American Military History, Volume 2 by Richard W. Stewart

To the Washington high command, strategic plans were one vital ingredient in the formula for victory. Manpower was another. Indeed, at stake in the midwar debate was the fresh and flexible military power of the United States. That power was also General Marshall's trump card in negotiations with the coalition partners. To put a brake on diversion- ary deployments to secondary theaters and ventures and to conserve American military manpower for the big cross-channel blow became the major preoccupation of the Chief of Staff and his advisers in mid- war. Behind their concern for effective presentation of the American strategic case at the midwar international conferences lay the growing uneasiness of General Marshall and his staff over the American man- power problem. To continue what appeared to them to be essentially a policy of drift in Allied strategy raised grave issues about mobilizing and deploying U.S. forces. To support a war of attrition and peripheral ac- tion, in place of concentrated effort, raised serious problems about the size and kind of Army the United States should and could maintain.

HOMELAND SECURITY DURING WORLD WAR II Prior to World War II, U.S. national strategy had centered on defending the United States and its possessions against inva- sion and other foreign military threats. With the outbreak of war in Europe, U.S. strategic planning shifted to embrace participation in a coalition war against Germany, Italy, and Japan. Despite prosecut- ing a global war, however, the Army retained significant responsibili- ties for homeland security. That mission entailed theater air defense, maintaining coastal fortifications near major harbors, guarding ma- jor defense plants and railroads, and supporting the Office of Civil- ian Defense that coordinated the efforts of some 5 million volunteers nationwide. The War Department feared with good reason that the last two functions could impair the Army's meeting its strategic commitments overseas. The lack of any realized threat to the United States allowed the Army to gradually deemphasize its homeland security mission and reduce troops assigned to this mission to fewer than 65,000 in mid-1944, with troops being replaced by auxiliary military police and state guard forces.