93. Memorandum of a Conference With the President, White House, Washington, October 11, 19561
OTHERS PRESENT
- Secretary Wilson
- Secretary Brucker
- General Taylor
- Colonel Goodpaster
The meeting was held to enable General Taylor to make a presentation to the President regarding proposed new tables of organization for2 Army Airborne, Infantry and Armored Divisions. Only minor changes were involved in the Armored Division organization. Airborne and Infantry Divisions were cut quite substantially from present strengths. Four principles were observed: adapting the Division to the atomic battlefield; pooling at higher echelons all elements needed only occasionally; taking advantage of improved communication equipment by which a Commander can control substantially more than three subordinate units; basing organization on new equipment, some of which must still be developed.
The President spoke strongly in favor of smaller Divisions, and thought the changes were in the right direction, although he would have preferred units cut to a strength of about 10,000. He felt sure that on an atomic battlefield there would be dispersion such as we have never seen before. He thought that ground bursts would contaminate large areas, and that small units—largely self-contained—would be needed which could weave between contaminated areas. With such great dispersion the Infantry company could include support weapons. (General Taylor pointed out that to a considerable extent this was being done in the new organization.) The President thought signal communications would be a difficult problem at company and platoon [Page 370] level. General Taylor said this was true with present equipment but with “transistorized” radios, the capability should approach the need. The President questioned the assignment of personnel carriers as organic equipment. He is not inclined to think the Division should be loaded down with them, but they should be pooled at higher echelon. General Taylor said that the existing personnel carrier is unsatisfactory but that a new lighter one is being developed, and would be used both for personnel movement and for movement of supplies cross-country.
The President said he thought there should not be a publicity campaign about the divisional changes, and specifically thought that no emphasis should be given to the placing of atomic weapons in the Division (he was here following up on a memorandum from Mr. Jackson which I gave to him this morning).3 He thought the Divisions should be regarded simply as experimental. General Taylor said he wanted to phase into this new organization, beginning in February, and extending through the following year and a half or two years, and the President seemed to accept this schedule.
General Taylor asked if it would be all right to inform the NATO authorities of the new Division, and the President said that he thought such action would be quite desirable. He asked if General Gruenther wanted this done, and General Taylor said he did. The NATO briefing would be on a classified basis.
Reverting to the matter of public announcement, the President recognized that information as to the new Divisions would gradually become known; he did not favor an active campaign of articles in Service journals, magazines, etc.
Secretary Wilson asked whether there would be a proposal that the personnel being taken from the Divisions would be used to form additional Divisions. General Taylor said that the savings would be offset to some degree, which cannot now be determined, by increases in corps and Army troops. The President said he would certainly think that the adoption of the new Divisions, based on fuller use of modern fire-power, would make possible over-all personnel reductions.
Colonel, CE, US Army