Box 5, Folder 24 – General Speeches
May 20, 1987, National Science Board, Vannevar Bush Award, Washington D. C.
Packard was recovering from a back operation and was unable to attend the dinner award.
5/20/87, Copy of the printed invitation to the dinner
5/20/87, Copy of S. J. Buschsbaum remarks accepting the award on behalf of Packard
2/25/87, Letter to Packard from Roland W. Schmitt, National Science Board, telling him he has been selected to receive the 1987 Vannevar Bush Award
3/18/87, Copy of a letter from Packard to Roland W. Schmitt saying he and Mrs. Packard would be pleased to attend the award dinner
4/8/87, Letter to Packard from W. O. Baker, AT&T, congratulating him on being selected for the Vannevar Bush Award. He attaches a copy of a speech he had made at a similar award dinner in 1981.
4/23/87, Copy of a letter from Packard to W. O. Baker, saying he is recovering from a back operation and will not be able to travel to Washington to receive the award
4/23/87, Copy of a letter to Dr. Roland W. Schmitt from Packard’s secretary, Margaret Paull, transmitting a note from Packard to be read at the dinner saying he is honored to receive the award and explaining his recuperation prevents his travelling to Washington
5/18/87, Letter to Packard from President Reagan congratulating him on receiving the award
5/20/87, Copy of a press release from the National Science Foundation announcing presentation of the Vannevar Bush Award to Packard. Biographical information on Packard is attached.
5/20/87, Copy of the text of Dr. Schmitt’s comments in making the award presentation at the dinner. He explains that Mr. Packard is recuperating nicely from surgery and that Solomon Buchbaum will accept the award in Packard’s honor.
5/13/87, Copy of a letter from Packard to Dr. Solomon J. Buchbaum, saying he would honored to have the Doctor accept the award for him
5/22/87, Copy of a letter from Packard to Dr. Solomon J. Buchbaum thanking him for accepting the Vannevar Bush Award in his behalf
Undated letter from Dr. Buchbaum to Packard saying it was an honor to accept the award for Packard. He encloses a copy of his remarks on that occasion.
6/4/87, Copy of a letter from Packard to Dr. Buchbaum thanking him for the copy of his comments at the dinner
Several letters of congratulations to Packard on his receiving the Vannevar Bush Award
9/7/89, Note from Margaret Paull to Packard attaching the file on documents relating to this award. She reminds him that he had not been able to attend.
Box 5, Folder 25 – General Speeches
October 14, 1987, Remarks on Accepting the George C. Marshall Medal
10/14/87, Typewritten text of Packard’s speech
Packard says he would like to discuss a few of the management principles that General Marshall followed, and which, he feels, are important in the management of industrial affairs as well as military affairs.
“One of these principles,” Packard says, “is to establish sound objectives and to have them fully supported by the people who are involved…..His papers continually reflect the importance he gave to sound plans and to the need to develop support for those plans by agreement rather than by command.”
“Another principle of good management is to select the best people for the job, give them responsibility and authority, and back them up when they need help.”
Packard gives the example of General Groves who Marshall chose to manage the Manhattan Project. While Marshall tried to follow the project, he soon found he could not keep up and left it to General Groves to manage.
Packard says that “One of the most important things that could be done to improve defense management is to do better overall planning for our military activities. We would benefit from continually asking the questions General Marshall asked and making the important decisions; 1st – as to what we are not going to do, and 2nd – as to what we must be prepared to do.”
Referring to the work done by the President’s Commission on Defense Management, Packard says their first recommendations to improve military planning was to “change the structure of the joint chiefs and this has been done by the Congress and the Department. The chairman was given more authority to be able to develop better plans for joint operations and overall military strategy. A vice chairman has been appointed to give the unified and specified commands a larger influence in the planning process. These changes are intended to give professional military people a more effective role in defense planning.”
One of the other recommendations the Commission made on planning was to establish a longer time for the planning and the implementation of the acquisition work. While the Department of Defense does plan on a five year basis, the Congress provides financial support year by year. This causes programs to be cancelled or stretched out and instead of being done on an efficient basis, billions of dollars are being wasted. An even more serious problem is that the Congress has become involved in detailed legislation which adds cost and seldom achieves what is intended. For example, it now takes longer than ever to deploy new technology weapons and we are throwing away whatever technical advantage we have over the Soviets. This is a very serious problem which has triggered by far too many detailed regulations on procurement imposed on the Department by the Congress. Thus we have strayed a long way from the kind of planning General Marshall considered so important in the mobilization and training of the military forces and in the development and acquisition of the weapons to win World War II.
“Better planning simply can not be done unless the members of the Congress will change their ways and consider our defense establishment essential to our leadership of the free world, and to our survival as a free nation instead of treating the Department of Defense as their personal pork barrel for the benefit of their constituents.”
“Our Commission made several recommendations intended to get the Department back to General Marshall’s normal practice of picking a responsible man and leaving him great freedom to carry out his assignment. The management of research and development and procurement in the Department has strayed far from this principle. In fact, it has been getting worse year by year in this regard..”
“Our Commission recommended that a new undersecretary job be established and be given the sole responsibility for managing defense acquisition, including a strong input in the planning process and full responsibility for establishing the overall Department policies for research, development and procurement, and this new under secretary be a man with industrial management experience. That has been done but it has not worked out as we had hoped. Perhaps we were expecting too much to establish a new job in as organization that had been working together for six years. Despite the fact that Secretary Weinberger gave the new undersecretary good support, it required that many other people in both OSD and the services had to get out of the procurement business which they were not willing to do. The next administration could do a much better job in implementing the Commission’s recommendations if the people involved are really interested in improving defense management.
