DEMOBILIZATION OF OSRD 319 



Navy Materiel Inspector, and execute a blanket receipt for all expendable 

 items which might be in the possession of the contractor without any in- 

 ventory thereof being made. Ten transfers were made under tripartite 

 agreements, while seven transfers were handled on the above basis. 



In general, as the end of hostilities approached, the Services became 

 more reluctant to accept OSRD contracts by transfer. Therefore, OSRD 

 contracts were allowed more and more to expire in accordance with their 

 termination dates, and the Services undertook to write their own contracts 

 for the continuation of the projects. 



Pursuant to the CMR demobilization plan forty-two CMR projects were 

 transferred to the Public Health Service. In each case the OSRD contract 

 was allowed to terminate and a new contract to take its place was exe- 

 cuted between Public Health Service and the contractor concerned. 



Twenty-three contracts in the medical field were transferred to the Office 

 of the Surgeon General of the Army. Transfers were accomplished in each 

 case by use of the standard tripartite supplement of assignment, except 

 that OSRD agreed to reimburse the contractor for all expenditures in- 

 curred prior to the date of transfer and undertook to secure from the con- 

 tractor technical and invention reports with respect to all work performed 

 up to the transfer date. 



Plans for a Successor Agency 



Recognizing the desirability of a continuing participation by civilian 

 scientists in military research and accepting the fact that OSRD would 

 go out of existence shortly after the end of the war, the Secretaries of War 

 and the Navy established, on June 22, 1944, a Committee on Postwar 

 Research under the chairmanship of Charles E. Wilson, Vice-Chairman of 

 the War Production Board. The Committee was charged with studying 

 the postwar research and development needs of the armed services and 

 recommending a plan for meeting those needs. It recommended the creation 

 within the National Academy of Sciences of a Research Board for National 

 Security composed in approximately equal parts of civilian scientists and 

 military men, with the latter consisting of equal numbers from the Army 

 and Navy. This Board could start functioning without delay, it could be 

 financed by transfers from Army and Navy appropriations until Congress 

 could make appropriations directly to the Board, and when Congress was 

 ready to set up a research organization on a permanent basis, all or any 

 desired part of the Board's organization could be transferred to the new 

 agency. 



The Wilson Committee report was accepted by the Secretaries. At their 

 request the Academy set up the proposed Board which was ready to func- 

 tion until it was completely blocked by the refusal of the Bureau of the 



