On Whom the Fate Depends

Better than statistics of ships, planes and guns, a figure in flesh & blood last week told the U.S. the spread of its tremendous share in World War II. More than 5,200,000 U.S. fighting men are now on overseas duty.

Afloat or stationed at foreign ports, said the Navy Department, are 1,566,000 Navy, Coast Guard and Marine Corps men, while another 900,000 are on the way or in training for duty outside the U.S.

War Secretary Stimson announced that the Army has 3,657,000 overseas, of its total strength of 7,700,000. These men are on every continent and hundreds of islands from Iceland to Biak. (Peak A.E.F. strength in World War I was 2,057,675.) To nourish this great force supply lines stretch more than 56,000 miles, to every continent. Some 1,150,000 of the Army's troops outside the U.S. are in the Air Forces.

Said Secretary Stimson: "It is on the shoulders of these men, and their comrades in the U.S. who are scheduled for overseas deployment, that the fate of the final phase of overall strategy--the period of decisive action--depends." In the U.S. are 1,300,000 trained men held as reserves, "ready to follow."

At year's end U.S. fighting men abroad will number almost 7,500,000--less casualties. -

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