SCIENCE SERVING THE NATION — DUBRIDGE 187 



potential aids to meeting them may come to mind. Similarly the 

 military officer, hearing about new weapon developments may see new 

 possibilities for their tactical use or how they could be adapted to new 

 situations. 



The idea that the function of the military is to tell the scientists 

 what weapons they need, and that the function of the scientists is 

 to deliver them without argument, is as obsolete as the idea that the 

 scientist can toss new weapons at random at the militai-y and that it is 

 their job to find a use for them. 



We must face the fact that weapon development which will keep 

 us ahead of our enemies is a tough business, and it requires the best 

 combined talents we can muster at all stages of the enterprise. We 

 have no talent to waste on either the military or civilian side. If mili- 

 tary secrecy is interfering with this intimate meeting of minds then 

 secrecy is working against national security, and it is time that real 

 security considerations come first. 



If I were to express a hope for the future of this Laboratoiy which 

 we are dedicating here today, it would be that, as it maintains and 

 develops the spirit of research that I have been talking about, it also 

 becomes a meeting place where scientists and military men discuss 

 broadly, intimately, and vigorously the problems of the military de- 

 fense of this country. Out of such discussions will come, we can be 

 sure, new and important concepts in the field of military weapons and 

 their uses. Your business and my business is not just a better device 

 for this or that purpose ; it is, rather, nothing less than the safety of 

 this Nation. And it is your responsibility and mine — not someone 

 else's — to insure that each of us is making his most effective contribu- 

 tion to that end. 



