 1961. An Army Reserve training division,  the 100th, was also ordered into active military service. Thus, the  reserve components played an important role during the Berlin crisis.  However, in order to be prepared for such crises in the future, a  buildup in Regular Army strength was necessary. To satisfy this need,  existing units were made more combat ready and two additional divisions  were authorized. In February 1962 the 1st Armored Division and the 5th  Infantry Division (Mechanized) were activated. These divisions and their  organic elements became the first units to be organized under the new  ROAD concept.

By the time the ROAD reorganization was  officially completed in June 1964, active infantry strength had grown to  130,131, even though infantry units from the reserve components had  reverted to reserve status. The Regular Army now had sixteen combat  divisions: 5 infantry, 2 airborne, 4 armored, 4 mechanized infantry, and  I cavalry (organized as infantry), with 107 organic infantry battalions  among them. Sixteen infantry battalions were assigned to seven separate  brigades: 3 infantry, 1 airborne, 1 armored, and 2 mechanized infantry.  There were also three battalions assigned to the 11th Air Assault  Division (Test) , four separate battalions, and five separate companies.  One unit was still designated a battle group; it was the 1st Battle  Group, 1st Infantry, active at zero strength at West Point. From this  total of 136 infantry units, 67 were stationed in the continental United  States and 69 were overseas with 31 in West Germany, 19 in Korea, and  the remainder in Okinawa, Hawaii, Alaska, Berlin, and the Canal Zone.

Infantry readiness in the Army Reserve and  Army National Guard was also considerably improved during the 1960's,  but it was accompanied by a reduction in the total number of organized  units. Robert S. McNamara, Secretary of Defense during the Kennedy and  Johnson administrations, was instrumental in bringing about several  realignments of the reserve components. He recommended drastic cuts in  the number of reserve units, which in turn would enable the remaining  organizations to be more fully manned and equipped. One of McNamara's  original suggestions was to eliminate all infantry and other combat  units from the Army Reserve, leaving only service units, and to make the  Army National Guard the combat reserve. Congress rejected this proposal  and modified many of his other recommendations. Nevertheless, after the  reorganization of 1967-68 both the Army Reserve and the Army National  Guard were significantly different from the reserve components of a  decade earlier.

The twenty-seven Army National Guard divisions  of the late 1950's, with sixtythree organic infantry regiments (of three  battalions each) and twenty-four organic armored infantry battalions,  had been reduced by 1968 to only eight divisions and eighteen separate  brigades, having a total of 111 organic ROAD infantry battalions. There  were also four separate infantry companies and twelve separate infantry  battalions, including two scout battalions organized in Alaska with  Eskimo personnel. All of the Army National Guard infantry units were  elements of seventysix CARS parent regiments.

In the 1968 Army Reserve there were no  divisional combat infantry units left, since four of the ten combat  divisions had been inactivated in 1963 and the other six by the end of  1965. Only three separate brigades, each having three organic, infantry  battalions, remained active together with one separate infantry  battalion. In the course of these realignments twelve of the eighteen  CARS infantry parent regiments with Army Reserve backgrounds had been  eliminated. The 313th, 314th, 315th, 409th, 410th, and 442d Infantry  were retained with one battalion each, while the other four active  infantry battalions were elements of Regular Army parent units. The Army  Reserve continued to have thirteen training divisions, but these too had  undergone a major reorganization. The five training regiments previously  organic to each division were replaced by thirteen battalions, with  eight for Basic Combat Training (BCT), three for Advanced Individual  Training (AIT), and two for Combat Support Training (CST), all of which  were attached to four brigades within the division. Although a battalion  and brigade structure was introduced, the training divisions were not  organized under ROAD and the new battalions did not become elements of  designated CARS parent regiments. The former training regiments,  however, were reorganized under a modified CARS concept with a variable  number of BCT, AIT, or CST battalions and with the regimental  headquarters inactive.

One other type of infantry organization, the  Special Forces, remained active in the Army Reserve and also had  elements in the Regular Army and in the Army National Guard. Although  part of CARS, the Special Forces were not like any other CARS units, but  had a unique structure. Their basic operational unit was the 12-man "A"  detachment, commanded by a captain. Forty-eight of these detachments  were organic to a full strength Special Forces group. The parent  regiment for all Special Forces units from all three components,  designated the 1st Special Forces, was created on 15 April 1960 by  consolidation of the six ranger infantry battalions and the 1st Special  Service Force of World War II. Since the ranger companies of the Korean  War period traced their lineages back to elements of the World War II  ranger battalions, their histories were also perpetuated by the new  parent unit.

