Nuclear Weapons

Embattled CRS Director Speaks Out on Earmarks

03.28.07 | 1 min read | Text by Steven Aftergood

A Wall Street Journal column on March 26 reported that the Congressional Research Service “will no longer respond to requests from members of Congress on the size, number of background of [budget] earmarks.” The new CRS policy, the Journal article alleged, “is helping its masters hide wasteful spending.”

“The article is replete with mischaracterizations of CRS work and policies,” wrote CRS Director Daniel P. Mulhollan in a memo to all CRS staff (pdf). “Such attacks on our independence cannot go unanswered.”

Mr. Mulhollan defended his agency in a letter to the editor of the Wall Street Journal, circulated with his March 26 memo. A copy was obtained by Secrecy News.

The Journal article “gratuitously alludes to issues related to public access to CRS work,” Mr. Mulhollan wrote in his letter. “The restriction on publication of CRS work was established long ago by Congress. CRS internal policies regarding distribution of its products ensure compliance with congressional directives. We leave to Members and committees the discretion to share CRS products how and when they wish.”

“CRS has recently been subjected to much scrutiny because we have not shied away from analysis of controversial issues,” Director Mulhollan told CRS staff.

publications
See all publications
Nuclear Weapons
Report
Nuclear Notebook: Russian Nuclear Weapons, 2023

The FAS Nuclear Notebook is one of the most widely sourced reference materials worldwide for reliable information about the status of nuclear weapons, and has been published in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists since 1987.. The Nuclear Notebook is researched and written by the staff of the Federation of American Scientists’ Nuclear Information Project: Director Hans […]

05.08.23 | 1 min read
read more
Nuclear Weapons
Blog
Video Indicates that Lida Air Base Might Get Russian “Nuclear Sharing” Mission in Belarus

On 14 April 2023, the Belarusian Ministry of Defence released a short video of a Su-25 pilot explaining his new role in delivering “special [nuclear] munitions” following his training in Russia. The features seen in the video, as well as several other open-source clues, suggest that Lida Air Base––located only 40 kilometers from the Lithuanian border and the […]

04.19.23 | 7 min read
read more
Nuclear Weapons
Blog
Was There a U.S. Nuclear Weapons Accident At a Dutch Air Base? [no, it was training, see update below]

A photo in a Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) student briefing from 2022 shows four people inspecting what appears to be a damaged B61 nuclear bomb.

04.03.23 | 7 min read
read more
Nuclear Weapons
Blog
STRATCOM Says China Has More ICBM Launchers Than The United States – We Have Questions

In early-February 2023, the Wall Street Journal reported that U.S. Strategic Command (STRATCOM) had informed Congress that China now has more launchers for Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) than the United States. The report is the latest in a serious of revelations over the past four years about China’s growing nuclear weapons arsenal and the deepening […]

02.10.23 | 6 min read
read more