April 1971

From The Space Library

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Current revision

NASA issued Funds for Research, Development, R&D Plant and Scientific and Technical Information, Fiscal Years 1970-1972: Annual Report to The National Science Foundation. In FY 1972 budget, NASA was seeking authorization of $3.271 billion. Effect on programs would be: Funds for basic research would remain at FY 1970 level in FY 1971 and rise in FY 1972, reflecting increased funding for Viking and initiation of outer planets Grand Tour project. In applied research, estimates for FY 1971 reflected 10% increase over 1970 and slight increase in FY 1972, primarily for earth re- sources surveys and space station. Budget authority for development activities would decline in 1971 and 1972, primarily as result of completion of Apollo program and reduction in NASA-AEC NERVA program effort. R&D funds were requested in FY 1972 for space shuttle technology and engine development facilities. (Text)

A1A Aerospace Research Center published National Technology Support: A Study of Research and Development Trends and Their Implications: New patterns were emerging in magnitude and direction of R&D in U.S. "Recent R&D trends reflect diminishing governmental leadership in R&D which could lead to an erosion of the national research effort. The impact of continued inflation, the higher costs and longer lead times associated with increasingly sophisticated projects, plus accelerated efforts to meet specific national goals, suggest an even greater degradation of the total R&D effort than an examination of expenditures would indicate." Recent growth of industrial financing and leveling of Federal funding indicated shift in direction of national R&D activities. "Whereas industrial research and development has focused primarily upon product improvement and product development, most of the nation's basic research and the high risk, high cost activity has been financed by the Federal Government. Although their respective R&D programs frequently are complementary, certain technological projects traditionally initiated or sponsored by the Federal Government are beyond the financial scope of private enterprise. Consequently, a reduction in Federal R&D activity could have a negative impact on the level of sophisticated effort nationally." Investments in higher education, level and nature of Federal R&D support, and utilization of existing manpower "provide some indication of the long-term scientific and technical capability of the nation. Previous Federal support of certain programs has had a feedback effect on the desirability of pursuing certain careers. Thus the failure to consider the long-term relationship among various fields of science implies future imbalances." Establishment of longer range R&D priori-ties and well defined national technological strategy was needed. (Text)

Challenge of educational satellite telecommunications was discussed in Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists by Delbert E. Smith: While advances in comsat technology promised to revolutionize global communication, "it is not certain that educational uses of such a satellite system will develop concomitantly. They may, in fact, be lost in the speed with which our society utilizes the more spectacular and commercially viable facets of the medium." Educational Satellite Center at Univ. of Wisconsin had been established to work toward "fuller understanding of the social, cultural, political and legal consequences of the inevitable massive transformations in global communication patterns which are imminent." Objectives of EDSAT Center were: to provide focus for multidisciplinary research and training in educational and social applications and impact of comsats, to develop working models for application of satellite telecommunications systems to educational and social problems, to develop and maintain satellite transmission and reception capability for integration of hardware and software research, and to disseminate information on educational and social applications of space telecommunications. (Bull of Atomic Scientists, 4/71, 14-8)

Changes and chances in U.S.-U.S.S.R. foreign affairs were described by Dr. Hans J. Morgenthau of Univ. of Chicago and City Univ. of New York in Foreign Affairs: ". . future of American-Soviet relations is shrouded in uncertainty. Neither amity nor enmity is foreordained. Those who proclaim the inevitability of conflict on ideological grounds are as wrong as those who assert the inevitability of peace, or even friendship, because the United States and the Soviet Union have become more restrained in words and deeds in dealing with each other. The future depends first of all upon how the two governments conceive of their respective interests and how they will go about defending and protecting them. If they conceive of them in compatible terms and pursue them with appropriate concern for each other's sensibilities, the future might well witness the realization of Roosevelt's dream, Stalin's grand design, and Mao's nightmare: the cooperation of the United States and the Soviet Union in establishing and maintaining a modicum of order in the world. Otherwise the world will continue to hover on the brink of self-destruction." (Foreign Affairs, 4/71, 428-41)

Study completed by TRW Inc. for DOD and CIA estimated that multiple warheads flight-tested to date with Soviet SS-9 ICBMs were not accurate enough to knock out U.S. Minuteman ICBMs in surprise attack. Study said. warhead accuracy probably could not be improved enough with current techniques to achieve first-strike capability. (Getler, W Post, 6/17/71, Al)

NSF published Research and Development in Industry, 1969: Funds, 1969; Scientists & Engineers, January 1970 (NSF 71-18). In 1969 industry spent $18.5 billion for R&D-6% above 1968 level of $17.5 billion and 5 times amount spent on R&D in 1953. Increase in 1968-1969 was due to increase in companies' own funds. Between January 1969 and January 1970 full-time equivalent number of R&D scientists and engineers employed in industry dropped from 387 100 to 380 600. Decline -first recorded by NSF in 13-yr series of reports, was primarily caused by cutbacks in personnel working on Federal R&D programs. Most of R&D unemployment among scientists and engineers occurred in aircraft and missiles industry. Number of R&D professionals in DOD programs remained level between 1968 and 1969. Federal Government was source of 47% of R&D dollars spent by industry during 1969, down from 59% in 1959. DOD and NASA furnished 89% of Federal R&D funds to industry in 1969 and supported 89% of industrial scientists and engineers working on Federal programs, at average annual cost of $56 200 each. In 1969 industry financed 53% of its R&D with its own funds, increase from 41% in 1959. Industry allocated 3% of its 1969 R&D funds to basic research with more than 50% of this amount spent on physical sciences. (Text)

Government Executive editorial noted that many experts feared "nation's wealth of technological brainpower has . . . been clobbered by budget cuts close to the point of no recovery, And history records so consistently it's become a politico-economic truism that the civilization which does not face up to these technological challenges sooner or later becomes captive of the civilization which does." (Govt Exec, 4/71, 9)

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