The mission of the Special Forces was to fight  both as guerrillas and against guerrillas and to organize, train,  advise, direct, and assist indigenous forces anywhere in the world in  the conduct of guerrilla warfare as well as in counterinsurgency and  counterguerrilla operations. Special Forces personnel were therefore  among the first Americans to be sent to Vietnam as advisors to the South  Vietnamese in their struggle against Communist aggression. As the  conflict in Vietnam developed into a major war, the U.S. involvement  deepened. Regular infantry and other combat troops were committed, and  the war in Vietnam became the first actual battle test of the strategy  of flexible response and the ROAD organization.




The War in Vietnam

The first U.S. infantry combat units arrived  in Vietnam in May 1965. They were the 1st and 2d Battalions, 503d  Infantry, elements of the 173d Airborne Brigade, previously stationed on  Okinawa. These units were joined in July by three battalions from the  1st Infantry Division and three battalions from the 101st Airborne  Division, and in September by eight battalions of the 1st Cavalry  Division (Airmobile). The infantry battalions organic to the 173d  Airborne Brigade and the 101st Airborne Division were airborne, those  assigned to the 1st Infantry Division were standard infantry, while the  elements of the 1st Cavalry Division were a new type of unit called  "airmobile." Although the airmobile infantry battalions had no organic  aircraft, the division was authorized 428 helicopters, enough to give  all of its elements tactical mobility by air.

Military strategists had long dreamed of  airmobile units that would introduce a true third dimension to the  battlefield. The first practical application of the airmobile concept,  the organization of the 11th Air Assault Division, was made possible by  the great strides of recent years in the design, production, and  doctrine of employment of the helicopter Elements of this test division  were activated at Fort Benning, Georgia, starting in February 1963 as a  result of the recommendations of the U.S. Army Tactical Mobility  Requirement Board, more commonly known as the Howze Board after its  chairman, Lt. Gen. Hamilton H. Howze. Following more than two years of  testing and evaluation, the Secretary of Defense approved the creation  of a combat ready airmobile division. The 1st Cavalry Division was  selected. It was transferred less personnel and equipment from Korea to  Fort Benning and was reorganized as airmobile on 1 July 1965. With the  formation of this division the Army acquired a new way of bringing the  infantry and other ground troops in contact with the enemy. One of the  major goals of the ROAD reorganization had been to furnish appropriate  tactical mobility to combat units in different geographical areas. The  development of airmobile units was another example of ROAD's continuing  flexibility. Since in Vietnam the use of ground vehicles was severely  limited by terrain, the new airmobile division was ideally suited for  employment there.

Probably the most significant innovation of  the war was the largescale use of helicopters in general and of  airmobile combat units in particular. All units in Vietnam depended  heavily on the helicopter for aerial reconnaissance, medical evacuation,  and resupply, as well as rapid transportation into and out of otherwise  inaccessible areas. Helicopters used by the infantry were Army not Air  Force aircraft and, as such, were more responsive to the needs of the  units. The infantry in turn quickly adjusted to airmobile operations.  Although all types of infantry units were regularly transported by  helicopter, the airmobile division was the only infantry organization  that could move all of its elements with its own organic aircraft.

Airmobile units were capable of moving rapidly  and directly to their objective regardless of terrain obstacles or enemy  troop concentrations. Responding swiftly to changes in the tactical  situation, they could break off action at one point and fly quickly in  any direction to fight at another point or disperse to widely separated  bases. Characterized by speed, surprise, maneuverability, and  aggressiveness, the airmobile assault proved to be a highly successful  offensive technique. In terrain such as that of Southeast Asia, it was a  great improvement over airborne assault techniques developed in World  War II. Except for one jump by elements of the 173d Airborne Brigade on  22 February 1967, no combat parachute drops were made by U.S. Army units  in Vietnam, whereas literally thousands of helicopter missions took  place. On 1 July 1968, therefore, the 101st Airborne Division was  reorganized as airmobile. Although the division base was significantly  changed in the process of airmobilization, this was not a major  reorganization for the ten airborne infantry battalions assigned to the  division. By that time their structure had already been standardized  under Modification Tables of Organization and Equipment (MTOE's) for  light infantry battalions.

