Institute for Defense Analyses

This is an interview with Martha Krebs, former director of the Consortium for Building Energy Innovation for Penn State in Philadelphia and advisor to the Defense Science Study Group at the Institute for Defense Analysis. She recounts her childhood in postwar Japan and then central Pennsylvania, and she describes her interest in science and the formative influence of Sputnik on her ambitions during her time in a Catholic high school. Krebs explains her decision to attend Catholic University where she knew she wanted to pursue a degree in physics from the beginning. She discusses the importance of securing a National Science Foundation graduate fellowship and the family considerations that influenced her decision to stay at Catholic for graduate school, where she studied under Tomoyasu Tanaka, who was working on hydrogen bonds in ferroelectrics. Krebs describes the opportunities leading to her first postgraduate job in the Science Policy Research Division of the Congressional Research Service which led to her work on the Energy Subcommittee of the Science and Technology Committee, and she provides context on the major issues relating to federal energy policy in the mid-1970s and the rebalancing of power between the White House and Congress in the post-Watergate era. She narrates the origins of the Department of Energy during the Carter administration and she describes the circumstances that led to her tenure as staff director of the Energy Subcommittee which was becoming increasingly important to national developments in renewable and efficient energy sources. Krebs describes the major partisan and industry dynamics that shaped her work on the committee, particularly with the ascendancy of the conservative movement in the 1980s. She explains her decision to move to the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, which was looking to reinvent itself beyond high-energy physics with new projects in relativistic heavy ion collider projects. She describes the central influence of the Cooperative Research and Development Agreements in the relationship between the Lab and the DOE, and she describes the events leading to her work as director of the Office of Science in the DOE for the Clinton administration. Krebs discusses the collapse of the SSC project at the beginning of her tenure and her contributions to the Office of Energy Research and the applied R & D programs and how she understood the relationship between DOE and OMB on science policy generally during the Clinton years. She describes the state of high energy physics during this time and the DOE’s involvement in nanotechnology research, her decision to join the California NanoSystems Institute, and then her decision to become director of energy efficiency at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard. At the end of the interview, Krebs reflects on her career and offers insight into how U.S. national policy can be best directed toward further gains in energy efficiency into the future. 

York's involvement in science policy, particularly JASON; types of science policies and science policy advisors: consultants and officials; role of physicists. Origins of JASON: roles played by John Wheeler, Eugene Wigner, Oscar Morgenstern (Project 137); comparison with other science advisory groups; relations with Institute for Defense Analysis (IDA); preservation of the history of JASON (MITRE Corporation, Advanced Research Projects Agency [ARPA]); prominence and influence of JASON members; JASON science policy; technical advice and technical conclusions; shift of power from academic to industrial physics. Also prominently mentioned are: Lou Allen, Harold Brown, Keith Allan Brueckner, Ed David, Lee DuBridge, John Foster, Marvin Goldberger, James Killian, George Kistiakowski, Oscar Morgenstern, William Nierenberg, Charles Schwartz, Marvin Stern, Charles Townes, Felix von Kármán, Jerome Wiesner; and President's Science Advisory Committee.

Early education and exposure to field; attends Duke University; graduate work at California Institute of Technology; Caltech environment; work with Smythe; develops interest in spectroscopy. Accepts position at Bell Laboratories; shift from research to engineering; attempts to pursuade Bell Labs to become involved in microwave spectroscopy. Impact of war on development of spectroscopy and physics in general. Interest in astronomy. Accepts I. I. Rabi's job offer at Columbia; work conditions at Columbia versus Bell Labs. Forms advisory committee on millimeter waves; on Navy committee for infrared radiation; feelings about committee work. Work on service advisory committees prior to position as director of research at the Institute for Defense Analysis (IDA). Involvement in Office of Naval Research (ONR) committees on millimeter waves and infrared radiation; purpose and outcome of work, including development of maser concept; participation in non-service advisory committees; work at Brookhaven National Laboratory. Acceptance of IDA position; circumstances and considerations involved; views on direction of IDA. Involvement in establishing JASON?establishing clearances, convincing Pentagon. JASON organizational structure; selection of projects and members; extent of Townes' own involvement in projects; impact of JASON on government advising and social policy.

Research on nonlinear optics at MIT, 1962-1967. Other laser research in MIT period. Responsibilities as Vice-President and Director of Research at Institute for Defense Analysis (IDA), 1959-1961. Interest at IDA and ARPA in lasers and laser weaponry. Contemporary evaluations of Robert Dicke’s superradiance paper. Townes’s change of research field from nonlinear optics to radio astronomy in the late 1960s.

