Word: echelons
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...Front, which is like a long letter home, sets forth some of Bill Mauldin's favorite gripes, which are the gripes of all infantrymen. Among them: revulsion at "spit & polish" in the field; envy of rear-echelon men who take over the towns after the infantrymen have captured them, occupy all the best spots and drink all the liquor; disdain for brass hats full of arrogance and stuffing...
...drive was a thing of the sheerest military beauty: First came a long row of throbbing tanks moving like heavy dark beetles over the green cabbage fields of Germany in a wide swath-many, many tanks in a single row abreast. Then, a suitable distance behind, came another great echelon of tanks even broader, out of which groups would wheel from their brown mud tracks in green fields to encircle and smash fire at some stubborn strong point. Behind this came miles of trucks full of troops, maneuvering perfectly to mop up bypassed tough spots. Then came the field artillery...
...done some combing, but lightly; latterly he has demanded a hospitalized veteran for every man he gives up to the combat-training camps. Gasser's combing will be ruthless; his orders are stern and clear. When he gets through with Comm Z, the Army's rear-echelon establishments will be pretty well raked clean of all men fit for combat...
Their forward echelon is composed of Selznick, Goldwyn and International (a holding corporation for a number of the newer lone hands, such as Writer Nunnally Johnson, Director Sam Wood and Actor Gary Cooper). Other front-rankers are Hunt Stromberg, and (potentially) crack Producer-Writer-Director Preston Sturges...
...before they could get to their guns. Germans surrounded a field of artillery-spotting planes, whose pilots were fast asleep. U.S. divisional generals found their command posts the centers of battles, their defenders hastily armed cooks, clerks, medics, runners. Trucks filled with German soldiers dashed through areas where rear-echelon G.I.s went about their routine tasks...