To assess the reading ability of military service applicants and accessions, and to determine the relationship between Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) measures and reading scores, 2,432 subjects were given the Gates MacGinitie reading test and a subsample of 818 were given the Nelson-Denny reading test. The median reading grade level for service applicants was 9.0 based on Gates-MacGinitie and 9.5 based on Nelson-Denny. The median Gates-MacGinitie reading grade level of applicants who qualified for services was 10.2 compared to 5.7 for non-qualified applicants. The Armed Forces Qualification Test of the ASVAB correlated .76 with the average of reading grade levels for the two reading tests; the ASVAB General Technical (GT) composite (General Aptitude Index used by the Air Force) correlated .79. Finally, multiple correlations between the three ASVAB measures (work, knowledge, general science, and numeric operations); the two reading tests; and average reading grade levels were .80, .77, and .86 respectively. It was recommended that the GT composite be used as an index of reading grade level. (Author/CP)