Research on nonlinear optics at MIT, 1962-1967. Other laser research in MIT period. Responsibilities as Vice-President and Director of Research at Institute for Defense Analysis (IDA), 1959-1961. Interest at IDA and ARPA in lasers and laser weaponry. Contemporary evaluations of Robert Dicke’s superradiance paper. Townes’s change of research field from nonlinear optics to radio astronomy in the late 1960s.

The main topics discussed include his work with the Institute for Defense Analysis in the mid-1960s; laser damage; and laser fusion.

In this interview, John Foster discusses the impact of the JASON Group. Topics discussed include: Foster's father, John Stuart Foster; Lawrence Livermore Laboratory; serving as Director of Defense Research and Engineering (DDR&E); Charlie Townes; Defense Science Board; Robert McNamara; Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA); Marvin "Murph" Goldberger; Institute for Defense Analyses.

Graduate research on nuclear magnetic resonance at Harvard with Edward M. Purcell and Robert V. Pound, 1946-1947. Leiden postdoctoral fellowship, 1947-1948. Microwave and nuclear experiments as a Harvard Junior Fellow, 1949-1951. Early years in the Harvard Division of Engineering and Applied Physics. The 3-level maser. Nonlinear optics in the 1960s. Also prominently mentioned are: John A. Armstrong, Nikolai Gennadievich Basov, George Benedek, Francis Bitter, Felix Bloch, Gregory Breit, Vannevar Bush, Al Clogston, James Bryant Conant, William Culver, Gene Cummins, Damon, Robert Henry Dicke, Peter Alden Franken, Elsa Meints Garmire, Alexander J. Glass, Glauber, Gordon, Gorter, Grivet, William Webster Hansen, Herscher, Clarence Lester Hogan, Heike Kamerlingh-Onnes, Robert Karplus, Rudolf Kompfner, André Lallemand, Jim Meyer, Peter Pershan, Isidor Isaac Rabi, Arthur Leonard Schawlow, Julian R. Schwinger, Malcolm Woodrow Pershing Strandberg, Charles Hard Townes, John Hasbrouck Van Vleck, Shih Wang, Welton, Irvin Wieder, Wolf, Zeldovitch; American Physical Society, Bell Telephone Laboratories, Institute for Defense Analysis (IDA), International Business Machines Corporation, Lawrence Radiation Laboratory, Lincoln Laboratory at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Radiation Laboratory at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Netherlands Ministerie van Oderwijs en Wetenschappen, and Optical Society of America.

Exposure to government consulting while Ph.D. student at Stanford; JASON membership as outgrowth of university work with Marvin Goldberger. Primary JASON work on ABM defense; first summer study at Berkeley, 1962; other projects include Cape Cod, Woods Hole, and Santa Barbara studies. Impact of personal philosophy on choice of study topics. Broader involvement in Advanced Research Project Agency (ARPA) and Arms Control and Development Agency (ACDA) project on test ban issues. JASON involvement in Viet Nam war issues; disillusionment leading to resignation; broader questions of Institute for Defense Analysis (IDA) independence.

In this interview, William R. Bennett discusses his work with lasers. Topics discussed include: helium neon laser; Ali Javan; Donald Herriott; Columbia University; Yale University; Air Reduction Company (Airco); Linde Air Products Company; Hugh Robinson; Lewis B. Headrick; Ora S. Duffendack; Bell Labs; Harrie Stewart Wilson Massey; Eric Henry Stoneley Burhop; Allan C. G. Mitchell; Mark W. Zemansky; Rudolf Walter Ladenburg; Sidney Millman; Technical Measurement Corporation; Ted Geballe; Conyers Herring; A. L. Schawlow; Henry Scovil; Harry Nyquist; Jim Gordon; Gardner Fox; Tingye Li; E. I. Gordon; G. D. Boyd; A. F. Turner; Bausch & Lomb Laboratories; Technical Research Group (TRG); Gordon Gould; Charlie Townes; Theodore Maiman; Deming Lewis; A. T. Forrester; George Dacey; C. Geoffrey B. Garrett; Ross McFarlane; Bruce Bogert; Willis Lamb; Paul Rabinowitz; V. P. Chebotaev; John. W. Knutson; Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR); Army Research Office, Durham (AROD); Vernon Hughes; Lloyd Wood; Marshall Harrington; Alfred P. Sloane Foundation; Institute for Defense Analyses; Bob Collins; Kurt Shuler; Walter Faust; argon laser; Spectra Physics; Bill Bridges; Grant Fowles; William Silfvast; Bill Walter; Marty Pilch.