IV. Growth of the Science Office, 1966-1974 



The various obstacles that had retarded development of the science 

 office of the Department of State were overcome in part by the 

 activity and accomplishments of the office during the directorate of 

 Herman Pollack, a career Foreign Service officer with no pretensions 

 to scientific preeminence but with considerable administrative 

 experience and flexibility. 



During these years the office expanded in personnel, increased in 

 effectiveness and impact, and somewhat bettered its acceptance by 

 other elements of the Department. However, while it undertook many 

 experiments in bringing science understanding into the Department 

 there were few unqualified successes. It was never adequately manned 

 to perform both operational and staff policy functions. It became 

 overloaded with operational chores and tended to neglect other 

 commitments. The differing intellectual demands of science policy 

 and technology policy, and the differing administrative requirements 

 of science programs and technological programs, made it difficult 

 to allocate effort to deal with these four functions in a balanced way. 

 Still, these are criticisms of a dynamically evolving function in a 

 Department and an administrative environment that tended to 

 resist change and new directions of growth. 



Endorsement oj Science Program by Secretaries of State 



Secretary Rusk appears to have appreciated quite fully the im- 

 portance of science and technology for diplomacy. He was receptive 

 to the communications from the office, gave nian3'^ speeches to public 

 groups and much testimony to congressional committees stressing 

 the importance of science and technology for diplomacy, and responded 

 generously to proposals for innovative approaches to the problem 

 of making State science conscious. However, in general the Foreign 

 Service tended to be unresponsive. Assignments to SCI were not 

 usuall}'- welcome, liaison between SCI and the geographic bureaus 

 was not close, and the function was not highly regarded as a ladder 

 to promotion or an interesting career.^'^ 



Secretary William P. Rogers, who took office in 1969, similarly 

 appealed the cause of science and technology as a major concern of 

 his Department. In a number of speeches within the Department and 

 to congressional audiences he called for staff expertise in such techno- 

 logical problems as the nuclear nonproliferation treaty, Intelsat, and 

 the control of the seabed; and pledged that "Our basic goal is to put 

 science and technology at the service of human — and humane — ends.^* 



" These impressionistic observations aie gleaned from many conversations with Foreign Service officers, 

 comments in the literature, and statistics of age in grade. 



For example, the 610 page study carried out under the direction of the Deputy Under Secretary of State 

 for Administration (U.S. Department of State, Diplomacy for the 70s, A Pre gram of Management Reform for 

 the Department of State, Department and Foreign Service Series, no. 143, Publication no. 85.51, December 

 1970) gave only one-half page to science; it said in effect science was important for diplomacy, reporting 

 should be a two-way proposition, and field officers need not be trained scientists (p. 491). 



" For example, his remarks to the Scientific Attaches, January 29, 1970 and his address, "U.S. Foreign 

 Policy in a Technological Age" in U.S. Congress, House, Committee on Science and Astronautics, Inter- 

 national Science Policy, proceedings before the Committee of the Panel on Science and Technology, Twelfth 

 Meeting, January 2&-28, 1971, pp. 2-8. 



(1358) 



