NATIONAL DEFENSE RESEARCH COMMITTEE

• Committee on Uranium (S-1 Section)
• DuPont Company
• National Defense Research Committee (NDRC)
• Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD)
• University of California

The National Defense Research Committee (NDRC), an effort to organize American science for war, owed its existence to Vannevar Bush. With the outbreak of World War II in Europe, Bush - an electrical engineer, former vice president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), president of the Carnegie Institution, and chairman of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics--feared that the nation was in danger of being forced into a war for which it was unprepared in terms of new weapons. After discussions with fellow scientists and administrators Karl Compton, James Conant, Frank B. Jewett, and Richard Tolman, Bush evolved a plan for a committee that would organize science in the development of the devices of warfare. On June 12, 1940, Bush unveiled his proposal, described on one page in four short paragraphs, before President Franklin Roosevelt. After ten minutes of discussion, Roosevelt approved it. Three days later, Roosevelt, by letter, appointed Bush chairman of an eight-person committee that would include representatives of the Army and Navy, the commissioner of patents, and Compton, Conant, Jewett, and Tolman. On June 27, an order was issued officially creating the NDRC. Bush would later note that

There were those who protested that the action of setting up NDRC was an end run, a grab by which a small company of scientists and engineers, acting outside established channels, got hold of the authority and money for the program of developing new weapons. That, in fact, is exactly what it was. Moreover, it was the only way in which a broad program could be launched rapidly and on an adequate scale. To operate through established channels would have involved delays-and the hazard that independence might have been lost, that independence which was the central feature of the organization's success.

The NDRC was created under the authority of the World War I Council of National Defense, from which it was to draw its funds. The NDRC was to supplement the work of the military service laboratories by expanding the research base and by recruiting scientists into war-related research. Even more important, it was to search for new opportunities to apply science to the needs of war. The NDRC was authorized to draw on the resources of other federal institutions with technical missions and laboratories, such as the National Bureau of Standards. It was authorized to enter into funding contracts with individuals, academic and scientific institutions (including the National Academy of Sciences, of which Jewett was president, and the National Research Council), and industrial organizations. The committee, in sum, would be an important new factor in mobilizing the scientific resources of the nation. The NDRC did not have to wait for a request from the Army or Navy but could judge what was needed for itself. It was not limited to advising the services but could undertake research on its own.

The creation of the NDRC was of great significance for the incipient uranium research program looking at the possibility of an atomic bomb. In his June 15 letter, Roosevelt specifically instructed that the Advisory Committee on Uranium set up in October 1939 report directly to Bush. Subsumed under the NDRC, the uranium program was freed from exclusive dependence on the military for funds. In addition, it rescued the novel field of research from the jurisdiction of an informal, ad hoc committee. By providing a place within the organizational framework of the defense effort of American science, the NDRC made it easier for nuclear scientists to advance their claims. Finally, and perhaps of equal importance, was the bringing of Bush and Conant into the atomic bomb effort. From mid-1940 to mid-1942, Bush was the key government official guiding atomic energy research. Conant, who worked closely with Bush on the issue, was a close second.

By early autumn of 1940, Bush had reorganized the uranium committee. Guided by instructions from Roosevelt, he retained Lyman Briggs, director of the National Bureau of Standards, as chairman but dropped the Army and Navy representatives because the NDRC was now the proper channel for liaison with the military. Bush, in turn, added five scientists to strengthen the scientific resources of the group. The NDRC now controlled the funds, but it remained the duty of the revamped committee to formulate the program. The committee also placed increased emphasis on security. Foreign-born scientists, which formed the core of the initial committee, were excluded from committee membership, a policy adopted in deference to Army and Navy views. Arrangements, in addition, were made, largely at the initiative of the scientists themselves, for blocking the publication of reports on uranium research.

The NDRC was a great step forward, but a year's experience revealed certain imperfections. Although it had a strong focus on research, the NDRC lacked the necessary authority to take the next step in developing and procuring new technologies. In June 1941, Bush attempted to overcome the relative weaknesses of the NDRC by obtaining Roosevelt's authorization of a new Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD) with Bush as the director personally responsible to the president. The NDRC, now headed by Conant became an advisory body responsible for making recommendations on research and development to the OSRD. The uranium committee remained within the NDRC but was somewhat enlarged and renamed the Section on Uranium. On December 6, 1941, the atomic energy program was placed under the immediate supervision of Bush. The Section on Uranium became the OSRD S-1 Section, dropping the word uranium for security reasons, with Conant providing oversight of the entire program. Total appropriations for the Manhattan Project under the NDRC amounted to half a million dollars (as compared to $14.6 million under the OSRD and $2.2 billion under the MED). In 1947 the NDRC was disbanded.

• Committee on Uranium (S-1 Section)
• DuPont Company
• National Defense Research Committee (NDRC)
• Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD)
• University of California

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