236 ORGANIZING SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH FOR WAR 



the WPB (which had replaced the OPM shortly after Pearl Harbor) dele- 

 gated responsibility for administering OSRD's priority program to the Army 

 and Navy Munitions Board. 



By July 1942, the priority rating structure required revision because the 

 AA rating originally intended as an emergency rating for limited assign- 

 ment, had been assigned to a considerable number of Service production 

 contracts. As a result the A-i-a rating, which had hitherto been used for all 

 important war production and for OSRD research as well, became increas- 

 ingly ineflfective. The WPB then amended the priorities structure to provide 

 for five categories of AA (AA-i, -2, -3, -4, -5) for war work and superim- 

 posed AAA as the emergency rating. The Joint Chiefs of StafI recommended 

 and the WPB approved certain production and other programs for the 

 various ratings. Among these was that research programs and pilot plants 

 of the OSRD, Army and Navy should be placed in the AA-3 category. This 

 lowered the position of research to fourth place in the priorities structure 

 where formerly it had been in second place. The rating covered all materials, 

 supplies and equipment needed with the exception of machine tools, build- 

 ing construction materials, and office equipment which required special 

 handling. 



Fortunately, OSRD was able to obtain AA-i and AA-2 ratings for certain 

 of its contracts and for portions of others where it could be argued that the 

 development work had reached the prototype stage or where operational 

 use of the devices would begin in a comparatively short time. This was an 

 informal arrangement but it helped to solve the problem for some of the 

 larger contractors, especially in the field of electronics. 



In July 1942, the WPB also announced the Production Requirements 

 Plan. This plan provided that manufacturers and others who could antici- 

 pate their requirements for three months in advance could be given ratings 

 upon the submission of such information and approval of the program by 

 WPB. Only a few of the larger OSRD contractors, such as M.I.T. for the 

 Radiation Laboratory and C.I.T. for the rocket program, could take advan- 

 tage of this plan and thereby receive sufficiently high priority ratings for 

 their purposes. 



In time some new projects for the production of limited amounts of 

 equipment for Service use or test were placed in the higher categories, but 

 most of the OSRD contractors were forced to struggle along with the AA-3 

 rating assigned to research. They were able, of course, to apply for out-of- 

 line ratings through the priorities section and so were not permanently 

 stymied in the procurement of materials, but this made for much paper 

 work and was naturally slow and cumbersome. 



In September 1942, at the request of OSRD the WPB set up an out-of-line 

 priority rating procedure which made it possible to receive ratings including 

 AAA where designated persons in the safety and technical equipment 



