ARMY & NAVY: Plan for Planning

ARMY & NAVY

When U. S. Army & Navy officers talk shop nowadays, they chatter less about Roosevelt Rearmament than about a recent, historic shift from professional to civilian control of military affairs (TIME, Dec. 19). From Commander in Chief Franklin Roosevelt down, civilian authorities now are telling the admirals and generals what to do, sometimes are even telling them how to do it.

This week, Assistant Secretary of War Louis Arthur Johnson told Army generals how he proposes to run the War Department’s important Planning Branch from now on. In the February issue of Factory Management & Maintenance, he announced a plan to keep Planning Branch officers on indefinite assignment, the better to prepare industry to mobilize for war-time production. Army’s traditional policy: to change officers’ jobs at least once every four years.