of the Army Air Forces, directed the AAF Scientific Advisory Group (SAG) to study the technological achievements of America's wartime allies and provide a blueprint for large-scale research and development of science and advanced technology for the Air Force. However, the Army Air Forces needed to achieve independence, which it did on 18 September 1947, with its transition into an independent United States Air Force. Also, the role of the Air Force in the postwar world had to be defined. The 1948 Finletter Commission published its report, Survival in the Air Age, in January 1948. It set forth a new concept of airpower, i.e., a powerful peacetime force able to counter any enemy air attack. The Finletter Report inspired a group of senior USAF officers with backgrounds in engineering and related fields to analyze the existing R&D organization. Their findings, and the salesmanship of Generals Jimmy Doolittle and Donald Putt, convinced Air Force Chief of Staff General Hoyt S. Vandenberg to put the R&D mission on a more equal footing with the operational Air Force. Accordingly, and in the face of intense Air Staff opposition, on 23 January 1950, the Research and Development Command (RDC) came into being. Eight months later it was re-designated the Air Research and Development Command (ARDC) as a separate organization devoted strictly to research and development. Cold War Research and Development Command was redesignated the Air Research and Development Command (ARDC) on 16 September 1950, and the Arnold Engineering Development Center was dedicated by President Harry S. Truman on 25 June 1951. During the 1950s, the new command began to make its mark. ARDC developed many ambitious aircraft and missile prototypes. Among the successes of this period were the North American F-86 Sabre swept wing fighter, the Boeing B-52 Stratofortress intercontinental bomber, the Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker jet-powered refueling tanker aircraft, the Lockheed C-130 Hercules turboprop transport and the Lockheed U-2 very high-altitude strategic reconnaissance aircraft. In addition, ARDC played a major contribution in the development of Intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), which became a priority after the world learned that the Soviet Union had detonated a thermonuclear (hydrogen) bomb on 23 August 1953. A crash program was employed which developed America's first ICBM (the SM-65D Atlas), that became operational in 1959. In terms of importance, resources, and success, the ICBM program was rivaled only by the famed Manhattan Project of World War II. AIMACO, the "Supply