--- title: William J. Donovan url: https://propagandaarchive.org/quotes/william-j-donovan/ description: 5 verified quotes from William J. Donovan, Coordinator of Information (1941-1942) and Director of the Office of Strategic Services (1942-1945), with… section: FRAME --- ![Illustration: a Second World War naval-intelligence collage of a Pacific theatre map, aerial reconnaissance photographs and radar plots.](https://propagandaarchive.org/static/generated/detail/hero-wwii-pacific.jpg) [Quotes](https://propagandaarchive.org/quotes/) · United States # William J. Donovan ![William J. Donovan, head of the OSS, about 1945](https://propagandaarchive.org/regimes/images/roosevelt-administration/william-j-donovan.jpg) [Photo](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:William_Joseph_(Wild_Bill)_Donovan,_Head_of_the_OSS.jpg): Unknown (U.S. government), Public domain (U.S. federal government work) Coordinator of Information (1941-1942) and Director of the Office of Strategic Services (1942-1945) · United States On the regime page: [Roosevelt administration](https://propagandaarchive.org/regimes/roosevelt-administration/#william-j-donovan) 5 quotes, oldest first. [Filter with other speakers](https://propagandaarchive.org/quotes/#speaker=william-j-donovan). 1. > “Strategy, without information upon which it can rely, is helpless. Likewise, information is useless unless it is intelligently directed to the strategic purpose.” — June 10, 1941 · Statement — Opening of Donovan's proposal to President Roosevelt for a central intelligence organization under a Coordinator of Strategic Information. Roosevelt created the Office of the Coordinator of Information, with Donovan as head, in July 1941. — William J. Donovan, Memorandum of Establishment of Service of Strategic Information, to President Roosevelt, 10 June 1941 (CIA Reading Room, CIA-RDP57-00384R000100150074-6, pp. 1-6) [Source](https://archive.org/details/CIA-RDP57-00384R000100150074-6) 2. > “Thus there is another element in modern warfare, and that is the psychological attack against the moral and spiritual defenses of a nation. In this attack, the most powerful weapon is radio. The use of radio as a weapon, though effectively employed by Germany, is still to be perfected. But this perfection can be realized only by planning, and planning is dependent upon accurate information.” — June 10, 1941 · Statement — Passage of the same memorandum on psychological warfare, written six months before the United States entered the war. It argued that radio propaganda needed the same central intelligence as the other tools of war. — William J. Donovan, Memorandum of Establishment of Service of Strategic Information, to President Roosevelt, 10 June 1941 (CIA Reading Room, CIA-RDP57-00384R000100150074-6, pp. 1-6) [Source](https://archive.org/details/CIA-RDP57-00384R000100150074-6) 3. > “Once our enemies are defeated the demand will be equally pressing for information that will aid us in solving the problems of peace.” — November 18, 1944 · Statement — Donovan answered a note from the President of 31 October 1944 asking for a plan for a post-war intelligence service, and attached a draft directive for a central intelligence authority reporting to the President. — William J. Donovan, Memorandum for the President, 18 November 1944, copy sent to the State Department on 19 February 1945 (CIA Reading Room 0000242485) [Source](https://archive.org/details/cia-readingroom-document-0000242485) 4. > “In accordance with your wish, this is set up as a permanent long-range plan. But you may want to consider whether this (or part of it) should be done now, by executive or legislative action. There are common-sense reasons why you may desire to lay the keel of the ship at once.” — November 18, 1944 · Statement — From the same memorandum proposing the plan that, after Roosevelt's death and the closing of the OSS, led to the Central Intelligence Group (1946) and the Central Intelligence Agency (1947). — William J. Donovan, Memorandum for the President, 18 November 1944, copy sent to the State Department on 19 February 1945 (CIA Reading Room 0000242485) [Source](https://archive.org/details/cia-readingroom-document-0000242485) 5. > “Among these assets was the establishment for the first time in our nation’s history of a foreign secret intelligence service which reported information as seen through American eyes.” — August 25, 1945 · Letter — Donovan told the Budget Director that OSS would be liquidated by 1 January 1946 and asked that an agency be designated to take over its functions and assets. President Truman ordered the OSS disbanded the following month. — William J. Donovan, letter to Harold D. Smith, Director of the Bureau of the Budget, 25 August 1945, in Foreign Relations of the United States, 1945-1950, Emergence of the Intelligence Establishment, doc. 3, attachment 1, p. 19 [Source](https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1945-50Intel/d3)