When the buildup of U.S. troops in Vietnam  began in 1965, infantry units in general were organized under the ROAD  tables of 15 July and 15 August 1963. Shortly thereafter a new series of  infantry TOE's was published. These tables were prepared under the  direction of the U.S. Army Combat Developments Command, which had been  created during the 1962 reorganization of the Department of the Army.  The new command took over the responsibility for development and  processing of TOE's from the Continental Army Command (CONARC), but  training of infantry units and supervision of the Infantry School  remained CONARC functions. The standard and mechanized infantry tables  were dated 31 March 1966, while the airborne infantry had two sets of  tables, dated 30 June 1965 and 30 June 1966. These TOE's added an air  defense section to the headquarters company of all three types of  battalions, which was organized to use the new Redeye guided missile  system (a manportable, shoulder-fired, low altitude, antiaircraft  weapon). The Davy Crockett section augmentation was eliminated from the  battalions, but in February 1967 a tentative test TOE for a separate  infantry Davy Crockett platoon was published. Its primary mission was to  provide close-in nuclear fire support for the maneuver battalions of a  division or brigade. Since this was a test TOE, units were to be  organized under it only when specifically directed.

The number of personnel in airborne units was  reduced by the 1965 and 1966 TOE's, and lighter equipment was authorized  for them. The battalion's antitank weapon was changed from the ENTAC to  the 106-mm. recoilless rifle, which in turn was to be replaced by the  TOW (Tube-launched, Optically-tracked, Wireguided) missile system as  soon as it became available. A new individual rifle, the lightweight  M16, was also authorized for airborne infantrymen. All three types of  infantry battalions-standard, mechanized, and airborne-retained the ROAD  structure of a headquarters and headquarters company and three rifle  companies.

Meanwhile, test TOE's had been prepared by the  Combat Developments Command for two new types of infantry units, the  airmobile battalion organic to the airmobile division and a special  infantry battalion which was to be assigned to light infantry divisions  and separate light infantry brigades. With authorized strengths of 767  and 769, respectively, these units were smaller than the regular  infantry battalion of 849 men Both battalions had a headquarters and  headquarters company, three rifle companies, and a combat support  company consisting of a mortar platoon equipped with 81-mm. mortars, a  reconnaissance platoon, and an antitank platoon armed with 106-mm.  recoilless rifles. The rifle companies in both battalions had three  rifle platoons supported by an 81-mm. mortar platoon, and the rifle  squads consisted of ten men. The basic individual weapon in the light  infantry battalion was the M14 rifle, while the airmobile unit was  authorized M16 rifles. The new battalions had fewer telephones and  radios than other infantry units and the number of vehicles,  particularly in the airmobile battalion, was considerably smaller than  in the standard infantry battalion.

Regular infantry units, serving in Vietnam did  not use all of their authorized heavy weapons and equipment. As a rule,  most of their vehicles and weapons like ENTAC's, 4.2-inch mortars, and  106-mm. recoilless rifles were left behind either in storage or in base  camps while the units were in the field. Although 90mm. recoilless  rifles and 81-mm. mortars were employed much more frequently than their  more powerful and heavier counterparts, a rifle company rarely carried  its full TOE complement of these weapons on operations and often used  the much lighter LAW instead of the 90-mm. recoilless rifle. The  resulting loss in firepower was offset by a corresponding gain in  mobility and a decrease in fatigue among the soldiers. Transporting  heavy equipment in most parts of Vietnam was a very difficult procedure,  while excellent air and artillery support was readily available.  Infantrymen, therefore, were not reluctant to leave some of their own  fire support weapons behind. Since the enemy did not employ heavy  armored forces, certain heavy weapons (notably the big antitank missiles  and 106-mm. recoilless rifles) were used rarely or not at all, simply  because they were not needed.

