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The Post-War Technical Naval Reserve
By Captain Leonard B. Loeb, U. S. Naval Reserve.—The writer views with some concern present policy trends which appear as if the Navy might be going to repeat the mistakes made with regard to the Reserve after World War I. The Navy doubtless recognizes the need for a strong reserve in the post-war period. It appears as if the present considerations are somewhat as follows.
The need of a greatly augmented Navy following the close of hostilities is well recognized and it is the hope of the Navy that for some time to come enough of the general service reserve officers, deck and engineering, will choose to remain wilh the Navy to man its post-war fleet at least until more officers can be trained to meet the needs. Whether they will or not remains to be seen. The needs arc so great that strenuous efforts will have to be made in this direction. Even then there will not be enough officers and perhaps men ni the reserve to meet future emergencies unless the inactive reserve following hostilities are willing to continue on as reserves.
To take care of these future reserve needs the following sources are at present being considered. (1) It is expected that the enlisted personnel will come through the functioning of the Universal Service law if that ls passed. Hence too much concern is not being expressed on this score. It is, however, not certain that such a bill or act will pass. It is still more a question as to whether it will be passed in such a form as to yield a useful pool of reserve enlisted personnel even With the preference of young men for the Uaval service as shown by recent polls. (2) It is anticipated that the 27 present Naval Reserve Officer training units, with the 25 additional ones now being installed in, colleges and universities, will furnish the required deck and engineering general service reserve officers of the future. While potentially this source could supply a sufficient number of graduates annually for this purpose it is not certain that these will be available. The peacetime record of ROTC graduates that remained active in the reserve in the days of peace before World War II causes one to question whether without a strenuous effort on the part of the Navy, to retain the interest and enthusiasm of the graduates, much more interest will be exhibited in the future than in the past.
Beyond this there appears to be little thought. In fact the writer on his return to an inactive duty status was shocked to see what might be called the dissolution in his district of the vestiges of the pre-war Reserve Desk, which was the center to which all reserves on inactive duty flocked. As his first act on return to his home station he reported to the Reserve Desk to volunteer his services for any functions that he could perform only to find that it was virtually being discontinued. Yet it was this Desk with its enthusiasm, encouragement, and interest that had kept the pre-war reserve alive through the discouraging years of economy and pacifism. This situation is closely parallel to what happened in 1919 through 1921, the result of which was that strenuous recruiting and work was required partially to recoup the loss in the years of a reviving Naval Reserve beginning with 192425.
Even with Japan’s surrender, we must continue to keep a strong Navy in the Pacific.
Yet with the close of the European conflict the return of reserves of all types is beginning now and will continue with increasing impetus as time goes on. Now is the time to begin the work of creating the peacetime reserve from those officers and men retiring to inactivity. These men should be encouraged to remain in the reserve. They should be contacted and encouraged to keep in touch with District Headquarters. They should be made to feel that they are still part of the Navy and that they can do much to keep efficient and useful for future eventualities. The reserves going to inactive duty are ifa a sense Alumni of the Navy and all colleges well know the value of enthusiastic and active alumni associations both from the uses to which they can be put as well as for the political power which they can wield. It is probable that with little cost to the Government and largely through the volunteer services of the more enthusiastic and patriotic inactive reserve officers, with the assistance of the District Reserve Desks, much can now be done in retaining the interest of a great proportion of the retiring reserve officers and men.
Leaving aside the question of the need for the District Reserve Desk in connection with the general service reserve for the present, since it may be possible to devise some other scheme for handling that problem, it now is necessary to discuss a section of the reserve that appears to have been completely ignored in whatever planning has been done. This section of the reserve officer personnel constitutes no small fraction of the total. It comprises the specialist reserve and in particular the technical specialist reserve. It is believed that there must be a total of at least some 75,000 specialist reserve officers all told among the .300,000 odd general service reserve officers. It is these officers that have kept our shore establishments going. These officers with their technical training and specialized skills have contributed much which the regular Navy in itself was incapable of contributing. In doing their work they have learned of the Navy’s way of doing things, of the Navy’s needs and requirements and to this they have added of their skill and experience in civil life. They furnish an invaluable reservoir of assistance in time of national emergency. Are we going to lose their interest, their support, and their valuable experience during the years to come? Some of these young men will be the headliners and leaders in engineering, science, and industry of the future. They are ready at hand, indoctrinated, willing, and valuable. They will not alone be of value in future emergencies. They can be of great technical value to the peacetime Navy. Some of them should be called back to active duty for periods of three months to a year to bring to our naval research laboratories, and to our naval technical services the new ideas and developments, the recent arts, their enthusiasm and energy to keep the technical branches of the Navy alive. They should remain active and interested partisans of the Navy in industry in the times of peace when the Navy will, because of curtailed funds, need strong support from the industries. They will be of immense value to the Navy in their influence on public and political matters affecting the Navy’s welfare, for they will be the future technical leaders and they have a real appreciation and affection for the Navy. It is they, for instance, who can be counted on to answer criticism of our naval policy in technical matters in the public press when, for example, in the past such partisan writers as the late Hector Bywater wrote syndicated articles against the 8-inch- gun cruisers, in our public press, with no answer from our Navy. They will do so, however, only if they remain in contact with the Navy and are kept informed of the Navy’s wishes and needs. To achieve this end the writer proposes the following organization of the Technical Naval Reserve in the coming times of peace.
