Original Source Documents: October 10, 1943 - Gen. Lynch to Charles Payne
Contributor: Robert A. Notman
Source: Major General George A. Lynch Papers
October 10, 1943
Reply to Payne Memo of October 1-3 1943
Dear Harry,
I hope that what I am going to say in this letter about the copy you have prepared for Mr. Wells re: the Jeep will not be treading on the toes of a prize baby of yours. I know what a job it must have been to get all this copy together. But I feel that I must tell you frankly the effect I believe it will create on a reader who is at all critically minded.
In the first place, you have to bear in mind that Mr. Wells article is to be passed on by the War Department Press Bureau. As the copy now stands, it hasn't a chance of getting by. It is too highly critical of personalities and measures to permit it to receive any color of official sanction. While I think the facts ought to be frankly stated, I think it is best to allow them to speak for themselves, without adding any embroidery.
In the second place, you haven't clearly indicated the genesis of the military conception of the car. So far as you have gone into this, you have represented it as the outgrowth of the Short-Howie carrier. I have repeatedly attempted to make clear that there was never any connection either in function or design between the Howie Carrier and the jeep.
About two years before you appeared in the War Department, I held a session in person with the Infantry Board at Fort Benning on the subject of the Howie Carrier. It was unanimously agreed that this vehicle should be rejected, not of the grounds of deficient performance, but because the conception of the car was fallacious; that is, we believed that the use of an unarmored assault car was an utter impracticability.
The Howie car had nothing in common with the jeep in conception. It was not a cross-country car but would have to be transported on a truck to a point near the front-line where it would be put into action. It was not a weapons carrier but a firing platform for a weapon. It was designed for front-line use, the jeep for movement in rear of the front line. It had much more relation to a tank than to any other form of motor transport.
You also connect the Howie carrier with the motor cycle. The carrier was never intended to perform any of the functions of the motor cycle and the two vehicles had no common features of design.
I don't think you intended to create these impressions, but that's the way your copy reads to me.
Though the Howie carrier had no connection with the jeep in the minds of the people responsible for the military conception of the latter vehicle, I think there was a connection (entirely coincidental) in you mind. When you first appeared in the War Department, you were given the impression by high authority that the Howie Carrier would be adopted. When you first appeared at the office of the Chief of Infantry, you appeared to believe that we would be required to accept the carrier and that the only question to be settled was one of detail. It was some time before you became convinced that we would on no account accept the Howie carrier. At the same time, we informed you that the infantry was interested in replacing the motorcycle by a vehicle more efficient for cross-country movement, and it was from this angle that the development of the jeep commenced. Later the possibilities for other missions became apparent.
So that is all there was to the connection between the jeep, the Howie Carrier, and the motorcycle. The only connection was that as different projects, they were under consideration at the same time; i.e. the Howie Carrier as assault vehicle on its own account, the jeep as a replacement for the motorcycle and weapons carrier.
If you bring the Howie Carrier into the picture at all, I think it ought be about as above described. I feel particularly keenly about this matter because certain persons in the War Department have laid claim to credit for the development of the jeep because they forced consideration of the Howie Carrier - in fact did all they could to force its adaptation. It seems strange denouncement that people who tried to force through a fallacious proposition should on that ground lay claim to credit justly occurring to the agency which defeated them and freed through a wholly unrelated development.
Thirdly, you envoke the impression that the man-handling feature originated with the jeep. This was an outstanding feature of the 1/2-ton truck though not of course in equal degree with the jeep. When in 1948, I was trying to have the 1-1/2 ton weapons carrier replaced by the 1/2 ton, I had moving pictures made of the 1/2 ton being manhandled out of trouble by an infantry squad while the 1-1/2 ton took about half a company. I think that in all fairness, Marmon-Herrington ought to be given credit for their contribution.
Fourthly I think Colonel Less is not given the place he is entitled to. You don't mention him in connection with the amphibious development, yet he and he alone was responsible for initiating the amphibious project.
Fifthly, I think your treatment of the whole subject partakes a little too much of the romantic. If I do not mistake, what is wanted is a factual account of the genesis of the jeep; anything in the nature of a sales talk won't fit the case.
Lastly, I don't think you do yourself justice. You create the impression that your activities were for the most part promotional - which is what too many people are saying already. This obscured the really big ideas in connection with the development: on the military side, light weight to permit man-handling combined with qualities of sturdiness to stand difficult cross-country movement and low silhouette to decrease vulnerability; on the engineering side, the realization of these qualities through decrease dimensions of the wheel base - a simple idea but one which seems to have occurred to no one before. The people who conceived these ideas and initiated the action and prosecuted the development are the ones around whom the story should be built. You can safely omit the small fry and pretenders who climbed on after the project was well on the road to success. As I have told you before, I have no ambition to be removed from the quietude of my retired life by any build up or connection with the jeep. I assigned any interest I may have in the matter to Colonel Lee, to whom after all, I give acknowledgement for the accomplishment of my office in his connection.
I hardly need to say after the above comment that I don't see any way in which I could be helpful in suggesting amendments to your copy. To be of any service I should have to re-cast your draft completely - which you haven't asked me to do.
Sincerely
GAL