SECOND DRAFT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23489, 28 October 1939, Page 13

SECOND DRAFT

SO DATES ANNOUNCED NEED FOR STATEMENT RECRUITING POSITION NORTHERN MILITARY AREA The removal of a number of uncertainties concerning the recruiting and enlistment- of men for the Second Kchelon of the Second Now Zealand Division was suggested in Auckland yesterday as an essential to speed recruitment. Although the Minister of Defence, the Hon. F. Jones, announced recently that the Second Echelon would enter camp some time in December, the date has not yet been fixed. This is. not a vital matter at the moment, but an announcement of an approximate date, it was stated, would enable a number of young men to complete their business and private arrangements. Dearth o! Single Men On the supposition that the northern military district would be called upon to supply the same number of men for the Second Echelon as for the first, 2200, there seems little reason to doubt that the quota will be filled, although not by single men. Up to yesterday enlistments for the Second and Third Echelons totalled 2046, but of these only 628 had been passed as fit foi' service, the remainder not having yet been examined. A disturbing feature of the enlistments is that of the 628 examined and passed fit only 316 are single men. .Officers for the Second Echelon are to enter camps for courses and preliminary instruction on November 8, so that they will have at least a few weeks' refresher before their men join them. There was general expectation that lioncommissioned officers would go into camp at the same time, but no advice of any such intention has been received. a Non-Commissioned Officers

It is to be expected that opportunity will be given to selected men in the First Echelon to qualify as senior noncommissioned officers in the second draft, but to do this to any great extent would affect their present units. While their experience would certainly be of value in the Second Echelon, the withdrawal of any substantial number of men would be merely a robbing of Peter to pay Paid. In the meantime a number of potential non-commissioned officers for the Second Echelon are impatiently awaiting instructions. Since the district schools of instruction are being reopened for the territorial force, it is stated that there cannot be any question of sliortage of accommodation or instructors for these men who are ready to give their services in a wider field. In the last war officers and non-commis-sioned officers for the reinforcement drafts had at least a two-months' special course in Trentham before took over their men. It was recognised at the time that even this period was too short, and that at the end of the two months they were just beginning to realise just how little they knew about soldiering. . „ t In the baste of taking the First Echelon into camp, the officers and noncommissioned officers preceded their men bv little more than a week, much of which was occupied in other than instruction parades. As a consequence many of the non-commissioned officers are only about one lesson ahead df their men in" military knowledge.