except the universities chose not to spend it all in 1 year, but rather to have a balanced program which requires a 3-year period to complete. Mr. HECHLER. All right. Any questions by other members of the

committee?

Mr. FULTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I want to compliment the chairman. I was on the conference committee and know what a good job of selling the chairman did on aeronautics, especially on getting the young people into the program.

My question is this: How much did you request from the Office of Management and Budget for personnel? Did you apply for the full complement? Did you apply for a cut of 200 personnel, and then when you went to the Office of Management and Budget for young people. were you turned down?

Mr. JACKSON. Mr. Fulton, we went forward with the plan that world have retained the staff levels at the fiscal year 1971 level.

Mr. FULTON. You were cut 200 people by the OMB?

Mr. JACKSON. A total of 5 percent within NASA overall.

Mr. FULTON. What does that mean to you?

Mr. JACKSON. That means about 500 people out of some 10,000 that we have in the four OART laboratories.

Mr. FULTON. How many people of those would greatly diminish your capacity and competence in research and development? Of the 500, how many are the important ones?

Mr. JACKSON. I will have to answer your question this way: We will take full advantage as best we can of the attrition that does occur. Mr. FULTON. Yes; you have to live with it. I didn't ask that question. I said where does it cut? Are you losing important people? If so, how many had you asked of the OMB?

Mr. JACKSON. I will turn to the Center directors. They are in a better position to supply some specifics.

Mr. LUNDIN. At Lewis we are planning a reduction of 208 people at the end of next fiscal year. All of these 208 people are important to the work of the Center.

Mr. FULTON. How much is that in money?

Mr. LUNDIN. About $3 million.

Mr. FULTON. Now, where else? Dr. Cortright?

Mr. CORTRIGHT. I feel the same way about the people we are losing, that they are valuable. I have the option to take the cuts in the areas that I see fit and we haven't determined just where they will be. Some of them will be in aeronautics and some in space work.

Mr. FULTON. How many personnel for you and in what amount? Mr. CORTRIGHT. About the same, a little less than 200 and about $212 million.

Mr. FULTON. Where do the others come from?

Dr. MARK. A cut of about 100, a million and a half dollars. That is at Ames Research.

Mr. FULTON. So it means a total cut of personnel of 500. That is about a 5 million cut budgetwise in dollars.

Mr. JACKSON. About $412 million associated with the people. Mr. FULTON. Are all of these people important? Do they contribute in great measure to the research and development and the success of these installations?

Mr. JACKSON. Yes; they are, Mr. Fulton. We would not reduce the staff if the decision is based on their importance.

Mr. CORTRIGHT. May I add a thought to that? One thing which will help you understand why they are important is that we have been coming down in staff for a period of years and have gradually focused our remaining people and on the best programs.

Mr. FULTON. Can you put on the record, with the chairman's permission? How much has the staff been reduced through these years and in what categories?

Mr. JACKSON. Yes; and we can inform you now that in fiscal year 1969

Mr. FULTON. I would rather not take the time now.

Mr. HECHLER. I would also like to have you put in the average age level,

Mr. JACKSON. Fine.

(Information requested for the record follows:)

Because of the increased requirement for manpower in Aeronautics, as well as projects such as Viking, we have significantly decreased manpower on Space Technology effort at the Research Centers to provide for these increases while reducing total manpower. The Space Technology effort has absorbed all of the personnel reductions we have experienced over the past several years. The following chart shows these actions, by year, from the end of FY 1968, and the anticipated effect for Fiscal Years 1971 and 1972:

MANPOWER AT THE RESEARCH CENTERS AND THE SPACE NUCLEAR SYSTEMS OFFICE

The above reductions from the end of FY 1968 through the end of FY 1972 will result in 740 less Scientists and Engineers, and 870 less Technical Support people at the OART Centers.

From the end of FY 1968 to the end of FY 1970, the average age at the OART Centers has increased from 40.2 to 41.9 years, or .85 a year. We expect that the average age will increase at a faster rate during fiscal years 1971 and 1972, due to RIF actions affecting the younger portions of the population.

Mr. HECHLER. Mr. Pelly?

