certainly not in the theater or fleet commands, but at higher Defense levels in Washington, where problems of public relations, legal liability, reimbursement for use of equipment, and other matters had to be considered. We cannot speculate about what weight, if any, Secretary Clifford or Deputy Secretary Nitze gave to the fact that Mr. Valenti was formerly in the White House and closely associated with President Johnson. Mr. Nitze, who made the decision, was formerly Secretary of the Navy, and one could argue that this influenced his decision as much as, if not, more than, Mr. Valenti's request. Since Mr. Valenti was president of the Motion Picture Association, he would be expected, in any case, to try to help the film industry, as Darryl F. Zanuck pointed out in an interview for the Reasoner-Wallace program. If Mr. Valenti had not interceded, the decision probably would not have gone higher than the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs; but, one cannot assume that this decision at the Public Affairs level, despite the reservations, necessarily would have been unfavorable. Mr. Goulding was waiting for, and the Navy operating elements already had recommended, a formal Navy decision permitting carrier use when Mr. Valenti wrote his first letters. If it be said that Mr. Zanuck tried to use influence in the Johnson administration to get use of the carrier, he also did not hesitate to do the same in the Nixon administration when criticism of Government assistance to the film project emerged. Mr. Zanuck wrote a letter dated June 23, 1969 to Secretary Laird and asked a Senator to transmit it and see that it got Mr. Laird's personal attention. The letter, hand-carried at the Senator's instruction, had been composed by Mr. Zanuck while in Europe. He wrote that he noticed in the press Mr. Laird's statement "disassociating" himself from the film project (apparently referring to news reports of the Secretary's letter to Mr. Weicker). Mr. Zanuck expressed concern that the Secretary "might be deliberately brought into this situation by certain publicity seeking representatives." Mr. Zanuck also referred to "close and warm relations which I enjoy with the present administration" and reminded Secretary Laird that he (Zanuck) was an old friend of Mr. Nixon and wrote him frequently on personal matters. Mr. Zanuck was sure that the President would be happy to let the Secretary read a letter he had written to the President giving the facts on the "Tora" film. GOVERNMENT EXPENSES AND REIMBURSEMENTS Total billings to Twentieth Century-Fox by the Navy for various Government materials and services used or consumed during the filming of "Tora! Tora! Tora!" will amount to approximately $300,000. This is the best figure we could obtain, but it is subject to minor upward revision if additional items are identified for billing. Besides these direct reimbursements to the Government, the company paid approximately $491,000 to military units or individuals who participated. These payments were mainly in the form of per diem compensation or bonuses for off-duty work as pilots, "extras", or support service personnel. Government billings covered such items as fuel consumption, maintenance, refitting, safety observers, rentals and parking fees in * After this memorandum was prepared, the Subcommittee was advised that the Department of the Navy would bill Twentieth Century-Fox an additional amount of $13,743.65 for ammunition used in the filming scenes. See DØD letter, p. 31. curred in the use of Government equipment and personnel for filming operations. The largest single billing, for transporting company aircraft from San Diego to Honolulu, on the carrier Yorktown, was for $134,736 (later revised upward to include three more aircraft). This bill, originally questioned by Twentieth Century-Fox, was paid on October 13, 1969 after the Navy submitted the revised figure of $153,944.16 on October 8. The following tabulations list the Government receipts, amounts still to be paid, and payments to military units or individuals. The list of reimbursable expenses was prepared by the Navy at the Subcommittee's request. The summary of payments to military units or individuals comes from the Navy but presumably is based in part on information obtained from Twentieth Century-Fox. The amounts in the tabulations differ somewhat from those reported by Secretary Chaffee to Mr. Weicker, which were based on an earlier tally. I. Payments to the Government Public Works Center, Pearl Harbor: Electrical power, service calls, LCM rental, equipment rental. [$4,473.18] 1 $25, 704. 42 Naval Air Station, Barbers Point: Aircraft landing and parking fees ($18,862.62), building rental, labor on electrical and construction work, fire fighting and other material___ 24, 010. 61 Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard: 1 Painting and repainting hull numbers, floating crane services, rigging services, antenna removal, work on gun mounts. [$617.00] 1 29, 981. 