<--PREV Doc #7  |  Memorial Commission Home Page  |  First Term Table of Contents  |  Presidential Papers Home Page  |  Doc#  |  NEXT--> Doc #9 Document #8; January 24, 1953 To James Selden Lay, Jr. Series: EM, AWF, Administration Series: NSC The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, Volume XIV - The Presidency: The Middle Way Part I: Charting a New Course; January 1953 to April 1953 Chapter 1: Developing a spirit of teamwork   Dear Mr. Lay:1 I have today established a Committee, to be known as the President's Committee on International Information Activities.2 I have authorized and directed it to make a survey and evaluation of the international information policies and activities of the Executive Branch of the Government and of policies and activities related thereto with particular reference to the international relations and the national security of this country. It shall make recommendations to me for such legislative, administrative, or other action, respecting the said policies and activities as in its opinion may be desirable. It has long been my conviction that a unified and dynamic effort in this field is essential to the security of the United States and of the other peoples in the community of free nations.3 The Committee's final report and recommendations are to be in my hands not later than June 30, 1953, and the Committee will cease to operate thirty days after submitting its final report.4 All executive departments and agencies of the Federal Government are authorized and directed, as a matter of common concern, to cooperate with the Committee in its work and to furnish the Committee with such assistance not inconsistent with law as it may require in the performance of its functions. The establishment of this Committee and the scope of its inquiry were discussed at the Cabinet meeting Friday morning and received full and complete support. I am today appointing the following as members of the Committee: William H. Jackson, Chairman5 Robert Cutler, Administrative Assistant to the President6 C.D. Jackson, representing the Secretary of State7 Sigurd Larmon, representing the Director for Mutual Security8 Gordon Gray9 Barklie McKee Henry10 John C. Hughes11 Abbott Washburn has been designated as Executive Secretary of the Committee.12 The appointments of C.D. Jackson and Sigurd Larmon were respectively made after consultation with, and at the designation of, Mr. John Foster Dulles and Mr. Harold E. Stassen.13 A designee to represent the Secretary of Defense will be named to the Committee before the end of the month. The Committee will have its offices at 901 Sixteenth Street, Northwest, Washington, D.C. Sincerely 1 Lay served as executive secretary of the National Security Council. 2 See Galambos, NATO and the Campaign of 1952, no. 999, and n. 7 below for background on the group, which Eisenhower had begun to assemble in late November 1952. Repeating much of the language of this letter, the President at his news conference on Monday, January 26, publicly announced creation of the Jackson committee and discussed its charge (Public Papers of the Presidents: Eisenhower, 1953, p. 8; New York Times, Jan. 27, 1953). 3 For evidence of Eisenhower's longstanding interest in psychological warfare see Galambos, NATO and the Campaign of 1952, nos. 366, 392, and 999. 4 For developments see nos. 54, 481, and 624; and Public Papers of the Presidents: Eisenhower, 1953, p. 472n. 5 On Jackson, a member of the J. H. Whitney banking firm, who had served in 1950-51 as Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, see Galambos, NATO and the Campaign of 1952, no. 999. 6 Cutler was Administrative Assistant for National Security Affairs and chairman of the National Security Council's planning board (see ibid., nos. 30 and 1053). 7 In 1951 Jackson, Chief of Psychological Warfare on Eisenhower's wartime staff, had taken a leave of absence from his post as publisher of Fortune magazine to head Radio Free Europe (ibid., nos. 144, 934, 999, 1053). In mid-December Jackson had sent the President-elect a memorandum (AWF/A: Psychological Warfare) calling for an analysis of U.S. political warfare operations, an appraisal of the Soviet effort, and a set of "conclusions and recommendations as to how we should prosecute the cold war, assuming that Psychological Warfare is not a freak of one or more Department of Government, but a considered policy of the entire Government to win World War III without having to fight it." He advised setting up a committee to put the resulting plans into operation. On February 16 Eisenhower would appoint Jackson special assistant to the President "with special responsibilities in the `cold war' planning of this Administration" (New York Times, Feb. 17, 1953). 8 Larmon, an advertising company president, had served as one of Eisenhower's chief media consultants in the 1952 campaign (Galambos, NATO and the Campaign of 1952, nos. 789, 828, and 888). 9 For background on Gray, Director of the Psychological Strategy Board in 1951, see ibid., nos. 32, 366, and 550. 10 Henry, director of the U.S. Trust Company of New York and other corporations, was a U.S. Navy veteran of World War II. 11 President of McCampbell & Company, a New York textile-sales firm, Hughes was an active member of the National Committee for a Free Europe. 12 Abbott McConnell Washburn, a Minneapolis business executive, had been active in the Crusade for Freedom and in Eisenhower's campaign (ibid., nos. 312 and 923). 13 Stassen, a Minnesota Republican, had been Eisenhower's choice for Director of the Mutual Security Agency (ibid., nos. 1010 and 1026). Bibliographic reference to this document: Eisenhower, Dwight D. To James Selden Lay, Jr., 24 January 1953. In The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, ed. L. Galambos and D. van Ee, doc. 8. World Wide Web facsimile by The Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial Commission of the print edition; Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, http://www.eisenhowermemorial.org/presidential-papers/first-term/documents/8.cfm <--PREV Doc #7  |  Memorial Commission Home Page  |  First Term Table of Contents  |  Presidential Papers Home Page  |  Doc#  |  NEXT--> Doc #9

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