Mr. PELLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. WYDLER. Would you yield to me following up what the gentleman from Pennsylvania said?

Mr. PELLY. I will be happy to yield to you.

Mr. WYDLER. The amounts that you cut, what would be the normal amount of attrition of your staff? What would be the percentage of normal attrition of your staff?

Mr. JACKSON. I think maybe half of the 500.

Mr. WYDLER. Thank you.

Mr. PELLY. Mr. Jackson, am I right that the present depressed condition of the private enterprise industry that normally would contribute research at their own expenses has meant that they cannot because of cuts in military contracts and in their profits and so forth, they cannot put into research and development the amount that they have been in the past?

Mr. JACKSON. You are very correct.

Mr. PELLY. Then it is very unfortunate it seems to me that the level of research and development has been lowered because we are not compensating for their inability to do much of this themselves. Mr. JACKSON. I believe that is a good observation, Mr. Pelly. Mr. PELLY. I would believe that 110 million for airplane-oriented R. & D. is completely inadequate. I think particularly-Doctor, you mentioned STOL. That has a very high priority, as I understand, in the Air Force, in the military need, but they don't care whether it is noisy or it pollutes the air or any thing. All they have to do is get something that serves their purpose.

Now when we utilize and think of the great need that we have in the civilian field for a STOL plane, and we have got to have a quiet engine and the research is so very important.

Mr. JACKSON. Yes; that is so correct. I might add, Mr. Pelly, though, that the Air Force is joining with us on this experimental airplane program. They are on the sidelines, but if the situation is right for them, they would hope that they might obtain a military derivative of this aircraft should it go to the point that it is in production for the civil aviation fleet. And as they are sitting with us, they are quite concerned about noise and pollution. They recognize that there will be a need for them to operate their aircraft out of civil airports. They are anxious to take full advantage of the reduction in noise levels that can come out of the civil program.

Mr. PELLY. Well, year after year after year members of this committee have spoken for greater emphasis on research and I had sort of been led to believe that maybe we were going to get it this year, but certainly I don't see it in the budget figures that we have been given, and I would wonder whether or not you would be willing to comment as an individual as to whether you think $110 million is enough.

Mr. JACKSON. There are some very quality tasks to be undertaken and in short order. Noise is a very, very difficult problem with us. We talked a lot about it and there are very useful things to be done in the noise program.

Mr. PELLY. I think your achievements as far as the supersonic plane were concerned are now a matter of record and remarkable. Mr. JACKSON. That is a generous observation.

Mr. PELLY. Although I would say the noise that some of my colleagues in Congress want to quiet down is the Studebaker Wagon rather than create a plane for the 1980's.

Mr. JACKSON. The first increment, given a larger budget to work with, would go into noise abatement and further development of improved engines. I believe the military departments, the Air Force and the Navy, very definitely have suffered in the last decade from lack of prototype developments and the flying of prototype aircraft. There has been such a demand for the defense dollar in support of production needs that the unchallenged design teams of this country who design the military and the combat aircraft are literally losing their cutting edge. That is a judgment based on experience and personal association. Given an opportunity for additional budget, I believe those of us at this table would steer our thinking toward assisting the military in finding a way to fly and test more prototypes. They can be inexpensive, by there being sound decisions in advance

59-311 0-71-No. 2, pt. 4

that they will only be prototypes. Finding ways to obtain the best configurations that the industry design teams can come up with must be done. Finding inexpensive ways to get these into the air so that we can learn and do what we used to do, and see our friends across the water doing, is most necessary. The French are following that procedure and we, of course, know the Russians are doing it. We need to do more of it. There is no question in the minds of any of us here at the table but what there are very useful additional things to be done in aeronautics. Once again it is a question of balance.

We have to find balance within the guidelines and that is what we have attempted to do. In my statement to you today, Mr. Pelly, I emphasize that several of us here today are refocusing on the NASA aeronautics 5-year plan and a year from now we are going to be in here with new starts over and above the new starts we are talking about this year. We are committed to finding a way to do that.

Mr. PELLY. I take it you wouldn't be upset if the members of this subcommitee recommended a figure larger than you were permitted to ask for?

