246. Memorandum From the Assistant Executive Secretary (Lay) to the Executive Secretary of the National Security Council (Souers)0

SUBJECT

  • Psychological Warfare

REFERENCE

  • SANACC 304/101

The organization proposed in SANACC 304/10 does not appear to offer a practical solution for the following reasons: [Page 629]

a.
It is proposed to establish it under either the National Security Council or the Committee of Two. The Council appears inappropriate since it is only advisory to the President and was not legally designed to supervise interdepartmental activities, with the sole statutory exception of CIA. The Committee of Two2 is an informal body like its predecessor, the Committee of Three,3 which never to my knowledge undertook to supervise interdepartmental organizations. SANACC, on the other hand, already supervises two interdepartmental organizations (Military Information Control and the Security Advisory Board) which are similar in character to that required for the coordination of foreign information and psychological warfare activities.
b.
SANACC 304/10 proposes a full-time working group headed by a specially appointed director, with separate funds and personnel. This would only create another governmental agency. Its director would be usurping the functions of the head of the State Department’s Information Service. Finally, a request for separate funds for the proposed organization would jeopardize the security of psychological warfare operations.

A much less complicated and more effective organization could easily be built along the following lines: Establish, under SANACC, a board whose functions would be to formulate coordinated policies and plans for the conduct of foreign information and psychological warfare activities and, upon their approval by SANACC, to coordinate the implementation of such policies and plans. This board would be composed of officials in the various departments and agencies who are responsible for the conduct of foreign information and psychological warfare activities. The Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs should be chairman. The other members should consist of the official in CIA charged with covert activities, and any officials in other Government departments who are responsible for similar activities. The members of the board should jointly furnish the funds and the personnel required to form a full time staff for the board.

The above plan would have the following benefits and advantages:

a.
An established interdepartmental coordinating body, SANACC, would furnish policy direction which incorporated the views of the State Department and the Departments of the National Military Establishment.
b.
A separate agency, with a new director, separate budget, and additional personnel, would not be required.
c.
The formulation of policies and plans and the coordination of their implementation would be in the hands of the officials responsible for the actual conduct of foreign information and psychological warfare activities.

James S. Lay, Jr. 4
  1. Source: National Archives and Records Administration, RG 273, Records of the National Security Council, NSC 10/2. Top Secret.
  2. Dated November 3. (Ibid., RG 353, Records of Interdepartmental and Intradepartmental Committees—State Department, Records of the State–War–Navy Coordinating Committee, Box 55, File 304, 381, Psychological Warfare Pt. 1) See the Supplement.
  3. The Secretary of State and the Secretary of Defense.
  4. The Secretaries of State, War, and Navy, who met informally under this rubric from 1944 to 1947.
  5. Printed from a copy that bears this typed signature.