ted in the
press.[14-63]

[Footnote 14-62: Draft Memo, Reid for SecNav, 3 Jun
49, and Memo, Reid for SecDef, 1 Jun 49, both in
PPB files; Memo, Kenworthy for Fahy, 30 May 49,
sub: Replies of Army and Navy to Mr. Johnson's May
11 Memo, FC file.]

[Footnote 14-63: NME, Off of Pub Info, Release 78-49A,
7 Jun 49. See Washington _Post_, June 7, 1949, and
New York _Times_, June 8, 1949.]

To some extent the Army had an advantage over the Navy in its dealings
with Johnson and Fahy. It never had an integration policy to defend,
had in fact consistently opposed the imposition of one, and was not,
therefore, under the same psychological pressures to react positively
to the secretary's latest rebuff. Determined to defend its current
interpretation of the Gillem Board policy, the Army resisted the
Personnel Policy Board's use of the Air Force plan, Secretary Johnson's
directive, and the initial recommendations of the Fahy Committee (p. 360)
to pry out of it a new commitment to integrate. In lieu of such a
commitment, Acting Secretary of the Army Gordon Gray[14-64] offered
Secretary Johnson another spirited defense of Circular 124 on 26 May,
promising that the Army's next step would be to integrate black
companies in the white battalions of the combat arms. This step could
not be taken, he added, until the reactions to placing black
battalions in white regiments and black companies in composite
battalions had been observed in detail over a period of time. Gray
remained unmoved by the committee's appeal for the wider use and
broader training of the talented black soldiers in the name of combat
efficiency and continued to defend the _status quo_. He cited with
feeling the case of the average black soldier who because of his
"social environment" had most often missed the opportunity to develop
leadership abilities and who against the direct competition with the
better educated white soldier would find it difficult to "rise above
the level of service tasks." Segregation, Gray claimed, was giving
black soldiers the chance to develop leadership "unhindered and
unfettered by overshadowing competition they are not yet equipped to
meet." He would be remiss in his duties, he warned Johnson, if he
failed to report the concern of many senior officers who believed that
the Army had already