President's Science Advisory Committee (PASC)

As a response to the launch of the Soviet radio satellite, 'Sputnik', on 4 Oct 1957, President Dwight David Eisenhower launched the President's Science Advisory Committee (PSAC) on 21 Nov 1957. Dr James Killian, Jr, previously Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) president, was appointed its first chairman. Dr George Kistiakowsky was appointed to that position in 1959 and served as PSAC chairman until 1961. The PASC was presented with a succession of space and national security issues in general and arms control in particular. On the advice of the PSAC, Eisenhower established the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) and the Defense Reorganization Act of 1958, which proposed a centralisation of science and technology in the newly created office of Director of Defense Research and Engineering. By the summer of 1958 PASC turned its attention towards the formulation of national security policy. Exploiting a network of working groups on topics such as reconnaissance, arms control, missiles and early warning systems, PSAC was able to give Eisenhower a succession of recommendations on disarmament, aerial and space-based reconnaissance, and banning of nuclear weapons tests. Other major areas of study included the exchange of scientific information with North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) countries and the establishment of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). As much as technical advice and information was essential, however, the PSAC was divided on political issues such as test-ban verification. In addition, subsequent administrations valued the PSAC less highly than Eisenhower did and accorded it less influence. It was disbanded by President Richard Milhous Nixon in 1973.