VISIT TO THE USSR, AUGUST 17 - 20, 1975.

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79-00798A000500130003-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 18
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 23, 1999
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: September 11, 1975
• Content Type: MEMO

STATOTHR
MEMORANDUM
11 September, 1975
TO: William Carey, Co Chairman, Subcommission on Policy
Studies of Research Management.
FROM: STATOTHR
STATOTHR.
SUBJECT: Visit to the USSR, August-17.- 20, 1975.
.and I spent two and half days
in Moscow in August visiting institutes and discussing
science policy at the State Committee. I attach three
relevant reports. The first, of September 9, is a
general report summarizing our visits.
The second item is a brief report on our visit to the
State Committee emphasizing discussions which related
to the ongoing joint program.
Finally, I enclose a copy of my_own notes ..of__the visits.
Conclusions from these visits must be regarded as tentative.
In.particular, it is virtually mandatory that someone visit
the management groups within the Academy Nauk and the State
Committee which supervise these two large research institutes,
the`Lebedev and the Kurchatov. Even so,-it may be useful
to give a few tentative,conclusions.-
Management of these institutes seems to be a good deal less
directed and sharp than is management of comparable U.S.
facilities. There seems to be much less in the way of
sharp development of objectives, establishment of time-scales,
evaluation of progress, etc. Also there seems to be
substantially less use of budget-making as a method of
analysis and control. Indeed report-writing seems to be
substantially less than for the U.S. Internal stability
in the laboratories seems high. Most professionals are
brought up in the system and the turnover of professionals
is apparently very small. Many senior professionals
participate in university teaching programs, but there seems
to be relatively slight linkage to industrial ministries or
industrial facilities. Particularly in the Kurchatov
Institute, knowledge of U.S. institutes and management
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procedures seems good, as is an awareness of the differences
between the U.S. and the USSR procedures.
STATOTHR
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STATOTHR
MEMORANDUM
STATOTHR
September 9, 1975
SUBJECT: Report of August 1975 Visits to the USSR on Problems
of Research Management
The two of us spent August 17, 18, and 19 and part of
August 20 in the USSR assessing questions of research
management as they relate to the activitie f the joint STATOTHR
U.S.-USSR study effort on science policy. interest
in the latter stems from his position on the joint commission,
but he has long had a specific interest in research management.
Long is a member of the sub-commission on research management
of the joint activity.
STATOTH R We did not see Skylarov of the State Committee, who, along
with of the U.S., is co-chairman of the
joint sub-commission, but we did see members of his staff.
More importantly, we visited two institutes, and in each
had extensive discussions on research management. Both
are major institutes. One, the Lebedev Institute, is devoted
to fundamental research in physics, and reports to the
Academy Nauk; the second, the Kurchatov Institute, focuses
on relatively more applied nuclear energy problems and
reports to the State Committee. Both institutes are of
the highest standing. Both are large: the Lebedev has
about 3000 employees total, and the Kurchatov about 5500.
At the Lebedev we talked with Academician Cherenkov, a
Nobel Prize winner, and Academician Vul, both of them
section chairmen in the Institute. At the Kurchatov we
met with Academician Evgenie Velekov and three people from
the State Committee for the Utilization of Atomic Energy,
including in particular G. B. Miakinkov, deputy head of
its foreign relations department.
The questions we asked related quite directly to research
management. of the Institute. The questions included:
How are budgets constructed?
Are separate budgets developed for salaries,
equipment, and capital and buildings?
What about foreign exchange?
What kinds of budget documents are submitted?
what portions of the budget are fungible ?
Are there any contract activities by the Institute?
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SUBJECT: Report of August 1975 Visits to the USSR
Management structure was another general topic of questioning,
asking about the structure overall, the autonomy of senior
scientists, the role of committees, the resolution of
disagreements.
Another set of questions dealt with program planning. How
does it relate to the budget? What is done about mid-year
add-ons? Who makes decisions to start new programs? What
is the definition of a project and how is it started? How
much flexibility exists in carrying out programs?
Another set of questions dealt with promotion decisions
for the staff, i.e., who makes them? What background
material? What use of outside opinion, i.e., advisory
committees?
Similar questions were asked about hiring.
