The release of some 90,000 classified records on the Afghanistan War by Wikileaks is the largest single unauthorized disclosure of currently classified records that has ever taken place, and it naturally raises many questions about information security, the politics of disclosure, and the possible impact on the future conduct of the war in Afghanistan.

But among those questions is this:  Can the national security classification system be fixed before it breaks down altogether in a frenzy of uncontrolled leaks, renewed barriers against information dissemination, and a growing loss of confidence in the integrity of the system?

That the classification system needs fixing is beyond any doubt.

“I agree with you, sir,” Gen. James R. Clapper, Jr., told Sen. Ron Wyden at his DNI confirmation hearing last week, “we do overclassify.”

That makes it more or less unanimous.  What has always been less clear is just what to do about the problem.

In what may be the last opportunity to systematically correct classification policy and to place it on a sound footing, the Obama Administration has ordered all classifying agencies to perform a Fundamental Classification Guidance Review.  The purpose of the Review is to evaluate current classification policies based on “the broadest possible range of perspectives” and to eliminate obsolete or unnecessary classification requirements.  Executive Order 13526, section 1.9 directed that such reviews must be completed within the next two years.

“There is an executive order that we, the [intelligence] community, are in the process of gearing up on how to respond to this, because this is going to be a more systematized process, and a lot more discipline to it,” Gen. Clapper said.

“Having been involved in this, I will tell you my general philosophy is that we can be a lot more liberal, I think, about declassifying, and we should be,” Gen. Clapper said.

It is unclear at this point whether the Fundamental Review will be faithfully implemented by executive branch agencies, whether it will have the intended effect of sharply reducing the scope of the national security classification system, or whether the system itself is already beyond repair.

There are probably many reasons why people may become motivated to break ranks, to violate their non-disclosure agreements, and to disclose classified information to unauthorized persons.  One of the most compelling reasons for doing so is to expose perceived wrongdoing, i.e. to “blow the whistle.”

It obviously follows that the government has an interest in providing safe, secure and meaningful channels for government employees (and contractors) to report misconduct without feeling that they need to go outside the system to get a fair hearing for their concerns.  Unfortunately, would-be whistleblowers today cannot have much confidence in those official channels.

To the contrary, “most employees who reported disclosing wrongdoing or filing a grievance believe that they experienced negative repercussions for doing so,” according to a recent report to the President from the Merit Systems Protection Board.  See “Prohibited Personnel Practices—A Study Retrospective,” June 2010 (at page 16).

“Morale, organizational performance, and (ultimately) the public suffer unnecessarily when employees are reluctant to disclose wrongdoing or to seek redress for inequities in the workplace,” said the MSPB report, which did not specifically address whistleblowing involving classified information.

“Work remains to be done in creating a workplace where employees can raise concerns about organizational priorities, work processes, and personnel policies and decisions without fear of retaliation, and where managers can respond to such concerns openly and constructively,” the Board report said.

See, relatedly, “Whistleblowers have nowhere to turn to challenge retaliatory suspensions” by Mike McGraw, the Kansas City Star, July 24.

The size of the annual budget for the Military Intelligence Program (MIP), which has been classified up to now, will be publicly disclosed, said Gen. James R. Clapper, Jr., the nominee to be the next Director of National Intelligence.  He said that he had personally advocated and won approval for release of the budget figure.

“I pushed through and got Secretary [of Defense Robert M.] Gates to approve revelation of the Military Intelligence Program budget,” Gen. Clapper told Senator Russ Feingold at his confirmation hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee yesterday.

Since 2007, the DNI has declassified and disclosed the size of the National Intelligence Program (NIP) at the end of each fiscal year, in response to a legislative requirement.  But despite its name, the NIP is not literally the whole “national intelligence program.”  Rather, it is one of the two budget constructs, along with the MIP, that make up the total U.S. intelligence budget.

Thus, when former DNI Dennis Blair said last September that the total intelligence budget was around $75 billion, he was referring to the sum of the NIP (which was $49.8 billion at that time) plus the MIP.