Personnel who would normally man the heavier  infantry weapons were frequently used to make up a small fourth rifle  company within the battalion. This unit served as a command post  security force and as an emergency reserve, thereby giving the,  battalion commander three maneuver companies and additional flexibility  in the employment of the battalion. Since this provisional extra company  was so common, and it increased the capabilities of the battalion  significantly, official permission was given to all infantry battalions  in Vietnam to organize such units on a permanent basis. Battalions  stationed elsewhere were not authorized the additional company. This  variation from the basic TOE structure was approved by MTOE's prepared  under the direction of the Commander in Chief, United States Army,  Pacific. Such tables were published from time to time by the major Army  commands to make appropriate changes for particular units necessary to  meet certain requirements without altering the basic TOE for other units  of the same type. Another change approved by MTOE's was the addition of  a separate combat support company to standard and airborne infantry  battalions. Only those battalions that were stationed in or scheduled to  be deployed to Vietnam were permitted to have this extra company, which  was similar to the one in airmobile and light infantry units.

Gradually all infantry battalions in Vietnam,  with the exception of mechanized and riverine units, were reorganized  under modifications of the light infantry battalion TOE with a  headquarters and headquarters company, four rifle companies, a combat  support company, and a total authorized strength of 920. Eventually the  organizational modifications adopted in Vietnam were also recommended as  changes to the basic infantry TOE's. One suggestion was to remove the  mortar, reconnaissance, and antitank platoons and the ground  surveillance and air defense sections from the headquarters company of  the infantry battalion and to organize them into a separate combat  support company, leaving only the administrative and service support  elements in the new headquarters company. Another suggestion was to  authorize a fourth rifle company for the infantry battalion in wartime,  but to retain the three-company structure in peacetime. By the, end of  1969 this recommendation was still under study by the Army Staff, but  TOE's were already being prepared for the new headquarters and combat  support companies.

Although few mechanized infantry units were  sent to Vietnam, those that served there operated effectively wherever  the terrain permitted. They were equipped with M113 and M113A1 armored  personnel carriers, which were sometimes employed as fighting vehicles  in a tank-like role. The mechanized battalion was modified to include a  smaller fourth rifle company, but a separate combat support company was  not authorized. Mechanized infantry battalions located outside of  Vietnam were organized with three rifle companies, as provided by the  basic TOE.

Units from the 9th Infantry Division, together  with a Navy task force, created the Mobile Riverine Force which operated  in the Mekong Deltaa low and flat region with innumerable canals,  rivers, swamps, and inundated rice paddies, almost completely  inaccessible to ground troops, especially during the long monsoon  season. Riverine infantry units fought as regular infantry but lived on  barrack ships and were transported by specially modified landing craft,  known as armored troop carriers. They received fire support from Navy  gunboats as well as from Army artillery mounted on barges.

Since there were no clearly defined front  lines and it was difficult to find and fix the enemy without running the  risk of falling into an ambush, reconnaissance, intelligence, and  patrolling became particularly important in Vietnam. Although all units  took part in such operations, specialized infantry units were also  organized to carry out certain types of missions. Among them were scout  dog platoons and combat tracker teams-both of which used dogs to detect  the presence of enemy troops-and long range reconnaissance patrols  (LRRP's), also called long range patrols (LRP's) . LRP's were small  teams specially trained to penetrate deep into enemy-held territory.  From there they reported detailed, accurate, and timely information  concerning troop concentrations, installations, and activities needed  for planning future operations, or they called in and adjusted artillery  fire or air strikes.

Infantry long range patrol companies, having  twenty-four patrols of five men each, were first assigned on the basis  of one per corps or field force, while within divisions LRRP missions  were performed by provisional detachments or platoons. Starting in late  1967, a LRP company was attached to each division in Vietnam and  eventually to each separate brigade. The number of companies continued  to increase and by the end of 1968 about half of all separate infantry  companies in the active Army were long range patrol units. They were  elements of various different regiments and had no common numerical  designation or historical connection with each other until 1 January  1969. On that day the 75th Infantry, the famous "Merrill's Marauders" of  World War II, was reorganized under CARS and became the parent regiment  for LRP units. At the same time the parenthetical designation of the  companies was changed from LRP to ranger, although their long range  patrol mission remained unchanged.

The importance of small units in Vietnam was  not limited to such specialized organizations as long range patrols,  scout dog platoons, combat tracker teams, or Special Forces detachments.  Regular infantry contacts with the enemy were frequently made at the  squad and platoon level. Small unit actions were typical and often  decisive. As a result, the war in Vietnam has often been called a  platoon leader's war. Most major operations were conducted on the  brigade level with varying numbers of maneuver elements attached for  specific missions in accordance with the ROAD principle of tailored  brigades. Vietnam was the first test of the ROAD organization under  actual combat conditions, and the system proved its flexibility by  adapting quickly to a difficult terrain and an elusive enemy in a war  with many unconventional aspects.

