Engineer Memoirs _____________________________________________________________________
but we didn't routinely have him because he left it to General Read to run the installation
planning and the program budgeting functions and to testify on the Hill.
Of course, he had been the ACE before Major General Read. When one has such a seat-of-
the-pants feel for something--he and General Read could talk on the phone, and he would
understand immediately where things were and how things were running. So, he didn't pay
attention to the nitty-gritty or hold the meetings to develop things involving installation
planning and the programming aspects. At the same time, General Read really didn't get
involved with running the MACOM aspects of the Corps--that is, design and construction or
the facility engineering execution--even though we did the programming.
It was difficult for me to get the facilities and housing program people over. I could go right
outside my office and there were the construction programmers. When we had four hours to
prepare for a change or present something to the Program Budget Committee the next day
that we'd just found out about, I'd have to get on the phone and call over. Hopefully, we'd
find out before five o'clock because people bailed out of the Forrestal Building with their
carpools and the people I needed might already be on their way home. It was difficult not
having all programmers in the ACE.
General Read had John Sheehey, who worked between the two offices. He was the one who
was always filling in the data and the projects and maintaining the books that Al Carton used
for programming and which engineering and construction were going to design and build
to--the designers, most specifically.
Thus, Generals Wray and Read ran two separate organizations and both were fully employed,
I can assure you, with the many things happening in the Army. The next organization change
brought facilities engineering and Jerry Hilmes over to be under the ACE. Now the Army
Staff included both installation planning and programming and the installation support of
facility engineers under one head. Then the USACE execution part, design and construction,
were under another head.
We were living through a point of transition when I was there; that is, we were understanding
what next needed to be fixed, and at the time of the next change, they were fixed.
Q:
When I talked to you on your assignment when you were a Deputy Chief of Engineers, you
referred to the situation as one in which there were tensions between Military Programs and
the ACE. You didn't really use that word today, but I mean, was it causing real problems in
the operations that that word might indicate?
A:
We had some tensions involved really with what I've already subtly described as trying to get
the programming folks together, trying to get the people back when they've gone home at
5:00 and you have the pressure of a meeting the next morning at 7:30 and you have no one to
work the facility engineering programming issue or the housing programming issue, and
somebody to build the case. On the one hand, Al Carton, who'd been there so long, and his
organization was right down the hall, and when somebody said, "You've got to cut
million out of MCA," they would fall in, do some what-ifs, get on the phone and call
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