SCIENTISTS AND ENGINEERS WORKING IN R&D (THOUSANDS)

800

700

600

EMPLOYMENT OF QUALIFIED SCIENTISTS & ENGINEERS IN R&D IN THE U.S. & USSR [Full Time Equiv.)

USSR

U.S.

SOURCE: NSF

NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION AND DEFENSE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY ESTIMATES

Dr. FOSTER. First of all, let us look at the United States. The U.S. effort looks like this. Here is the total number of engineers and scientists in the country as a function of time. The upper curve is the total number in the Soviet Union as a function of time. This is supplied by the National Science Foundation.

The U.S. intelligence estimate, provided by the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, shows the Soviet effort a little lower but now still above the United States. That is the total national pool that is available to do the job. Now I think, frankly, the United States does use its people more efficiently. So although in the earlier curve we show that the two countries have roughly the same total output in effort so to speak, with the same total equivalent dollars going into it, the Soviets do seem to take more manpower than the United States by something like a factor of 2.

U.S. MILITARY EFFORT

Now let me just describe what fraction of this U.S. manpower goes into our military area. You see the fraction is roughly one-third related to military and space. If you were to take the space out, it would drop about 30 percent. So, the defense portion is perhaps one-quarter of the national portion. Indeed, our defense funding is one-quarter of our national effort, which is $28 million. Our current defense and development effort is about $7 billion.

(Slide presentation.)

(Classified information was furnished separately to the committee. An unclassified version submitted subsequently is found on pp. 913– 914.)

RUSSIAN MILITARY AND SPACE EFFORTS

Dr. FOSTER. Let us take the military plus atomic energy, that portion of atomic energy associated with military. Here is the Soviet effort as a function of time. We subtracted the civil side. We then take off their space effort. This yellow band indicates the uncertainty, [deleted] regarding the U.S. dollars it would take for the space effort and the military effort. So you see, then, the resulting military effort in the Soviet area.

What is interesting about that is the following: You saw earlier the Soviet total national program. We take off roughly half and we end up with their space and military efforts. You see that has a rather steady increase as a function of time. However, around 1961 they made a decision to expand their then rather small space program. One could argue it was prompted by President Kennedy's decision to go to the moon. They made a major investment in their space effort, and to do that they cut into their military programs for a period of about 5 or 6 years. Following that, around 1967, they again went back and started funding the incremental available effort from the gross national product into the military space.

COMPARATIVE SPACE PROGRESS

Now the United States curve can be superimposed on this. It has the following characteristics. First of all, after President Kennedy's decision you can see that the United States increased its effort in space compared with that of the Soviet Union. Our effort actually went con

siderably above theirs. If you look in retrospect at the progress made by the United States in space, as compared with that of the Soviet Union, you will see with this extra effort we progressed faster than the Soviet Union and, as you know, landed on the moon first.

However, there is an interesting thing about this space activity. That is, while the Soviet effort in space has remained roughly constant since 1967, the U.S. effort, as indicated earlier, has been reduced from an amount above $5 billion down to about $3 billion.

Chairman ELLENDER. Why is it you think the Russians have not sent a person to the moon?

Dr. FOSTER. I don't know that situation well enough, sir, to venture a guess.

Chairman ELLENDER. It is, I understand, because of our computer knowledge, our being able to calculate so intricately. They are far behind. That accounts for a lot of it, I am told.

Dr. FOSTER. I have not looked into this in detail. I just don't know. I would say, however, that to land a vehicle on the moon and bring it back remotely without people takes a lot more computing capability than is required to get it down with people. Now they did that job well. That was a very impressive display. It did not have the emotional impact on the people here on earth, but to technical people it was an incredible feat.

Senator CASE. Are these equivalent efforts in dollars?

Dr. FOSTER. That is right, in dollars. Again, however, what is here calculated is the investment by the Soviet Union to get research and development done in space and in military affairs.

Senator CASE. This again goes back to your suggestion that it is an attempt to give equivalents in results.

Dr. FOSTER. That is exactly the point. As I said, this is an economist's view of what is going on [deleted]. However, we have taken an independent look not at the input of resources but at the output. We took advantage of a very significant feature of this curve [deleted].

The questions really are, "Is the Soviet effort half that of the United States, or is it double? What is the relevant effort going into military research and development?"

[Colloquy deleted.]

(Slide presentation)

[Classified information was provided to the Committee.]

DUPLICATION OF EFFORT BY U.S. AND NATO ALLIES AND BY WARSAW PACT

COUNTRIES

Senator CASE. Mr. Chairman, may I ask a question?

Chairman ELLENDER. Certainly.

Senator CASE. What about measuring and adding to our own effort, all the free world technology and research on our side and then adding what is available to the Russians outside Russia on their side?

There are very substantial efforts aside from our own. Secretary Laird for instance, said we should have common efforts with our allies to save money. Have you measured that in any way?

Dr. FOSTER. Yes, sir, I have. The total NATO military R. & D. effort, excluding the United States, amounted to about [deleted] in 1970. Compared with the U.S. effort of about $7 billion, it is relatively small. Unfortunately, this effort has two other characteristics. One, most of

the work underway in NATO is also being performed in the United States.

