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...technologies during the war left a lasting imprint on the AAF leader. Radar, atom bombs, and jet aircraft made it clear that the next war would look little like the last. After the war, Arnold ensured that the (AAF) would foster relationships with the scientists and engineers who created the technologies needed to win the next war. Perhaps the most important of Arnold's postwar actions to ensure technological prowess was to place his protege, a little-known colonel, in the new position of scientific liaison. The choice of Col. Bernard Schriever to be the Air Force's scientific point man would prove to be a masterstroke.
As scientific liaison, Schriever would meet some of the nation's most brilliant scientists, who after World War II would move into prominent positions of power. Schriever would find himself appointed to progressively more influential positions in the Air Force, heading the United States' top priority intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) program with unprecedented authority, and eventually leading the Air Force Systems Command, itself based upon Schriever's design.
Schriever promoted two major ideas: that scientifically-driven innovation was crucial to the Air Force, and that management of these innovations required leadership and authority just as much as the operational Air Force. Inspired by the scientists' vision of technical change, Schriever led the Air Force's development of ballistic missiles, and then its push into space. His career showed that the Air Force need not wait for technical development, but could lead and direct it.
Early Career--An Introduction to the Scientists
Bernard Schriever was born on September 14, 1910 in Bremen, Germany After his father, who worked in the merchant marine, was interned in New York in 1916, the rest of the family came to the United States, settling in Texas where some of his father's relatives lived. After his father died in 1918, in an industrial accident, his mother had to raise Bernard and his brother Gerhard by working as a housekeeper, and selling refreshments at a golf course.(2)
Bernard worked at the local golf course, becoming an exceptional golfer in the process, a skill that would serve him well in his military career. He graduated in architectural engineering from Texas A&M, and then became a reserve officer in the Army Air Corps. In 1933, upon completion of flight training, he became a bomber pilot and maintenance officer under Lt. Col. "Hap" Arnold. The two became close, partly because of the friendship between Schriever's mother and Arnold's wife. Arnold became Schriever's mentor and friend, even so far as hosting Schriever's wedding in 1938 at Arnold's home. Schriever, who at that time had left the Air Corps to be a pilot for Northwest Airlines after failing to acquire a regular commission, reapplied, becoming a second lieutenant in October 1938. (3)
Before the United States' entry into World War II, the Air Corps assigned Schriever to be a flight instructor, engineering officer, and test pilot, before attending the Air Corps Engineering School and then Stanford University from 1940 to June 1942. After receiving his masters degree in aeronautical engineering from Stanford, the Corps sent Major Schriever to the 19th Bombardment Group as the chief maintenance officer. He flew about thirty-six combat missions in the Pacific, and by the end of the war, had been promoted to colonel as commander of Advanced Headquarters, Far East Air Service Command. Since much of his work involved logistics, Schriever made critical contacts with officers from Air Materiel Command at Wright Field.(4)
After the war's end, General Arnold, now the Army Air Forces Commanding General, acted to maintain the partnership between military officers and scientists that had been so beneficial during the war. One new organization created to aid this collaboration was the RAND Corporation, spun off from an operations analysis group of the Douglas Aircraft Corporation.(5) Another was the Scientific Advisory Board (SAB), recommended and then initially chaired by eminent California Institute of Technology aerodynamicist Theodore von man. (6) The SAB, established in June 1946, was to act as a semi-permanent adviser to the AAF Staff. (7)
Arnold recognized that an external board of scientists would have little influence unless he also created internal positions that would act as bridges and advocates for scientific ideas. For this purpose he established the Office of Scientific Liaison under the Assistant Chief of Staff, Materiel, and elevated Schriever to be its first director in 1946. During his three years as Scientific Liaison, Schriever had a hand in creating the Air Force's research and development (R&D) infrastructure. These included test facilities at Cape Canaveral, Florida, in the Mojave Desert north of Los Angeles, and research centers in Tennessee and at Hanscom Field, near Boston. From these activities, he became familiar with most of the Air Force's budding R&D.