“I thought, frankly, we were being a bit disingenuous by only releasing or revealing the National Intelligence Program, which is only part of the story,” said Gen. Clapper.  “And so Secretary Gates has agreed that we could also publicize that [i.e., the MIP budget]. I think the American people are entitled to know the totality of the investment we make each year in intelligence.”

The MIP budget figure has not yet been formally disclosed.  A Freedom of Information Act request for the number that was filed in October 2009 by the Federation of American Scientists remains open and pending.

Open government advocates believe that intelligence budget disclosure is good public policy and may even be required by the Constitution’s statement and account clause.  But what makes it potentially interesting to policymakers is that it would permit the intelligence budget to be directly appropriated, rather than being secretly funneled through the Pentagon budget as it is now.

“I would support and I’ve also been working [on] actually taking the National Intelligence Program out of the DoD budget,” said DNI-nominee Gen. James R. Clapper at his confirmation hearing yesterday, “since the original reason for having it embedded in the Department’s budget was for classification purposes.  Well, if it’s going to be publicly revealed, that purpose goes away.”

Removing classified NIP funding from the DoD budget would be appealing to the Pentagon since it would make the DoD’s total budget appear smaller.  “It serves the added advantage of reducing the topline of the DoD budget, which is quite large, as you know, and that’s a large amount of money that the Department really has no real jurisdiction over,” Gen. Clapper said.

The primary obstacle to such a change in the structure of the intelligence budget may now lie in Congress, not in the intelligence community.

The Senate Intelligence Committee has just weakened an amendment to require annual disclosure of the NIP budget request at the start of the budget process — which is a prerequisite to an open intelligence budget appropriation — by making disclosure subject to a presidential waiver.

The original amendment, offered by Senators Feingold, Bond and Wyden, “was intended to make possible a recommendation of the 9/11 Commission to improve congressional oversight by passing a separate intelligence appropriations bill,” explained Senator Feingold.  But the effort to implement that recommendation “would be seriously complicated by the year-to-year uncertainty of a presidential waiver,” he said in the revised markup (pdf) of the FY2010 intelligence authorization act, released yesterday (at p. 76).

The Government Accountability Office (GAO), the investigative arm of Congress, won plaudits for its contributions to intelligence oversight from Gen. James R. Clapper at his July 20 confirmation hearing to be the next Director of National Intelligence.  But in the latest version of the intelligence authorization bill, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence yielded to White House opposition and abandoned a provision that would have enhanced GAO’s role in intelligence oversight.

“The GAO has produced very useful studies,” Gen. Clapper said. “I would cite as a specific recent case in point the ISR [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] road map that we’re required to maintain and the GAO has critiqued us on that.”

“I’ve been very deeply involved in personnel security clearance reform,” he said. “The GAO has held our feet to the fire on ensuring compliance with IRTPA [intelligence reform legislation] guidelines on timeliness of clearances and of late has also insisted on the quality metrics for ensuring appropriate clearances.”

“So I think the GAO serves a useful purpose for us,” Gen. Clapper told Sen. Feingold.

But under pressure from the Obama White House, the Senate Committee stripped out a provision that would have ensured authorized GAO access to the intelligence community.

Paradoxically, executive branch opposition to GAO involvement in intelligence oversight may be a positive sign.  It implies that GAO oversight would represent a meaningful change in the status quo and that it could usefully destabilize entrenched bad habits.

On the other hand, congressional reluctance to embrace GAO oversight is somewhat scandalous.  If there is a single policy issued raised by the Washington Post’s sprawling account of the sprawling intelligence industrial complex this week, it is the questionable adequacy of intelligence oversight.

Simply put, the size of the intelligence bureaucracy has more than doubled since 2001, but intelligence oversight capacity has not increased accordingly.  A focused use of GAO assets offers one immediate way to correct that oversight deficit.

But in its new report (pdf) on the intelligence authorization act, the Senate Intelligence Committee said further study was needed before it could endorse GAO oversight.