66 Naval Station, Pearl Harbor: Craft rental ($11,583.00), tugs, labor and materials, civil labor and tug pilots__ 23, 385. 03 Inactive Ships Maintenance Facility*: Rental of ex-Newell ($14,000), and ex-Phillips---- 18, 166. 67 Naval Ammunition Depot, Oahu, Hawaii: Safety supervisor ($8,041.50), debulleting of 50 cal. cartridges. 11, 530. 25 USNS Yorktown: Meals ($560.85), paint supplied from NSC Long Beach ($453.70) Total collected (as of 10/15/69) -- 1 Additional billings subsequently submitted-see separate category. Paid to Navy Accounting and Finance Center, Washington, D.C. * Congressional Record (daily edition), June 18, 1969, pp. H4967–8. 9, 604. 00 718. 40 290, 897. 70 1. Payments to the Government-Continued Billings submitted, receipt of funds pending: Ford Island Ferry charge-. Naval Shipyard, Pearl Harbor-Miscellaneous and tug services__ Public Works Center, Pearl Harbor-Damage to LCM ($2,500), statistical surcharge. North Island Naval Air Station-Rigging and crane services, landing and parking fees__. Fleet Air, San Diego-Helicopter for camera platform_-- Total outstanding (as of Oct. 15, 1969). $76.00 617. 00 4, 473. 18 1, 330. 54 317.50 6, 814. 22 297, 711. 92 [NOTE. After this memorandum was prepared, the Navy submitted an additional billing of $13,743.65 for ammunition, which will bring the grand total to $311,455.57.] II. Payment to military units or individuals other than U.S. Government A. Payments to off-duty pilots- 176, 514. 61 $196, 274. 48 B. Payments to off-duty military personnel working as security D. Contributions to Welfare and Recreation Funds of various ships that participated in the film (as of May 1, 1969) ---. Total 111, 123. 00 7, 915. 30 491, 827. 39 In addition, the Defense Department considers as miscellaneous benefits a number of contributions from Twentieth Century-Fox, including the donation of tools and equipment no longer needed, construction of two small boat landings, use of over 4,000 manhours used to refurbish boats, and payments to an officer's club and a flying club for inconveniences. There may be further billings beyond those reflected here. We understand, for example, that a justification has been requested for ammunition furnished without charge.* The problems of reimbursement are compounded for the following reasons: 1. There is no central supervision or control of the billing process, which is handled severally by the Navy units affected. 2. The assistance given is frequently of a sort which entails no significant or discretely identifiable Government costs, although it may be of considerable value to the company. 3. The benefits of the assistance do not accrue exclusively to the company but are shared by the Government, either because some value serving the national interest is identified, or the assistance can be rationalized as a training exercise that will be performed anyway. 4. There are no clearly established cost concepts applicable to this area of Government assistance since ostensibly motion picture companies are exempted from the usual categories subject to user charges, and reimbursement is required only for temporary diversions of equipment or personnel from normal locations or operations. On the first point, we noted that the Navy had considerable difficulty in responding to our request for billing information. The first estimates See footnote 2. used by Navy and Defense authorities in responding to congressional inquiries several months ago were based upon rounded figures obtained from the project officer and Twentieth Century-Fox. To answer our inquiry precisely, it was necessary for the Navy to send a series of messages to the various commands involved to come up with the information contained in the above tabulations. Even now, some uncertainties remain as to the final and total receipts. The billings are not made from one central place. Each Navy activity performing a reimbursable service for the film company submitted its individual billing and received a check made out to the U.S. Treasury from Twentieth Century-Fox. Apparently most of the receipts went back into activity funds. According to DOD Instruction 5410.16, when assistance to a motion picture production is approved, a project officer may be assigned to work with the producer. He serves as liaison and trouble shooter, monitors compliance with the official terms of assistance, and generally looks out for the interests of the DOD while trying to help the production go smoothly. The project officer is drawn from a military service but represents Public Affairs at the DOD level and is required to report weekly to that office. His tenure is mainly for the period of photographing. The company picks up the tab for extra expenses such as travel, room, and board. Since the project officer must become familiar with the script and