Engineer Memoirs
A ..
He gave me specific requirements. Also, I carved out certain areas to oversee on my own. I
kept a lot of people busy, I know that. The secretaries up there wondered what I was up to. I
chaired the Board of Engineers for Rivers and Harbors. Also, I led command inspections, plus
getting the headquarters of the Saudi program moved and producing the command
management program he wanted. I was fairly busy as a deputy. I probably was busier than
people realized. As I say, I kept a lot of secretaries busy.
Q ..
One follow-up question on establishing the ACE's shop. Did that lead to any overlap with the
Directorate of Military Programs? Did the spheres of the director of Military Programs in
headquarters and the ACE's office have to be carefully worked out?
A ..
Yes, they did and that'11 come up a little later. The ACE's shop traditionally puts together the
program for the Chief of Staff to present to Congress. Consequently, the ACE had to work
very closely with the director of Military Programs. For the normal staff things such as
training, military equipment, and policy matters, the ACE didn't have to be concerned about
the director of Military Programs.
Q ..
We haven't talked about Tenn-Tom.
A ..
True, and we began to get rumors of cost problems when Danny Raymond was division
engineer at the South Atlantic Division and later when he was deputy. He'd watched
Tenn-Tom like a hawk and predicted it would become a real issue. He was right. During my
term as deputy, the issue of the cost overrun of Tenn-Tom arose again, but not so much as it
succeeded Raymond at the South Atlantic Division. He briefed
did later. General
us on the cost growth and why it was happening. The environmental issue was very critical
also at that time, and he mitigated as much of the environmental impact as possible. I went
to Atlanta while I was deputy to get a detailed briefing on the progress and other various
aspects that were beginning to evolve into major problems.
Q ..
Were there other important issues on the military side?
A
can't remember exactly when it happened, but Mr. Veysey added to his staff a position to
overlook the entire Army's environmental program, but principally to overlook the Corps'
environmental program. On our own initiative, I had the Strategic Studies Group, Don
take a cursory look at what the Army was doing about the environment and came to
the conclusion that the military wasn't doing very much. I remember reporting to the Army
staff that NEPA applied to the Army as well as it did to everyone else, and that we had to be
mindful how we operated within our installations. CERL [Construction Engineering Research
Laboratory] began immediately to work up an environmental assessment worksheet and
program for the installation commander.
The Army's early attitude seemingly was that training was more important than the
environment. That
had to be changed. The Corps was early on in trying to highlight
this problem, this
We made a survey of the Army and found that we had a long way to go. At the same time, you
may recall, there was a big program, big move on to save energy. Funds were appropriated
for an energy survey and we managed to get money for an environmental survey also, which
the commanders didn't like because they felt that it was money they otherwise would have
had for some other purpose.
My recollection is that the Corps of Engineers assumed leadership in opening the subject of
environmental attitudes within the Army family. It has taken a while, but now the Army is
everywhere because, as I said, the commanders in the field in the 1970s felt training
and military preparedness were more important than the environmental constraints on post.
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