The Majors Page 26

  There are three official combat arms—infantry, artillery, and armor—and a fourth, unofficial, but equally powerful politically, made up of officers of the three combat arms trained in the technique and philosophy of vertical envelopment, the airborne.

  Airborne had always wanted aviation, and felt that it was logical for it to absorb it. Aviation was really nothing more than the evolutionary development of vertical envelopment. The helicopter, so to speak, was nothing more than an improved and vastly more efficient means for delivering the guy with the rifle safely behind enemy lines.

  Infantry, although there were very few infantry generals who had not gone through the three-week jump school at Benning and who in consequence did not wear parachutist’s wings, had by and large reached the consensus that airborne was so much elitist bullshit.

  Their argument ran that it made very little sense to spend a great deal of time and money training people as parachutists only to lose somewhere in the neighborhood of twenty-five percent of them in parachute accidents before they fired a shot in combat. These accidents ranged from broken ankles, legs, and backs to electrocution and incineration on high tension power lines. This sin was multiplied when airborne tried to insist that airborne privates have Army General Classification Test scores of 100, only ten points below the AGCT required to send a man to OCS.

  The function of an army, those disenchanted with airborne said, was not to die yourself but to kill the enemy.

  Artillery’s claim on the empty commanding general’s office at Camp Rucker was by right of lineage. Army aviation had entered the army as Piper Clubs flying during War II as artillery spotters. It was theirs, they argued, and there was a corps of company and field-grade officers coming up who had spent their careers in aviation.

  It was pointed out by the Signal Corps, however, that aviation, period, had entered the army, period, via the Signal Corps. The first aviator’s “wings” had been a representation of the Bald Eagle clutching signal flags in his claws. There was no reason the Signal Corps should not send one of its generals to command Rucker. No one really took their bid seriously.

  Armor maintained that aviation should be an armor function. For those who really understood military history and the lessons it taught, it was clear that the three combat arms were infantry (the man with the pike, or the bow and arrow, or the rifle, whatever the individual hand-held weapon); artillery, (the people who fired the catapults, the cannons, and the rockets); and cavalry (those who moved rapidly around the infantry and the artillery in battle, once on horses, presently in tanks, and quite obviously in the future on mechanical horses called helicopters). They were willing to grant that George S. Patton had made one mistake. He had gone along with the misguided when they wanted to change cavalry’s name to armor. They pointed out that General I. D. White, who had gotten the 2nd Armored Division to the Elbe when General Porky Waterford was still hung up around Kassel, had thrown a famous I. D. White fit in the office of the Chief of the Staff after the war, the result of which was that cavalry sabers were superimposed on the tank in armor’s insignia.

  The arguments reduced the number of candidates to fill Scotty Laird’s vacancy from nearly five hundred to about fifty. The selection process moved into the inner offices of the Pentagon. Further recommendations were not desired, nor would they be entertained.

  The list was distilled down to three general officers, a straight-leg infantry major general, presently commanding the 1st Infantry—“the Big Red One”—Division in Germany; a jumping general, presently deputy commander, XVIII Airborne Corps, at Bragg; and a brigadier general, whom both the Chief of Staff and the Vice Chief of Staff (but few others) knew had just been selected for promotion to major general. The brigadier general was presently serving as Special Assistant to the Deputy Secretary of Defense for Research and Development.

  At eight o’clock that same night, General E. Z. Black, Vice Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, walked up to the charcoal grill erected in the garden behind Quarters No. 3 at Fort Meyer, Virginia.

  A white-jacketed orderly was broiling steaks. A slight, erect man in civilian clothing watched him.

  “Staying close to the fire, Paul?” E. Z. Black said.

  “A cavalryman always knows enough to stay close to the food, General,” Brigadier General Paul Jiggs said.

  “And how are things in Research and Development?”

  “I’m thinking about resigning and running for public office,” General Jiggs said. “Obviously, politicians live much better than we do. They eat inside with linen on the table and everything.”

