Office of the Historian

S/S–NSC (Miscellaneous) files, lot 66 D 95, “NSC Admin., 1950–54”

The President to the Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs (Cutler)

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Washington, March 17, 1953.

Dear Mr. Cutler: I am returning your letter to me dated March 16, 1953, with its enclosed report of recommendations regarding the National Security Council.1 I understand that in the preparation of this report you have had the assistance of the Director and Staff of the Bureau of the Budget and of the President’s Advisory Committee on Government Organization.

I approve both your letter and the recommendations, and direct that they be circulated promptly to the Council for information and guidance.

Please call the special attention of Council Members to Part VI of the Report (“Planning Board of the Council”). It is my wish that you bring to me as soon as you conveniently can the names of persons nominated by department and agency heads as Members or Advisers of the Planning Board, who are approved by you, so that I can decide on their appointments and the Planning Board can begin to function. I place great emphasis on the selection of men of high calibre for these positions, able to devote plenty of time to their Planning Board functions; for thereby the Council will be better able to operate promptly and effectively.

You will submit the appropriate budget amendments for FY 1954 to the Bureau of the Budget and take up with Mr. Steffan the arrangement [Page 258] for necessary space in the Executive Offices Building, capable of being made into a restricted security area.2

Sincerely yours,

Dwight D. Eisenhower
  1. Supra.↩
  2. On Mar. 17, Lay circulated to the National Security Council, and to the Secretary, of the Treasury, the Acting Director of Defense Mobilization, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Directors of Central Intelligence and the Bureau of the Budget, copies of this letter together with the memorandum by Cutler to the President of Mar. 16 with its enclosed report. In his covering memorandum Lay called “Special Attention” to the third paragraph of the President’s letter dealing with the Planning Board of the Council “about which Mr. Cutler will confer with you individually.” (S/S–NSC (Miscellaneous) files, lot 66 D 95, “NSC Admin., 1950–54”)↩