summed up his postwar
attitude very simply: "I said let's go easy--as fast as we can."

Second, segregation was an efficient way to isolate the poorly
educated and undertrained black soldier, especially one with a combat
occupational specialty. To integrate Negroes into white combat units,
already dangerously understrength, would threaten the Army's fighting
ability. When he was Chief of Staff, Eisenhower thought many of the
problems associated with black soldiers, problems of morale, health,
and discipline, were problems of education, and that the Negro was
capable of change. "I believe," he said, "that a Negro can improve his
standing and his social standing and his respect for certain of the
standards that we observe, just as well as we can." Lt. Gen. Wade H.
Haislip, the Deputy Chief of Staff for Administration, concluded that
the Army's racial mission was education. All that Circular 124 meant,
he explained, "was that we had to begin educating the Negro soldiers
so they could be mixed sometime in the future." Bradley observed in
agreement that "as you begin to get better educated Negroes in the
service," there is "more reason to integrate." The Army was pledged to
accept Negroes and to give them a wide choice of assignment, but until
their education and training improved they had to be isolated.

Third, segregation was the only way to provide equal treatment and
opportunity for black troops. Defending this paternalistic argument,
Eisenhower told the Senate:

In general, the Negro is less well educated ... and if you make a
complete amalgamation, what you are going to have is in every
company the Negro is going to be relegated to the minor jobs, and
he is never going to get his promotion to such grades as
technical sergeant, master sergeant, and so on, because the
competition is too tough. If, on the other hand, he is in (p. 229)
smaller units of his own, he can go up to that rate, and I
believe he is entitled to the chance to show his own wares.

Fourth, segregation was necessary because segments of American society
with powerful representatives in Congress were violently opposed to
mixing the races. Bradley explained that integration was part of
social evolution, and he was afraid that the Army might move too fast
for certain sections of the country. "I thought in 1948 that they were
ready in the North," he added, "but not in the South." The south
"learned over the