Chief of Staff

Like Napoleon, Major General Charles Pelot ("Per Schedule") Summerall is associated with the fact that when a piece of artillery hits a soldier it automatically eliminates him from the battle. After Cadet Summerall won his Phi Beta Kappa Key at West Point, the fact was noted when his guns blasted the Philippine insurrectos out of the village of Calamba in 1898, when he smote down four gates of Peking at the time of the Boxer massacres. Later he entered the World War a Colonel, came out a Major General. At Soissons. St. Mihiel, and in the Meuse-Argonne he commanded brilliantly the First Division, never admitting that it could be "held up by machine gun fire" or "shot to pieces," so long as he had his artillery sputtering. Said he: "Fire is the secret of fighting. If you have enough you can take any enemy position. Nothing else will do it. Men's bodies can't for they will be shot." Therein is a mechanistic philosophy of warfare, perhaps Napoleon's, perhaps the World War's.

Last week it was Major General Summerall, 59, whom Secretary of War D wight Filley Davis recommended and President Coolidge approved as the new Chief of Staff* of the U. S. Army to succeed Major General John L. Hines whose term expires on Dec. 5.

It has been customary in the army to select the senior ranking officer as Chief of Staff. In 1924 the influence of the "Pershing crowd" in the War Department was so potent that Major General Summerall was passed up in favor of Major General Hines. Last month some military prophets wondered whether these same influences would again result in the appointment of another Pershing favorite, Major General Hanson E. Ely. Commandant of the Army War College, who is only eight months younger than Major General Summerall. However, Secretary of War Davis is a staunch believer in the seniority rule and Major General Summerall has a brilliant record, so his appointment was no surprise.

Soon "Per Schedule" Summerall, that rigid disciplinarian, that man who gets things done, that "hardboiled" artillery philosopher, will leave his duties at Governors Island* to become the peacetime chief of the army. In the language of the streets, he should keep the army on its toes. Said he, many years ago: "Persons who talk about peace and abolishing the army forget that everything the United States has, it got by force. No matter how righteous are the decisions it makes, it could not be anything but another China if it had not force to back up those decisions."

*Except for the President who is lawfully Commander in Chief of both the army and navy, the Chief of Staff is the active head of the army. In time of a great crisis such as the Civil War or World War, a General may be appointed by the President (with the Senate's approval) to the supreme command. The following have held the rank of General: George Washington, Ulysses Hiram Grant (or Ulysses Simpson Grant [see p. 6]). William Tecumseh Sherman, Philip Henry Sheridan, John Joseph Pershing, Tasker Howard Bliss, Peyton Conway March.

The enlisted strength of the regular U. S. Army on Sept. 30, 1925, was 125,117 men, of which 6,709 were Philippines scouts.

*Where sea gulls frolic above the barracks and forts of the U. S. Army, Governors Island poking its barren head out of New York Harbor at the entrance to the East River, was originally a residence of Colonial governors, then a quarantine station, later a prison for Confederate soldiers.