 | Between the United States and Germany 1945-1954 |
| | Between the United States and Germany 1945-1954 |
The development of projects that made up the total exchange program was strictly the responsibility of each of the OMGUS divisions directly concerned; it also was their function to solicit sponsors in the United States.(1) It was this arrangement more than anything else that established and shaped the character of the exchange program as one dictated by substantive rather than logistical considerations. Further, it gave the program its proper focus, format, and content. The mandate of each office and division determined the selection of projects and candidates. The authority of the various functional units, in turn, stemmed from directives and regulations issued by the Allied Control Council and by the Military Governments in each of the zones of occupation. The directives had to do with such problems as school reform, administration and supervision of education, political activities, courts and judicial procedures, government institutions and elections. Each of the major offices, divisions, and branches was assigned responsibility for the execution of one or more of these directives and nearly every unit soon seized upon the exchange program as a means of enlisting German participation in one form or another in the implementation of its programs.(2) To do so was both logical and practical. Given the conditions prevailing in Germany in 1947, 1948, and 1949, with public and private institutions only slowly recovering from physical destruction and political corruption, with professional and technical manpower at a premium---in short, with a critical shortage of resources in the face of overwhelming demands for expertise and guidance, assistance was needed from the outside. OMGUS' efforts had to be supplemented and, in time, superseded by efforts from within, that is, by Germans who had observed and studied democracy in action outside Germany proper. The exchange program offered the opportunity for them to do so. It came to be recognized as the long arm of the reorientation effort.
The bulk of exchanges sponsored by Military Government in the early years fell upon the Education and Religious Affairs Branch (see Appendix VI). The objective of the Branch was to bring about a democratic reform of the German educational system on all levels in accordance with the principles stipulated in Allied Control Council Directive 54. To achieve equal educational opportunity (Principle 1), it demanded that "German education . . . must be so organized and so conducted as to give continuous opportunity and guidance to each individual to develop to the best of his ability, irrespective of race, color, creed, financial condition or political belief . . ."(3) This meant freedom of teaching and learning. The policy enunciated by Dr. Grace in October 1948, for the Education and Cultural Relations Division, deemphasized the technical aspects of educational reform and raised policy to the level of broad humanitarian principles, e.g., "dignity and rights of the individual, deference to the personal conviction of others and to universal opinion, freedom of thought and expression, and liberal social attitudes." The resources of the Division were to be used as a means of achieving a reform of German society in toto through a broad change, in social concepts, attitudes, and institutions.(4)
The diversified structure of the Division entrusted this task to a number of subdivisions and branches pursuing the objectives in critical sectors of German society. The Religious Affairs Branch was concerned with the restoration of organized religion. Taking its guidance from a statement by the State-War-Navy Coordinating Committee and issued as Directive 12 by the European Advisory Committee and JCS 1143 by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the policy of OMGUS assured freedom of worship according to the dictates of the individual, protection and fair treatment to all religious elements; and was so proclaimed by General Eisenhower in April 1945.(5) The policy was dictated by humanitarian and practical considerations. OMGUS relied heavily on the prestige of the church and, in particular, on those elements within the Catholic and Protestant communities which had a proven record of resistance to National Socialism.
The Community Education Branch had as its principal objective the development of grass roots support for democratic institutions and processes through group initiative and cooperative action of voluntary organizations, community councils, and the like. The purpose was to stimulate citizen participation, individual responsibility, and tolerance in civic and social life---qualities whose absence at critical moments in German history had proved fatal to political stability and democratic reform.(6)
Adult education classes, as postulated by Control Council Directive 56,(7) October 28, 1947, "to prepare active workers for the democratic education of Germany" now offered a chance to supplement school training. SWNCC 269/9 of February 4, 1947,(8) singled out youth as a special group to be reoriented, and encouraged "initiative and active participation of German Youth in the reconstruction of German community life." Ninety percent of the young people left school in their early teens after consuming a scholastic diet that was highly deficient in civic education.