Another group of questions related to the scientific-technical
evaluations. One important set of evaluations consists
of technical programs and of progress. The second evaluation
area concerns scientists. For all of these the question is
who makes the evaluations? How formal are they? Who resolves
disagreements? And if programs are abandoned or scientists
discharged, how is this done?
We asked about report writing, to whom and how frequently,
how much administrative and how much technical. We asked
about role of visiting committees. We asked about the
character of linkages, i.e., to the Academy, to universities,
to the State Committee, to industry, etc.
In all this we kept in mind a number of specific questions
which the U.S. had asked about the topic, and the answers
which the State Committee group had given.
It was interesting to find that in spite of their different
nature and in spite of the fact that the Lebedev reports
to the Academy and the Kurchatov to the State Committee,
the management procedures and characteristics of the two
Institutes were closely similar. Each.institute has been
dealing with an approximate staff "freeze" for the last
several years, so that new programs must be considered in
the light of this. Each institute has grown used to a
budget increase of from 5 to 7% each year. Salary budgets
for each are fundamentally separate from those for equipment
and capital needs. These latter are in many cases func.rt_ble,
although this is not true for certain important and
explicitly labeled projects of a "big science" character,
as for example the laser-fusion work at the Lebedev and
Tokomak 10 at the Kurchatov. In the overall management
of the operation, there is a good deal of autonomy of the
major groups and the senior scientists. In each institute,
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and at two or three levels, Science Councils are exceedingly
important. They make recommendations to the director on
programs and on people. Reports on progress are made by
scientists to the Science Councils. The final decisions
are the director's, but apparently this advisory role is
crucial.
Dealings with the Academy and State Committee tend to
involve a minimum of report writing, budget preparation,
and the like. As Velekov noted, this is in strong contrast
to the U.S. Apparently, budget decisions are made with
relative informality, as are decisions about proposed add-
on programs. (It will be important to check this point
out with the Department of Finance of the Academy Nauk,
and with the group under Petrenko in the State Committee,
to which the Kurchatov Institute reports.)
Promotion decisions are essentially based on recommendations
of the science councils. Not much use appears to be made
outside advisory committees or outside opinions, although
outsiders are sometimes invited to the Science Council.
Questions of promotion and of non-promotion are also
essentially based on recommendations of the Science Councils.
As this implies, there is not very much role for outside
visiting committees in these activities. Nor does there
seem to be very much in the way of formal report writing
about the results.
This same informality appears to entail for scientific
and technical evaluations of programs and of progress
within programs. Again, the role of the science councils
seems to be highly important and difficulties are bucked
up finally to the director.
There is only a very modest amount of contract work done
by either of the institutes, i.e., work paid for by other
agencies than the supporting one. Lebedev estimated that
it might do in the order of 10% of its work by contract.
Kurchatov implied a smaller percentage.
Staff members do relatively little consulting for outside
groups and what they do do does not bring in extra pay. In
contrast, academicians get extra pay and are also exempt
from staff, reviews, of which more later. Those people
who hold teaching positions at universities can also
get extra pay, apparently up to about 50% of their local
salary.
The large percentage of new staff are brought into both
institutes by bringing in quite young people still doing
their education. Apparently it is common for a number
of people, perhaps 20-30/year in each institute to come
in before finishing their first degree (i.e., their A.B.)
to do their diploma research in the institute. They also
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SUBJECT: Report of August 1975 Visits to the USSR
defend this diploma research in the institute. Some who
do well are permitted to stay on as Candidates and work
for what is the equivalent of their Ph.D. and ultimately
to work toward their D.Sc. Thus, Cherenkov said that about
95% of the scientists in his group had been trained by
him and promoted by this process. Velikov had much the
same to say about the Kurchatov and noted that in his
own case he went directly from his first degree to his
D.Sc. taking 6 years in the process. This turns out to
be an overall saving of time, however. Apparently it is
unusual to bring senior scientists from outside into
institutes. It seems also to be rather unusual to hire
new Candidates from the universities and even speaking of
Moscow University, their comment was that the Candidate
students there werea large cut below the quality of the
students hired directly in the Institutes to work for
their Candidate degree.
Linkages to the Academy Nauk are quite close in the sense
of scientific interaction. Each institute contains
Academicians and these and other members of the staffs
serve on various nationwide Academy committees for this
technical subject or that. On the other hand, the Academy
does not seem to play a large managing role even for the
Lebedev. (It would be interesting, however, to get the
Academy's view of this).'