Attached to each District Reserve Desk there shall be one or perhaps more senior technical reserve officers in an inactive duty status to act as the District Technical Reserve Advisors, or better, the Board of District Technical Reserve Advisors. At least one of these should be a well-known scientist or engineer whose position in civil life is such that he has an entree to all colleges, universities, and technical schools as well as technical industrial concerns in the district. It shall be their duty in collaboration with the District Reserve Desk to pick outstanding technical reserve officers in each large population center to organize and maintain Technical Reserve Officers’ Pools in those centers.
The Pools may operate in affiliation with other reserve units in those centers but shall have their independence and autonomy as regards their personnel, reporting directly to the District Reserve Desk and the Board of Technical Advisors. The Pools shall maintain a roster of all technical reserve officers in their geographical locality. They shall maintain contact with those officers by means of notices and correspondence and as much as possible by personal contact. They shall arrange monthly, bi-weekly or even weekly meetings at which outstanding speakers on technical, international, political, and military matters deliver authoritative lectures. They shall stimulate interest in naval problems and activities. They shall encourage their personnel to take correspondence courses and training cruises afloat or in naval shore establishments. They shall advise the Reserve Desk on the technical and naval proficiency of the technical reserve officers in the Pools by means of annual fitness reports. They shall advise the Desk of the proper wartime assignment of the technical officers and of officers whose technical lines of work would be of value on a temporary assignment to active duty in the Navy.
The technical officers participating in such Pools who maintain active interests in the Pools should be eligible for promotion with their running mates in the regular Navy. The technical reserve officers who fail to maintain interest in the reserve and the pools should be interviewed and their situation reported to the Reserve Desk by the Officers in Charge of the Pools with recommendations for appropriate action. The promotion of technical reserve officers shall be determined by their professional growth, by theif fitness reports, and on the basis of correspondence courses or cruises taken. To qualify for promotion each officer shall have completed one cruise or tour of active duty of at least two weeks’ duration, or one correspondence course in a two-year period, and shall have satisfactory marks or fitness reports on this basis. The Officers in Charge of the Pools shall be alert, active, enthusiastic, and be good judges of men. It shall be the duty of the Board of Technical Advisors to inspect the local Pools in collaboration with the Reserve Desk and to assist in rating them for efficiency on a competitive basis.
Once or twice each year a representative of the Board of Technical Advisors who has the requisite educational contacts and is a good judge of men shall visit the colleges, universities, and the larger technical industrial laboratories, on active duty, to recruit new technical officer personnel for the reserve and to bring the technical specialist reserve to the attention of those institutions. He shall personally interview the likely candidates for lower and higher degrees in the graduating classes and try to “sell” the Naval Reserve to them. He shall interview their professors or supervisors in industry and get cogent data on which to write a report on each candidate for commission. These reports shall be forwarded with the application forms for each candidate for commission. In this the advisor shall also indicate the possible assignment to a technical bureau or service, expressing his own judgment as well as the candidate’s preferences.
In order better to fulfill these duties as regards the Navy the Technical Advisors who do the interviewing shall on active duty be given a “Cook’s Tour” of the Naval Research Institutions and Material Bureaus once in two or three years, that they may become familiar with their needs. If desired the visiting technical advisors in conjunction with the Civil Service or other representatives of the Navy may recruit technical personnel in the educational institutions for work in the research laboratories of the Navy and file reports on these men with the interested Material Bureaus through the reserve Desk.
The Technical Board ofA dvisors may on request also act in a Technical Advisory capacity to the District Commandant as needed.
There arc many details and doubtless other services that involve the Advisors and the Officers in Charge of Pools which require working out. Enough has, however, been said to indicate a simple means of achieving an effective Technical Reserve Officer Corps at relatively little cost and effort. It involves very little beyond adequate planning and the trifling expenses of secretarial help, office space, and the use of lecture halls all of which can readily he provided in one fashion or another. There should be no difficulty in getting officers to do the work once their help and interest are solicited.
The scheme proposed above can serve to maintain a very active interest among the reserve officers in the district as well as furnishing a small but valuable flow of capable new technical reserve officers into the Specialist Reserve. It will maintain a growth of the value of these officers to the Navy by insuring adequate indoctrination. Finally it can serve to keep the Technical Bureaus and services informed as to the quality of its personnel and aid them in proper wartimeassignment of such personnel.
It will, however, be noted that this activity is built up about the District Reserve Desk. While it doubtless could be handled in other ways the decentralization in terms of district organizations already existing will greatly facilitate the problem relative to its achievement by a Desk in the Navy Department and will greatly reduce the burden of recruiting and supervision by dividing it into smaller and more geographically localized groups.
It thus is seen that irrespective of any. other function in connection with the general reserve the District Reserve Desk can be of immense value in (he organization and maintenance of an active and useful Specialist Technical Officer Reserve Corps. This is a numerous and vital branch of the Naval Reserve that is all too often forgotten by the Bureau of Naval Personnel and the active line officer of the Navy, preoccupied as they arc with the general service officer and his problems. It is the writer’s hope that what he has set forth above will promote both thought and discussion on this very important aspect of the Naval Reserve and may cause a reconsideration of the dissolution of the District Reserve Desk now apparently going on.