Word: mcnair
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...chief of the U.S. Army Ground Forces, Lieut. General Lesley James McNair had whipped millions of civilians into the greatest Army in the nation's history. A skeptical, gently dour little professional, "Whitey" McNair had done it without raising his voice, and with rare recourse to his considerable vocabulary of caustic profanity...
George Marshall, Chief of Staff, knew just the man for the vital job of directing troop training. "Whitey" McNair, who had dreamed of leading troops afield once again before he retired, became a schoolmaster. He broke sharply with easygoing tradition, trained troops under live fire at home, pounded endlessly at the basics of combat training-physical conditioning, tight discipline, painstaking reconnaissance, good shooting...
...months ago, Whitey McNair, in tribute to the infantry, said: "[Their] guts and brains . . . put the finishing touches-the copper-riveted handiwork-on the craftsmanship of the air forces, the artillery, and the tank corps." Last week it looked as though Whitey McNair was off to do some copper-riveting himself. Best guess: he would command an American army group somewhere in Europe...
Successor. To take McNair's job on the home front came rugged, crusty old (65) Lieut. General Ben Lear. He had held the job before. In 1943 Whitey McNair made such a close-up inspection of U.S. troops in action on the African front that he was hit by German shell fragments, briefly hospitalized...
...Lear, a crack training man who was on the point of retirement for age, took over McNair's command in the interim, later took a desk job. Canadian-born Ben Lear came up from the ranks (enlisting in 1898 for the Spanish-American war). As Army-wise as a rolling caisson, Ben Lear would give uncompromising stability to the ground forces command on the home front...