Science Advice to the President: During and Immediately after World War II.

摘要

At the time of the outbreak of World War II the United States had little capacity for science advice to the President or the Organization of American Science for War. The National Academy of Sciences, created by an Act of Congress in 1863, and the National Research Council, created by an Executive Order in 1918, were in the position to be helpful, but they were not government agencies supported by the Congress and reporting directly to the President and were, therefore, not designed to focus attention on such relatively narrow portions of the field of science as those concerned with the instrumentalities of war. A more effective organization was the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), established by Congress in 1915 ''to supervise and direct the scientific study of the problems of flight.'' President Roosevelt, in June 1939, directed the NACA to become a consulting and research agency for the Joint Army and Navy Aeronautical Board at the outbreak of a national emergency. For some years prior to the outbreak of the war, the members of the NACA had become acutely conscious that they were living in a pre-war period. Vannevar Bush became chairman of the NACA in 1939. After the outbreak of war in Europe, Bush's thoughts turned more and more to the need for an overall organization of science for war. It was at his initiative more than anyone else's that an apparatus for science advice to the President and the gearing of science for aid to the war effort took place. 15 figs. (ERA citation 14:025260)