Experiment for Survival

The Army's tough Major General James ("Jumpin' Jim") Gavin, Assistant Chief of Staff for Operations, knows that bulky concentrations of soldiers, supplies and vehicles are sitting ducks for atomic and hydrogen weapons. To solve the problem, Parachutist Gavin (four combat jumps in World War II) has had his Pentagon staff working hard on plans for a new, more mobile army for the thermonuclear age. Items: small, self-contained outfits (instead of massive divisions), scattered supply stores (instead of huge, centralized depots), lighter weapons, more helicopters and convertiplanes. Last week Gavin said that the new theories will be tried out on two divisions: the 47th Infantry and 1st Armored. This fall and winter the two will be broken up, reorganized and retrained, then tested in the spring. Thereafter, all Army forces may adopt the mobility-and-dispersal-for-survival plan. Ironically, the Army, now being cut back in money and manpower, has already figured that the thermonuclear-age fighting forces will require more--rather than fewer--men.

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