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officers. (1) These "squadrons" existed without grades or tables of organization, the members of the group occupying grades in the various sections in which they worked. (2)

So simple did the procedure for assignment of Wacs become under this system that Army Air Forces Headquarters soon stopped placing requisitions for WAC personnel entirely, and merely asked WAC Headquarters to give AAF Headquarters weekly "availability reports", by Military Occupational Specialty, as to the total number of women finishing basic training and available for assignment to AAF under its quota of 43 percent of all WAC recruits. The number of women entering the service, compared to the strength of the army, was so small that there was no chance that any given number of women in any MOS could not be absorbed someplace in AAF. These women were distributed among air commands according to


1. From the first day that Waacs arrived at AAF installations, Air Force commanders raised a continuing cry to be allowed to call their WAAC units, in true Air Force style, "squadrons" rather than "companies" or "detachments". This could, of course, be done as soon as the War Department authorized the informal organization of WAAC companies by The Adjutant General.

2. This system fitted ideally into the "base unit" system of organization which was developed by AAF a few months later, under which all permanent part military personnel at a base was assigned to a "base unit" made up of various working sections and of "squadrons" informally organized to administer the personnel. Men and women were formally assigned to the base unit only, and held grades according to the jobs performed in working sections, but were "placed in" the various squadrons for housing, messing, and supervision.

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