“The Committee believes it is important to explore further the scope of current GAO arrangements with the Intelligence Community, the history of GAO’s work on classified matters outside of the Intelligence Community, existing GAO procedures for working with classified information, and the extent to which future GAO investigations and audits of the Intelligence Community can be conducted by mutual agreement,” the Committee said (at p. 71).

But the case in favor of GAO oversight is already quite strong and clear.  General Clapper’s personal testimony aside, there is a solid record on the subject thanks especially to Senator Daniel Akaka, who held a hearing on it in 2008.  And a new DoD Directive specifies a role for GAO in oversight of DoD intelligence programs.

Legislation endorsing GAO oversight of intelligence sponsored by Rep. Anna Eshoo and colleagues remains pending in the House, and is strongly supported by Speaker Pelosi.  I discussed the subject in a July 12 interview with Federal News Radio.

The new Senate markup of the intelligence authorization bill has some features that would improve accountability, said Sen. Feingold in a statement appended to the Committee report, but it “removes many other important provisions … that were aimed at improving oversight and transparency, as well as accountability.”

More than a trillion dollars has been appropriated since September 11, 2001 for U.S. military operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.  This makes the “war on terrorism” the most costly of any military engagement in U.S. history in absolute terms or, if correcting for inflation, the second most expensive U.S. military action after World War II.

A newly updated report from the Congressional Research Service estimated the financial costs of major U.S. wars from the American Revolution ($2.4 billion in FY 2011 dollars) to World War I ($334 billion) to World War II ($4.1 trillion) to the second Iraq war ($784 billion) and the war in Afghanistan ($321 billion).  CRS provided its estimates in current year dollars (i.e. the year they were spent) and in constant year dollars (adjusted for inflation), and as a percentage of gross domestic product.  Many caveats apply to these figures, which are spelled out in the CRS report.

In constant dollars, World War II is still the most expensive of all U.S. wars, having consumed a massive 35.8% of GDP at its height and having cost $4.1 trillion in FY2011 dollars.  See “Costs of Major U.S. Wars,” June 29, 2010.

The Department of Defense has more contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan than it has uniformed military personnel, another newly updated report from the Congressional Research Service reminds us.

“The Department of Defense increasingly relies upon contractors to support operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, which has resulted in a DOD workforce that has 19% more contractor personnel (207,600) than uniformed personnel (175,000),” said the CRS report — which forms a timely counterpoint to this week’s Washington Post “Top Secret America” series on the tremendous expansion of the intelligence bureaucracy, including the increased and often unchecked reliance on contractors.

The explosive growth in reliance on contractors naturally entails new difficulties in management and oversight.  “Some analysts believe that poor contract management has also played a role in abuses and crimes committed by certain contractors against local nationals, which may have undermined U.S. counterinsurgency efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan,” the CRS said.  See “Department of Defense Contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan: Background and Analysis,” July 2, 2010.

And see, relatedly, “U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF): Background and Issues for Congress,” July 16, 2010.

The potential benefits and limitations of using unmanned aerial vehicles for homeland security applications were considered by the Congressional Research Service in yet another updated report.  See “Homeland Security: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and Border Surveillance,” July 8, 2010.

The same set of issues was examined in a newly published master’s thesis on “Integrating Department of Defense Unmanned Aerial Systems into the National Airspace Structure” by Major Scott W. Walker.

Another new master’s thesis looked at the comparatively high accident rate of unmanned systems and their susceptibility to attack or disruption.  See “The Vulnerabilities of Unmanned Aircraft System Common Data Links to Electronic Attack” by Major Jaysen A. Yochim.

The “secret history” of unmanned aircraft was recounted in an informative new study published by the Air Force Association.  See “Air Force UAVs: The Secret History” by Thomas P. Ehrhard, July 2010.

