Department of State Atomic Energy Files
Memorandum by the Counselor (Bohlen) to the Under Secretary of State (Lovett)
Subject: Meeting in Secretary Symington’s office regarding interchange of information with Britain and Canada.
I attended as you requested the meeting in Secretary Symington’s office at 10:30 this morning concerning the handling of technological exchanges with the British and Canadians.
The first part of the meeting was taken up with the discussion between Dr. Bush1 and the Service representatives from which it developed that Bush was very dissatisfied with the way the present set-up was looking and he said there was considerable irritation on the part of his opposite members in Great Britain and Canada. He read a despatch from the Embassy in London in which the British head of their Scientific Research and Development Board complained [Page 632] at the way the system is working. The Service Departments maintained the opposite and emphasized the security aspect. The Service Departments proposed that the present SANACC set-up2 should be maintained with the addition of a representative from the NRDB, but Dr. Bush said he did not think that would be satisfactory, and said he did not quite see why State was especially interested since the policy was clear and it was only the implementation he had in mind.
I pointed out that while we were in favor of a liberal policy in regard to exchange for the general reason involving relations with the British and Canadians, we were of course not competent to decide on the degree of security risk involved in any given process for information; that that was a matter for the Service Departments to pass upon. However, I said I thought that there was the element of what might be called “political security” involved in the various countries concerned and that this sometimes varied depending upon what branches of a foreign government did receive classified technological information, citing in this case the matter of the jet planes3 and the difference between the War Office and the Admiralty on the one hand, and the civilian ministers of supply and aircraft production on the other. I further pointed out that the political relations of the receiving country such as Great Britain with other European countries had to be taken into consideration. I also pointed out that these matters were under constant change as the political situation altered abroad and that, therefore, the implementation of these policies should be kept under constant review in connection with the considerations I had mentioned.
Dr. Bush said he had not thought of that aspect of the matter and was impressed by it. He thereupon abandoned his original position that State should not be represented on the Committee to handle implementation and in effect agreed that some modification of the present SANACC set-up to include NEDB representation should be satisfactory.
The meeting thus ended in agreement and Mr. Ohly4 was asked to work out the necessary changes in present SANACC procedure on this subject to take care of Dr. Bush’s desire as modified and to submit them to the interested Departments for consideration.
I therefore imagine you will be receiving very shortly recommendations for this revised SANACC procedure.
- Vannevar Bush, Chairman of the Research and Development Board.↩
- Reference is to the State–Army–Navy–Air Force Coordinating Committee’s Subcommittee for Information Control (MIC).↩
- Reference is to the possible sale of jet aircraft and engines by the United Kingdom to the Soviet Union.↩
- John H. Ohly, Special Assistant to the Secretary of Defense.↩