Women received special attention. They outnumbered men by 7 1/2 million, yet they were still struggling for liberation from a deeply underprivileged status in professional and civic life. In 1948, a special Women's Affairs Section in OMGUS was established "to aid, advise and encourage individual German women to assume their full responsibility as citizens in the building of a democratic society and to assist voluntary associations of women to exercise a constructive role in developing democratic attitudes and democratic principles in community life." (9)
Other HICOG divisions equally concerned with reorientation also used exchanges as a means of accomplishing their objectives. The Civil Administration Division, e.g., devoted its efforts to helping. create a democratic cadre of political and civic leaders who could be relied upon to rebuild the civil service, legislative, and other key institutions greatly depleted by the necessity for de-Nazification, war casualties, and the exodus of many members of the prewar elite. The Division's aim was to create "a lively citizen-government relationship which will strengthen the cause of civic responsibility and give life to the democratic structure and procedure."(10) To do so involved, among other things, the development of local self-government, the protection of civil liberties, and the exercise of the franchise by periodic and free elections.(11)
The Legal Division was principally concerned with the restoration. of a viable democratic judiciary. This required not merely inducement to introduce democratic principles into the legal system, but a major effort to insure acceptance and support of a totally reformed legal system by the German public. Another program feature of major importance was a systematic attempt to broaden the scope of legal training and the horizon of law students by a new emphasis on ethical and social issues.(12)
The objectives of the Manpower Division were the restoration of democratic trade unions and the creation of an effective working relationship between labor and management and labor and government.(13) The Labor-Management Techniques Branch of that Division was especially concerned with the establishment of relations between German trade unions and their counterparts in the United States, in order to bridge the gap caused by 12 years of isolation that had left even what remained of the German labor movement wholly uninformed of developments in unionism on the outside.
The Information Services Division saw as its principal function the rehabilitation and democratization of German information media, partly through the creation of media, e.g., RIAS (Radio in the American Sector of Berlin), Der Monat, a monthly magazine, Die Neue Zeitung, a daily paper which at one time had a circulation of 1.6 million, under OMGUS auspices; and partly by a systematic attempt to familiarize German editors, columnists, commentators, reporters, news broadcasters, and other media technicians with democratic practices, and new techniques of printing and the like. The purpose of this program was to help German media specialists to modernize their output and to improve their professional and technical skills, as well as to demonstrate to them the importance of vigilance and independence vis-a-vis encroachments by official authorities and pressure groups.(14)
Finally, the Food and Agriculture Division was concerned with both the political and occupational status of the farmer. It introduced organizational reforms and new production and consumption concepts and techniques. Special attention was given to the training of young farmers.
A new procedure was developed to regulate the initiation and clearance of projects originating outside OMGUS headquarters. Responsibility for the development of projects was charged to each of the substantive divisions but could be launched at the Land (State) level. Land offices submitted their proposals to the corresponding OMGUS division at the zonal level which in turn placed them, along with proposals of their own, before the Interdivisional Reorientation Committee. The latter made the ultimate decision---approval or disapproval.(15)
These, then, were the functional units and their multiple purposes which gave exchanges under OMGUS their special content. The complexity of the objectives pursued by each called for a type of organization which broke each division or branch program into individual projects and which grouped leaders and specialists selected for exchange visits around such projects. This was, indeed, the way in which OMGUS proceeded.
