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small but excellent staff, drawn as was the Commission from diverse 

 fields and backgromids. And to insure that we do not perpetuate our- 

 selves, the enabling act prescribes that we shall cease to exist 30 days 

 after the submission of our report. 



In return for freedom from day-by-day involvement, we recognize 

 that the Congress and the President await from the Commission a 

 wholly detached assessment of the national effort in marine affairs, 

 viewed from the standpoints of science, technology, economics, se- 

 curity, and the quality of our national life. Upon this basic evaluation 

 of needs and resources, the Commission must endeavor to formulate 

 a national plan for the future w^hich will embody both vision and 

 realism. 



Within the span of your lifetime and mine there have been many 

 milestones along the path of progress. Technically among the most 

 significant have been the development of nuclear energy and the 

 penetration of outer space. Depending upon what we all are able to 

 accomplish and set in motion, history may now well record with 

 these the new exploitation of the seas. 



Yet, I should like to emphasize that the circumstances underlying 

 these forward thrusts differ profoundly from one to another. 



In the field of atomic energy a brilliant, isolated discovery in the 

 purest of sciences Avas converted with an unparalleled rapidity to 

 practical purposes — both useful and destructive. The future of atomic 

 energy, with all its stupendous implications, focuses upon the develop- 

 ment of a single device — ^the nuclear reactor. 



The triumph over outer space was the product of engineering break- 

 throughs within a relatively limited domain of technology involving 

 propellants, materials, and electronics. Although the technological 

 span of our space ventures is broader, it nonetheless is encompassed 

 within a well-defined and totally novel array of hardware. 



But the sea is an entirely different matter. From the beginning of 

 time men have sailed upon it, have fished and swum in its waters, and 

 searched along its shores. The ocean, sometimes hostile and some- 

 times generous in its moods, has always offered us its abundant 

 resources in countless ways. 



The level of marine technology has risen and expanded over the 

 years. But the driving force and urgency of today's concern for the 

 lakes and oceans comes from no one spectacular discovery or engineer- 

 ing achievement. It derives from the changing character of the world 

 itself — from mounting economic needs, from a congested population, 

 from the deteriorating countryside and shore, from a shrinking of 

 earthly dimensions as transportation becomes ever more rapid. Sud- 

 denly — within a very short time — the import of all this has begun 

 to bear in upon us. We are awakening to the enormous potential of 

 the seas and are now responding to the challenge to exploit them for 

 the greater benefit of mankind. 



But how? How shall we plan the future? How shall we set the 

 priorities ? What shoiTld we hope to achieve and how shall we go about 

 it? How, in sum, shall we mobilize and organize a truly national effort 

 on a scale in keeping with the magnitude of the needs and opportuni- 

 ties? 



Oceanology — as Senator Pell has very aptly named it, for it is a 

 more accurate word than "oceanography" — is not simply a new fron- 



