HISTORY - Page 18
Engineers (COE) reported expenditures of
$22,087,451.21 against obligations of $22,087,459.
Added to this, approximately $1.5 million had been
spent on an engineering building at the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory (JPL) in support of the JUPITER program.
Thus, the construction program stayed well within
its authority
24
.
Despite the crash connotation placed on the
weapon's development, the construction program did
not move with the speed this implied. During
December 1956, ABMA sent a message to OCO, the
gist of which was largely justification for the facilities
to be constructed, modified, or expanded. Moreover,
ABMA pointed out that these facilities could be used
at a later date, with little, if any, change for other
guided and ballistic missile development programs.
Only five projects had made any significant progress
by 30 November 1956 —10 to 30 per cent— and these
were still a considerable time away from effective
use. On the others, there was no progress or a mere
one per cent
25
.
The situation of "make do" with what they had in
1956 was far from satisfactory. A good example, in
this respect, although reported much earlier in the
year than the December message, was the missile
assembly and inspection hangar. As already stated,
the original facility was constructed in 1953 to
provide for the production of one REDSTONE missile
per month. This facility was totally inadequate for
the 1956 production work, and an expansion request
was placed in the amount of $2,401 million. At that
time, the production goal was two missiles per
month, but there were other factors involved besides
this. For one
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24. Ibid.; Ltr, ABMA to COFORD, 29 Jun 56, subj: Revision of FY 57 MCA Prog of JUP, in ABMA Ref Book, subj: Facil, MCA;
Msg, 289/05, COE, 5 Jan 62, Mobile Dist to ABMA. See Appdx 3 for listing of projects in the FY 1957 MCA program.
25. Msg, ORDAB-E-220, CG, ABMA to C0F0RD, c. Dec 56, in ABMA Ref Book, subj: Facil, MCA. 26. MFR, Col J. G. Zierdt, Chf,
ABMA Cont Off, 28 Apr 56, subj: FY 57 MCA Constr in the JUP Prog, in ABMA Ref Book, subj: Facil, MCA.