One of Schriever's main jobs as Scientific Liaison was to work with the Scientific Advisory Board, meeting many of the nation's leading physical scientists.(8) Among the more important scientists that he came to know during this time were von Karman. Princeton mathematician John von Neumann, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology physicists George Valley and Ivan Getting. This experience had a profound effect on Schriever's thinking, as he learned the possibilities and implications of the latest discoveries in science and technology. Schriever came to have a tremendous respect for these men and their visions for the future. Many years later, Schriever stated that
I became really a disciple of the scientists who were working with us in the Pentagon, the RAND Corporation also, so that I felt very strongly that the scientists had a broader view and had more capabilities. We needed engineers, that's for sure, but engineers were trained more in a... narrow track having to do with materials than with vision.(9)
With scientific prestige at unprecedented high levels after the development of radar and atomic weapons during World War II, scientists placed in positions of power throughout the defense establishment became powerful advocates for the Air Force. Because of Schriever's profound respect for their opinions and ideas, they became strong allies, with access to leaders at the highest levels of the Air Force, the Department of Defense, Congress, and even to the President. Schriever would consistently use their advice and expertise through the formation and use of advisory panels and boards. These relationships would serve him well as he moved to his next major assignment, to create plans for the Air Force's future weapons.
Scientific Vision in the Development Planning Office
After a stint at the National War College in 1949 and early 1950, the Air Force assigned Schriever to the office of the Assistant for Evaluation in the newly formed office of the Deputy Chief of Staff, Development (DCS/D). The DCS/D office came about as part of the reorganization of the Air Force to separate R&D from Air Material Command into the new Air Research and Development Command, which came into official existence on January 23, 1950. (10)
The chief of the Assistant for Evaluation Office was Dr. Ivan Getting, who had been the Chairman of the Electronics Committee of the Research and Development Board.(11) Getting assigned his deputy, Colonel Bernard Schriever, responsibility for strategic matters, while others handled tactical issues, air defense, guidance, and so on. (12)
One major task of the Assistant for Evaluation was to make plans for the development of future Air Force systems and technologies. The first attempt in this direction began in August 1950, as Getting's office was to begin "immediate preparation of development planning objectives which would point out the goal of research and development effort in relation to the strategic and operational plans of the Air Force. Such objectives would take into account future combat conditions, possibly enemy and U.S. capabilities, major requirements, etc."(13)
These objectives would then form the basis for allocating and programming of R&D funding. To generate development objectives, Getting's office could look in two directions: "operations pull" from the needs of current operations through the Directorate of Requirements, or "technology push" from the expertise of scientists and technologists. For the latter, they had ready access to the RAND Corporation specialists in analysis of future systems. In July 1951, four RAND personnel relocated to the DCS/D office under Getting, now renamed the Assistant for Development Planning.(14) They assisted with the creation of "development planning objectives," or goals for new technology development. Others in the DCSID office would translate these objectives into "General Operational Requirements," then into specific orders known as "Development Directives," and finally, allocate funds based upon these prioritized directives.(15)
In the spring of 1951, Getting left for an executive post at Raytheon, and Schriever took his place as Assistant for Development Planning.(16) He, therefore, became the point man for the new policies and procedures for technology development. Contrary to the earlier practice of asking the operational commands what their needs were, the new procedures required an analysis of future technologies, strategies, and objectives using systems analysis along with requirements from current operations to establish development planning objectives for future systems. These new, controversial methods led to battles between Schriever, who represented the scientists and the long-term future of the Air Force, with officers with a shorterterm view of their needs, like the powerful Vice Chief of Staff, Gen. Curtis E. LeMay, who vigorously fought some of Schriever's recommendations. As Schriever put it, he did not win too many of these battles, except on missiles, where there were fewer entrenched interests.(17)
A more immediate problem facing Schriever's office was a result of the Korean War. The Air Force found itself with numerous unusable aircraft, leading Vice Chief of Staff Nathan F. Twining, in January 1951, to start an investigation of the Air Force's development and maintenance processes. DCS/D chief Lt. Gen. Gordon Saville ordered the fonnation of a study group led by Schriever to analyze the problem.(18)
The group completed its study in April 1951, and released an influential staff paper called "Combat Ready Aircraft." It pinpointed two major problems with current aircraft: requirements based on short term factors, leading to continuous modifications, and insufficient coordination and direction of...
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