The most popular infantry weapons in Vietnam  were the lightest ones. Among them were the M79 grenade launcher, the  LAW, and the Claymore antipersonnel mine. The mine, which scattered  hundreds of steel fragments in a fan-shaped pattern, could be  deliberately detonated by the operator or concealed and left to be  activated by trip wire. As its official field manual stated, the number  of ways in which the Claymore might be employed was limited only by the  imagination of the user. Another widely used weapon was the. M60 machine  gun.

There was also the new M16 rifle. The rifle  itself weighed 6.5 pounds and its firing weight, including a shoulder  sling and a fully loaded 20-round magazine, was only 7.6 pounds. The M16  used 5.56-mm. (.223-caliber) ammunition. A clothespin-type bipod and a  6-inch bayonet were issued with the rifle. Having a muzzle velocity of  approximately 3,150 feet per second and an average cyclic rate of fire  of 750 rounds per minute, the M16 was particularly effective at short  ranges. It was less accurate and less effective than the M14 at long  ranges and, unlike the M14, did not fire standard NATO ammunition.  However, its light weight and lethal close-in effectiveness made the M16  an ideal weapon in terrain such as Vietnam's. Although originally  adopted for limited use by Special Forces and airborne troops, the M16  was soon authorized for all infantry units in Southeast Asia. In  mid-1967 it was standardized for general Army distribution in addition  to the M14 rifle, which continued to be used by most infantrymen  stationed outside of Vietnam.

Meanwhile, the manufacturers of the M16 were  developing an entire family of 5.56-mm. weapons to supplement the M16  rifle. These included a carbine, a submachine gun, a, very light  survival rifle, a heavy assault rifle, and several machine guns, as well  as a 40-mm. grenade launcher attachment for the M16. By late 1968, the  submachine gun was being authorized for selected infantry units, such as  long range patrol companies and combat tracker platoons. A completely  new kind of weapon called SPIW (Special Purpose Individual Weapon) was  also in the process of development. The new SPIW may combine the  capabilities of a rifle, a controlled pattern shotgun, and a light  mortar. It could be designed to fire a single medium-sized dart, a  cluster of small darts, a microcaliber bullet, or a high explosive  round. Many military experts predicted that the SPIW, or something like  it, would become the basic infantry weapon of the future. By the end of  1969, however, the SPIW was still purely experimental, and no such  weapon was available to the infantryman fighting in Vietnam.

Infantry strength in Vietnam had increased  gradually as the war escalated. By mid1969, when the eleventh official  campaign was being fought and just before the first phase in the  withdrawal of U.S. troops began, there were seven divisions and four  brigades in Vietnam. To make this large scale deployment possible  without moving units from Europe and Korea or reducing the strategic  reserve to a dangerously low level, the overall strength of the Army and  the infantry had been built up. Between June 1964 and June 1969 the  number of divisions in the active Army grew from sixteen to eighteen,  while brigades increased from seven to eleven.

Two of the brigades were federalized Army  National Guard units, the 29th Infantry Brigade from Hawaii and the 69th  Infantry Brigade from Kansas. They were ordered into active Federal  service on 18 May 1968, as a result of the Pueblo crisis and the Tet  offensive earlier that year. Only two of the three organic infantry  battalions from the 69th were called up, but the 2d Battalion, 133d  Infantry, from Iowa was also federalized and joined the brigade at Fort  Carson, Colorado. At the same time the 100th Battalion, 442d Infantry, a  Hawaiian Army Reserve unit, was called to active duty and attached to  the 29th Infantry Brigade at Schofield Barracks, Hawaii. One other  infantry unit was federalizedCompany D, 151st Infantry, from Indiana.  After training at Fort Benning, Georgia, this long range patrol company  served in Vietnam for eleven months. It was the only infantry  organization from the reserve components to participate in the war.

