90. Memorandum From the Director of the Policy Planning Staff (Bowie) to the Secretary of State1
Washington, October 2,
1956.
SUBJECT
- Recommendations in the Report to the President by the Technological Capabilities Panel of the Science Advisory Committee,ODM (Killian Committee): Item 2— NSC Agenda 10/4/562
- 1.
- The Council is asked to note the status of implementation of the Technological Capabilities Panel (TCP) recommendations on “Meeting the Threat of Surprise Attack”, as presented in the several agency reports contained in NSC 5611 (“Status of National Security Programs on June 30, 1956”).3 Oral reports may be given to the Council by Defense, AEC, ODM, FCDA and CIA.
- 2.
- The draft Record of Action, which the Council will be asked to
approve:
- a)
- notes a number of changes in programs to carry out tasks assigned to Defense;
- b)
- requests Defense to supplement its Council briefing, in December, on the ICBM, with a report on the anti-missile missile program; and
- c)
-
defers decision on a follow-up study to the Killian Report, which the TCP recommended “within two years”.
(Defense and ODM differ as to the need for this: The Planning Board agreed to defer a recommendation to the Council until the ODM consults its Science Advisory Committee, the TCP parent, on whether technological advance in the past two years justifies initiation of another study at this time.)
- 3.
- Five TCP Recommendations were assigned as our primary responsibility by NSC Action 1355.4 We do not make an annual Status Report and therefore have not submitted an accounting. In the event that questions arise concerning their status, I am attaching a brief memorandum of comments you may care to use.
- Source: Department of State,PPS Files: Lot 66 D 487. Top Secret.↩
- Extracts of the Report to the President by the Technological Capabilities Panel of the Science Advisory Committee (Killian Committee) are printed as Document 9. For NSC consideration of the report, see Document 92.↩
- See Document 87.↩
- Regarding NSC Action No. 1355, see footnote 3, Document 17.↩