Colonel BENEDICT. In 1933 you are going to get up to 60 per cent; yes, sir.

Mr. JAMES. And if the amendment suggested on page 7 is adopted, in which you provide for promoting men to the grade of lieutenantcolonel when they are not less than 52 years of age, in a few years from now we are going to have an Army with 70 per cent in the field grades and 30 per cent in the company grades, are we not? Colonel BENEDICT. It will be several years from now.

Mr. JAMES. When will we reach about 70 to 30? It is 60 to 40 under the Wainwright bill and the question is, when will it be 70 to 30?

Colonel BENEDICT. At the time you have your peak you will have somewhere between 60 and 70 per cent in the field grades.

Mr. JAMES. It will be more likely to be 70, will it not?

Colonel BENEDICT. I do not think so, for this reason, that all those extra numbers in the grades of colonel and lieutenant colonel, under the 52-year proviso, even if they were not extra numbers, would be in the grade of major, and would, therefore, be in the 60 per cent of field officers. In other words, when you picked them out of their grade and put them in the grade of lieutenant colonel, they would be taken out of the grade of major.

Mr. JAMES. There would be no object in including the language unless you increased the number.

Colonel BENEDICT. It would increase the colonels and lieutenant colonels, but the increase is taken out of the grade of major. Therefore, it does not increase the 60 per cent of field officers.

Mr. JAMES. In talking about the Air Corps, does the Senate amendment there of 15 per cent apply to everybody, or what do you mean by that language?

Colonel BENEDICT. It provides that not to exceed 15 per cent of the promotion-list officers shall be lieutenant colonels and colonels.

Mr. JAMES. That is not the maximum that may be promoted, is it, or the 15 per cent is not the maximum number of colonels and lieutenant colonels that may be promoted?

Colonel BENEDICT. It is not if the extra-number proviso is adopted. Mr. JAMES. It may double it, or it might treble it.

Colonel BENEDICT. I do not believe there will be any chance of going that far, although it is difficult to estimate as to how many could go up under the 52-years-of-age provision.

Mr. JAMES. I call your attention to this language:

In so far as necessary to maintain the prescribed minimum of field officers, captains credited with less than 15 years of service shall be promoted in the order of their standing upon the promotion list.

Why is that provision made?

Colonel BENEDICT. That provision, coupled with the 26 per cent minimum limitation, in the first section, is intended to preserve the present flow of promotions for captains who have less than 15 years' service, until such time as the senior captains do have 15 years of service.

Mr. JAMES. How many men is that provision supposed to take care of, and for how long?

Colonel BENEDICT. That will run for about three years, and during those three years, I estimate you will have about 125 men a year

going from the grade of captain_to the grade of major who have had less than 15 years' service. In 1932, your senior captains will have had 15 years' service. In fact, we will have hundreds of captains with 15 years' service. Then the minimum limitation of 26 per cent, in this sentence to which you referred, will not longer apply. It is good for three years only.

Mr. JAMES. What branch of the service are you in?
Colonel BENEDICT. In the Infantry.

Mr. JAMES. On page 8, line 24, referring to the Air Corps you say, "the total number of officers commissioned in the Air Corps." Why do you use the word "commissioned"?

Colonel BENEDICT. I want to say that in drafting that section, there was a good deal of difficulty for the reason I have stated already, that is, that we were in a state of flux. The Air Corps now has, in round numbers, 1.000 officers, and the national defense act, as amended, contemplates that it shall have 1,650 officers. With the Air Corps anywhere near its strength of 1,650 officers, instead of being at about five-eighths of that strength, I would much prefer to see this percentage computed upon the maximum authorized strength of the Air Corps. This was put in merely to find something that would meet the situation.

I did not know how long this situation will exist, where they will be short, not a few officers, but, as they are now, about 550 officers short. Of course, it was believed that it never was intended to count officers who were detailed to the Air Corps, and, in fact, we try here to take the same basis that was taken in the Furlow bill. Really we have taken a little higher basis. In the Furlow bill the percentages were to be computed on the number of officers on the Air Corps promotion list. Only officers of the Air Corps would be on that list, and only those below the grade of colonel would be on that list. Here we have language that allowed a computation of the percentage on the number of officers in the Air Corps, including colonels.

