1940 Benjamin O. Davis Sr. is appointed as the first black general in the history of the U. S. Armed Forces. Responding to NAACP pressure, Franklin Delano Roosevelt announces that black strength in the Armed Forces will be proportionate to black population totals. Several branches of the military service and several occupational specialties are to be opened to blacks. But Roosevelt rules out troop integration because it will be "destructive to morale and detrimental to... preparation for national defense." At the start of Selective Service, less than 5000 of 230,000 men in the Army are black and there are only two black combat officers. Approximately 888,000 black men and 4,000 black women are to serve in the Armed Forces during World War II. Blacks are mostly confined to service units.