STEC Archives, Print Document Division
Curator signature: Jer
Format: Textual Record
Object: Item 114 of “Special Collection: STEC through the 60s”
Location (if known): STEC Archives
Time (if known): Document first made public in August 15, 1956
Curator’s note: Item 114 is a copy of Presidential Executive Order 10676, with one additional note attached. It is donated to STEC’s archives from the personal effects of Adm. William F. Halsey.
Executive Order 10676 – President’s Intelligence Policy Board
August 15, 1956
By virtue of the authority vested in me as President of the United States, it is hereby ordered as follows:
- There is hereby created a board to be known as the President’s Intelligence Policy Board which shall be composed of a chairman and four other members to be designated by the President. Excluded from this selection are all members, past or present, of the National Security Council as established by the National Security Act of 1947, but the President and the chairman may make exceptions from time to time the appropriate officials from agencies as he sees fit.
- The function of the Board is to study the present and unfolding situation involving matters of national security, specifically that of national and foreign intelligence. The board does not gather or process intelligence matters; rather it analyzes what is available and make and presents to the President evaluations and recommendations, on a monthly basis or more frequent as the situation demands, in the national interest concerning the following:
- Matters of foreign relations that are of interest to the national interest
- Matters of international communications that are of interest to the national interest
- Policies governing the relationship, capacity, or other affairs pertaining to governmental agencies pertaining to matters of intelligence
- Policies governing the relationship, capacity, or other affairs pertaining to non-governmental actors pertaining to matters of intelligence
- any such related policy matters as the Board may determine
- The Board is authorized to consult with representatives of industry or government concerned with the aforementioned subjects. The Board shall protect the security of any classified information submitted to it, and all executive departments and agencies of the Federal Government are authorized and directed to cooperate with the Board to furnish it such information as it is necessary for the completion of its task.
- The expenditures of the Board and the expenses incurred on behalf of the Board shall be drawn in accordance to the Standard Government Travel Regulations.
- The Board shall remain in place until such time as the President decrees its termination.
Item 114, attachment 1.
Object: Letter, personal
Date: August 15, 1956
Dear Bill,
You know what this is for.
I apologize for disturbing your retirement. However, recent affairs as well as your unique experience have led me to believe that you may be one of the best people suitable for this task.
Please give it some thought. I look forward to hear from you.
Sincerely,
DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER
STEC Archives, Print Document Division
Curator signature: Jer
Format: Textual Record
Object: Letter, Personal
(Associated with Item 114 of “Special Collection: STEC through the 60s”)
Location (if known): STEC Archives
Time (if known): August 20, 1956
Dear Mr. President,
You know full well what my opinions were on the matter. It has always been my belief that the younger officers should be given higher commands with greater responsibilities. I’m an old man. I’m tired. I’m disappointed. They’re trying to scrap my old flagship, did you hear? In any case let the young fellows take over.
I’ll have to respectfully decline. My time is currently dedicated fully to the business of saving my old flagship.
Respectfully,
William F. Halsey
STEC Archives, Print Document Division
Curator signature: Jer
Format: Print Media
Object: Clipping, Print Media – The Pasedena Star
(Associated with Item 114 of “Special Collection: STEC through the 60s”)
Location (if known): STEC Archives
Time (if known): July 2nd, 1958
OBITUARY
Frances Cooke Grandy Halsey (1887 – 1958)
STEC Archives, Print Document Division
Curator signature: Jer
Format: Print Media
Object: Clipping, Print Media – Popular Mechanics 1958
(Associated with Item 114 of “Special Collection: STEC through the 60s”)
Location (if known): STEC Archives
Time (if known): July 2nd, 1958
The “Big E” Dies With Her Boots On
Last summer, a deafening staccato roar echoed through the cavernous hangar deck of the U.S.S. Enterprise. The ragged din was punctuated by an occasional boom as gigantic chunks of her steel superstructure broke loose and fell screeching against torn bulkheads. The glare of white fire slashed the dark spaces below decks…
STEC Archives, Print Document Division
Curator signature: Jer
Format: Textual Record
Object: Letter, Personal
(Associated with Item 114 of “Special Collection: STEC through the 60s”)
Location (if known): STEC Archives
Time (if known): July 3rd, 1958
Dear Bill,
Sorry to hear about your loss. I hope you’ll take the time needed to recover.