production sequences and must supervise the utilization of military equipment, it would seem appropriate to make him responsible for identifying, coordinating, and supervising the collection of reimburs able costs. For this purpose, in productions where substantial Government assistance is required and approved, it would seem useful to allow the project officer longer tenure on the job and the help of a financial control officer. The responsibilities for identifying and supervising collection of reimbursable costs, in turn, would be made easier if the applicable directives were clarified, made more consistent, and amplified by general statements and illustrative examples of costs to be reimbursed. Ostensibly the kinds and extent of Government assistance are determined by the requirements list submitted by the film company, as reviewed and approved in Washington. Problems occur even at the Washington level, since it is not always clear how much in the way of specific assistance must be approved by Public Affairs and how much is left to the military service. At the service level what is authorized by the Washington office is translated by the field command and in turn by the operating personnel into specific actions which sometimes may go beyond the letter of authorization. It is certain that beyond the officially authorized items or services, various others were provided or performed on the local scene by Navy personnel within the context of official cooperation. To put a price tag on all of these services is impractical if not impossible. In many ways they contributed, or were essential, to the accuracy, realism and dramatic value of the film sequences. Oftentimes they were available only from the Government. In other instances, Government assistance was sought because it was awkward and difficult to inject civilian commercial resources into a closely controlled military environment, particularly when the resources were needed only for a brief period. For example, a Navy tug was used by the film company for approximately 30 minutes as a fire boat, and its fire pumps were operated for about 5 minutes of filming. The Government considered the cost negligible and no charge was made (this is subject to change). Twentieth Century-Fox paid $10 each to the tug's 9 crew members. Similarly, the Navy allowed Twentieth Century-Fox to utilize in port the fantail of the submarine USS Spinax as a set to film sailors raising the colors. In another instance an old aircraft, the Douglas Dauntless Dive Bomber (SBD), was loaned to Twentieth Century-Fox from the Marine Corps Museum. Again, several small craft (45 to 50 feet) were made available to the film company for use in Hawaii during certain sequences. The craft were crewed and fueled by Twentieth Century-Fox but no rental payment was made. We were informed that the boats were not otherwise required for Navy use and that Twentieth Century-Fox expended their own funds to bring these boats up to operational standards, which apparently left them in better condition than when they were borrowed. Apart from the use of the small craft, some 10 active ships helped out in filming scenes. For sequences in which the destroyer Ward sinks a Japanese midget submarine at the entrance to Pearl Harbor, these ships participated: USS Savage (DER 386), USS Finch (DER 238), CSS Camp (DER 251), USS Hitchiti (ATF 103) and USS Takelma (ATF 113). All the ships were not used at the same time but in pairs of one destroyer escort and one ocean tug in four separate "takes”. The ships were released for this purpose by their operational commanders because they were not otherwise committed on the particular day or half day of their participation. Extra fuel costs were reimbursed by the film company and $1900 contributed to ship welfare and recreation funds. The Yorktown (CVS 10) was used both for the takeoff of the enemy strike group and to transport company aircraft from San Diego to Honolulu. For the filming sequences, the company maintained its own. aircraft aboard ship and reimbursed the Navy for expenses of aircraft fuel, meals and related items of its own personnel while aboard. The charge for transportation of aircraft was separately billed by the Navy at a later time. The USS Ticonderoga (CVA 14) was used to portray the old USS Enterprise returning to port with Admiral Halsey aboard. This was done while the ship was re-entering Pearl Harbor after training operations. Arrival was delayed about two hours. The sum of $500 was donated to the ship fund. The USS Renshaw (DD 495) was filmed investigating an unidentified object during the war alert on December 7, 1941. The filming was done enroute from Pearl Harbor to the ship's operating area. A twohour delay was involved, and $200 was donated to the ship fund. The USS Chipola (AO 63) acted the part of the oiler Neosho hurriedly departing Pearl Harbor under attack. Chipola was scheduled |