  Black laughed.

  “I’ve got something for you, Paul,” E. Z. Black said. He put something in Jiggs’s hand. “Keep it under your hat until it’s official.”

  Jiggs looked at the small silver pin in his hand. It was rank insignia: two stars joined together.

  “Thank you, sir,” he said.

  “There’s a catch, Paul. There’s no free lunch.”

  Jiggs looked at him.

  “Rucker and the Army Aviation Center,” General Black said.

  “I didn’t think I was even being considered,” Jiggs said. Black sensed that Jiggs’s surprise was genuine.

  XII

  (One)

  Camp Rucker, Alabama

  12 June 1956

  HEADQUARTERS

  THE U.S. ARMY AVIATION CENTER

  CAMP RUCKER, ALABAMA

  12 June 1956

  The undersigned herewith assumes command of the United States Army Aviation Center and Camp Rucker, Alabama.

  Paul T. Jiggs

  Major General, USA

  Commanding

  (Two)

  On his third day as commanding general of the Aviation Center and Camp Rucker, Major General Paul T. Jiggs walked out the back door of the headquarters building and across the street and into the officer’s open mess. He was trailed by his two aides-de-camp (one of whom he had brought from Washington, the other appointed that day; the latter had been functioning as unofficial aide to the colonel who had been in temporary command since General Laird’s death) and a lieutenant colonel from the Department of Flight Training who had been named as the general’s instructor pilot.

  General Jiggs got in the cafeteria line, going to the end of it like everybody else instead of going into the dining room, where there was waiter service and a table reserved for the commanding general.

  He put a bowl of gelatin with pineapple chunks embedded in it on his tray, then pork chops, no gravy, and held his hand up to refuse mashed potatoes. He took a roll, no butter, and a glass of water and a mug of coffee. He initialed the bill he was given by the cashier and found a table in the crowded cafeteria, uncomfortably aware that people were staring at him. They tried not to, but they did.

  Apparently, Scotty Laird had not carried his own tray to eat with the peasants and had otherwise accepted the benefits of the myth that rank hath its privileges. Jiggs had already seen that the colonel who had been holding the fort had wallowed in the prerogatives of the base commander.

  “Good afternoon,” General Jiggs said to the adjacent table of second and first lieutenants, who responded—until he stopped them with a wave of his hand—by jumping to their feet.

  The general’s party joined him. They unloaded their trays and the junior aide collected all of them and put them on a tray table before sitting down himself.

  The general’s party became aware that something in the cafeteria dining room had caught the general’s attention. He kept looking at something. They narrowed it down. The general’s attention was drawn to two officers sitting at a table. One was a very large, very black captain, wearing stiffly starched fatigues and the Aviation Center insignia. The other was a young-looking major in a Class “A” tropical worsted uniform. One of General Jiggs’s first official acts as commanding general was a change in the center uniform regulations. Wearing of tropical worsted uniforms during normal duty hours was discouraged. It was a good change, doing away with bot
h chickenshit and high dry-cleaning bills. It was a lot cheaper to have khakis or fatigues washed and starched than it was to have TWs dry-cleaned. It was difficult in the Alabama heat to make a uniform last a full day before it became sweat-soaked.

  The general spoke: “Across the room,” he said, “are two officers. A major in TWs and a captain in fatigues. Do you see them?”

  “Yes, sir,” the general’s party replied, almost in unison.

  “I want you to carry a message to the major,” the general said to the aide he had acquired since coming to Rucker.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You will tell the major that if he cannot afford to offer to buy the commanding general a cup of coffee, the general is willing to loan him the money to do so.”

  “Yes, sir,” the aide said, confused, uneasy, getting to his feet.

  “Wait a minute, I’m not through,” General Jiggs said. “You will say to the captain that if he is indeed sweet little Phil Parker, the general will buy him a cup of coffee, too.”

  “Yes, sir,” the aide said, and walked across the room. He returned almost immediately, with the major and the captain trailing him.

