'WRISTON REPORT' OF THE DEPARTMENT OF STATE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP78-04718A000100250049-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 12, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 24, 2000
• Sequence Number: 49
• Publication Date: July 20, 1954
• Content Type: MF

Approved For Release 2002/05/08 :CIA-RDP78-04718A000100250049-2
State Dept. declassification & release in~ctie~is_on file
1. While much of the content of the ao-called Wriaton Report
on the Foreign Service is of interest only within the State Depart-
me~, in view of your interest in the development of Career Service
within CIA, I thoup,~rt I xould bring to your attention a quote from
that report, since it appears to have some relation to xhat the are
trying to develop here.
2. The quotation comae from section !t of the Committee's
final reports
?
"The Foreign Service has been retarded in its logical
development by a peraiaterzt belief that promotion from
the bottom is the only try incentive and that incur-
sions of elements from outside into the higher officer
grades would seriously impair both incentlves and morale.
This attitude, however, runs counter to experience in
commerce, industry, education and many other lines of
endeavor where late starters of hig}i ability often en-
rich the base and bring fresh incentive into the faded
middle years.
"It is counter to experience to assert that only a
salt-eontained ayatam into xhich entry is discouraged
save by beginning at the bottom rung can generate incentive
and bulwark morale. The Foreign Serviceta own experience
in the satisfactory abaorptioa of successive waves of
lateral entrants indicates that its Cffiaer corps is no
different from other organisations in this respect."
3. At first blush, this would seem to be a denial of the prin-
ciple of career development as xe would eventually like to aes it
applied within CIA. However, oonaidering the special problem of
State's dual labor force -departmental versus Foreign Service -
theae remarks seem to have greatest applicability to the historical
tendency of the Foreign Service to resist entry of "outlanders" except
Approved For fleasp 2rD62t05/08 :CIA-RDP78-04718A000100250049-2
 !y. Were CIA ever to develop a special bow of employees
eligible for overseas employment, Career Serviw designees or
what have you, opposed to which xae another group not eligible
for duty "ar~yxkbsro xhen and if called," xe could quickly drift
into the same kind of parochialism that prompted these remerka
over Mr. Wriaton~a signature.
5. I think that these statements might be borne in mind as
xe continue to think toward the development of Career Service con-
cepts xithin CIA, so that xe do not rua the risk of considering all
those not xithin the Career Servioo ao "second class citisena," and
so that xe do not run the danger of overselling the idea of "career
progression, fYrom bottom to top." Aa in State, I think xe x111 alxaya
have to z+ely on the infusion of nex personalities and ideas at the
middle and higher levels, especially in those areas of CIA prio~arily
devoted to research and analysis.
SA-DD/A:JAC:mrp (20 July 195k)
Distribution:
~-1 - DD/A Chrono
Approved For Release 2002/05/08 :CIA-RDP78-04J~18A000100250049-2