United States Navy Special Projects Office (SPO) is a former research and design office of the United States Navy, responsible for the coordination of the development and design of the US Navy Fleet Ballistic Missiles (FBM) Polaris and Poseidon. The Special Projects Office was initiated in 1956 as new organization with a mandate to develop a submarine-launched solid-fuel fleet ballistic missile. The Special Projects Office reported directly to Admiral Arleigh Burke, and the secretary of the Navy, an unprecedented bypass of the Navy bureaus that signalled the Navy's commitment to the FBM concept. To direct the Special Projects Office, at John H. Sides' persistent suggestion, Burke selected Sides' former deputy, Rear Admiral William F. Raborn, Jr., whose phenomenal success in that role would earn him renown as the father of Polaris. The Special Projects Office (SPO) is also known for the development of the planning and scheduling methodology, known as Program Evaluation and Review Technique or just PERT, and first published in 1958. History Origins On September 13, 1955, President Dwight D. Eisenhower directed the Navy to design a ship-launched Fleet Ballistic Missile (FBM) similar to the Army's Jupiter IRBM. John H. Sides, director of the guided-missile division in the office of the chief of naval operations, and the Navy protested that liquid-fuel rockets like Jupiter were too dangerous for shipboard use and pushed instead for submarine-launched solid-fuel rockets for tactical use against enemy submarine bases. However, on November 17, 1955, Secretary of Defense Charles E. Wilson ordered the Navy to join the Army on Jupiter development, and specified that all such missile development would not be externally funded but would have to be carved out of the existing Navy budget. Despite strong support from the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) Admiral Arleigh Burke, the program ballistic missile system for the fleet did not develop well, also due to the resistance of the bureaucracy in the Navy. Desiring to strengthen the status of the program and accelerate the development of its own missile, the Admiral created the Special Projects Office (SPO), independent of other technical offices, whose sole task was to support the work on the marine ballistic missile. At the head of the Special Projects Office was appointed Admiral William Raborn, a former Navy pilot, chosen by Burke due to his personal qualities and belief in the military, rather than his vision on the technical run of the program.