Mr. JAMES. If the Furlow bill should become a law, as it passed the House, would that slacken promotion in the Infantry, in any way, in the grades of lieutenant colonel and colonel?

Colonel BENEDICT. The Judge Advocate General has construed that language, and holds that it undoubtedly would.

Mr. JAMES. Is that the reason for some of this language here? Colonel BENEDICT. No, sir.

Mr. JAMES. In what way would it slacken up promotion in other branches of the service, or what particular language of the bill would do that?

Colonel BENEDICT. If, under that bill, for example, they should have 40 colonels in the Air Corps, and 1.000 is the basis on which to compute it, there would be 40 officers in the Air Corps in the grade of colonel. They have 3 now, and some 37 would have to be promoted. There is nothing in that bill that changes the existing law which limits the Army to 470 colonels. Now, if you are going to have 37 more colonels in the Air Corps, they must be promoted, but you are. not to exceed 470. The Judge Advocate General has estimated that you would simply have to stop other promotions until those 37 promotions had been made. The same thing was true of the other grades.

Mr. JAMES. I call your attention to section 4 on page 9: What is the present law on the subject covered by the first proviso? Will you read the present law to us?

Colonel BENEDICT. I do not believe I have it. I do not have that. Mr. JAMES. What is the law on that subject now?

Colonel BENEDICT. There is no law now that specifies what service shall be credited for promotion. The only law we have on the subject is that the officers shall be promoted in the order of their standing on the promotion list.

Mr. JAMES. What is the law now on the subject covered by the second proviso?

Colonel BENEDICT. There is no law at present with respect to any part of section 4.

Mr. JAMES. Why is it necessary to have it now?

Colonel BENEDICT. It was assumed, when we initiate the new system of promotion based on length of service, that in some way or other you must specify what service is to be credited to the officer for his promotion, just as in the national defense act it is specified what service a medical officer shall be credited with for promotion purposes, and also, what service a chaplain shall be credited with for promotion purposes. If we are to have promotion for length of service in effect for the Army as a whole, and it was believed that it was likewise necessary to lay down some rule covering what service should be credited. That is the whole purpose of this section-that is, to specify specifically what service shall be credited, and to do it in such a way that you would not alter the present relative order.

Mr. JAMES. I call your attention to section 5, page 10. Under that provision, it would be possible, would it not, for a man who had been chief of a branch, or who was responsible for his successor or one or two assistants, to come here to Washington and direct those assistants. Would not that be true? Is there any limit on the power conferred there?

Colonel BENEDICT. I can not say. I am not familiar with that subject at all. It has been exhaustively studied in the office of the Judge Advocate General by Major Hedrick. I have done nothing whatever except to put in this bill the language that they determined would carry out the recommendation which the Secretary of War has made several times, that this restriction should be removed. I am not prepared to discuss the merits of it.

Mr. JAMES. There is a bill to carry out that purpose that has been before the Senate Committee on Military Affairs for 15 months, is there not?

Colonel BENEDICT. As I recall it, there is a bill that was sent by the War Department to both committees, in accordance with the recommendation of the personnel board.

Mr. JAMES. I say this: There has been a bill with a proviso covering this subject pending for 15 months. It has been before the Senate Committee on Military Affairs for 15 months, with no request for a hearing upon it.

Now, I call your attention to the language in line 13, page 11, as

follows:

Provided further, That when an officer of the Regular Army or Philippine Scouts shall have served 40 years as a commissioned officer in active service in the Army of the United States, or if 60 years old, he may, without action of a

retiring board, be retired from active service at the discretion of the President and placed upon the unlimited retired list.

Why do you use the language "commissioned officer in active service" in that connection?

Colonel BENEDICT. That language was prepared by Major Llewellyn and was given to me by him. I recall that he stated he was following the existing statute and merely changing the 45 years to 40 years and 62 years to 60 years. Otherwise, he said it was the same as the existing statute, except that the words "without action of a retiring board" were inserted.

Mr. JAMES. What effect would that language have on emergency officers?

Colonel BENEDICT. It is generally applicable to all officers of the Army.

Mr. JAMES. Constructive service would not count under that language, would it?

Colonel BENEDICT. No, sir; he must have served 40 years as a commissioned officer.

