Office of the Historian

133. Memorandum From the Assistant Director, Information Center Service, United States Information Agency (Schneidman) to the Director (Shakespeare)1

Washington, May 11, 1971

SUBJECT

  • Special Thematic Programming

Following our conversation on Friday2 and with the strong concurrence of Henry Loomis, we are proceeding to carry out your wishes for this new approach to field support.

We will put together a very small planning staff in my office. These will be almost entirely foreign service officers and will have no vested interest in any unit, its growth or continuation.

Our planning and production will be fully responsive to a combination of IOP worldwide themes and the specific themes put forward by the PAOs in the highest priority countries. We will produce only where there is very substantial commonality or in the event of an overriding political problem in a key country.

There will be no forced feeding or undue attempts to sell products to PAOs. We will do nothing which the field can do better or equally as well on its own. The size and expense of our products will be determined by the subject rather than the opposite.

STP will not alter in any way the existing relationship between the field and the various media elements. It will be the basis of continuing and productive interrelationships between the heads and creative personnel of all the media elements. We will work together on how to best focus Agency resources on a specific problem or idea rather than hold general discussions.

Harold F. Schneidman3
  1. Source: National Archives, RG 306, Director’s Subject Files, 1968–1972, Entry A1–42, Box 22, FPD—General 1971. No classification marking. A copy was sent to Loomis.↩
  2. May 7. No record of this conversation has been found.↩
  3. Schneidman wrote “Hal Schneidman” above this typed signature.↩