In the second half of 1969 the number of  infantry units started to decline for the first time since the Vietnam  buildup began. President Richard M. Nixon's decision to withdraw U.S.  forces gradually from Southeast Asia was accompanied by a plan to reduce  the strength of the Army. Among the first units to be redeployed were  six infantry battalions organic to the 9th Infantry Division. They left  Vietnam in July and August 1969, and were inactivated in August and  September at Fort Riley, Kansas, and Schofield Barracks, Hawaii. By  mid-December 1969, all infantry units from the reserve components had  been released and reorganized at their home stations. Meanwhile, the  second increment of organizations scheduled for redeployment was in the  process of leaving Vietnam.

Although airmobile and light infantry units  were most common in Vietnam, other types of infantry were not neglected  elsewhere during the late 1960's. Only a handful of mechanized units  went to Vietnam, but numerous mechanized infantry battalions were  assigned to mechanized and armored divisions in Europe and in the United  States. Most airborne personnel in Vietnam lost their jump pay, because  their units did not have the opportunity to utilize their unique  capabilities, but the airborne battalions in the strategic reserve  proved their constant readiness in various emergencies, such as the 1965  Dominican Republic crisis and several domestic civil disturbances. In  spite of the heavy infantry commitment in Vietnam, as the decade of the  1960's ended there were still infantry units stationed all over the  world-in West Germany, Berlin, Korea, the Canal Zone, Alaska, and  Hawaii, as well as in the continental United States. The Regular Army  infantry was backed up by Army Reserve and Army National Guard infantry  units which, although fewer in number, were better trained and equipped  than ever before.

The infantry organizational structure existing  in 1969 was well suited to the strategy and tactics of flexible  response, but regardless of the great variety of infantry units, many of  them highly specialized, the basic mission of the infantry remained  unchanged. The infantryman of the future may be armed with the SPIW, may  wear a spacesuit-like uniform with a built-in two-way radio, and may be  transported by his own individual jet propulsion system. Nevertheless,  his job will continue to be essentially the same as it has been since 14  June 1775, the birthday of the United States infantry and of the United  States Army-to close with and destroy the enemy.
The Vietnam War is often regarded as a low  point for the army due to the use of drafted personnel, the unpopularity  of the war with the American public, and frustrating restrictions placed  on the military by US political leaders. While American forces had been  stationed in the Republic of Vietnam since 1959, in intelligence &  advising/training roles, they did not deploy in large numbers until  1965, after the Gulf of Tonkin Incident. American forces effectively  established and maintained control of the "traditional" battlefield,  however they struggled to counter the guerrilla hit and run tactics of  the communist Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese Army. On a tactical  level, American soldiers (and the US military as a whole) did not lose a  sizable battle.

The Total Force Policy was adopted by Chief of  Staff of the Army General Creighton Abrams in the aftermath of the  Vietnam War and involves treating the three components of the army – the  Regular Army, the Army National Guard and the Army Reserve as a single  force.[12] Believing that no U.S. president should be able to take the  United States (and more specifically the US Army) to war without the  support of the American people, General Abrams intertwined the structure  of the three components of the army in such a way as to make extended  operations impossible, without the involvement of both the Army National  Guard and the Army Reserve.

The 1980s was mostly a decade of  reorganization. The army converted to an all-volunteer force with  greater emphasis on training and technology. The Goldwater-Nichols Act  of 1986 created unified combatant commands bringing the army together  with the other four military services under unified, geographically  organized command structures. The army also played a role in the  invasions of Grenada in 1983 (Operation Urgent Fury) and Panama in 1989  (Operation Just Cause).

By 1989 Germany was nearing reunification and  the Cold War was coming to a close. Army leadership reacted by starting  to plan for a reduction in strength. By November 1989 Pentagon briefers  were laying out plans to reduce army endstrength by 23%, from 750,000 to  580,000. A number of incentives such as early retirement were used. In  1990 Iraq invaded its smaller neighbor, Kuwait, and U.S. land forces,  quickly deployed to assure the protection of Saudi Arabia. In January  1991 Operation Desert Storm commenced, a U.S.-led coalition which  deployed over 500,000 troops, the bulk of them from U.S. Army  formations, to drive out Iraqi forces. The campaign ended in total  victory, as Western coalition forces routed the Iraqi Army, organized  along Soviet lines, in just one hundred hours.