Mr. JACKSON. No; we wouldn't be upset if everybody was completely successful in such a course being accomplished, but we would be disappointed if dollars were added into this budget at the expense of some other part of our total program and then we were restrained from expending those dollars. It is hard to see how anybody comes out ahead on that kind of a procedure, but given the dollars and given the opportunity to spend them, I am sure we would come back here after the fact and show you some very fine things.

Mr. PELLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. HECHLER. Thank you, Mr. Pelly. You have been one of the most powerful advocates of stressing aeronautics and I think if your advice had been followed we would be better off in this Nation. Mr. PELLY. On a lot of things I am used to talking to myself. [Laughter.]

Mr. HECHLER. Mr. Wydler?

Mr. WYDLER. I get the impression that there has been a real command decision in Government, may be it is justified or not, in the last year to push the STOL aircraft with all possible speed. There is, of course, much real evidence of that happening. I am trying to get a picture of just what we are going to do in the next year with the STOL. Are we going to have a prototype STOL flying within the next year? What is the schedule?

Dr. MARK. No, sir; what you will have in early 1972 is an experimental jet STOL aircraft which is a modification of an existing military transport. It is an existing twin-engined turboprop transport. This is experimental. It is not intended to be a prototype or anything that could be certified for civil use.

Mr. WYDLER. How many passengers could it carry?

Dr. MARK. Roughly 40. It is an experimental aircraft to investigate the flight envelope of the machine and to begin to see how a machine having such flight properties can fit into a prototype air traffic control system for it, if you will.

Mr. WYDLER. This project is being controlled from the old Electric Research Center buildings in Boston?

Dr. MARK. We are working in collaboration there.

Mr. WYDLER. Out of the Boston Center?

Dr. MARK. Yes.

Mr. WYDLER. I am going to state this for the public record here now that I get the sinking feeling from listening to this testimony today that I heard this same type of situation before in regard to the SST. We started it here in this committee at the research discussions back in, I guess it was, 1963, and we came through it to the point where we spent $800 million or more up to date in Federal funds on it. Now we are in a position where we may not very well realize anything for that effort. The only question I have for you gentlemen is, what assurance can you offer to the American public, what assurance do we have that we are not going to go down the same road, that we are not going to spend a lot of money for research of the STOL and come to a point where we are about to build a prototype and find we end up with the same conditions as we did with the SST-it is not acceptable for the country, that the people won't accept it as an aircraft, and they don't want to invest further funds in it. Is there anything different in this from the way we handled the SST?

Mr. JACKSON. We believe there is. We have been in an indepth analysis with the DOT for the past year or more with what we refer to as the civil aviation R. & D. study and the outcome of that study, and the study is about to be released for everyone to make use of, the outcome of that study is that there are three critical areas in civil air transportation today. Noise is number one. We have to get the noise level down; congestion on the airways and at the terminals is number two. And number three, we need a short-haul transportation capability, at stage lengths up to 500 miles, between cities. We feel this STOL technology that we are developing, and that we want to go ahead with through the new experimental aircraft, will feed into all three of those considerations. First of all, the experimental aircraft is going to be a quiet airplane so the public will accept it. You heard what Mr. Lundin said about what he can do in his lab relative to noise levels. The aircraft will help relieve congestion. By being a short takeoff and landing airplane and quiet, the public will allow it to operate from strips close in to the city. That feature will also let it operate from unused portions of existing airports. We are talking about a 1,500- to 2,000-foot length runway.

The third consideration is that this technology is very definitely pointed to the short-haul transportation market. So the major considerations that we feel are in need of improvement are three characteristics that this technology is pointed toward. We all would feel that we have a different situation than on the SST.

Mr. WYDLER. Don't you think the public is going to raise environmental problems regarding this aircraft just as they have regarding the SST?

Mr. JACKSON. Some of the people will. But if we can show them an airplane that is operating at a low noise level, there will be a certain amount of believing.

Mr. PELLY. Have the Russians developed a STOL?

Mr. JACKSON. They are doing a lot of STOL technology development, Mr. Pelly. I am not in a position to say specifically that they have a STOL civil vehicle of the type we are talking about. But to