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Show I Supreme Council of National Defense WASHINGTON. Through the completion of a reorganization reor-ganization program begun immediately after the World war, the United States at last has a supreme council of national defense de-fense which is declared by service experts ex-perts to be the most efficient ever effected. ef-fected. An even half-dozen officers, three army and three navy men, comprise the council, officially termed the joint board. Appointments are all ex-of-ficio, the detail of an officer to a certain cer-tain bureau carrying with it membership member-ship on the board. The present organization or-ganization includes Gen. John J. Pershing, chief of staff; Maj. Gen. John L. Hines, deputy chief and the head of the army war plane division, and Brig. Gen. Briant II. Wells, for the land forces, and the chief of naval operations. Admiral E. W. Eberle ; the director of war plans of the anvy, Rear Admiral W. R. Shoemaker, and the assistant chief of operations, Rear Admiral R. H. Jackson, for the navy. To this board is finally referred every major problem, Involving the national security, and all items of information in-formation and all rumors which may have a remote bearing upon the national na-tional defense. The new organization organiza-tion extends in a network over the entire country. The Joint aeronautical board has been made virtually an adjunct of the super-council through an order which requires its recommendation to be referred re-ferred to the higher tribunal. A slml- iar restriction upon the joint munitions muni-tions board, composed of the assistant secretaries of war and navy, brings this agency of defense under the same directing control. A glimpse of the scope of the new plan is given in the following partial list of subjects recently presented for the consideration of the board: Function and missions of the army, navy and marine corps. Policy relative to development of aircraft In the army and navy. Policy relative to uses of rigid airships air-ships by the army and navy. Defense plans for sections of the coast. Courses of Instruction, army war college and naval war college. Experiments in bombing naval vessels ves-sels from aircraft. Censorship and control of communications communi-cations in war. Coal and fuel oil supply and storage. stor-age. Man-power available for military and naval purposes. Combined army and navy exercises for the coming winter. |