Newly declassified transcripts of closed hearings and executive sessions of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from 1968 were published by the Committee yesterday.  The transcripts include an extended inquiry into the official version of 1964 Gulf of Tonkin Incident, which led to the escalation of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, and which became the object of increasing skepticism, inside and outside of government.

“If this country has been misled, if this committee, this Congress, has been misled by pretext into a war in which thousands of young men have died, and many more thousands have been crippled for life, and out of which their country has lost prestige, moral position in the world, the consequences are very great,” said then-Senator Albert Gore, Sr. (D-TN).

Senator Wayne Morse (D-OR) urged the Committee to take a more assertive and public role in questioning the (Johnson) Administration.

“I hope to God we haven’t gone so far that we are now going to operate a government by secrecy in time of crisis,” Senator Morse said.  “I don’t know what has happened to us that we have got the notion that you have got to operate in time of war a government by secrecy.  I say you are carrying the very foundations of the Government away if you are continuing this.”

See “Executive Sessions of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee (Historical Series),” Volume XX, 1968.

It has been three years since the Committee published the previous volume of declassified executive sessions for the preceding year (1967) in April 2007.  At the present rate of production, the complete historical record of Committee deliberations should be available approximately… never.  On the other hand, the volume before that (1966) was published in 1993, fourteen years earlier, so one could say that the pace of publication is accelerating sharply!

The growing backlog of classified historical congressional records will be discussed by the Public Interest Declassification Board at a special public meeting on Thursday, July 22 at the Capitol Visitor Center in Washington, DC.  The subject will be addressed by Porter Goss, the former House Intelligence Committee chairman and former DCIA, as well as several other scholars and experts.  In a Thursday morning session, the Board will also consider the challenges posed by the classification category known as Formerly Restricted Data, a topic that will be discussed by myself and others.  For more information and a meeting agenda, see here (pdf).

Project Bioshield, a program that was created by the Bush Administration in 2004 to foster development of new drugs to respond to a potential bioterrorism attack, now faces significant budget cuts from Congress with the acquiescence of the Obama Administration.

Supporters of the program argue that the reductions to Project Bioshield are shortsighted and dangerously unwise.  Critics say the Project is a boondoggle that has produced little of value.

The budget cut is “an extremely negative development in our overall efforts to prepare not only for bioterrorism but for other biological events from nature,” former Sen. Bob Graham told the Los Angeles Times.  (“Bioterrorism experts condemn a move to cut reserve money” by Ken Dilanian, July 13.)

But Project Bioshield reflects a mistaken prioritization of an extreme scenario, said George Smith of GlobalSecurity.org, who added that even within the domain of pharmaceuticals, the money involved would be better spent elsewhere.  “The country needs more antibiotics to fight infectious bacterial diseases– magnitudes more than it needs anything BioShield could theoretically furnish,” he said.

A newly updated report from the Congressional Research Service says the cuts to Project Bioshield are consistent with its actual expenditures, which have been lower than originally anticipated, and “could be interpreted as Congress and the President adjusting the amount of funds available so that they track more closely with the actual ability of HHS to obligate them.”  See “Project Bioshield: Authorities, Appropriations, Acquisitions, and Issues for Congress,” July 7, 2010.

“I have grown increasingly concerned that we have become too lax, disorganized, and, in some cases, flat-out sloppy in the way we engage with the press,” said Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates, explaining why he had issued new guidance to regulate Pentagon interactions with the news media.

The new guidance (pdf), issued on July 2, requires advance notification and coordination with DoD Public Affairs before a Department official can speak to the media on a story that may have any “national or international implications.”

In the absence of such controls, Gates said at a July 8 press briefing, “personal views have been published as official government positions, and information has gone out that was inaccurate, incomplete or lacking in proper context.  Reports and other documents, including on sensitive subjects, are routinely provided to the press and other elements in this town before I or the White House know anything about them.  Even more worrisome, highly classified and sensitive information has been divulged without authorization or accountability.”