Most of the projects were developed by the Education and Religious Affairs Branch and subsequently, after the organizational change already noted, by the Education and Cultural Relations Division. The program moved slowly at first. Early budgets contained proposals for visits of groups organized according to occupation (professors, teachers, administrators) or professional specialization (e.g., subject matter: education, literature, history, psychology, sociology).(16) The final budget proposed by OMGUS in 1949 for fiscal year 1950 foresaw a total of 241 individual projects under 33 different titles sponsored by the Education and Cultural Relations Division. Most of the projects involved the visits of German educators (1,255) to the United States and of American educational experts (88) to Germany. All projects addressed critical needs in the fields of elementary, secondary, higher and vocational education, and teacher training. Examples were: the use of audio-visual aid equipment in classroom teaching, research in child growth and development, educational psychology, citizenship training, social studies, vocational guidance, education for the handicapped, curriculum improvement, textbook writing, and comparative education. The purpose behind the selection of these subjects was to enable educators to deal with some of the most notorious deficiencies in the German system by studying theory and practice of education in other (American and European) countries. Comparison, it was hoped, might encourage German educators to come to grips with fundamental weaknesses inherent in the philosophy and structure of the German system, among others, the segregation at the age of ten, of the gifted and socially advantaged, the upper-crust children, from the less endowed ones and, in so doing, to reserve solely for the former admission to secondary and higher education and eventually to the professions.
Other projects were designed to remedy "flaws" in the German training of teachers and school administrators by having these persons observe the organization, administration, operation, and the architecture of schools in the United States.
Still other projects were intended to free German schools from their isolation within the community by demonstrating the benefits of lay participation and local initiative in supervision and planning, e.g., through parent-teacher associations and cooperation with other community groups. Finally, various projects were devoted to the encouragement of teacher and student initiative in forming organizations representing their interests and in practicing self-government.(17)
Other OMGUS divisions and branches followed the example of the Education and Cultural Relations Division although on a somewhat lesser scale. The Civil Administration Division proposed a total of 47 projects under 9 titles labeled governmental affairs, political parties, civil service, books, films, city planning, social science, public welfare, and public health. They called for the visits of 613 Germans to the United States and of 55 Americans to Germany. The Legal Division listed 3 projects involving the exchange of 155 Germans and of 16 American experts. The Manpower Division had 2 projects in which 155 Germans and 19 Americans were to participate. The Information Services Division presented only one project for 52 representatives of the German press. The Food and Agriculture Division, on the other hand, proposed a total of 42 projects grouped under 4 titles: technical assistance, agricultural extension, home economics, and student exchanges. These involved a total of 558 Germans and 12 Americans.(18)
How many of these projects actually got off the ground is difficult to determine from available records. Educators were, among the first to arrive in the United States, some as early as 1948. As fur as the other groups were concerned, it appears that most of the more significant projects did not move forward until 1949 when seven high-ranking German administrators visited the United States under the auspices of the Bureau of the Budget. They were followed in relatively short order by similar groups of federal, state, and local officials, mayors, county executives, city planners, women leaders, journalists, and other media experts. The first major group of students came in the fall of 1949.
Moreover, under OMGUS even the project approach remained by and large a concept that was never fully realized and, in fact, not completely accepted. It even came under fire. In a memorandum to his Land directors of March 23, 1949,(19) Major General George P. Hays, the Deputy Military Governor, sharply criticized what appeared to him a waste of money and motion on behalf of reorientation and democratization. "While, it is not intended," Hays said, "to criticize our present program as being unworthy in any respect, we are scattering our efforts and our funds at present over a rather broad field with very little knowledge of the concrete results obtained from any project." Hays ordered that a survey be made to identify the accomplishments up to then and to determine what was valuable enough to be continued. A survey of this kind, he suggested, would assure optimum use of funds and manpower, even if it might involve the termination of certain projects, once a German Government had been established.
General Hays' criticism was shared by officers of the Department of State who had felt for some time, that existing machinery at the disposal of Military Government and the Department of the Army was not adequate to administer an expanding and increasingly sophisticated program and to do justice to the multitude of projects proposed or contemplated.(20) The project approach was a step in the right direction, but it seemed premature. Major changes in policy, organization, and funding were required before it could be expected to become an effective operational tool.
The problem of finding a proper administrative structure to a unique exchange program such as this one, with specific foreign policy goals, proved to be extremely difficult and was, in fact, never settled by OMGUS to the full satisfaction of all parties involved. As shown above, the exchange program had neither autonomy nor a substantive identity of its own, but was a service operation that took direction from a multitude of divisions and branches, all of which had reorientation functions and shared the reorientation funds and the services of the exchange operation. Instead of forming an independent unit, the exchange division was part of one of the functional divisions.
