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Show i News fix Behini By PAULuihTy Released by Western Newspaper Union. i UNIVERSAL MILITARY TRAINING MYSTERY I WASHINGTON. - No secret meetings meet-ings with the military were held by the Woodrum house committee which urged what it called "a broad policy of universal military training." train-ing." No special Information concerning difficulties ahead of this nation was privately passed to the committee by the war department which has been promoting the youth draft. Specifically, Specif-ically, no inside scare over Russia inspired the committee. ConsequenUy, considerable perplexity per-plexity has developed as to how and why it went contrary to the weight if evidence In its own hearings. It seemed to vote 16 to 0 in favor of a program which none of Its hearing witnesses endorsed, en-dorsed, except the army, navy, state departments and the U. S. chamber of commerce, against the popular opposition of national nation-al educational groups, both ma jor national labor organisations, two of the three national farm organisations, as well as the usual peace societies, and women's wom-en's groups. j To make the mystery more possible, pos-sible, one member of the committee says he has received only two letters let-ters from his district In favor of the youth draft, while he has a bushel of mail against it. When congressmen go 16 to 0 (the remaining six members abstained or wanted to delay action but did not vote against the report directly) in I favor of something opposed by their constituents and the. most powerful lobbies in Washington labor, farmer, farm-er, education, women a miracle is wrought. Woodrum's Plan. This one seems to come within the realm of magic political magic. It should have been entitled "How to Be a Politician in One Easy Lesson." Les-son." Caught between the army and the lobbies, the committee favored both opposite courses in moderation, modera-tion, of course. Committee Chairman Woodrum tossed all the hot potato evidence he had amassed into the air, then caught and came forward with some conglomeration which steamed in the headlines. Actually it is cold potato salad, i His pride in it did not leap even ! to ordinary bounds as he did not , even have it printed in the congres- sional record which prints all con-: con-: gressional thoughts for the asking. Upon close inspection you will find , the report did not endorse the war department program but was worded to sound as if it did, by approving ap-proving "the principle" and "the j broad policy" yet undefined. Among members of the Woodrum committee is Rep. James W. Wads-worth Wads-worth of New York, who is supposed to have seen to the wording. He wants to draft all youths of 18 or thereabouts for a year in the army. Talking around with the committeemen, com-mitteemen, you will find many favor a Democratic substitute such as advocated by the Veterans Veter-ans of Foreign Wars for training boys In schools without interrupting inter-rupting their education, expanding expand-ing the national guard and reserves re-serves systems, and summer camps. The report did not oppose op-pose this, excepting It seemed to want the youths drafted for It. The Veterans of Foreign Wars program, pro-gram, following the lines ouUined in this column since last September, now rates the best chance of adoption adop-tion by congress in the end without with-out a draft but only after more magic and semantics. Next will come a report from the house military mili-tary affairs committee and this may recommend drafting, as the military totalitarians are in the majority there also. Home Compulsion! But on the floor of the senate and house today, a majority for a youth draft would be hard to find. Compulsion Com-pulsion for home and school training without a national draft is the obvious ob-vious compromise. The army has never come forward for-ward with a specific outline of what It intended to do with the young men If it gets control of them tor a year (no one mentions the young women any more and I assume they have been dropped from the 1 army training program.) But retired officers who are going around the country whipping up sentiment In American Legion posts advocate something like this: Nine weeks' basic training (bunk-making, (bunk-making, setUng-up exercises, etc.); 0 weeks of specialists training In 4,000 categories in the army. Elsenhower really proved there must be a citizens' training system, and urged that the training pro-more pro-more co-ordination between the Innd. sea and air forces. But like Marshall he did not even consider enlarging the national guard, youth camps for summer only, creation of a Inrgrr and better officer reserve system, quadrupling West Point and Annapolis. Annapo-lis. Injection of military courses in high schools and colleges as compulsory com-pulsory subjects or any of the other many excellent alternatives to the youth draft systrm. founded by Prussinns and aditcd bv Nazis. |
