CHAPTER XVI 



PRIORITIES AND PROPERTY 



Priorities 



O 



SRD contractors spent approximately 457 million dollars 

 through November 30, 1945; and it is estimated that about 200 million 

 dollars of this amount went for material and equipment. The variety of 

 items was infinite — from airplanes to white mice, from machine tools to 

 dog food, from electronic components to sugar. Though the amount was 

 modest compared to the figures for armament procurement, it was large 

 in its own right; and its expenditure in view of competing demands was 

 an extensive undertaking. 



Prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor the Government agency for control- 

 ling material and equipment was the Office of Production Management 

 (OPM); after that event, the War Production Board (WPB). Production 

 was necessarily the keynote in the planning of these agencies. Restrictive 

 orders by the hundreds were issued, designed to channel the flow of scarce 

 materials into war equipment and to prohibit their use for other purposes. 

 The difficulty for research was not a lack of recognition of its importance 

 but the fact that the various plans for dividing scarce items were based on 

 forecasting requirements for months in advance. Normally the scientist 

 could not foresee that his research would progress to the point that in three 

 to six months he would need a specified number of radio tubes of stated 

 characteristics or a definite number of feet of wire of a certain gage. Yet 

 the absence of those tubes or that wire at a critical time might occasion 

 serious delay in a large and important program. The problem was to find 

 a way in which research could flourish within the system established for a 

 production-conscious world. 



A complicating factor was the confidential nature of the majority of 

 OSRD research and development contracts. Inability to disclose the subject 

 matter of contracts brought many problems. Even if the subject matter 

 could have been disclosed, it would have been extremely difficult for any- 

 one to judge whether a particular research project of OSRD was more 

 important than a Service production contract. The loint Chiefs of Staff 

 could determine whether ships or airplanes or tanks were most important 

 at a given time, but it was more difficult to weigh the importance of a 

 research program which might succeed or fail against an important pro- 

 duction program. 



