Page:John Banks Wilson - Maneuver and Firepower (1998).djvu/273

 THE KOREAN WAR AND ITS AFTERMATH trative action and did not affect the actual number of combat or training divisions in active service. In Europe the 9th and 5th Infantry Divisions replaced the 28th and 43d Infantry Divisions, while the 8th and 10th Infantry Divisions in the United States replaced the 31st and 37th at Fort Carson and Fort Riley. The 69th Infantry Division and the 101st Airborne Division were reactivated to fill the gaps left by the 5th and 9th in the training base.

By the summer of 1954 the Mutual Defense Treaty with the Republic of Korea and the expansion of its army to twenty divisions permitted additional American reductions in Korea and allowed the Department of Defense to release all reserve units from active duty. In October the 25th Infantry Division with its personnel and equipment moved from Korea to Hawaii, where it became part of the Pacific area reserve. Shortly thereafter the 2d and 3d Infantry Divisions, reduced to near zero strength in Korea, replaced the National Guard 44th and 47th Infantry Divisions at Forts Lewis and Benning. The Guard divisions returned to state control, thus ending the involvement of the reserve divisions in the Korean War. When those divisions left federal service, only their designations reverted to the states since the guardsmen themselves had been released earlier. The states reorganized the units, except for the 44th, which Illinois did not want, by using the NGUS divisions as the nuclei, as planned.

After many revisions of the blueprints for a residual force in Korea, the Department of Defense instructed the services to plan for three divisions, one Army, one Marine, and one United Nations, plus combat support and combat service support units to remain there. In December 1954 Secretary Wilson decided that the Marine unit would return to the United States, leaving two Army divisions in Korea. As a result, the 24th Infantry Division, in the midst of moving to Japan, reversed its course and rejoined the 7th Infantry Division in Korea.