Sincerely,
DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER
STEC Archives, Print Document Division
Curator signature: Jer
Format: Textual Record
Object: Letter, Personal
(Associated with Item 114 of “Special Collection: STEC through the 60s”)
Location (if known): STEC Archives
Time (if known): August 15th, 1958
Dear Ike,
Cut to the damned chase next time. This is the fifth message you’ve written me on the matter. I’ve been a sailor for over forty-five years. Leaving the fleet’s like cutting off my right arm. Mr. Truman intentionally keeping me out of the picture and blocking me from the Special Task and Evaluation Command’s sure feels like cutting off my left.
I’m an old man. I should be delighted to talk to you about the situation, but instead I am still fuming and furious. I had hoped that the world would return to peacetime, but instead it is not to be. I had hoped that our children and grandchildren will inherit a world better than ours, but instead that is not to be either. Not with how that war turned out.
Too frequently my thoughts wander back to the good old days, back when I was skipper of those old destroyers. I am tired. I am old. I am not feeling nearly as well as I did and my drinking arm is failing.
You’re going to have to come down in person to get me if you really want me on this damned Board of yours, so I expect the matter to be closed. Thank you and good luck.
Respectfully yours,
William F. Halsey
STEC Archives, Print Document Division
Curator signature: Jer
Format: Print Media
Object: Telegram, Western Union
(Associated with Item 114 of “Special Collection: STEC through the 60s”)
Location (if known): STEC Archives
Time (if known): September 7th, 1958
WESTERN UNION TELEGRAM
CHARGE TO THE ACCOUNT OF: DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER
TIME FILED: SEPTEMBER 7TH, 1958
RECEIVED AT: 530 PARK AVENUE, NEW YORK, NY
BEGIN MESSAGE
OK
END OF MESSAGE
STEC Archives, Print Document Division
Curator signature: Jer
Format: Textual Record
Object: Letter, Personal and OTHER
(Tentative Classification: “Item no. 19366 – Artifacts of the Abyssal War, 1990)
Location (if known): STEC Archives
Time (if known): UNKNOWN
Curator’s note: Item 19366 is a hand-written letter, sealed in an aging envelope. To preserve the letter’s integrity it has been placed in a specially designed container.
The letter simply says “To the Big E” on the envelope
Item 19366-1 is a bottle of Jack Daniels single malt whisky, “special stock.”
Dear Enterprise,
God knows when this will reach you, and I don’t think I’ll ever be getting a chance to meet you. But if you should be reading this message you’d have made an old man very happy. It means that we’re on the right track and definitely doing all the right things, even though there’s still a whole lot that I confess I don’t really understand. I’m here and I’m here to do my part, like you.
You did a splendid job for our country. Well done. It will be difficult to overestimate how much you’ve contributed to that war. Now there’s going to be another war, and from the looks and sound of things, this one’s going to be bad. It will be scary, but I’ll bet there was nobody in the war more scared, more often, and for as long as I was. We thought they were supermen, too, before we proved that they weren’t. I have full confidence that you’ll prove these creatures the same.
One of the hardest things in command is sending men into action to die. Soon it looks like we’ll be sending young women. That doesn’t sit well with me at all. You can’t manufacture blood. You can’t grow it and you can’t mine it or raise it. I’d much rather go myself.
But they say I’m too old. I may be too damned old to fight another war, but I sure as hell don’t want any of you to be fighting one either. In a sense I am grateful that the bastards aren’t here since we’d benefit greatly from the additional time for preparation, but I’m itching for a fight and dearly wish I can do my part in sending them sonuvabitches back to where they belong in hell.
I’m not a particularly religious man. I cursed more often than I prayed, especially in war, but I want to let you know one thing.
I believe in you.
I believe wholeheartly in you and all that you and you fellow sailors stand for. The greatest instinct to fight is in the American people, and those monsters will rue the day they started something that they cannot finish.
We are ready to fight and win this war. We’ve always been. No man in military history ever had enough men and materiel to fight a war, but he has always gone ahead and done it just the same.
Stay alive and do the utmost to take care of yourself.
Keep killing the bastards.
And when this whole thing’s over, don’t forget to pour me one. I saved the best for the best.
God bless!
Bill Halsey