SCIENTIFIC INFORMATION AND TRANSLATION SERVICE OF FOREIGN DOCUMENTS BRANCH

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP81-00706R000100210018-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 6
• Document Creation Date: December 23, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 11, 2013
• Sequence Number: 18
• Publication Date: January 1, 1949
• Content Type: MEMO

A
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Assistant Director for SoientiAc Intallizenee
Acting Assistant Director for Operations
3clentific Information and Translation Services of Foreign
Documeuts Branch
1. The attae%ed stud discusses in detail those operations,
prmeedures, and publientions of Foreign Pocuments Branoh.mhich
are believed to be of particular interest to ymur office. It is
forwarded for your information and tat of your staff, but should
not be circulated outside of CIA. Semple copies of the publieso.
tions described in the study are contained in the accompanying
envelope (Encl. 1,9).
? 2. Data in this stud:( shouid be considared in connection with
an CIA action on the investigation or facilities fmr tronslating
Runsian technical matrial made by the Special Committee on Technis.
cal Inforeation of the Research and Development Beard, !WAIL. and
the inter-agency meeting on the subject proposed by the Executive
Director of the Committee in a nesorandum dated 13 January 1949. ?
3. Ally propvaed CIA activity in the ilelds or surveying the.
sources, availability, or procedures for procurement of U.S.S.R.
publications should similarly be coordinated with Foreign. Documents ?
BratiOh. The problems of inter..ageney coordination or tranalatien pro-
grams and a proposal for centralims?ioirof certain intOlieenee treaso.
lotion and exploitation tunctionv for the IAC agencies are eurrently
under discussion by FOB and ICAPS.
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-#,LAYMAN B. KIRKiATRICK
4nels 1
Stwly - "Sc. Inf. Service of Fr41*
(with 9 sample copier mf pablicatinno)
00 c 4 Feb. 19149
co: Addressee- Orig. &].
ICUS -1
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SCIENTIFIC INFOICATION SERVICE Or FOREIGN DOCUNITS MAUCH
1. During the past two years, F1)B/00 has been developing a com-
prehensive exploitation program designed to serve scientific intelli-
gence agencies in general are; the scientific branches of CIA in particu-
lar. Various operations have been initiated, the results of which are
available in previous and current FDB publications. The information
in these publications is obtained from overt scientific and technical
source materials in foreio languages such as: journals and periodic
eels, doctoral theses, annals of academies, societies, or institutes,
and books of all kinds.
Requirements received from the scientific branches of CIA
and the IAC agencies have determined the types of publications produced
by FDB and the subject-.area, coverage and emphasis of these publica-
tions. A direct channel between the Chief, FDB and the scientific
branches las established to facilitate the receipt and discussion of
requirements, and this procedure will be continualwith OSI. Since the
highest priority is given by FDB to requirements for translation and
information from offices within CIA, the scientific and technical for-
eign language resources of FDB are used primarily to satisfy the needs
of OSI.
2. Operations
There are several kinds of OSI reqnirements assigned to
PDB at present, each resulting in a different type of informational
report either by the instructions in the requirement or format already
approved by CIA.
There are nErploitation Requirements" *Joh indicate the
need for informatittai covering a broad range of' subjects concerning a
particular country or countries. "FDB Scientific and Technical
Periodical Abstracts" (Enc).. 1) is a good example of information
produced in answer to these. All articles of value to scientific
intelligence appearing in Russian scientific journals are abstracted,
arranged systematically, and published in batches of one hundred in
each issue of this FDB publication. The objective of this effort is
full coverage of Soviet scientific literature. H ow well this is ao-
omplished may be judged be the following figures: almost all issues
of approximately 150 different current Russian periodicals have been
continuously received over the period from January 1947 to the present,
providing material for over ninety issues of "FDB Periodical Abstracts"
making a total of almost ten thousand abstracts from Russian sources,
Selection of articles to be abstracted has been controlled by a file of
hundreds of scientific requirements assigned to FDB.
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In addition to the Abstracts, FOB also produces a Bibliography
(biol. 2) of all Russian periodicals received. The Bibliography con'
tains the title and author of every article of every issue received.
From time to time, OSI has been informed that periodicals of other
areas could be similarly exploited, however, the ooncensui of opinion
in OSI indieated that these are of secondary interest; that eoisntifio
intelligence interest centers on the USSR.
Next is the 4Guide-Type Requirement* designed to govern the
seleotion of articles in one or more allied fields for immediate re.
porting as they are uncovered. Items in answer to this type of re-
quirement are usually published in information Report form (Enol. 3)
and may consist of an extract, a sunmary, or, when material is found
in very large volume, a collection of abstracts of available data on
the subject. By means of these various devices TDB is keeping OSI
informed of the availability of all material of possible value to
Scientifie Intelligenoe.
*Informational requirements* may be oonsidered next. These
requirements indicate specific information desired. In answer to
these rim extracts the required data from source material. These are
usually published in the information Report farm though large studies
have been published as ne Translations (Ewa. 4). A scientific end
technioal oross.indexed subject file of current Soviet literature
available, drawn from all sources including *Periodical Abstracts*, is
maintained at FOB to produce rapidly information when needed.
There are *National Soientifio intelligence Requirements*
usually OA a particular subject and country and are satisfied in mudh
the same manner as "Ouide.Type.
