Physical Standards In Relation To The Demand For Soldiers
Some physical standards have changed easily with the need for soldiers, which suggests that what may be portrayed as a soldierly characteristic may not be solidly rooted in combat necessity. Height is an example. European monarchs prided themselves on their tall soldiers; it was also convenient to have men of about the same height for drill and ceremony. Some eugenicists claimed that criminals tended to be shorter than the rest of the population (Baxter, 1875), and a retired military surgeon proposed that physical characteristics could identify future heroes (Foster et al., 1967). Thus, the minimum height for U.S. soldiers was 66 inches early in the nineteenth century and has progressively lowered, with the least stringent requirements (no minimum height standard during part of the Civil War) coinciding with national emergencies when new recruits were in greater demand (Figure 3-1). The Romans also imposed height standards on their soldiers, and the usefulness of this selection standard was questioned even then. Vegetius Renatus, a military philosopher, suggested using a more subjective visual appraisal of potential recruits, noting that "when all these marks are found in a recruit, a little height may be dispensed with, as it is of much more importance that a soldier should be strong than that he should be tall" (Baxter, 1875). When health screening capabilities were less advanced, height standards served a health fitness screening purpose; for example, short stature could reflect disease and poor physical development. Thus, even after careful review of physical standards during World War II, men less than 60 inches in height were "nonacceptable" (U.S. Congress, 1944). Today, the best rationale for current height standards is practical: to limit the range of sizes for uniforms, protective ensembles, and workspace dimensions. However, when other reasons are dismissed, commanders argue from anecdotal experience that short soldiers simply cannot carry the same load as their average-height peers (Davenport and Love, 1921).
