More from the Bowl

They will dip into the goldfish bowl for the third time in Washington this week. They will fish out, one by one, 8,000 to 9,000 capsules, containing the numbers that will determine the order of induction into the U.S. Army of the 9,000,000 men who signed up in the Third Registration. Early numbers will mean a call to arms some time in June. Meanwhile the Army will pick & choose from among the 17,500,000 registrants of 1940-41. Last week many a registrant, teetering uneasily between mufti and khaki, was confused about the future.

Was the Army going to draft men with dependents? Did a notice to report for an Army medical examination mean induction forthwith? Was the Army planning to call men by age groups rather than by number? Had the Army reduced its training period to a matter of eight brisk weeks?

From Selective Service bigwigs came reams of explanations that could be threshed down into a few hard facts:

>The Army did not want men with dependents, although draft boards occasionally took one, anyhow. A man who acquired a wife before Pearl Harbor was reasonably certain of being deferred, provided that he didn't marry her to duck the draft. But if his wife was a working girl, or being supported by rich relatives, he was due to be inducted.

> For those in Class 3-A (dependent-deferred) who want to serve but can't support their families on $21 a month, the Army offered a way out: Any 3-A-men, sound of wind & limb, with a high-school education, may volunteer for officer training. If accepted, they will get four months' training in the ranks, either wind up successfully in officer's training school with subsequent commissions as second lieutenants ($125 a month) or return home unsuccessfully as Enlisted Reserves, possibly to be called up later as privates if the 3-As are tapped. Of the million men of 1-A caliber now on the lists as dependent-deferred, about 150,000 are eligible for officer training. The Army needs 75,000 new officers this year for ground forces alone, has good reason to coax worthy 3-As into its ranks.

> An Army medical test, successfully passed, now means immediate induction, with immediate furloughs available for draftees who just have to straighten out their civilian affairs. The Army's speed in grabbing manpower does not please the Navy. Determined to man ships with volunteers, the Navy formerly got quite a few youngsters who had passed the Army test, changed over to the Navy before induction. Although the Navy has had more than 140,000 volunteers since Pearl Harbor, it needs a minimum of 45,000 enlistments monthly. Last week the Navy sent out a press release, thoughtfully reminding draftees that a call for Army medical examination didn't mean that they simply had to join the Army; the Navy was open.

>The widespread notion that the Army had adopted the European system of calling men up by age groups rather than by number was spiked last week by War Secretary Stimson. The lottery system still prevails. If the Army wants a new batch of soldiers, they will be gathered from the rolls of all three previous registrations in proportion to the number of them in each pool, and low-number men will be the first selected.

While the draft boards pondered ways of tightening up on deferred "borderline cases," many an artful dodger was busy. The FBI was investigating a nationwide deferment mill that promised 1-A-men that it would shove them into Government jobs before the Army nabbed them. In Lafayette, Ind. a 25-year-old named Chester Cleon Hill looked like the dodger-of-the-year. A grand jury indicted him for taking so many benzedrine sulfate tablets before his Army physical examination that he trembled his way into deferment.

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