16. The Army finally began to expand in the late 1930s
After years of Japanese aggression in China, and s those of the Italians in Africa and the Germans in Europe, the US Army began to expand in 1938, though it remained around 200,000 men. MacArthur had officially retired from the US Army, though he remained on its payroll in his capacity as Military Advisor to the Philippines. He also received pay for his role as Field Marshall of the Army of the Philippines, making him the highest-paid soldier in the world in 1938. Eisenhower, critical of MacArthur’s activities and behavior in the Philippines, returned to the United States in late 1939 to his first position as a commanding officer of a battalion. By that time, the Germans had invaded Poland, England and France were at war with Germany, and isolationists were demanding the United States stay entirely neutral. FDR was already exploring ways to help the British.
By Autumn, 1940 France had fallen to the Germans. The British Empire was the only entity still at war with Germany. Japanese aggression was on the rise. In the Philippines, MacArthur called for increased American presence and financial support for the Philippine Army. After a summer of intense debate, in the national press and in Congress, the first peacetime draft in American history was authorized through the Selective Service Act of 1940. The Army expanded rapidly, in terms of the number of men called into the service. By mid-summer, 1941, less than one year later, 1.5 million Americans were conscripted into the US Army, which was ill-prepared to receive them. Inventories of uniforms, weapons, and even rations appeared adequate in numbers. But many of them, even rations, dated to the military buildup of World War 1, more than two decades earlier.