Mr. JAMES. Under section 6, on page 12

promotion-list officers who were originally appointed to the Regular Army or Philippine Scouts prior to July 1, 1920, or as of that date, may file application to be transferred from the active list, etc.

Why do you make that provision? In other words, the reason for the retirement system, as it has always been used by the War Department, is that officers may make the military service a life work. The retirement features have been provided so that they may make a life work of their Army service; and, then, after so many years of service in the Army, they may retire. Is this not a departure from that rule?

Colonel BENEDICT. It is a departure. It is a departure from that principle because of the fact that we are confronted with this unusual situation of an immense number of officers, or a congestion, which stops the flow of promotions very seriously. What was intended here was to give to those who might care to go an opportunity to leave the service with reasonable retirement pay.

Mr. JAMES. I may want to come back and look at that language again.

That is all for the present.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Quin, do you wish to interrogate Colonel Benedict?

Mr. QUIN. What was the exact reason, if you know, for the substitution of this amendment for the Furlow bill by the Senate? Colonel BENEDICT. I do not know, absolutely.

Mr. QUIN. You were not in the conference?

Colonel BENEDICT. I was not. I only know what I have been told. Senator Reed had requested the services of an officer, preferably of myself, to assist the committee in drafting some legislation. I was called up and told specifically what they wanted put into that particular Reed amendment.

Mr. QUIN. Will you detail to us what you understand to be the exact effect of this amendment, or of the Reed amendment, which has been substituted for the Furlow bill? Just tell us in plain language what you understand to be the real effect of that amend

ment.

Colonel BENEDICT. I understood that the primary purpose was to avoid separate legislation for the Air Corps, which would leave the promotion condition for the rest of the Army right where it was. That is the primary thing done by the Reed amendment. It was to couple with a certain provision for promotion in the Air Corps a provision for promotion in the rest of the Army. That was my understanding. That was the main purpose that they were endeavoring to serve by that Reed amendment.

Mr. QUIN. As you have explained to the committee, it could not affect it at all, except, perhaps, to keep out of the benefits 40 colonels, because that would be the maximum number, under the Furlow bill, going up in the Air Corps. That would mean curtailing, perhaps, of 37 for the rest of the Army, I believe you said.

Colonel BENEDICT. That is one positive injury that it would have. been to the rest of the Army. Of course, there would have been brought about a state which I think everyone wanted to avoidthat is, a state of stagnation of promotion in the rest of the Army and an acceleration of promotion in the Air Corps. I think that the whole purpose was to try to do something for the Army as a whole.

Mr. QUIN. How do you figure that this late in the session of Congress you could get any legislation through that was a radical change? How did you figure that you could secure the passage of a substitute like this, without consulting the War Department? I understand you to say they never referred it to the department.

Colonel BENEDICT. I am not responsible for that. I only know what was done. Why it was done, I can not say.

Mr. QUIN. You understand that this is a radical change.

Colonel BENEDICT. I do know this, that the Secretary of War appeared before the Senate Military Affairs Committee, before this was drawn up, and he made certain statements and recommendations to them. I think the committee conceives that in this they have practically conformed to his recommendations.

Mr. QUIN. Did he agree with the Furlow amendment?

Colonel BENEDICT. I do not know that he did. I have not heard him say.

Mr. JAMES. I was present at the hearing of the secretary, and I did not hear him make any comment on that, so far as I remember. I think he was for a separate promotion list for the Air Corps, but he said he hoped they would not press that. It was fundamental. Mr. MCSWAIN. His fundamentals were generalities.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Wurzbach, do you have any questions to ask? Mr. WURZBACH. Do I understand you to say that you drafted the Reed amendment or that you did it with the assistance of some other officer?

Colonel BENEDICT. Yes, sir; on the basis of decisions that were. given of what to put in.

Mr. WURZBACH. Who directed you to draw that kind of bill? Was it the Senate committee or some particular Senators?

Colonel BENEDICT. It was the chairman of the Senate committee. Mr. WURZBACH. He had a well-defined understanding of what he wanted before he directed you to prepare the bill, you think?

Colonel BENEDICT. I think so, yes, sir; because when I got my instructions to prepare it, I asked a large number of questions, specifically, "Do you wish this or that in the bill." With respect to the Air Corps, for instance, I put the question-I did not know what the