IMMORALITY IN U.S. ARMY

Press, Volume LXXXII, Issue 24816, 5 March 1946, Page 5

IMMORALITY IN U.S. ARMY

CHARGE BY CHIEF CHAPLAIN

“GENERAL BREAKDOWN IN DISCIPLINE” LONDON, March 3. “Looseness and immorality are prevalent in the United States Army in Europe and there has been a general breakdown of discipline,” said the United States Army’s chief chaplain in the European theatre (Colonel I* Cirtis) commenting on a letter which a British girl wrote to the army newspaper “Stars and Stripes.” The British girl accused United States Army officers.of being "rotten to the core” and she asserted that German girls were permitted to live with United States officers in their headquarters compound. An American girl, in a letter to “Stars and Stripes,” said that American officers placed jeeps at the disposal of German girls whenever they were wanted, so that the girls could go wherever they wished. The Frankfurt correspondent of the Associated Press, in reporting these accusations, adds that compound guards explained that officers and civilians working in the United States Headquarters compound are permitted to take girls in at any time between 10.30 p.m. and 8.30 a.m. Headquarters Command orders provided that officers must sign their guests in and the guests must sign out before 8.30 e.m., except at week-ends, when girls are permitted to remain within the compound over Sunday, leaving before 8.30 a.m. on Monday. The correspondent examined the register late last night and found that 120 officers and civilians, including lieutenant-colonels, signed in guests. The comments have raised a storm of sympathetic reaction from other chaplains, also from American soldiers.