race (for instance,
language and nationality) the German Army also
organized separate units. Its 162d Infantry
Division was composed of troops from Turkestan and
the Caucasus, and its 5th SS Panzer Division had
segregated Scandinavian, Dutch, and Flemish
regiments. Unlike the racially segregated U.S.
Army, Germany's so-called Ost units were only
administratively organized into separate divisions,
and an Ost infantry battalion was often integrated
into a "regular" German infantry regiment as its
fourth infantry battalion. Several allied armies
also had segregated units, composed, for example,
of Senegalese, Gurkhas, Maoris, and Algerians.]

[Footnote 2-17: Memo, ASW for Judge Hastie, 2 Jul 42,
ASW 291.2, NT 1942.]

Thus very early in World War II, even before the United States was
actively engaged, the issues surrounding the use of Negroes in the
Army were well defined and the lines sharply drawn. Was segregation, a
practice in conflict with the democratic aims of the country, also a
wasteful use of manpower? How would modifications of policy
come--through external pressure or internal reform? Could traditional
organizational and social patterns in the military services be changed
during a war without disrupting combat readiness?

_Segregation and Efficiency_

In the years before World War II, Army planners never had to consider
segregation in terms of manpower efficiency. Conditioned by the
experiences of World War I, when the nation had enjoyed a surplus of
untapped manpower even at the height of the war, and aware of the
overwhelming manpower surplus of the depression years, the staff (p. 024)
formulated its mobilization plans with little regard for the
economical use of the nation's black manpower. Its decision to use
Negroes in proportion to their percentage of the population was the
result of political pressures rather than military necessity. Black
combat units were considered a luxury that existed to indulge black
demands. When the Army began to mobilize in 1940 it proceeded to honor
its pledge, and one year after Pearl Harbor there were 399,454 Negroes
in the Army, 7.4 percent of the total and 7.95 percent of all enlisted