The purpose of this report is to outline the findings and recommendations of an ad-hoc committee of systems engineers and scientists with respect to the establishment of a National Systems Center (NSC). The committee concluded that there is a national need for a high-quality, independent, non-profit National Systems Center and that steps have to be initiated to establish such an entity. This report summarizes the developments to date (November 1, 1978) and is written for the purposes of (a)

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... rmation dissemination to the engineering and scientific community and (b) to solicit criticism and suggestions for future plans. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE AD-HOC NSC COMMITTEE The nation faces, and will continue to be confronted by, a sequence of critical decisions with respect to current and future complex technical, economic, and social issues. Limited resources require the coordination and optimization of complex interconnected, large scale, dynamic, stochastic systems. Existing methodologies are not sufficiently advanced, nor are they holistic enough, to provide understanding of key issues so as to advise planners and policy-makers at either the strategic