CIA RELATIONS WITH AIR FORCE ON ESTIMATES OF SOVIET INTENTIONS.

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP84-00022R000200040047-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 21, 2000
• Sequence Number: 47
• Publication Date: December 23, 1948
• Content Type: MF

Transcribed for ABD by cem
28 August 1953
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23 December 1948
MEMORANDUM FOR: THE DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE
SUBJECT: CIA Relations with the Air Force on Estimates of Soviet
Intentions.
1. My understanding of the origin of the March "wax scare"
is that General Clay wrote a letter to the Secretary of War in
which he stated that although he had no specific evidence to
support his position he had a distinct "feeling" that the USSR
might resort to military action in the near future. I never saw
Gen. Clay's letter.
2. After this letter was discussed in the Department of the
Army, as I understand it, General Chamberlain called a meeting of
the Directors of the IAC Agencies to discuss the sitution. At
this meeting, after considerable general discussion, it was decided
to appoint an ad hoc working committee representing all the IAC
Agencies to make a quick reassessment of Soviet intentions for the
next 60 day period and report back to the Directors of the agencies.
3. I was appointed chairman of this ad hoc committee. Within
a few days this committee submitted a report to a second meeting of
the Directors of the IAC Agencies. The Directors did not accept
the full report but decided instead to submit to the President, and
to publish as a CIA Special Evaluation, a short three paragraph
statement under the title, "Reassessment of Soviet Intentions for
the Next 60 Days", dated 16 March 1948.
4. The ad hoc committee continued its studies and subsequently
published three additional estimates as follows:
1. "Possibility of Direct Soviet Military Action During
1948", (ORE 22-48), 2 April 1948.
2. "The Strategic Value to the USSR of the Conquest of
Western Europe and the Near East (to Cairo) Prior
to 1950" (ORE 58-48), 30 July 1948.
"Appendices to ORE 58-48", 27 October 1948. (Nos.
2 and 3 were under the code name Project 50)
5.
In September the ad hoc committee was reassembled to review
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ORE 22-48, "Possibility of Direct Soviet Military Action During
191.8", and to extend the period under review to the end of 19149.
This was published on 16 September 19148 as ORE 22-148 (addendum).
6. The following procedures were followed in the preparation
of the above estimates:
a. The paper submitted to the second meeting of the
Directors of the IAC Agencies was based upon a draft which I had
submitted for the consideration of the members of the ad hoc
committee.
b. In the preparation of ORE 22-148, "The Possibility of
Direct Soviet Military Action During 19148", the representative of
each agency on the ad hoc committee submitted a draft. I then
prepared a new draft on the basis of the submissions, which, after
review and amendments by the committee, was accepted as the final
paper,
c. The basic work on ORE 58-148 (Project 50) was prepared
by four interdepartmental subcommittees which studied, respectively,
the military, economic, political and scientific aspects of the problem.
On the basis of these four subcommittee studies, I drafted the paper
which, after consideration and amendments by the committee, was
published as ORE 58-148. The subcommittee reports were subsequently
published as Appendices to ORE 58-148.
25X1A d. The draft for ORE 22-148 (Addendum) was prepared by
of CIA after the ad hoc committee had discussed ORE 22-48
and agree upon the changes which it considered necessary.
7. As already indicated, these estimates have all been published
and distributed to the authorized recipients of CIA studies. You
will recall that after ORE 22-148 was in print, General MacDonald,
Director of Intelligence, USAF, submitted an elaborate comment,
which amounted to a dissent, and, which was attached in dittoed form
to the published paper. The Office of Naval Intelligence also made
a minor notification in. the conclusions. You may recall also that
you had authorized publication of this study without resubmission
to the Directors of the Intelligence Agencies. ORE 58-48 (Project
50) included, as Enclosure B to the report, an elaborate dissent
by the Intelligence Organization of the Department of the Air Force.
This dissent represented the opinion of the Director of the Air
Force Intelligence Organization and was prepared after the original
paper had been agreed to by the Air Force working members and after
changes had been incorporated which the Air Force memberkad
anticipated would meet the objections of the Director.
8. To my knowledge, ORE has never seen during this period any
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Air Force estimate on Soviet intentions except the preliminary
draft submitted, along with those of the representatives of the
other agencies, for the preparation of ORE 22-i8. We have certainly
never seen any Air Force estimate that could be described as likely
to involve this country in war nor did we see any estimate in
Soviet intentions to attack Scandinavia as reported by the Alsops.
It is quite true, however, that at the time of the preparation of
the 60 day estimate for the second meeting of the IAC Directors and
of ORE 22-4e, the Air Force elements were far more alarmistthan
any of the others and would probably have preferred that the
possibility of Soviet military action be more strongly emphasized.
9. During a number of interviews with representatives of the
Hoover and the Dulles-Jackson Committees, I made the following
comments with reference to the necessity for an independent, top
level agency such as CIA to make intelligence appreciations and
estimates for the policy makers of the Government.
a. I stated that it was virtually impossible under present
circumstances to get a completely objective intelligence estimate
from the Service departments, as they were unable to free themselves
from the influences of departmental policy and budgetary interests.
b. As illustrative of this point, I told the committee
representatives that in the preparation of ORE 22-I8, the G-2
representative had stated that General Chamberlain wanted to have
included in the estimate a recommendation for the draft and universal
military training, which I emphatically refused to consider. I also
told them that the Air Force was far more alarmist than the rest
of the committee members and that everyone noted a marked change in
their attitude after the 70 Group Air Force had been obtained. I
may also have made reference to the fact that it was frequently the
tendency of the military departments too readily to translate
capabilities into intentions without giving due weight to the wide
range of political, economic and psychological considerations that
enter into the decision of any nation in resorting to military action.
10. I have very strong convictions concerning the points made
in 9 above, which are applicable to the State Department as well
as to the military Services, and I would be prepared to restate
these views under any circumstances.
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