Linkages to universities are primarily by way of the
staff members who hold chairs in universities or who
in other ways do teaching for universities. This seems
to be a valued activity and no doubt plays a helpful
role in getting students.
Linkages to industry do not seem large even for the Kurchatov
Institute. However, we did not explore fully the linkages
between the Kurchatov and the State Committee for Atomic
Energy. It is possible that this latter agency represents
an important intermediary toward the industry-oriented
ministries.
An interesting U.S. laboratory for comparison to these
two is the Brookhaven National Laboratory of Upton, N.Y.
This laboratory is about the same size as the two USSR
institutes which we visited. It is the intermediate
in its concern with fundamental science on the one hand
and applied science on the other. By comparison to the
information which we got on the Lebedev and Kurchatov
BNL of the U.S.A. is much more closely supervised and
"managed" by the governmental group to which it reports,
once AEC, now ERDA. It must spend much more care in
developing its budget in detail and it must supply
many more program details in reporting on its program
activities and progress. Formal visits from the "Washington
managers" are common and outside visiting committees
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are used by BNL as part of the evaluation procedure.
On the evidence of our comparison the two USSR institutes
seem to have a good deal more autonomy and seem to be a
good deal less closely linked than is BNL either to
their sponsors or to the users of their applied efforts.
In both institutes we were taken for brief tours of major
facilities. At the Lebedev it was to the activity on
laser implosion for fusion power which is a large
operation in which neodymium glass lasers are
used
to
produce pulses which are split and amplified
separate high intensity short- duration light
until
beams
12
are brought in on a target. Even more interestingly,
the Lebedev is in the process of developing a still much
larger effort, to which an immense new facility is dedicated,
which will permit 216 separate laser beams to be focused
in on a single target. Work toward this large facility
is progressing rapidly.
At the Kurchatov we were briefly shown two elements of
their fusion energy experimentation. One was a close
analogue to the laser fusion effort in which energy is
brought on to an implosion target from electron beams.
We were shown a prototype of a large elctron beam accelerator
and collimator and shown diagrams of the procedure where-
by a number of beams from such accelerators would be
brought onto a target.
The other large technical effort on fusion at the
Kurchatov related to the use of TOKOMACKS which were
initially devised at this institute. They are now
working on TOKOMAK 10 which is to be much larger than
anything hitherto and which is in a relatively advanced
state. (Apparently the TOKOMAK under construction at the
Princeton laboratory is of comparable size.)
In each of the institutes we explicitly asked for bulletins
or other published information about budgets, program
outlines, whatever. Neither had anything to offer us.
The Lebedev people said that they are preparing a bulleting
for their 250th anniversary which will occur soon, and
they will be glad to send that to us. The state of mind
about budgets is perhaps illustrated by the parting
remark from Miakinkov of the State Committee for Atomic
Energy who commented that he would be delighted if we
visited him and he would be glad to furnish any information
he could only "don't give me a heart attack by asking
me for a budget." Quite evidently the Soviets do not
use rubles as a measure of program size, progress, etc.
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 MEMORANDUM
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SUBJECT: Report of August 1975 Visits to the USSR
in anything like the way the U.S. uses dollars. (A
cynic could of course argue that the Soviet do use
ruble evaluations and do use budgets and progress reports
much as we do but that they are simply not made available
to foreigners. Perhaps, but if so, Cherenkov, Vul and
Velekov are extraordinarily good actors.)
Since our discussions at the State Committee were relatively
brief, they did not add much to the topic of research
management. It did seem clear that even at the higher
level the State Committee depends strongly on Science
Councils for recommendations for direction and for support
of new programs. It also seemed clear that they too
had considerable autonomy in use of funds once they had
been allocated them by the Gosplan. Discussions with
Petrenko to whom the hurch.atov Institute reports, will
be very useful in furthering this look at research management.
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 MEMORANDUM
STATOTHR
P791798A00050013000
STATOTHR
9 September, 1975
SUBJECT: Visits in th?Tt7SSqTo Rthe topic of Rescal-ch
Management,
August 17 -
STATOTHR
- -- - ..... ,. .a- - a ua I :7V
that only the two of us were on board. nTATi-% T1 ir%
STATOTHR
and I arrived at noon on the 17th after a
straight--forward trip over from the U.S. At the last moment
When we landed at Moscow, Pavli_chenko and Emelyanov were
-waiting for us, as was the U.S. Science attache, Dr. Loebner.
