North African Theater of Operations

Chakt 6—Organization of Chemical Warfare Section, Allied Force Headquarters, and Headquarters, North African Theater of Operations, U.S. Army, November 1943... 

NATOUSA North African Theater of Operations, U.S. Army... 

It is also necessary, from the military point of view, that the insecticides supplied to troops in the field be readily convertible into end-use items. It should not be necessary to go through an involved procedure in preparing insecticides for field utilization. For example, the earliest lots of DDT that were received in the North African theater were of the consistency of beeswax, and were extremely difficult to get into solution. It was necessary to process all this material through meat grinders, of the hamburg variety, requisitioned from the civilian economy before this material could be satisfactorily dissolved in Diesel oil. Such a situation complicates field operations unnecessarily, and should be avoided in the development of future insecticides. 

Chemical supply experience in the North African and Mediterranean Theaters of Operations passed through several phases, each illustrative of a development in both the theater supply system and the chemical supply system. The terms theater supply system and chemical supply system are employed advisedly, because the theater system and each technical service system tended to develop independently although both were dependent to a considerable degree upon the War Department system. But that War Department system was only eight months old at the time of the landings in North Africa, and, as it was never able completely to overcome the traditional autonomy of the technical services in the United States, so was it even less able to exert its influence bn the theater technical services through the intermediary of the theater organization. 

The only elements having just as great a variety of chemical experience were to be found in the field armies in North Africa, Sicily, and Italy. Since Shadle preferred to emphasize his own staffi role and to give field elements their head, Colonels Barker and Guild in Fifth Army and Colonel Humphreville in Seventh Army found themselves, again by their own preference, operating a CWS of their own. Barker and Coblentz, in a unique partnership, carried on development and manufacture and operated their own supply system. As a result, there was less co-ordination and unity in the CWS in the North African and Mediterranean theater than elsewhere in the world, but again the required job was done. The much lesser threat of gas warfare in die Mediterranean area made it particularly appropriate to accomplish the CWS administrative task differently there. 

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