  “Good afternoon, sir,” they said.

  “Long time, no see, Lowell,” General Jiggs said.

  “Yes, sir, it has been some time, hasn’t it?”

  “And you, Captain, were once known as sweet little Philip S. Parker, IV, am I correct?” he asked the six-foot four-inch, 235-pound officer.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I’m an old friend of your father’s,” General Jiggs said.

  “Yes, sir, I know.”

  “I was under the impression you were at C&GSC, Lowell.”

  “Yes, sir, I am.”

  “You’re a long way from Leavenworth.”

  “I came to see Captain Parker, sir.”

  “Birds of a feather?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What do I have you doing here, Parker?” General Jiggs asked.

  “I’m an IP in Rotary Wing Advanced, sir,” Captain Parker said.

  “That’s fascinating,” General Jiggs said. “Are you any good at it?”

  “I believe I’m competent, sir.”

  “As I was walking over here, it occurred to me that having a lieutenant colonel—no offense, colonel—detailed full time to teach me how to fly when I am not otherwise occupied was not a very efficient utilization of resources. Is there any reason, Colonel, why Captain Parker could not be detailed to teach me how to fly, permitting you to return to duties more appropriate to a senior officer?”

  “Sir, I’d have to review Captain Parker’s records,” the lieutenant colonel said.

  “He’s either a competent instructor pilot or he isn’t,” General Jiggs said, his voice suddenly very cold. “Which?”

  “I’m sure that Captain Parker is competent, sir,” the lieutenant colonel said, uncomfortably. “But we like to take a little extra care with general officers, sir.”

  “Bullshit,” General Jiggs said. “Captain Parker’s father was my instructor in equestrianism at Riley when I was second john. I always told myself I’d get back at him someday. You arrange for it, Colonel.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “How long do you plan to be AWOL from Leavenworth, Lowell?”

  “I’d planned to turn myself in in the morning, sir.”

  “In that case, you’ll be free to come to supper,” General Jiggs said. “We eat at seven. At half past six, we serve drinks.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Are you married, Parker?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Would it be convenient for Mrs. Parker?”

  “I’ll have to check, sir,” Captain Parker said, a little uncomfortably.

  “It’s Dr. Parker, sir,” Lowell said. “She’s a contract surgeon at the hospital.”

  “If it would be convenient for Dr. Parker, I would be honored to make her acquaintance,” General Jiggs said. “Now go finish your lunch.”

  General Jiggs ate two mouthfuls of pork chop.

  “That was Captain Philip Sheridan Parker IV,” he said. “A direct descendant of some of the first Negro soldiers in the army. His great, great, whatever it is, grandfather rode with Sheridan, and named his first-born after him. In the last great war to end all wars, that boy’s father, Colonel Parker III, led an armored column into East Germany and snatched Bob Bellmon and two hundred other American officer prisoners from the Russians.”

  There was no reply.

  “The other one is Lowell,” General Jiggs said. “Anybody ever heard of Task Force Lowell?”

  The aide he had inherited, who wished to remain assigned as an aide, had done his homework. In Korea, as a lieutenant colonel and later as a colonel, General Jiggs had commanded the 73rd Heavy Tank Battalion (Reinforced). A task force, Task Force Lowell, from the 73rd had made the breakout from the Pusan perimeter and linked up with General Ned Almond’s X Corps after the landing at Inchon. It was described in the book the lieutenant had read as “a near classic utilization of an armored column in both the breakthrough, and in disrupting the enemy’s rear.” After he had read it, the lieutenant remembered reconstructing the operations of Task Force Lowell at the Point. They’d done it twice, once on the maps and the sand tables and again as an exercise in logistics: how to supply a fast-moving armored column with the almost incredible amount of fuel, ammunition, and other supplies it consumes, by whatever means are available.

  “Yes, sir,” he said.

  “Tell them,” General Jiggs said.

