John W. Morris
rest of the Army. The Army engineer consequently did not have the mobility to keep up with
the troops he was expected to support.
The entire time I was the deputy chief, we had an ongoing effort to get the UET, the universal
engineer tractor. Then it was the ACE
ACE, armored combat earthmover]. That's what
it finally came out to be, I believe.
As Chief of Engineers, I only had staff input, so the real momentum resided in the commands,
the Army commands, not with the Chief of Engineers. The Chief of Engineers' office played
a principal role in getting the top leadership of the Army to recognize this deficiency and
ultimately have it satisfied.
Later General Kern, while CG at Fort Belvoir, advocated and got the E-Force moving. Now
we have an engineer brigade instead of a battalion in the infantry division. That was an
important move. General Kern deserves credit for his leadership.
Then there was the problem of mine detection. Having been in Vietnam, no one was satisfied
that we had a good way to clear a minefield. The old-fashioned method was good, but it was
just so slow and risky. So we were always looking for new methods. We had the flailer, an
attachment to a tank. Not a bad idea, but it had to work hard to get the job done.
That problem really has not been totally solved to date. In the matter of combat equipment,
I think mine detection and minefield breeching has to remain a front-burner item, particularly
since, as we learned in DESERT STORM, mobility is so important. Breaching minefields
remains a vital tactic and a major command concern.
I remember going out to the Engineer Topographic Laboratory with General Rogers, the Chief
of Staff, and being given a demonstration on how the Pershing could identify on ground what
had been programmed into its guidance system, and we were trying to develop water
purification and treatment facilities so we could have small amounts of water quickly for the
individual soldiers and larger amounts for large units.
So the whole set of combat engineer equipment being upgraded should always be a continuing
effort because times and requirements change. In my day, it was mostly the ACE and the
minefield equipment.
Bridging equipment probably was one.
A
Bridge equipment, of course.
Chief of Engineers: Civil Works Projects
We've
discussed a lot of the military projects when you were Chief. Let's turn and discuss
the civil works projects and issues while you were Chief.
A
Before we go to specific projects, we might set the stage a little bit by reviewing the national
issues that impacted on the public works projects.
There really were a couple. One was the environmental program, and the other was the
programmatic effect of having filled so much of the nation's water resource management
needs. So we had this national movement legislated in NEPA, superimposed on a program
which was declining in any case.
I've written and made so many speeches about how we got into the environmental priorities
during the 1970s that I really don't feel that we need to repeat them in detail now. There's no
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