Loebner turned immediately to schedules and said that he
had tried hard to make some arrangements at the State Committee
for our proposed visits, but had been unable to do anything
primarily because Skylarov was on vacation.
Pavlichenko told us that he and the Academy had turned to
the question of visits for Brooks and Long, that they were
not sure there would be any more than one on the first day,
i.e. Monday, but probably a couple on the second. We said
goodbye to Loebner but agreed to come to the Embassy and talk
with him and the anmbassador. We then came to town with
Paviichenko and Emelyanov. They saw us into the hotel and
shortly thereafter introduced us to Valerie Shanini who was
to be our guide and interpreter.. The four of us, except
her, had lunch at the hotel. It was a pleasant affair and
gave us time to go over the schedule which was as follows:
there would be time on the 20th for our proposed group breakfast.
Meetings would start at the Academy at 11 a.m., go on to 1.30 p.m.
with a break for lunch, resume at 3.00 p.m. at the Presidium
and keep going until 6.00 p.m. or so. Thursday's schedule
was to be identical to this. Friday was going to be a similar
schedule, but the meeting would be at Arbatav's Institute of
the USA. I asked what about a meeting at the Institute for
World Economic Affairs and Pavlichenko responded that Inozemtsev
was away on vacation as were some of his people and that this
did not look possible on this visit.
STATOTHR
There was a brief discussion of evenings.
n
.inner- w.>_ tr.
the Kapitzas on the evening of Wednesday the 20tr
y ,, Otherwise,
the evenings were free. '!'here was brief discussion of the
Occasion of Vinogradov's birt.hda~' and W'' wn - 1
W
4
E. O G hilt. i_1', n
entire festivities would be at the Academy which leered st,i_gh~
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forward. Tllcrdet:- l tale fo :-merly appointed. actrn~ o~.,nn~ i t-
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were told that they might get an invitatio
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obtained) is acting also. Wit T TOTHR
C gements settled
we then turned to our lunch. were permitted a
brief sleep, and our interpreter too us off to an evening
program of folk. dancing.
I should note that none of the papers which we had sent to the
Soviet Union appeared to have'come. The consequence is that
we quickly gave Pavlichenko two copies of the _ report and
one of the GURC which was all we had immediately available; we
also gave him four copies of the Rathjens counterforce comments.
Meetings on Au.c u..t 1 -th
STATOTHR
We started out August 18th by visiting the Science attache,
Dr. Loebner at the U.S. Embassy. Loebner is a vigorous person
who has been at his job only since December but is already deeply
immersed. He sees sicrnificant difficulties on each side in. the
relationships between the NAS and the Academy Nauk of the USSR.
On each side there are significant problems of bureaucracy.
With respect to the exchanges, the USSR has tended to use
.young post-Dbcs in the Soviet Union who really don't learn much
about the country. Similarly-on the U.S. side the visiting
groups don't make tight schedules and don't get problems
handled in the way he believes they should. He mentioned
i
spec
fically the. visiting group under Pines on a Solid State
t
d
s
u
y group.
.Loebner thinks there are serious problems at the Academy Nauk,
feeling that their bureaucracy is deep and that they are
currently paralysed in decision making. He is afraid that
they. are going to lose out in their relationships to the US
as compared to the State Committee for. Science and Technology
which is distinctly better organized, he believes. With
respect to the Academy, the does not believe that Katolnikov
who is currently Acting-President, will become President and
he does not think that the current. acting-acting, Fedoseev,
has any chance. His bet is with Vasov or Obichinikov.
There was a brief discussion of a difficulty concerning Scrabine
and Hammond which, in his judgement, was a case where "David
Pines blew.it." But more of this later. The problem here
is that fundamentally, the Soviet feel very strongly that they
must select problems and even people for exchanges whereas the
Pines proposal did not give them this possibility. In other
exchanges there are awkwardnesses because Nauk. is particularly
interested in fundamental research whereas the State Committee
is more interested in applied. Loebner thinks highly of Kirillin
who head the State Committee. He also thinks well of his
ex-Institute for High ri-emperat.rue s where the head, Chandelir.,
has brought the magneto-hydrodynamics effort, -which is almost.
half their effort, into quite good shape.