In the beginning, exchanges were handled by the Interchange-of-Persons Office which, in turn, was a sub-unit of the Education and Religious Affairs and Communications Division. The Education and Religious Affairs Branch was raised subsequently to the rank of Education and Cultural Relations Division. It was ably led and staffed by distinguished educators, such as Thomas Alexander and John Taylor of Columbia University, Edward Y. Hartshorne, Jr. of Harvard, and A. E. Zucker of the University of Maryland.
In 1946 the staff of the Education and Religious Affairs unit numbered 55. Exchange programs were assigned to the Cultural Affairs Branch, one of the Division's units, the others being the Education Branch, the Religious Affairs Branch, and the Group Activities Branch. The responsibility of the Cultural Affairs Branch was to oversee policies and procedures regarding international cultural exchanges between Germany and other countries. Its major operational function included, inter alia, the selection, processing, and program administration of all German nationals traveling to the United States and other countries on a cultural mission, and the coordination of program planning and budgeting for all expert consultants going to Germany from the United States or other countries on a reorientation Project under the sponsorship of the U.S. Government.(21)
The services of the Cultural Affairs Branch were available not only to the Education and Cultural Relations Division but also to the Civil Administration Division, the Legal Division, the Manpower Division, the Information Services Division, and the Food and Agriculture Division to assist them in performing the reorientation aspects of their programs. There was collaboration among these divisions, especially between the Education and Cultural Relations Division and the Civil Administration Division which together, for all practical purposes, formed the nucleus of the OMGUS reorientation Program. The number of sponsors in the, United States, the multitude of projects, and the relative, paucity of funds that had to be equitably shared, called for tighter arrangements insuring stronger and regularized coordination.
In response to this need OMGUS created in July 1948(22) an Interdivisional Reorientation Committee (IRC) which was given the job of coordinating the programs of the several divisions, of developing plans and procedures for implementing all aspects of the reorientation program and, to that end, of enlisting the interest of all offices and divisions. Furthermore, IRC was to establish criteria for the evaluation of projects, i.e., to coordinate projects and procedures for soliciting private funds, materials, and services and to review and approve all projects suggested by any one of the component groups of the IRC, and make appropriate recommendations. The Committee (IRC) was composed of the Director of the Education and Cultural Relations Division acting as chairman, the Director of the Civil Administration Division, the Director of the Information Services Division, the Control Officer, and the Chief of the Cultural Affairs Branch or anyone whom the Division chief had designated as his proxy. Representatives of other divisions, such as the Legal, Manpower, or Food and Agriculture Divisions would attend meetings at which projects of direct concern to them were discussed. Responsibility for the budget and fiscal aspects was assigned to the Control Office of OMGUS. The establishment of IRC marked considerable progress in comparison to the situation existing before; but the IRC did not succeed altogether in terminating competition among sponsoring units for funds, through firm priorities or quota allocations, nor did it reduce the flood of projects proposed by various divisions and branches.
