OFFICE OF FIELD SERVICE I39 



While OFS was of considerable assistance to the Navy, particularly in 

 Hawaii, it commonly had to work informally. Officially the Navy atti- 

 tude discouraged the presence of civilians in forward areas. 



Initially the Operations Division was designated as the Army Ground 

 Forces liaison office with OFS. In a short time, however, the War Depart- 

 ment shifted the responsibility for liaison with OFS to the New Develop- 

 ments Division (NDD) which then remained the major Army channel 

 for field service activities throughout the war. This division was a special 

 staff section composed of officers of the General Staff Corps. Its Direc- 

 tor at that time was Major General Stephen G. Henry, an able ofl&cer 

 of wide acquaintance in the Army whose enthusiasm for the introduc- 

 tion and effective utilization of new weapons and devices was matched by 

 his readiness to take maximum advantage of the skills of scientists either 

 in or out of uniform. General Henry was ardent in his support of OSRD 

 and keenly interested in the concept of transferring scientific talent through 

 OFS from research to field use. His personal backing did a great deal 

 to smooth the way for OFS in the difficult first days of its dealings with 

 the Army. 



In August 1944 General Henry was succeeded as Director of NDD 

 by Brigadier General William A. Borden, who was also keenly interested 

 in the possibilities for assisting the field forces by sending scientific talent 

 to the front and was thoroughly co-operative. Unfortunately the New De- 

 velopments Division was never sufi&ciently staffed to do its job completely. 

 As it grew, it took on increased responsibilities in connection with other 

 aspects of its directive and the officers assigned to take care of OFS mat- 

 ters were able to devote only part of their time to OFS projects. Field 

 service operations would have progressed more effectively if the Service 

 liaison office for the OFS type of activity had been authorized to develop 

 a staff of officers and secretaries whose only responsibility was the han- 

 dling of OFS matters and whose function included the military process- 

 ing of all personnel loaned to that Service. 



Initially OFS had no single channel with the Army Air Forces. Re- 

 quests originating in different units came through various offices. This 

 created diflSculties and led to arrangements in the summer of 1945, when 

 plans for channeling all OSRD field groups through OFS were being for- 

 mulated, to set up a single office in the Air Forces that would function in 

 parallel with NDD for processing OFS men and handling OFS com- 

 munications on AAF matters. Brigadier General J. F. Phillips's division in 

 the ofi&ce of the Assistant Chief of Air Staff for Materiel and Services was 

 designated, and Colonel W. G. Brown, who had been AAF Liaison Officer 

 with NDRC, was assigned to supervise the processing. The office began to 

 function late in July 1945. 