  The word spread, beginning that afternoon, that all the rumors were true. Armor was taking over. The first party the general had thrown was pure armor. Some jigaboo captain, whose father had taught the general how to ride, no shit, a horse, back when there still was cavalry; Colonel Bellmon, armor, director of the Aviation Combat Developments Agency; Major MacMillan, the guy with the Medal; his exec, also armor. And some hotshot major from C&GSC who’s the guy who flew into Laird Field in that red-and-white civilian Aero Commander. Also armor. Shit. The Armor Association would probably turn out to be worse for army aviation than the Cincinnati Flying Club and the West Point Protective Association.

  (Three)

  19 June 1957

  Oran, Algeria

  The tourists, mostly members of Local 133, International Brotherhood of Master Machinists, Tool Makers and Die Cutters, United Automobile Workers of America, but including (to fill up the forty-four passenger buses used by African Tours, Ltd.) a trio of middle-aged schoolteachers; two rather willowy gentlemen from New Hope, Pennsylvania, who thought that Native Art was going to be important in their interior decorating business; and three others arranged for by the Oran office of American Express, gathered at 7:15 in the morning in the lobby of the Hotel de Normandie in Oran.

  There was some confusion, of course, and someone, naturally, had overslept, and it was a few minutes after eight (not 7:30 sharp!) before the bus pulled away from the hotel. In thirty minutes the bus was out of Oran, which looked to most of the Americans not too different from European cities, except for the Ay-rabs in their dirty robes.

  The bus—Dutch, diesel, enormous, with lots of glass and surprisingly comfortable and roomy seats—swayed not unpleasantly down the highway as the green of Oran and its environs turned into the brown of the desert.

  Sidi-bel-Abbès, legendary home of the French Foreign Legion, was their first stop. It was something of a disappointment. The museum was interesting, but you can only take so many museums, and Local 133 had been on tour for sixteen days so far, and they had enough museums to last them awhile.

  The legionnaires, except for their funny hats, looked disappointingly like Americans. Their uniforms were American khaki and U.S. Army work clothes, and they drove jeeps and Dodge three-quarter-ton trucks and GMC six-by-sixes, some of which, the machinists and tool and die makers agreed among themselves, they had made back in Detroit. The legionnaires were armed with good old U.S. M1 Garand rifles and Thompson .
45 submachine guns and Colt .45 automatics.

  And then something happened that made everybody really hate the goddamned French Foreign Legion. No sooner did they get out of Sidi-bel-Abbès, than they got stuck behind a French Foreign Legion convoy that moved down the road like a goddamned snail.

  “Pass the sonsofbitches!” the machinists yelled at the bus driver, but the bus driver simply shrugged his shoulders.

  It was not that there was any good reason to go faster, and they really couldn’t have gone a hell of a lot faster on the narrow, winding roads. It was simply that they were part of their culture, and a vehicle in front of them going five miles an hour less than they were capable of going was almost insulting.

  Not that it was uncomfortable in the air-conditioned bus. There was a refrigerator with soft drinks (Coke and some local orange soda that the Americans didn’t like and some Algerian beer, which was nearly as bad). And the scenery was spectacular, if you liked rocks. Everybody oohed and aahed at first, and then they got bored with the mountains.

  They went through Tiemcen to Geryville. They stopped in Geryville for lunch, and everybody was pleased with that. It gave them a chance to stretch their legs, take pictures of camels and great big Arabs on little tiny donkeys, and have a little lunch. And the French Foreign Legion convoy had disappeared. They wouldn’t have to swallow their dust from here on in to wherever the hell they were going next. But when they left Geryville, the Legion convoy was on the road ahead of them again. Bastards!

  They were going next to Colomb Béchar, via Ain Sefra. Fourteen miles out of Ain Sefra as the crow flies, and thirty-six miles out as the road wound its way up and around the mountains, four 105 mm artillery shells furnished by the United States of America as military aid to the Republic of France and captured by the Armée Nationale pour la Libération d’Algérie were detonated under the road.