The horizontal layout of controls at headquarters level was supported by a vertical structure consisting of field offices at the Land level. These field offices were advised by Interdivisional Reorientation or Cultural Exchange Committees on the selection of experts and students. Attached to each Committee were groups of persons (panels) representing the interests of the various functional divisions concerned, e.g., the Education and Cultural Relations Division, the Civil Administration Division, and so on. Other panels could be added, as circumstances warranted. The panels received and reviewed applications, made preliminary selections, and submitted their choices with evaluative comments to the Land military government office.(23)
The responsibilities of the Land offices were rather comprehensive as far as students were concerned. They included selection and appointment of the so-called Committees on Selection, oral interviews with candidates, chairing the Committees on Selection, evaluating the Committees' nominations, formulating policy at the Land level, and forwarding recommendations for program improvement to OMGUS, et al.(24)
Compared to the OMGUS operation, the organization in the United States in the early days was relatively small but, despite its modest size, fairly complicated. Essentially, stateside agencies provided policy direction and technical and logistic support, so-called "backstopping." From 1945-1949 the State-War-Navy Coordinating Committee (SWNCC) exercised overall responsibility for policy. Later this function was returned to the separate agencies in Washington and in the period which followed the program was supervised by the Department of State in close cooperation with the War Department, which then became the Department of the Army. Within the Department of State responsibility for matters relating to Occupied Germany devolved upon the Bureau of Public Affairs under Assistant Secretary William Benton, followed by Howland H. Sargeant (Acting), up to 1948, and upon the Bureau for Occupied Areas, under General John H. Hilldring, and later Charles E. Saltzman, each of whom consulted with the appropriate geographic desks on significant policies and programs. The principal liaison officer in the Bureau for Occupied Areas was Benjamin O'Sullivan. Central responsibility for the initiation, coordination, and supervision of policy was assigned to the Area Division for Occupied Areas (ADO) under the direction of Henry P. Leverich, later of Hans Speier, followed by the author. ADO, later renamed Public Affairs Overseas Program Staff (POS), was a staff unit under the Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs. The Division (ADO) approved or disapproved applications of candidates and sponsors and projects.
All operational functions, i.e.., chiefly backstopping activities, were discharged by the Reorientation Branch of the Civil Affairs Division of the War (Army) Department under Colonel Robert B. McRae, and subsequently Colonels Bernard B. McMahon and Leon P. Irvin. The Reorientation Branch was responsible, among other things, for establishing program policy (jointly with the Department of State), performing liaison between all interested parties and agencies involved, approving projects requested by the Theater Commander or private sponsors, evaluating security clearances, employing the services of the Institute of International Education to administer the student program, and arranging the transfer of funds to the International Exchange of Persons Division of the. Department of State to act as agent for the administration of programs for visiting American experts and specialists. The Personnel and Training Branch of CAD was assigned the function of recruiting and processing all individuals as requested by the Reorientation Branch for service under the exchange program provided that such individuals passed -the security investigation and met minimum requirements to qualify as experts.(25)
The governmental organization functioned well considering the extremely complicated mechanism created to administer the program. As the program grew at an ever-increasing pace, however, it became, apparent that in the absence of adequate funds through Congressional appropriations, the Government lacked the resources to run an effective program. Dr. Wells had been quick to recognize this dilemma. Quite evidently upon his initiative, the Office of the Cultural Adviser, Headquarters, European Command, wrote a memorandum in which it pointed out that the Department of the Army was simply unable to approach private institutions, foundations, and individuals with requests for money or for contributions of personnel and materials to aid its exchange program in Germany.(26)
The Civil Affairs Division in Washington had indicated that it did not possess the funds nor the personnel to recruit individuals to serve as visiting experts and artists in Germany, to say nothing of the far more complicated and absorbing process of developing private resources for programming the visits of German visitors to the United States. Consequently, the memorandum went on to say, the problem had devolved upon OMGUS itself. Yet distance and lack of direct contact had slowed down progress. It was "manifestly difficult, if not impossible," to achieve any measurable success under these conditions. What was needed was "some kind of supporting organization in the United States, more specifically, an "officially recognized nonprofit organization of private citizens and affiliated institutions in the United States which would take the initiative in raising financial support, stimulating interest in this program in governmental and civilian circles, encouraging and selecting experts to come to Germany, and encouraging sponsorship by appropriate stateside organizations of visits to the United States by governmental and private leaders." Such an organization, the memo suggested, "would be invaluable for coordinating and implementing in the United States the democratization programs projected by Military Government for Germany."
The organization, Dr. Wells proposed(27) should be directed by "a group of noted, public-spirited citizens who are distinguished leaders in their respective fields, persons whose reputations and influence would enable them to work with and through existing foundations, councils, and institutions in the interest of German reeducation."
