177 



gress. In particular, Senator Thomas H. Kuchel, of California, asked 

 the Comptroller General of the United States, by letter of March 30, 

 1062, to inquire into this contract award. In response, an 18-page 

 analysis was prepared by the General Accounting Office and trans- 

 mitted Jmie 18. It observed that in the initial screening process, NSF 

 had used criteria and weights comparable to those used by other 

 Government agencies in selecting contractors for research and devel- 

 opment projects when the primary emphasis w^as on ''the managerial 

 and technical qualifications of prospective contractors." The fact 

 that Brown & Root and the other bidders had included cost estimates 

 in their proposals should not be regarded as of commanding impor- 

 tance. It was doubtful that "meaningful estimates of cost could have 

 been developed for a research project such as Mohole * * *." The 

 policy factors considered in the final evaluation were legitimate and 

 germane. Accordingly, the GAO report concluded, "we are unable to 

 conclude that the award to Brown & Root was not in the public in- 

 terest."' Nor had the GAO scrutiny of the award procedure revealed 

 evidence of abuse or misuse of NSF's contracting authority .^^ 



Senator Gordon Allott, of Colorado, also interested himself in the 

 Mohole contract and conducted an extensive interrogation of Director 

 Waterman of NSF during Senate appropriations hearings in 1962.^^ 

 However, the main thrust of his inquiry on this occasion concerned 

 tlie contract awnrd procedure rather than the technical aspects that 

 underlay it — and in the last analysis controlled both the magnitude 

 of the task, the magnitude of the cost, and the micertainties confront- 

 ing the contractor and NSF. 



Although the Congress, on the basis of its own investigations and 

 that of the GAO, found no reason to intervene in the contract between 

 NSF and Brown & Root, the impression was apparently widespread 

 that the selection process was tainted.^^ 



The interTriediate versus the ultimate dnlling vessel 



Brown & Root disclosed the preliminary design for the ultimate 

 Mohole drilling platform in the spring of 1963. It called for a large 

 structure (279 by 234 feet surface area) costing on the order of $40 

 million to iDuild. It would achieve the stability required for the climac- 

 tic drilling task of reaching the Mohole. But it would do so at consider- 

 able cost in mobility and ease of transiting — it could not pass through 

 the Panama Canal, or enter many of the principal harbors of the 

 world. It was too large to be drydocked. It could move at only 10 knots. 

 Its annual operating cost was estimated at $9 million (later $13 mil- 

 lion) . The large size and sophisticated design only anticipated the tool- 

 ing to be installed on the platform for the ultimate drilling: more 

 de^'elopment work would be required to complete the design of the 

 drilling system. 



21 Letter to Hon. Thomas H. Kuchel. U.S. Senate. Reproduced In : U.S. Congress. Senate. 

 Committee on Appropriations. Independent offices appropriations, 1963. Hearings before 

 the subcommittee of the * * * on H.R. 12711, maliins; appropriations for sundry inde- 

 pendent Executive Bureaus, Boards, Commissions, Corporations, Agencies and Office, for the 

 fiscal .year ending June 30, 1963, and for other purposes. 87th Cong., 2d sess. (Washington, 

 U.S. Government Printing Office, 1962), pp. 1388-1394. 



32 Ibid., pp. 1371-1426. 



2' For e-^ample, Greenberg, op. cit.. In comment on the GAO report to Senator Kuchel, 

 observed that "* * * ■whether or not the selection was in the public interest. Its appear- 

 ances were so suspect that, in addition to the growing confusion over ob.iectlves, Mohole 

 now bore the stigma of being involved In a questionable political deal." The effect, he 

 added, was to bestow on Mohole a "detrimental political Image," p. 191. 



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