NRO-MOL_2015

Chapter XVI - POST-MORTEM
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Figure 61. MOL Controls Model
Source: CSNR Reference Collection
year 1970 funds to pay contractor termination costs.
Consequently the total overall cost of the MOL program
would come t $1.54 billion. 3
OSD subsequently submitted to Congress a change
in its fiscal year 1970 MOL budget line item, reducing it
from $525 million to $125.3 million to pay the termination
costs. This sum was to be used for employee severance
pay and relocation reimbursement, settlement
expenses, and allowable post-termination activities
such as contractor inventory, hardware, and equipment
disposition, and plant maintenance. In mid-July, however,
the MOL Systems Office advised Colonel Ford that the
contractors’ initial claims totaled $137 million. On his
instructions, the Systems Office rejected their demands
for full fees and, by December 1969, the sum required
had been reduced to $128 million. Toward year’s end Dr.
Seamans was informed that a further reduction in their
closing costs was anticipated and that the $125 million
fiscal year 1970 appropriation would be sufficient to
satisfy all MOL program obligations. 4
Hardware Disposition
Along with an orderly phase out of the program, the
Air Force initiated studies to identify MOL hardware
or technology which might be useful to various USAF
agencies or NASA. At the request of Dr. Seamans, an ad
hoc group—chaired by Dr. Yarymovych of the Office of