Actually, considering the meager resources at the disposal of the Army, the latter had done a most creditable job in alerting the educational and philanthropic community to the importance of the program and in enlisting the interest of key organizations and institutions. It had approached the Institute of International Education as early as 1946 to secure its cooperation in bringing German students to the United States. The Institute, in turn, had written to more than 100 colleges and universities asking them to provide for incoming German students full maintenance and scholarships,(28) once it became clear that governmental funds were not available. IIE had received favorable replies from such institutions as the Universities of Georgia and Notre Dame, Oberlin College, Pendle Hill (a Quaker college near Philadelphia), Union Theological Seminary, and Washington State University at Pullman. After the program had grown to major proportions in the late forties, the Institute, under contract to the War Department, assumed responsibility for the administration of the student program, including raising funds for travel in the U.S. and incidental expenses.
Following the release of SWNNC 269/8, the Civil Affairs Division sent identical letters to 31 organizations and institutions, including the Rockefeller Foundation, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the National Education Association, the American Council on Education, the Institute of International Education, and many church and cultural, religious, social and civic organizations, calling attention to the new policy and emphasizing that the program in Germany was entirely dependent on private support.(29) Such private support, the letters pointed out, might consist of scholarships, training opportunities for specialists and experts, funds for maintenance and transportation, or any other special project considered appropriate, for the program.(30) The response, was wide and varied. The University of Chicago, for example, offered to release eight to ten of its faculty members to work as a group at a German university for one or two semesters, and, moreover, promised to obtain the necessary funds to do so. Columbia University indicated that it had obtained $25,000 to bring six German broadcasters to the United States for a 6-months' orientation period. The American Friends Service Committee offered to revive and expand its school affiliation program by including 25-30 German schools beginning in the fall of 1947. The Experiment in International Living of Putney, Vermont, declared itself ready to send 30 college students to Germany and Austria to reestablish contacts with their counterparts in these and other countries to help in jobs of physical reconstruction.(31)
But the, Army lacked the necessary capability for a follow-up and for full exploitation of the opportunities afforded them by generous donors. Private organizations complained that correspondence remained unanswered and that projects got bogged down in bureaucratic details.(32) Corrective action was needed to deal with what appeared to be a critical deficiency in the organization of the program and what threatened to become a serious public relations problem.
Washington acted with dispatch. The Department of State approved Dr. Wells' plan of establishing a nonprofit organization of private citizens in the United States to assist the Government in furthering cultural interchange with Germany. The Department, moreover, while declaring that operational responsibility within the Government should remain with the Army, offered to render all assistance possible under the circumstances and proposed that the work of establishing the requisite organization on the governmental and nongovernmental side start as soon as possible. The, element of urgency was suggested by the approaching beginning of the academic year and the anticipated transfer of operational responsibilities in Germany from the auspices of the Army to the Department of State, then scheduled for July 1, 1948.(33) In its reply the Department of the Army expressed its gratification over the readiness of the Department of State to accept the plan and proposed, in turn, that the Department should assume responsibility for establishing the nongovernmental unit and perfecting plans for implementation under its control.(34)
As a result, an Advisory Committee on Cultural and Educational Relations was created in the fall of 1948 under the auspices of the American Council on Education with the help of a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation. It was composed of representatives of leading U.S. cultural and educational organizations and interests. Its name was later changed to Commission on the Occupied Areas (COA). Dr. Wells assumed the chairmanship, and Harold E. Snyder, who was directing several international projects for the American Council on Education, became its director.