“The Commission believed that the implementation of its recommendations in the acquisition area would result in a substantial reduction in the number of people in both OSD and the services in acquisition work, including research and development. There would be better weapons, lower costs, and we would be able to put new technology into the field much more rapidly. We should have recommended to the Congress that it should have first mandated a reduction of about twenty-five percent in the number of people in the acquisition area. With a reduction of that magnitude there would still be more than enough people left to do the job right. The Defense Department is simply not able to make this kind of a reduction in people without a mandate from the Congress, and I strongly urge the Congress to take this action.,
“In closing I want to emphasize that we do have considerable military capability at this time, good men and women in the services, equipment generally superior to that of our potential adversaries, and a high level of morale. We are simply paying too high a price for what we are getting, and the whole acquisition process is in the worst condition ever. Perhaps it is too much to hope that someday the Department will get its house in order and the Congress will see the error of its ways, for that is the only way our great country will again be able to enjoy the excellence in defense management that General Marshall demonstrated so well.
“There are, fortunately, some areas in the Department where General Marshall’s management practices are being followed. Even though it will be difficult or even impossible to make significant improvements in the overall management of the Department, I want to encourage the men and women in the Army to continue to seek ways to expand the areas in which General Marshall’s principles can be applied, to develop centers of excellence in the management of your job in spite of all the regulations and red tape. This will do honor to the memory of General Marshall and it will do honor to your service to your country.”
1/16/87, Letter to Packard from Maj. Gen. Ret. Robert F. Cocklin, informing him that the Association of the United States Army has selected him as the 1987 recipient of the George Catlett Marshall Medal.
2/9/87, Copy of a letter from Packard to Gen, Cocklin saying “Frankly I do not believe that I am particularly qualified to receive the award…”
2/17/87, Letter to Packard from Gen. Cocklin asking that he reconsider
4/23/87, Letter to Packard from Gen. Cocklin telling that the announcement of his selection for the Marshall Medal will be released shortly
8/17/87, Letter to Packard from Gen. Cocklin giving information on arrangements for the dinner
10/20/87, Copies of letters from Packard sending copies of his speech to 16 prominent people
10/21/87, Letter to Packard from Norman R. Augustine congratulating him on receiving the Marshall Medal
10/26/87, Letter from Frank Carlucci, The White House, thanking Packard for the copy of his speech, and saying ‘Right on target.!’
10/21/87, Letter to Packard from Gen. Cocklin thanking him for his participation at the AUSA’s Annual Meeting
10/26/87, Letter to Packard from Carla Hills, congratulating on receiving the Medal
10/26/87, Letter to Packard from William P. Clark thanking him for his address
11/27/87, Letter to Packard from Charles J. Pilliod, Jr. Ambassador to Mexico, thanking him for sending a copy of his speech
Publications and news clippings
6/5/87, Clipping from the Wall Street Journal with an article written by Antonio Martino discussing the Marshall Plan
May 1987, clipping from Army magazine announcing forthcoming presentation of Medal to Packard
May 1987 issue of Army magazine
March 1987 issue of ‘Topics’, a publication of the George C. Marshall Foundation
1996 Annual report of The George C. Marshall Foundation
Box 5, Folder 25A – General Speeches
November 3, 1987 – Child Health and our Nation’s Future, David Packard and Richard E, Behrman, M.D. Center for the Future of Children, The David and Lucile Packard Foundation.
11/3/87, Copy of typed text of speech
“As a nation,” Packard says, “we are overlooking the most fundamental step required to provide for our economic welfare and quality of life in the next century. It is not a matter of protecting the commerce of oil or reducing our national debt, as important as these may be. We can fulfill our responsibilities to the next generation and maintain our competitive posture in the worldwide economy only if today’s children become healthy, productive adults. This requires that children have adequate health care during their early years, giving them a proper foundation for succeeding in their education.”
Packard emphasizes that meeting this goal will require a long range view. “Statements by the administration to the effect that we can’t afford major initiatives now to deal with those living in poverty (forty percent of whom are children), of the 31 million who don’t have health insurance ( a third of whom are children), are missing the point. For our own well-being, as well as theirs, we cannot afford to ignore the children in these groups…. We can’t afford to squander our natural human resources by failing to produce physically and mentally healthy children.”
Packard agrees there are honest differences of opinion on how to address the important educational and social issues that affect children, he says “…there is no debate about the proposition that all children should be provided basic medical care. Good health is a prerequisite to being able to learn, to develop normally, and to being able to work to one’s full potential.”
“At the very least, we should start now by providing all pregnant women and newborns each year with a basic insurance plan. We propose the following:
- A health benefit package similar to that proposed by the American academy of Pediatrics would be required for all insurance policies and should be included in every employee’s health insurance benefit package.
- For those children whose parents cannot afford a policy directly or through employers, coverage should be purchased for them through a combination of income-graduated, parent paid premiums, public funds financed by a payroll tax on employers and employees, and allocations from state and federal budgets. It is reasonable the public funds come from those whose families will benefit in the future from the good health of all children.
- The plan should include appropriate cost-saving measures such as managed care.”
“Children are our future and the future is now. Every CEO knows that today’s decisions determine tomorrow’s bottom line. Failure to act as well as think strategically leads to loss of productivity or competitiveness, or both. Failure to address the health needs of today’s children is similarly insidious in its consequences, We mortgage our future as a nation to a much greater extent by this negligence than by our failure to reduce the federal budget deficit.”
