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Show FLEXIBLE RESPONSE TO WAR ... The Army's capabilities for limited war are substantial. Our minimum aim is to be able to fight two limited wars nimul-taneously nimul-taneously in such distant corners of the worM as Southeast Asia and the Middle East using at least a corps of two or throe divisions di-visions in each," said Gen. Herbert B. Powell, Commanding- General, U. S. Continental Army Command, Com-mand, during a relent address. "With the capability of fighting two limited wars as a goal, it is obvious that the sixteen division, million-man Army now in being should not be considered as having hav-ing been formed solely because of the Berlin' crisis or the current troubled international scene. It rather should be considered as the result of an assessment of our entire military posture and the desire to bring about a better balance bal-ance to our military power. "In our planning, we must consider con-sider that a major but limited war might be fought with the se of tactical nuclear weapons on a rather large scale, in view of the strength and flexibility of firepower now possessed by the Sino-Soviet Bloc To these limited war possibilities we must also add the possibility of the guerrilla guer-rilla type of warfare occurring la a number of localities simultaneously. simultane-ously. "The pattern of aggression indicates in-dicates that the test will always be a valid one that a difficult problem will be presented.' In short, we must maintain an extremely flexible military posture, pos-ture, capable of deterring or fighting fight-ing wars across a wide spectrum of possibilities. The Army sdds immeasurably to this posture through its unique versatility which includes a built-in built-in capability to cope with our enemy effectively under a variety of conditions. The Army demonstrates this versatility in its major contributions contribu-tions to the security of the Free World. One of the most important of these contributions is the maintenance main-tenance of U. S. Army forces in critical areaa oversets. Militsry forces deployed overseas, along ff..v.r--, .- t .' -r-T. , -, fc ,.., Aiming Rodeyt, tho new two-stoge two-stoge solid fuel missile, whLh gives soldiers man-portable protection against aircraft. the Iron snd Bamboo curtains, serve ss s constant reminder of UJS. willingness to share the hazards of our allies who must live next door to the threat of sggression. A part of the present-day Sino-Soviet Sino-Soviet Communist threat is the externally-inspired insurgency which faces many of the free or uncommitted nations c f the world. To counter this threat, the Army has placed Increased emphasis on our Special Forces. These highly trained specialists in paramilitary operations and unconventional warfare have a primary mission to organize, train, advise and support indigenous military forces in counterinsurgency operations, ss well as to provide assistance in the fields of psychological warfare, war-fare, medicine and civil affairs. This is a natural Army mission, for the Army is especially fitted for this type of operation. The carefully developed doctrine, tactics tac-tics snd techniques for guerrilla snd sntiguerrilla warfare employed em-ployed by the Special Forces sre extensions of the cspsbilities of our regulsr combat units which sre trsined for conflict of this nature, na-ture, ss well ss for more conventions! conven-tions! combat operation. In support of our forward strategy and other overseas programs, pro-grams, we maintain mobile strategic stra-tegic reserves in the U. S. These reserves are available to reinforce rein-force our overseas units or to counter aggression in vital areas where there are no such forces present. The Army's foremost contribution contribu-tion to the Nation's stratecic reserves re-serves is the highly trained, hardhitting hard-hitting Strategic Army Corps known as STRAC. The outstanding characteristic of STRAC is the flexibility it offers of-fers through forces tsilored to accomplish a specific mission, in a specific place, in the shortest possible time. Nucleus of the STRAC striking force la thre ccuibat divisions: th 82nd Airborne, 101st Airborne and the 4 th' Infantry Divisions, sll part of the XVIII Airborne Corps. The bulk of the forces of STRAC and those of the Tactical Air Command have been designated desig-nated by the Department of Defense De-fense as major elements of the U. S. Strike Command. The new , unified command is responsible for development of doctrine and conduct of training exercises to weld these two forces into efficient effi-cient land-air teams. Thin arrangement ar-rangement substantially increases the flexibility, readiness and combat com-bat effectiveness of STRAC tft - Onrol fwll Additional sources of combat power are the Army's other five combat-ready divisions divi-sions in strategic strate-gic reserve in the Continental Continent-al U. S. These are the 1st and 2nd Infantry and the 2nd Armored Divisions converted from training to combat divisions in 1961 and the 32nd Infantry and 49th Armored National Guard Divisions that came into Federal service last October. They will be replaced by the 1st Armored and 5th Infantry (Mechanized), the two new Regular Army Divisions being activated under the Reorganization Reor-ganization Objectives Army Division Divi-sion (ROAD) concept. In reorgsnization we have not overlooked the need for continued improvement in our divisional capsbility to deliver nuclesr fire, while at the same time we have increased non-nuclear firepower. For nuclear fire at short range, we have the Davy Crockett, with the 8-inch howitzer and ttu. improved im-proved Honest John or Little. John rockets available for longer ranges. On the non-nuclear side a 45 per cent b,cresse in 105mm howitzers howit-zers is programmed. Machine guns will be increased by a factor fac-tor of three and recoilless rifles by a factor of four. The indispensable strength backing up STRAC and the other elements of the Active Army is found in the many units of the reserve components. The Army National Guard and Army Reserve Re-serve together with the Active Army form a single entity One Army the United States Army. A battery of Army Hawk air defense guided missiles on a transporter. trans-porter. Th Hawk has the unique ability to seek out and destroy invaders at extremely low altitudes. |