Office of the Historian

6. Letter From the Director of the Office of Strategic Services (Donovan) to the President’s Special Counsel (Rosenman)0

Washington, September 4, 1945.

Dear Sam: I am enclosing a copy of my letter to the Bureau of the Budget concerning the liquidation of the Office of Strategic Services.1

Since the above meeting with the Budget Bureau, I have submitted a liquidation budget for presentation to the Congress.

I understand that there has been talk of attempting to allocate different segments of the organization to different departments. This would be an absurd and unsatisfactory thing to do. The organization was set up as an entity, every function supporting and supplementing the other.

It’s time for us to grow up, Sam, and realize that the new responsibilities we have assumed require an adequate intelligence system.

Increasingly the President will see the need and I hope a new agency will be set up to take over a very useful legacy.

Sincerely,

William J. Donovan 2
  1. Source: Central Intelligence Agency Historical Files, HS/HC 801, Item 29. No classification marking.↩
  2. See Attachment 1 to Document 3.↩
  3. Printed from a copy that bears this typed signature.↩