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V
sit to the Lebedev Institute for Physic s, August 18, 1975
Discussions were with Cherenkov and V
ul (both heads of
large laboratories) and a third man from the direc.tor's office.
The Lebedev is old and famous, and, indeed, along with the Academy,
will be celebrating its 250th year anniversary soon. For many
years it was relatively narrow but was greatly broadened by
Vavilov who was Director in the '30''s who added new laboratories
such as nuclear physics and cosmic-ray physics so that it became
a major laboratory and later added "oscillatory physics", which
is their name for laser physics, and radioastronomy.
The Institute belongs to the Academy Nauk and reports in to two
sections of this: to physics and to astronomy. However, it
operates with a single budget. Its areas of interest are
.covered by an explicit charter. It has three principal depart-
ments: oscillatory problems, mostly lasers with two laboratories,
(Prokhorov is head'); quantum physics with two large laboratories.
One is run, incidentally, by Vasov, who is also Director of
the Institute. The third area is general physics run by Nikovsky
which has sixteen laboratories.
In all there are a total of 3,000 people of whom about 70 hold
Doctorate of Science and about 300 a Candidate for. Science.
Each laboratory is divided into sectors and each sector may
consist of two or three working groups presumably each linked
to an individual scientist.
We asked about planning. Each year in making up a budget., progra:v
are discussed within the individual groups and sectors. The
overall proposals are then brought to-the Scientific Council of
the Institute which goes over them and forms a whole. Apparently
this council which is mostly internal people with a few outsiders
occasionally invited in is a quite powerful advisory element in
the system. Budget figures relate particularly to the previous
year with the normal expectation that there can be a 5 or 10 per
cent increase each year. On the other hand, if some special-
facility is needed, that is treated in a somewhat special way.
Final decisions on the budget are made by the Director who
forwards it to the Academy. With respect to on going programs,
i.e., ones that had been established in the previous years, the
Director handles the budget quite directly. With respect to
proposed new programs there are preliminary discussions with
the Academy, perhaps all the way up to the Presidium to reach
a..decisi.on as to whether they are appropriate for the Institute.
We asked what was meant by a programming problem. They two examples. One was really a facility which consistedgofe
the installation of a recording assembly of counters to detect
very wide cosmic ray showers. From the standpoint of a research
topic, Vul, who participated, commented on the problem of
superconductivity of surfaces where exictons would be involved.
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e Institute, salaries are
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treated quite seperately, salary items are fungible within
the salary budget but not transferable to other items. In
recent years there has tended to be a constant number of
professional research workers with numbers of -technicians
more flexible. The staff has been highly stable with very
little tendency for people to.leave. There is a separate
budget for supplies and operating expanses with, as noted
earlier, major facilities coming in still separately.'
In answer to a question, it turns out that there is a
possibility of the laboratory doing contract work for outside
people. Normally t-h-.s does not cover the salaries which are
taken care of b' the laboratory but cover additional equipment,
perhaps technicians. On.the average maybe 101, of their total
effort is done via contracts. They are not enthusiastic about
contracts since they tend to be somewhat confining and their
principal interest is for fundamental work which normally tends
not to be terribly interesting to applied ministries. Looked
at from the standpoint of an individual scientist there is a
great deal of autonomy in the laboratory but it is not complete.
'In particular the Scientific Council exercises a strong advisory
role. Apparently if there are disagreements about relative
budgets, new programs, etc. they first go to the Scientific
Council for its comment with, then, decision by the Director.
Their stress is on continuity. They have close coupling
with the universities and bring in a good many bright, interested
students. Apparently new people will commonly come in toward
the end of their first degree and will do their so-called diploma
research within the institute, defending the work within the
Institute. After they are formally awarded their first degree
(A.B. equivalent), they will very probably stay on and do their
thesis work in the institute also. It turns out that the majority
of 'the current Candidates have, in fact, done their thesis work
in the laboratory. For Cherenkov's own group this number is
like 95%, i.e. it is almost entirely a group of his own students.
We asked about official reports that we might read for statistics
and program details. Nothing seemed available but they-will
get something to us. The particular reason is that they will
be celebrating their 250th year birthday soon and are preparing
a large report for this.
