ARMED FORCES: Small Minds, Big Job

Standing toe to toe against the looming Soviet-satellite army of 175 divisions keeps the five-division U.S. Seventh Army in Germany on constant alert against the day the "balloon goes up" in Western Europe. Merely staying combat-ready in peacetime is tough enough, but the hard-training Seventh is plagued by an even tougher problem: one in three of its 165,000 tankers, atomic cannoneers and plain gravel crunchers should never have been sent overseas in the first place. Reason: they are "eight balls," mentally equivalent to sixth-grade schoolboys, a disciplinary headache to their commanders and a serious drag on their fellow G.I.s.

So...

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