“My hope and expectation is that this new guidance will improve the quality of press engagement by ensuring that the people the media talk to can speak with accuracy and authority.  This should not infringe or impede the flow of accurate and timely information to you or to the public.  That is not my intent, nor will I tolerate it.”

Despite the Secretary’s assurance, however, it seems practically certain that the new guidance will significantly impede the flow of information to the press and will complicate the already difficult task of probing beneath the official surface of events.

The Gates memorandum seems to reflect a view of the press as a conduit for “official government positions” that are “authorized” and placed “in proper context.”  But everyone knows that the most interesting and important news stories often begin with unofficial and unauthorized statements that are lacking in context and may even be inaccurate.  It is the reporter’s job to validate them, assess their significance, place them in context and communicate them, and if the results appear “before I or the White House know anything about them,” so much the better.

That is what the Washington Post did in its series on neglect of veterans’ health at Walter Reed Hospital, and that is what USA Today did in its reporting on the casualties resulting from delayed acquisition of MRAP armored vehicles.

Secretary Gates knows this, and he acknowledged the importance of those particular stories.  “The reality is, stories in the press, and you’ve heard me say this before — whether it was the stories on the treatment of outpatient wounded warriors at Walter Reed in the Washington Post or stories about MRAPs in USA Today — have been a spur to action for me in various areas,” he said.

But the key point is that those stories did not emerge from authorized interviews or official accounts. They had to be pieced together from partial, incomplete and unauthorized sources.  That’s one of the things that made them great.

“If everybody’s following the spirit and the letter of the memo,” an astute but unidentified reporter asked Secretary Gates, “are you confident that stories like stories about the MRAP and the Walter Reed problems would emerge the way they did?”

“Actually, I am,” Secretary Gates said at yesterday’s press briefing, “and it’s largely because of my confidence in the persistence and the skills of the people sitting in front of me.”  But now that persistence and those skills will also be needed to penetrate the new barriers that the Gates memo has created.

If the Pentagon genuinely valued groundbreaking news stories that could serve as a corrective “spur to action,” then it would inquire into the specific conditions of access and disclosure that makes such stories possible, and it would then seek to foster those conditions more broadly throughout the Department.  The new DoD guidance on interaction with the media is a step in the opposite direction.

The July 2 Gates memo (which was first reported by the New York Times) also declared categorically that “Leaking of classified information is against the law, cannot be tolerated, and will, when proven, lead to the prosecution of those found to be engaged in such activity.”

On July 5, Pfc. Bradley E. Manning was charged (pdf) with the unauthorized transfer and disclosure of classified records, including the classified video of a 2007 Apache helicopter attack in Baghdad that was posted online in April of this year by the WikiLeaks web site.

Secretary Gates said that he was not familiar with the underlying investigation of the Manning case or whether it constituted a serious breach, and that he had not determined whether remedial security measures were needed.

In the planning of military operations, the U.S. Army is giving new emphasis to the environmental impact of its activities.

“Environmental considerations need to be integrated into the conduct of operations at all levels of command,” according to a recent Army field manual (pdf).  “Planners must consider the effect environmental considerations have and how they may constrain or influence various actions and decisions.”

There is nothing sentimental about the military’s focus on environmental matters.  Rather, it indicates a new recognition of the role of environmental issues in security and stability, as well as operational effectiveness.

“The military has a new appreciation for the interdependence between military missions, the global community, and the environment…. [I]nadequate environmental controls can lead to conflicts with neighbors and can present health concerns to their population and to U.S. military personnel conducting operations.”

“The U.S. national security strategy now includes a focus on environmental and environmental security concerns. Lasting victories and successful end states will be measured in part by how well the military addresses environmental considerations, to include the protection and the conservation of natural and cultural resources; the improvement of citizens’ living conditions in the affected nations; and FHP [Force Health Protection, i.e. the health of the soldiers themselves].”

When properly integrated into mission planning, the new manual said, environmental considerations “serve as force multipliers rather than mission distracters.”  See “Environmental Considerations,” U.S. Army Field Manual 3-34.5, February 2010.