Following these lengthy discussions the Lebedev group offered
to show us a few facilities, and by consensus these turned out
to be.facilities for laser implosion studies. We went first
to the existing apparatus which is similar in principle to that
developed by Lubin of Rochester, but substantially larger.
The general idea is to build short, perhaps ,nanosecond pulses
of intense laser radiation at the appropriate frequency from a
neodymium -glass laser. Each pulse is amplified in successive
stages anC Ultimately split into nine separate pulses which
brought simultaneously on to the-implosion target. This is a
very impressive and substantial aparatus which extends through
o -
three rooms b. ~ -L
to see r v `y o r0the /09%~9 y1L?l Dl~ t~(#+ 98AOi O A: 0003-6
y activity, which is very
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impressive indeed. It is in a very large room, with a balcony
around for viewing, the kind of room which would be appropriate
for a large accelerator. Various elements of the system are
being assembled at the present time, including the target area
where the implosion target will be present. The procedure
builds extensively on the previous work. Similar laser pulses
will. be used, however, in the new facility there w%,ill-be 216
separate pulses brought on to the target in groups of twelve.
This is clearly a large and extensive operation. Because of
its substantial applied characteristic, it represents something
of an exception to the normally basic science orientation of
the Lebedev.
Visit to the Kurchatov Institute, August 19th, 1975
ATOTH ? went out to the Kurchatov Institute along with our
nter_preter_, the meeting having been arranged b
the Academ
We were met by Academician Velekov and G.B. Miakinkov, the latter
being Deputy Head of the Foreign Relations Department of the State
Committee for the Utilization of Atomic Energy of the USSR. He
plus one of his staff went through the entire briefing and visit.
Velekov also had a young assistant with him. Velekov, incidentall,;,
is one of the major program directors of the Institute and -
was subbing for the overall Director Alexandrov who is on vacation.
y
y.
The Institute is a center for atomic energy work. It is
involved in a major way in the nuclear power program. Its
emphasis is fundamental work on nuclear reactors, on the
associated physical property activities, on computer programs
and also on test reactors for testing materials. It coordinates
all of the fundamental work on reactors and this constitutes about
a third of its effort. USSR is working on two kinds of reactors;
a pressurized water reactor and a boiling water reactor using a
tubular design.
They have done interesting things in fuel element technology
but when it comes to any sort of production they transfer their
information over to separate design organizations in industry
with whom they work closely. They also worry about chemical
processing and water chemistry. The breeder reactor is not
their responsibility but they do have a program on high-temperature
gas reactors. .
Another third of their work concerns studies on controlled fusion,
particularly with the TOKOMAK. They have some interest in laser
fusion and work closely with Lebedev on this. ' They also have as
part of their fusion effort an electron beam implosion procedure.
According to their analyses only a hybrid fusion procedure looks
economical at present, i.e. neutrons from fusion are used to
brecd plutonium or uranium-233. The names mentioned were Rudakov
for the electron beam work, and Xardomsev for the TOKOPAIAK work.
The latter was Artsimovich's deputy once. There is a complete
spectrum of fusion research under wa in the USSR. There is
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a special institute, the Ephramiov in Leningrad, which relates
particularly to design work on fusion and which reports to the
State Committee. Also noted was a good deal of superconductor
work relating particularly to the TOKOMAK.
The last third of their work is broadly in fundamental physics.
A man by the name of Galalysky handles nuclear physics including
superconductivity, a lithium ion cyclotron, etc. A 'man by the
name of Kargon works on theory of solid hydrogen and theoretical
problems. They have some theoretical biophysics. Once Dubna
was a branch of their institute and'now they work as one of the
users of the Dubna accelerator. He notes that the charter for
their work is not so tight as is typical of a US/AEC laboratory
and they can therefore study a very wide range of plasma physics
problems.
The laboratory is a large one, 5,500 people overall. It is
primarily at the one site but there are a few satellite
activities. They are an Institute of the State Committee for
Science and Technology. Many of them individually are on
commissions for the Academy and several are Academicians but
the fundamental orientation is to the State Committee.
Because their charter is wide it is under the purview of several
groups within the State Committee and they have individual dealings
with these groups. With respect to planning their program, they
have general discussions with the State Committee and then planning
is done by the separate groups. and ultimately brought to .a head
in the director's office.