The COA's stated purpose, was "to develop and strengthen sound approaches to cultural and educational affairs in the occupied countries (i.e., Japan, Austria, and Germany), stressing particularly the establishment of mutual relations between institutions and organizations in the United States and those in the occupied areas." Primary emphasis was to be placed on "the promotion of such activities in the educational and cultural fields as will encourage the development of democracy in these areas."(35)
COA's specific functions were listed as follows: (1) review of program policy in consultation with U.S. Government departments and agencies, concerning educational and related activities in occupied areas; (2) negotiation with independent organizations for services required to implement educational programs; (3) assistance in recommending qualified American personnel for overseas service; (4) stimulation and coordination of voluntary reconstruction aid to supplement government funds; (5) assistance in arrangements for foreign personnel coming to the United States; (6) establishment of technical panels to advise military government in special fields as needed; and (7) preparation of reports and recommendations to governmental and nongovernmental agencies directly concerned.(36) The primary role of COA was that of acting as adviser to the Government on private support for the reorientation program and of opening up additional private resources to supplement the capabilities of the government, not so much as regards funds, although in 1948 such were still badly needed, as in terms of much greater professional and technical know-how and institutional sponsorship for German exchange students and visitors. As OMGUS control functions over the total program shrank and were gradually replaced by private advice and assistance, eventually by cooperation, the role of voluntary agencies in the reorientation effort gained greater momentum. The members of COA were firmly convinced that "cooperation between government and the voluntary groups, with the latter assuming an ever-increasing share of the joint responsibility, would maximize the likelihood that the influence on Germany . . . would be constructive, effective, and persistent."(37)
The creation of COA gave a decisive boost to the exchange program if for no other reason than that of placing the prestige of some of the leading representatives in the fields of culture and education behind a government program critically in need of public and private support. COA was relatively short-lived (1948-1951). The Commission insisted that it was a short-term organization and that long-range responsibility whenever possible should be left with existing permanent operating agencies.
COA completed an impressive number of assignments. The first year was spent on a review of federal policy, vigorous representations for adequate governmental programs, recruitment of personnel for service overseas, organization of a series of technical panels, and arrangements for exchange of persons. The second year witnessed an increased promotional effort to stimulate, and coordinate the work of voluntary agencies, notably of national organizations. COA furthermore developed standards for the visits of foreign nationals and even organized some exchanges through four of its panels. It also established and operated an orientation center for German leaders (described in Chapter V, below) .
In support of these activities the Commission organized major national conferences, held meetings with government consultants, created a clearing house to exchange information among government agencies and voluntary organizations, undertook field investigations by sending missions to Japan and to Germany, actually operated, under contract with the government, some leader exchange programs, and published reports, studies, and recommendations. In addition, COA gave assistance to a number of specific projects, such as the Harvard-Salzburg International Seminar, the affiliation of American universities with German counterparts (e.g., Columbia University and Swarthmore College with the Free University of Berlin), the Unitarian Service Committee medical teaching missions, the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education in helping sponsor the visits of German educators, and many more. One of the Commission's most successful ventures was the establishment of technical panels in the following fields: the arts, community activities, governmental affairs and the social sciences, higher education, humanities, legal affairs, natural sciences, public education, teacher education, religious affairs, rural affairs, and women's activities. Most of the panels were placed under the auspices of a sponsoring organization and had as their members some of the most outstanding members of the professions which they represented.(38) Their function was, inter alia, to encourage, contacts and reciprocal relations with corresponding organizations in the occupied countries, to propose policy, programs and projects to government agencies and private groups, to evaluate, place, and assist with the operation of programs and in some cases to conduct exchange projects.(39) Due in no small part to the efforts of COA, there were eventually 167 private institutions which sponsored student programs alone.
OMGUS had made a beginning. It had introduced the concept of exchanges as an instrument of policy important to the realization of reorientation which had become an overall objective of OMGUS' mission. While it had succeeded in achieving a certain measure of coordination among its various functional units concerned with aspects of the reorientation, it fell short of creating a fully integrated program with a distinct focal point under unified high-level direction. Specifically, it had been unable to provide the organizational, administrative, and, above all, financial wherewithal needed to achieve its objective. Nevertheless, OMGUS, thanks to the effort of many highly qualified staff members, left a legacy of ideas, structures, and procedures which, with appropriate adaptations and improvements, set the stage for the full evolution of the exchange program under the Office of the High Commissioner.