Special requirements have been likewise assigned. *Biographic
Intelligence Register* requirement is a good example. This is designed
to build up, among other things, *A Scientific Order of Battle". This
is not published, but rather the required information concerning a
foreign scientist is filled in onea card form and is forwarded in that
fashion to the Biographical Intelligence Register. However, frequently
a roster of an entire scientific society or group of scientific
institutes is available end is then regularly published (Encl. 5).
Proper romanisation of foreign personal names is important when it is
realised that they are punched by INK or otherwise arranged in files
at considerable expense. ?DB has been using standard transliteration
systems for years producing data in a form yielding maxim= efficiency
in the files mentioned Shove, it may readily be seen that the efficiency
of a Biogeaghical Register drops considerably-when the same scientist
is filed under several romsnisstion systems.
'When an OSI Analyst has a deadline to meet, special measures
are taken by FOB and the deadline is met w*Advance.Copyo procedure.
Information produced in this way may or may not be published at A
later date. Recently, an entire book was translated and forwarded by
SEMI
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advance copy in five days. The book *Technical Standards for Petroleum
Products*, USSR, 1947 will be published shortly, some months after the
advent* copy was delivered.
Considerable effort has been made by PDS to cover current
Russian scientific books. The relevant arrival of books from the USSR
at the Library of Congress has been screened and abstracts of books of
intelligence value hare been prepared. A memorandum seeking permission
to publish the abstracts of these and all future book receipts is now
pending approval. At present PUB is ordering scientifio books from
Miaow, has prepared abstracts of 1944-48 Russian scientific books re.
ceived in PUB and is preparing to render complete servioe covering
current Russian scientific) books similar to the Periodical Abstracts,
At present Tables of Contents and some description of the more important
books available are published in the Information, Report form (Encl. 8).
Soviet Press Extracts is another regular PUB publication. It
covers the current Soviet provincial press. Though designed primarily
for economic and sociological information, all scientific information
appearing is extracted.
Further, FDB in able to use the experience of past operations
to produce new routine publications based upon foreign language material
being received designed exclusively to serve scientific intelligence
analysts. A description of these projected publications will be :lib.,
mitted to OBI for evaluation of the effort, clamant, and oonourrenee.
*In the Academy of Sciences of the USSR" is a good illustration of a
projected publication.
This Fa publication would be designed to report current
news about the Aoademy. Feature seotion of the publication would be:
a. "In the Departments". This information can be gathered
from, two or three periodicals now being received and are not
adequately treated by "Periodical Abstraots*. Information is
available concerning all activities in the various Departments
(Bnol. 7): Physical and Mathematical Science, Chemical &donee,
Geological and Geographical Science, Biological Science,
Technical Scienoe.
b. New Books (Encl. 8). This can be gathered from some
six periodicals now being received and is simply a bibliography
of new books released by the Academy during a specific period.
c. Institutes (Ewa, 9).
3. Source Survey, Procurement and Coordination
The problem of insuring that maximum acquisition of foreign
language publications is maintained by Foreign Documents Branch.has
resulted in oontinuous surveys of worldwide sources, and of govern-
mental and non-governmental organisations, to determine the existence
SEMI
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and availability of those documents which are of actual or potential
value to Intelligence agencies. During the past two years, particular
emphasis was plaoed on sources involving the procurement of publics..
tions from the USSR,
oa the domestic front, Foreign Documents Branch and the
respective IA0 agencies are cooperating an document problems swom.
passing survey, procurement, and exploitation activities. The vast
store of foreign language publications funneling into the State
Department la currently being screened and processed by this Branch.
In the field of exploitation en ad hoc oammittee composed of TAO
memberemet recently at the invitation of CIL to work out esoteric
problems of centralised translation. These are examples of projects
and arrangements that FDB has initiated in its role at coordinator
in the field of foreign language documents.
Foreign Documents Branch maintains liaison and content with
all major document repositories. Where necessary. Branch screening
teams have been sent out to repositories requiring this function.
Such:was the purpose of FDB "document team" to the Beaver Library,
Stanford University. in 1947, and to the Buropeen Command in 1948.
In the field of translation coordination. Foreign Documents
Branch is presently attempting to avoid duplication of effort with the
resultant waste of vital linguistic personnel. The majority of the
major translation activities are forwarding to Foreign Documents
Branch periodic reports of their activities and with impending CIA
approval of MA recommendations a publication will appear listing
translation activities of contributing agencies. In this sphere of
activity. ¢ral locator file of completed translations is being
built up in the Branch end will become available for use in the near
future.
SEClik
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is. ln suessary* FDD is in a position to perform any type of foreign
language exploitation function for aSI. Although currently understaffed*
MD has a nucleus of well trained foreign language intelligence epecialm
its, silo aro experiered in dealing with sclentifio and technical nsterim
ala. The Braneh. is capable of correctly Interpreting 05/1s stated re.,
quirenents* of followinl instructions to produce infornAtiMal reports
and translations to satisgr much requirements* and even of anticipating
the need() of scientific intellizanon analyets to a reasonable degree,
shnuld be increasingly oble to take on the full burden of detail inf..
volved in exploitation eq. .1'434.cn 1anua7u Jo4umums with a ninimun.ef
direction from 03I analyst's* thereby ,ielevlmj maxim= cr,nservation of
tNair tine and effort.
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