After Desert Storm, the army did not see major  combat operations for the remainder of the 1990s but did participate in  a number of peacekeeping activities. In 1990 the Department of Defense  issued guidance for "rebalancing" after a review of the Total Force  Policy, but in 2004, Air War College scholars concluded the guidance  would reverse the Total Force Policy which is an "essential ingredient  to the successful application of military force."

After the September 11 attacks, and as part of  the Global War on Terror, U.S. and NATO combined arms (i.e. army, navy,  air force, Marine, special operations) forces invaded Afghanistan in  2001, displacing the Taliban government.

The army led the combined U.S. and allied  Invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, and Iraq in 2003. In the following  years the mission changed from conflict between regular militaries to  counterinsurgency, resulting in the deaths of more than 4,000 U.S  service members (as of March 2008) and injuries to thousands more and  23,813 insurgents were killed in Iraq between 2003–2011. The lack of  stability in the theater of operations has led to longer deployments for  Regular Army as well as Reserve and Guard troops.




Two gold color crossed muskets,  vintage 1795 Springfield musket (Model 1795 Musket), 3/4 inch in height.

Crossed muskets were first  introduced into the Army as the insignia of officers and enlisted men of  the Infantry on 19 November 1875 (War Department General Order No. 96  dtd 19 Nov 1875) to take effect on or before 1 June 1876. Numerous  attempts in the earlier years were made to keep the insignia current  with the ever changing styles of rifles being introduced into the Army.  However, in 1924 the branch insignia was standardized by the adoption of  crossed muskets and the 1795 model Springfield Arsenal musket was  adopted as the standard musket to be used. This was the first official  United States shoulder arm, made in a government arsenal, with  interchangeable parts, caliber .69, flint lock, smooth bore, muzzle  loader. The standardized musket now in use was first suggested by Major  General Charles S. Farnsworth, U.S. Army, while he was the first Chief  of Infantry, in July 1921, and approved by General Pershing, Chief of  Staff, in 1922. The device adopted in 1922 has been in continual use  since 1924. There have been slight modifications in the size of the  insignia over the years; however, the basic design has remained  unchanged.

Branch plaque

The plaque design has the  branch insignia, letters and border in gold. The background is light  blue.

Regimental insignia

Personnel assigned to the  Infantry branch affiliate with a specific regiment and wear the insignia  of the affiliated regiment.

Regimental coat of arms

There is no standard infantry  regimental flag to represent all of the infantry regiments. Each  regiment of infantry has its own coat of arms which appears on the  breast of a displayed eagle. The background of all the infantry  regimental flags is flag blue with yellow fringe.

Branch colors

Light blue – 65014 cloth;  67120 yarn; PMS 5415.

The Infantry has made two  complete cycles between white and light blue. During the Revolutionary  War, white facings were prescribed for the Infantry. White was the color  used for Infantry until 1851 at which time light or Saxony blue was  prescribed for the pompon and for the trimming on Infantry horse  furniture. In 1857, the color was prescribed as light or sky blue. In  1886, the linings of capes and trouser stripes were prescribed to be  white. However, in 1902, the light blue was prescribed again. In 1917,  the cape was still lined with light blue but the Infantry trouser  stripes were of white as were the chevrons for enlisted men. The  infantry color is light blue; however, infantry regimental flags and  guidons have been National Flag blue since 1835. White is used as a  secondary color on the guidons for letters, numbers, and insignia.

Birthday

14 June 1775. The Infantry is  the oldest branch in the Army. Ten companies of riflemen were authorized  by the Continental Congress Resolve of 14 June 1775. However, the oldest  Regular Army Infantry Regiment, the 3d Infantry, was constituted on 3  June 1784 as the First American Regiment.
 
  • Condition: Neuf

PicClick Insights - Onglet ACU « Nasty Bravo » soutenu crochet et boucle - 4-17 Infanterie - 11B Infanterie, Buffalo PicClick Exclusif

  •  Popularité - 24 personnes suivent la vente, 0.0 de nouvelles personnes suivent la vente par jour, 2.912 days for sale on eBay. Super grande quantité suivi. 26 vendu, 24 disponibles.
  •  Meilleur Prix -
  •  Vendeur - 8.901+ articles vendu. 0% évaluations négative. Grand vendeur avec la très bonne rétroaction positive et plus de 50 cotes.

Les Gens ont Aussi Aimé PicClick Exclusif