13. Presidential Review Memorandum/NSC–311
TO
- The Vice President
- The Secretary of State
- The Secretary of Defense
ALSO
- The Secretary of the Treasury
- The Secretary of Commerce
- The Secretary of Labor
- The Secretary of Energy
- The Director, Office of Management & Budget
- The Chairman, Council of Economic Advisers
- The Director, Arms Control & Disarmament Agency
- The Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff
- The Director of Central Intelligence
- The Assistant to the President for Domestic Affairs and Policy
- The Director, National Science Foundation
- The Director, Office of Science & Technology Policy
- The Chairman, Nuclear Regulatory Commission
- The Administrator, NASA
SUBJECT
- Export Control of US Technology
The President has directed that the SCC review our policy on the export control of US technology transfer to Communist countries. The review should develop options for Presidential decision concerning objectives, criteria, control measures, organizational arrangements, and possible legislative initiatives regarding export control. The review should provide the basis for reports on these matters called for by recent legislation and recommend guidelines for US participation in the upcoming review of the COCOM list.
The review should include:
• An examination of existing policy, criteria and current mechanisms for control of technology transfer and an evaluation of the degree to which the objectives of such control have been attained.
• An assessment of the military, political, and economic implications for the US and its allies of technology transfer to the various Communist states and an evaluation of how trade-offs among these [Page 51] factors are and should be made. To place this assessment in perspective, an evaluation should be carried out of the implications for US of technology transfer to other industrial and Third World countries.
• An evaluation of which technologies, and in what form, are most in need of control, together with development of criteria and recommended procedures for carrying out such control.
• An analysis of the policies of COCOM and non-COCOM supplier states regarding the transfer of technology to Communist states, including the likelihood of obtaining cooperation by other key supplier countries.
• An assessment of the advantages and disadvantages of establishing varying standards of export control for specific Communist states, together with development of criteria and procedures for applying such control.
• Identification of the interaction between export control and US policies on related issues (non-proliferation, arms transfers, and North-South technology transfer).
The review should draw on existing PRM responses and other studies. It will be chaired by Ben Huberman on behalf of the NSC and OSTP staffs. It should be submitted for discussion by the SCC by November 1, 1977.2
There will be a follow-on interagency study dealing with the use of US technology transfer as a positive influence in North-South relations.
- Source: Carter Library, National Security Council, Institutional Files, Box 3, Unclassified/Declassified PRM and PD/NSC Documents. Confidential.↩
- No Presidential Decision was drafted out of the PRM. The PRM report, finalized in March 1978, called for the creation of an NSC Technology Transfer group to deal with technology transfer issues and coordinate administration policies. The PRM recommended that the policy continue as set, evolving toward increasing control over sensitive technologies and associated end products. (Carter Library, National Security Affairs, Staff Material, Europe, USSR, and East/West, Putnam Subject File, Box 30, East-West Economic Relations: 3–8/1978) In an August 14 memorandum to several agencies, Ben Huberman of the National Security Council Staff circulated an action plan for implementation of PRM 31. (Carter Library, National Security Affairs, Brzezinski Material, General Odom File, Box 40, PRM–31 [Technology Transfers to Communist Countries]: 3/74–8/78)↩