As in other institutes, salaries are taken care of separately and
the salary funds are not fungible, i.e., they must be used for
salaries only.
The Kurchatov has been going for wome years with a virtually
constant-sized professional staff. Hence, new programs mean
restructuring of old. They contract. out a good deal of their
support needs and specifically in the recent work on their latest
major faci'4ity, the TOKOMAK 10, they have contracted out for a
good deal of the design. In answer to a specific question,
their staff size five years ago was about 5,500.. Still a
different point is that some of their new programs are likely
to have to go.outside of Moscow as part of a broad decentralization
move in the USSR. There is some indication that there will be
a large next-generation TOKOMAK and it may go outside Moscow.
The laboratory's Scientific Council is a key element for decision
making and for settling disputes and making priorities. The
Cbuncil is almost entirely internal but outside people are
invited.in from time to time. The Council is in effect advisory
to the Director and he, working with the State Commission, makes
the final decisions.
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In answer to a question it turns out that the Institute does
not do very much contract work, probably no more than 5% or
10. and that for some industries and other Institutes.
There is moderate autonomy for the major scientific people at
the laboratory.. The interface with the State Committee is
important. On the other hand, there is a relatively small
amount of paper writing involved in this interface. Decisions
are much more likely to be taken by discussions. Scientific
Councils exist at various levels below the central Council, i.e.
each of the major units has one and so, apparently, do the
individual laboratories.
In answer to another question, it was the strong impression of
Velekov that there was more development of new projects by
individual scientists than in the U.S. In other_ words, ever,
if this is a more or less applied institute, the role of the local
staff in generating projects is large. Incidentally, there
have been a great many interchanges between people working
in this Institute and U.S. laboratories so that knowledge of U.S.
practices appears to be good.
There are modest links of the institute to universities, especially
to Moscow University. Many of the senior staff hold chairs
in the universities. Their utilization of young people in
the laboratory during their student days is extensive, just as
it was at the Lebedev. Selected young people come in to the
Institute and do their diploma as part of their first degree within
the Institute. Some of these same students then go on to work
as Candidates. Velekov himself was one of these young students.
He noted that he did not stop at the Candidate level at all.
He spent six years on his thesis work and then applied directly
for a D.Sc. degree, which he holds. His comment was that this
was more efficient than taking first the Candidate and then the
D.Sc. degree.
There seems to be relatively small'movement of staff, i.e.,
there is great stability within the group. There appears to be
little tendency to look for senior staff outside the Institute.
In answer to a question; promotion of scientists relates primarily
to their capability in local programs. Decisions involve the
Scientific Councils and sometimes there will be particular
examing committees. set up. Younger people are examined every
threee or four years in a rather formal way.
The Scientific Councils also have responsibility to look at
the progress of the technical and scientific programs at the
laboratory. Returning to the question of promotion; for the
intermediate age scientist, the final decision in the Scientific
Councils are made by secret ballot. People, who have become
Academy members, are excluded from this three-year review however.
Even so, staff evaluation is a major activity and somecbing like
100 of the staff are reviewed. each year for promotion.
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With respect to reports on planning.it turns out that relatively
little is done in the way of annual report writing. .
With respect to linkages, the important linkacje is to the
State Committee. There are, however, pretty good links to
industry, particularly the nuclear power industry. However,
there is no formal consulting done to these groups and no extra
pay for consulting.. Those members of the Institute who also
hold appointments to the universities are, however, paid extra.
In answer to a question,: it turns out that they do not have a
published budget._ A.pparontly their budgets have been going up
something between 50 and 7' a year but with a number of peaks
because of large facilities.
I asked whether they hired. many new Ph.D.'s from the universities
and their response to this question was that in their judgement
the calibre of.graduates from the universities was substantially
lower than the selected young people they train themselves. Hence,
only occasionally will they hire someone from a university.
They have an internal examination system which they use in their
hiring. The number of new people brought in is small; no more
than twenty or thirty young people are brought into the Kurchatov
each year. They have a problem of what to do with the not--very--
successful people and the normal practice is not to fire them,
but to stop promoting them and announce to them that this is
true and so ease them out. Apparently the reputation of the
Institute is such that these people can get pretty good jobs
outside.
