New and newly updated reports from the Congressional Research Service obtained by Secrecy News that have not been made publicly available include the following. Does Foreign Aid Work? Efforts to Evaluate U.S. Foreign Assistance, November 19, 2012 Congressional Redistricting: An Overview, November 21, 2012 Update on Controlling Greenhouse Gases from International Aviation, November 19, 2012 […]
Linton Brooks and I discussed nuclear modernization at a November 13 panel organized by BASIC. . By Hans M. Kristensen BASIC invited me to discuss nuclear weapons modernization with Linton Brooks at a Strategic Dialogue panel held at the Capitol Hill Club on November 13, 2012. We’re still waiting for the official transcript, but BASIC […]
In a memorandum to agency heads last week, President Obama transmitted formal requirements that agencies must meet in order “to deter, detect, and mitigate actions by employees who may represent a threat to national security.” Along with espionage and acts of violence, the National Insider Threat Policy notably extends to the “unauthorized disclosure of classified […]
The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) of the Department of Justice said it had recently completed a review of the Department’s use of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Amendments Act (FAA), but the report is classified and its findings have not been released. “The OIG examined the number of disseminated […]
The Department of Defense issued a new Directive last week establishing DoD policy for the development and use of autonomous weapons systems. An autonomous weapon system is defined as “a weapon system that, once activated, can select and engage targets without further intervention by a human operator.” The new DoD Directive Number 3000.09, dated November […]
New and updated reports from the Congressional Research Service that have not been made readily available to the public include the following. India-U.S. Security Relations: Current Engagement, November 13, 2012 A Guide to China’s Upcoming Leadership Transitions, October 16, 2012 U.S. Trade and Investment Relations with sub-Saharan Africa and the African Growth and Opportunity Act, […]
The escalating confrontation between the United States and Iran over the latter’s nuclear program has triggered much debate about what actions should be taken to ensure that Iran does not develop a nuclear weapon. How might certain actions against Iran affect the global economy?
What are the major national security threats facing the United States, and what can the next president do to prepare for a potential disaster? Three days after the 2012 national election, FAS hosted a symposium featuring policy experts who provided recommendations (in memo form) to the Obama administration on how to best respond to catastrophic threats to national security.
Over the objections of its authors, the Department of Homeland Security classified a 2007 report from the National Academy of Sciences on the potential vulnerability of the U.S. electric power system until most of it was finally released yesterday. The report generally concluded, as other reports have, that the electric grid is lacking in resilience […]
New or newly updated reports from the Congressional Research Service that have not been made readily available to the public include the following. Privacy: An Abbreviated Outline of Federal Statutes Governing Wiretapping and Electronic Eavesdropping, October 9, 2012 Privacy: An Overview of Federal Statutes Governing Wiretapping and Electronic Eavesdropping, October 9, 2012 Privacy: An Overview […]
During a recent visit to Germany I did an interview with the Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk magazine FAKT on the status of the B61 nuclear bomb modernization. . By Hans M. Kristensen Last week, I was in Berlin to testify before the Disarmament Subcommittee of the German Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee on the future of the U.S. […]
President Obama’s declared goal of making his “the most transparent Administration in history” generated successive waves of enthusiasm, perplexity, frustration, and mockery as public expectations of increased openness and accountability were lifted sky high and then — often, not always — thwarted. Every Administration including this one presides over the release of more government information […]