Senator CASE. Isn't that a wasteful duplication?

Dr. FOSTER. It is indeed.

Second, most of the effort going on in the major countries of NATO, excluding the United States, is also being duplicated several times by the NATO partners. So for this reason I can't add the NATO contribution directly to ours. A similar thing is happening in the Warsaw Pact countries.

Senator CASE. For practical purposes, why can't we agree to get together and wash out the duplications? In some cases we are doing things that they have done better, [deleted]. It is better than our Chapparal or Vulcan, Hawk, or SAM-D. That is an opinion, but would you talk to that point at the proper occasion?

Dr. FOSTER. Yes, sir, I would like to come to that, if I may, at a later point.

SUPERIOR RUSSIAN AND UNITED STATES TECHNOLOGICAL AREAS

Chairman ELLENDER. I wish you would also continue on this. Judging from what you have been saying, we didn't get our dollars' worth. There have been waste and duplication.

Dr. FOSTER. No, sir, I don't believe that is what I said at all.

Chairman ELLENDER. You did not say that, but I have come to the conclusion from the charts you have been showing us. You evidently didn't get your dollars' worth in this country. That has been the trouble, in my opinion.

Dr. FOSTER. I believe there is no evidence in what I have shown you that could lead to your conclusion.

Chairman ELLENDER. No, but in your trying to make a comparison with Russia, I would come to that conclusion.

Dr. FOSTER. I don't understand, sir. What I did say

Chairman ELLENDER. What you are trying to say here is that you need the money because Russia is so far ahead of us in certain categories.

Dr. FOSTER. No, sir. I would like to summarize what this information, general as it is, means.

No. 1, the United States is technologically ahead of the Soviet Union by 2 to 3 years on the average. That does not mean that there aren't areas where we are ahead 5 or 8 years. It doesn't mean that there are not areas where the Soviets are ahead by a few years. Both are true. But on the average we are ahead 2 to 3 years.

AIRCRAFT AREA: TACTICAL AND FIGHTER AIRCRAFT

Senator YOUNG. May I ask this question? In the airplane development area, haven't they put forth more effort in recent years?

Dr. FOSTER. Yes, sir; that is the case. If I may show the chart on the tactical side, [deleted].

As you gentlemen have reminded us on a number of occasions, we did not make a major effort in tactical aircraft in that period.

Senator YOUNG. When the Russians specialize on one thing, they do

a pretty good job, don't they?

Dr. FOSTER. No question about that, sir-a first-class job.

LARGER RUSSIAN EXPENDITURE IN HEAVY ENGINEERING HARDWARE

The second point I would make is that the Soviet equivalent effort is today larger than that of the United States by about 40 or 50 percent-that is, larger by about $3 billion in 1968 dollars. That increase resulted from the difference in trend between the funding patterns of the United States and the Soviet Union (which were roughly equal) in 1968 and reflects the situation in 1971.

Let me explain to you what $3 billion looks like.

First of all, it can't be in research. It can't be in exploratory development or advanced development.

Senator YOUNG. Are you talking about military R. & D.?

Dr. FOSTER. I am talking only about military R. & D. (Slide.) This $3 billion is mainly in heavy engineering hardware, 70 to 80 percent of it. Let me show you the U.S. program. Here is a total of a little over $7 billion, and in our program major efforts like the air defense programs, the strategic missiles, the tactical air superiority aircraft, the major ASW efforts and so on-all those add up to about $3 billion. This $3 billion brings us down to the relatively smaller programs. The Soviet effort today is larger in equivalent U.S. dollars by essentially that much.

Now of course it is not all distributed in major programs. Presumably it is distributed among some major programs, some advanced development, some additional base facilities, some more research, and so on. But one would have to put in about [deleted] major programs the size of our B-1, F-15, ULMS, F-14 and Minuteman programs and

so on.

Now that effort that has reached a differential of about $3 billion today was initiated back in 1968. So, it is still too early for us to know anything about the results. [Deleted.]

[Deleted.] Now it may be that these new silos that Senator Jackson mentioned the other day and to which Secretary Laird has referred are the first of a number of such systems. [Deleted.]

But it also means that we are in for some major Soviet surprises about which we can do very little at the moment because we do not know what they will be.

POSSIBLE FUTURE RUSSIAN TECHNOLOGICAL SUPREMACY

There is no question but that this additional Soviet effort-even if held constant for the next 5 or 6 years, with all of the growth in their GNP devoted to things in the civilian sector-will by the latter part of this decade give them technological superiority if we maintain our current level of effort. There is no way to avoid that.

Senator YOUNG. Under their system-I certainly don't defend it— they can, if they want to, put more money into research and development on military matters while making their people sacrifice in other areas, which we can't do very well.

Dr. FOSTER. Yes. It is perhaps true that they will not stop at the $10.5 billion or so equivalent that they currently appear to be devoting to military research and development. They may go on up to $12, $15, $18 billion and just aggravate the situation. But I am saying that, even if they held it constant at $10 or $11 billion, whatever it is at the moment, and we were to stay at a constant effort, increasing 4 or