In view of the fact that the State Committee is the head agency
for the Kurchatov Institute, it will be very much in order to
send some written questions to them about the Kurchatov and
indeed it is quite possible that a real attempt at a second
round of questions stemming from their first answers would be
desirable.
Visit to State Committee, Moscow
STATOTHR
On the morning of August 20, spent an hour and a
half at the State Committee for Science and Technology. Skylarov
was away. We were met by two of his people, V.P. Axilenko and
Alexander. Metalnikov, accompanied by Nikiti L. Dvoretc, Chief
of Secretariat, Soviet Part, US/USSR Joint Commission on Science
and Technology.
We stated. that we had two very different goals in wanting to talk
with the people at the Secretariat. The first goal was to discuss
further our joint activities specifically in the area of reasearch,
management; the second. goal was to ask them.specific questions
about the management of institutes from the Soviet side wi.-Lh
particular reference to the Kurchatov Institute which we had just
visited.
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On the first of these, I went through the current situation
on joint report writing activities as I saw them and in particular,
I listed the topics of the case studies which the U.S. side
has in mind and also the titles for the short analysis reports
which we plan. The principal spokesman on their side was
(I think) Valentine P. Axilenko of the Foreign Relations
Department, State Committee, whose card lists the same Telex
number on it and who lists two telephones; 229-22-36 and 229-20-00.
He stated that he had accompanied Skylarov on the last visit
to the United States and was aware of the character of the planned
activities. At the same time, he wrote down the titles of
the planned U.S. papers, etc. I then went into what we were
planning to do on the case studies. I passed on a Dorothy
Nelkin book as an example of something done at Cornell and also
passed on the translation into Russian of the checklist which
we had developed on items of significance for a case study.
Dvoretc asked for the English original. also saying that sometimes
there were subtle differences in words and it was therefore
useful to have both languages, so I gave him the English.
After some further discussion of these activities and a
generalized offer of collaboration and "keep in touch" from
the U.S. side, we shifted to our visit to Kurchatov Institute
and some of the questions about management which had arisen.
Among the things said were the following.
Within the State Commission the allotment of funds parallels
quite closely the development of the five-year plan. On the
other hand there are methods to accommodate new ideas in that
the State Commission does have some flexible money which it
can use for add-on programs in the area of science and technology.
Fund requests are forwarded from the Committee to the State
Planning Commission which makes final decisions on financial
allotment. With respect to advice, their comment was that for
institutes in general the analyses of the Academy Nauk were
very important, and that, in particular, the very powerful
office within the Academy was the Finance Department, which had
a good deal to say on the analysis of funding. Rather generally,
it appears.that they lean heavily on activities of Scientific
Councils. One such exists in the State Committee and interacts
with the councils of the institutes themselves..
At the Academy Nauk, a Mr. Gervitz of the Finance Department,
would be an important man to-talk to to understand the details
of financial activities. (Apparently there is a similar office
in the State Committee).
The Scientific Council of the State Committee itself turns out
tb have on it representatives from several ministries so that
a decision made by it is in a sense a government-wide decision.
If their decision on an add-on project is positive, it then goes
with their recommendation to the Department of Financing.
It was noted to us that the coming meeting of the Commission
in Moscow in October would be an excellent tim t a
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on vacation will be back and present.
raised the question about possible conflicts that might
TATOTHRccur between Gosplan and the State committee where the approval.
of each seems to be needed for a project. The answer was that
funds are normally allotted in large budget units to the State
Committee, which can make its own decision on use of the funds
which come in. Put another way, the normal monies of the State
Plan are pretty fully fungible. The Gosplan allocation is
made with the expectation that decision making on scientific
and technological projects will be fundamentally that of the
State Conmli_ssion.
On the particular question of the management of Institutes, and
particularly of the Kurchatov, the man to see turns out to be
a Ilr. Petrenk.o. Ale attempted to get an appointment with him,
but he was tied up during times when we were. free. Iie would be
a useful man to ask questions of at the time of the Commission
muting in October 1975.
In order to expedite communication with the State Committee,
Dvoretc urged us to use the Telex.. The formal address is:
Foreign Relations Department
State Commission of USSR
Council of Ministry for Science and Techonology
11 Gorky Street
Moscow
Telex number is 7241 MSK
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