164 ORGANIZING SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH FOR WAR 



Laboratory to evolve suggestions and ideas for the best solution which they 

 could visualize. The Laboratory then would come up with a proposal for 

 the technical design of equipment, accompanied possibly by proposals for 

 new methods of employment. After full analysis and discussion a final 

 approach would be agreed on. From that time on the design of the equip- 

 ment was left to the men in the Laboratory. 



This governing principle came to be accepted by all concerned. It empha- 

 sized the partnership between the civilian scientists and the Services and got 

 away from any suggestion that the scientists were working for or under direc- 

 tion of the Army or Navy. Many of the most spectacular achievements of 

 OSRD resulted directly from this conception of partnership. 



Relations with the Chemical Warfare Service 



From the summer of 1940 until the summer of 1942, the relationship 

 first of Division B and later of Divisions 9 and 10 to the Chemical Warfare 

 Service (CWS) followed customary channels. These contacts proved, in 

 many ways, to be inadequate to insure co-ordination between the CWS and 

 the NDRC programs and to guarantee the absence of friction. Accordingly, 

 an arrangement was adopted during the first week of August 1942, under 

 which a representative of NDRC was placed in the office of the Chief of 

 the Technical Division of CWS in a liaison capacity. 



This "Technical Aide for Co-operation with the Chemical Warfare 

 Service" was given a course of instruction in Army procedure and in the 

 projects of the Technical Division, CWS. He visited various CWS labora- 

 tories and proving grounds. He was treated in every way as a member of 

 the staff of the Chief, Technical Division, made recommendations on either 

 OSRD or CWS projects, and attended staff meetings. 



Several very difl&cult problems had arisen concerning items developed 

 by the OSRD, so the Chief, Chemical Warfare Service, appointed a com- 

 mittee consisting of two Army oflScers and three representatives of NDRC, 

 with an Army officer as Secretary. This committee began meeting late in 

 August 1942, and continued to meet at more or less regular intervals for 

 about two years. It succeeded in disentangling several very complicated 

 situations under the broad powers given to it in the order under which 

 it operated. 



In November 1942, the OfBce of the Chief, Technical Division, moved 

 from Washington to Edgewood Arsenal, and the staff was reorganized 

 simultaneously. Under a program worked out by the CWS-NDRC Tech- 

 nical Committee as an experiment, the Technical Aide for Co-operation 

 with the CWS was put on the staff of the Chief, Technical Division, with 

 power to co-ordinate in his name in the Chemical Warfare Service the same 

 subjects over which he had jurisdiction in his capacity as Chief of Division 



