Friday, May. 14, 1965

How Many Left? Plenty

Considering the fact that more than 100,000 U.S. military men are involved in combat-type duty in the Viet Nam and Dominican Republic areas, how many more could the U.S. tap if any new crises were to pop up? The answer: plenty -- for anything less than another world war.

The roll call:

?ARMY. Of the 18,800 Army personnel in Viet Nam, almost all have been picked on the basis of specialized qualifications; organized units have not, as a rule, been sent. The Army presently has 16 active divisions of about 15,000 men each. Of these divisions, five are in Europe, two in South Korea and one in Hawaii. The other eight are stationed in the U.S. as part of the so-called "strategic reserve." They are: the 1st and 2nd Armored Divisions at Fort Hood, Texas; the 1st Infantry Division at Fort Riley, Kans.; the 2nd Infantry Division at Fort Benning, Ga.; the 4th Infantry Division at Fort Lewis, Wash.; the 5th Infantry Division (mechanized) at Fort Carson, Colo.; the 101st Air borne Division at Fort Campbell, Ky.; and what is left of the 82nd Airborne Division after some 12,000 of its men were sent from Fort Bragg, N.C., to the Dominican Republic. In addition, Defense Secretary Robert McNamara has designated six National Guard and Reserve divisions as high-priority out fits furnished with the most modern sort of equipment and in a state ,of readiness that could take them into combat anywhere in the world within 30 to 60 days. By rough estimate, there are 110,000 Army combat men on active duty (not including supporting units) immediately deployable from the U.S.

?MARINE CORPS. The corps now has three divisions of 18,000 fighting men each. Of these, the hallowed 1st Marine Division is in combat readiness at Camp Pendleton, Calif. The 2nd Division has sent slightly more than one-third of its men to the Dominican Republic, but the others remain at Camp Lejeune, N.C., on call for anywhere. The 3rd Marine Division is largely deployed in the Pacific area, and has furnished most of the corps' contribution so far to the Vietnamese fighting, particularly around the Danang airbase. Attached to each of the three divisions is an 8,000-man, 200-fighter plane air wing. Currently, parts of two wings are as signed to Viet Nam and the Dominican Republic.

?AIR FORCE. Strategic bombers and missiles are not, of course, being used. Of some 1,800 ultramodern U.S. tac tical fighters and fighter-bombers, only about 10% are actively engaged in Viet Nam -- and none in the Dominican Republic. Thus the tactical strength of the Air Force has hardly been dented by the combat operations in which the U.S. has recently been engaged.

?NAVY. Of the Navy's 667,000 men, only a fraction are presently involved in either Viet Nam or the Dominican Republic. Some 27,000 of the Seventh Fleet's 64,000 men are on duty in the South China Sea and 9,900 men of the Second Fleet's complement of 20,000 are stationed in the Caribbean. Elsewhere, the Navy has the Sixth Fleet, with 50 ships, 200 planes and 25,000 men in the Mediterranean, and the First Fleet, with 90 ships, 420 planes and 60,000 men in the Pacific.

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