49 



again is where the Council can come in and be effective with the Vice 

 President as its Chairman, in vesting to the Secretary of the Depart- 

 ment of Defense the need for the development of this deep search 

 vessel, the salvage vessel. 



From my undrstanding there is some concern as to the emphasis 

 being placed on this hj the Department of Defense. I think the Navy 

 is placing the emphasis, but I am not so sure that the Department of 

 Defense is placing the proper emphasis. What would be your comment 

 on that? 



Dr. Wenk. First of all, the Navy is the major sponsor of research 

 and development in the sea. Fifty-eight percent of the total Federal 

 program comes from the Navy. This is oriented toward the Navy's 

 immediate needs, but there is a very substantial part of the research 

 they do that benefits the other agencies and benefits industry. 



We can show these benefits clearly. One of the most beautiful ex- 

 amples I know is the navigation satellite. This was developed by the 

 Navy in reference to its fleet ballistics missile program, but with its 

 evolution the opportunity developed to declassify this program. 



With initiative from the council just about 2 months ago there was 

 concurrence from the Department of Defense to make it possible for 

 industry in the United States to manufacture and make available for 

 sale in the United States the receivers necessary to tune in on that 

 navigation satellite. This is going to help our merchant fleet. It is 

 going to help people doing oceanographic research who need to know 

 their positions far more accurately and it is going to help the offshore 

 oil industry, because they must know their location precisely. 



This is an example where a piece of apparatus designed entirely with 

 Navy funds and without a single other Federal dollar going into this 

 can be made available to other parts of our society. 



Mr. EoGERS. I am concerned about this search vehicle. I understand 

 the contract has not been let. It was supposed to be in October, but 

 now I understand it may be November or budgetary problems may 

 come into the picture. 



Here is an area where I think we can be helpful to industry by 

 developing such a vehicle and bringing about the teclinique of know- 

 ing about the fuel system that we use, all about the buoyancy, the 

 propulsion and how deep we can go and then, of course, the other pro- 

 gram where you have salvage. Certainly that can be geared toward 

 industry very simply if we have a vehicle and the capacity to go down 

 and salvage, and certainly we should have learned our lessons by the 

 Thresher and the atomic bomb off Spain. We need to develop these 

 programs, and we have not yet done it. 



I realize that this is a primary function of the Department of De- 

 fense and Navy in this particular field, but I think it is of such impor- 

 tance to the overall field of oceanography that the council must give 

 some impetus and put some pressure in the right places to see that the 

 emphasis is given to these programs. 



I wanted your feeling and the feeling of the Vice President perhaps 

 on this. 



Dr. Wenk. You put your finger on an area in which the council has 

 taken an explicit interest — in this matter of a deep sea capability, in 

 full recognition of the Thresher disaster and also the lost but later 

 recovered unarmed nuclear weapon off Spain. 



