Army Reorganization Act

Army Reorganization Act (1950).In part, the 1950 Reorganization Act was intended to regularize the new relationship provided by the National Security Act of 1947, which created an Office of the Secretary of Defense, at cabinet level, and the World War II creation of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The act also abolished the old statutory limits on the size of the Army General Staff, providing an undersecretary of the army and four assistant secretaries (reduced to three after 1958). Infantry, Artillery, and Armor were recognized as the component arms of the army, while the Coast Artillery, already largely defunct, was formally abolished, and the Air Defense Artillery (technically a sub‐branch of the Coast Artillery) was merged with the Field Artillery in a single artillery arm. The act recognized fourteen technical services, and, as a quasi‐arm, Army Aviation was authorized fixed‐wing and rotary‐wing aircraft for support and medical purposes.
[See also Army, U.S.: Since 1941.]

Bibliography

Russell F. Weigley , History of the United States Army, 1967; enlarged ed., 1984.
Larry H. Addington , The U.S. Coast Artillery and the Problem of Artillery Organization, 1907–1954, Military Affairs: The Journal of Military History, vol. 30, no. 1 (February 1976).

Larry H. Addington