By Hans M. Kristensen Russia’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sergey Ryabkov, gave a lengthy reaction to the FAS/NRDC report From Counterforce to Minimal Deterrence during a press conference Wednesday. The transcript from the press conference shows that in response to a question that the “report [is] suggesting a possible retargeting of US missile from […]
Following an August 28, 2008 explosion at the Bayer CropScience facility in Institute, West Virginia, Bayer used official secrecy restrictions to limit public awareness of the accident and to impede investigators from the U.S. Chemical Safety Board, a congressional review found. “Bayer engaged in a campaign of secrecy by withholding critical information from local, county, […]
The Senate Intelligence Committee released a newly declassified account of the opinions issued by the Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel concerning CIA’s interrogation and detention program during the Bush Administration. The document is neutral, dispassionate, and maybe a little dull, particularly when compared with the gruesomely detailed contents of some of the OLC opinions […]
Updated below By all authoritative accounts, Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) did not interfere in the investigation of two former pro-Israel lobbyists who were suspected of unlawfully receiving and transmitting classified information. She did not seek to win favorable treatment for them from the Justice Department. They did not receive any such treatment. And she did […]
“The value and the major limitations” of a recently released CIA documentary collection on Col. Ryszard Kuklinkski, the Polish official who provided a vast quantity of political and military intelligence to the CIA in the 1970s and early 1980s, are assessed by Mark Kramer of Harvard University in a new publication of the Cold War […]
The disclosure of four Bush-era Office of Legal Counsel opinions on interrogation and torture is likely to have significant political and perhaps legal consequences. But their release is also a landmark in national security classification policy. These OLC memos, released by the Justice Department yesterday, were among the most urgently sought and the most fiercely […]
Former Justice Department attorney Thomas Tamm, who was one of the early sources for the December 2005 New York Times story on warrantless government surveillance and who is under threat of prosecution for having revealed classified information without authorization, yesterday received the Ridenhour Prize for Truth-Telling. The Ridenhour Prizes, named for the late Ron Ridenhour […]
Noteworthy new reports from the Congressional Research Service, obtained by Secrecy News, include the following (all pdf). “The National Intelligence Council: Issues and Options for Congress,” April 10, 2009. “Pakistan’s Capital Crisis: Implications for U.S. Policy,” updated March 6, 2009. “Direct Overt U.S. Aid and Military Reimbursements to Pakistan, FY2002-FY2009,” updated April 15, 2009. “China-U.S. […]
At a press conference in Mexico City yesterday, President Obama urged the Senate to take up the Inter-American Convention against the Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives, and Other Related Materials, which is often referred to by its Spanish acronym, CIFTA. The Convention aims to curtail the illicit international trade in small arms by […]
If you have followed Russian news media recently, you might have gotten the impression that FAS and NRDC are in charge of U.S. nuclear strike planning and are recommending increasing nuclear targeting of Russia. Of course, neither is true. Yet major Russian news media – and apparently also the chairman of the Russia’s parliament’s international […]
Updated below “The consequences of a prolonged economic downturn–including real estate foreclosures, unemployment, and an inability to obtain credit–could create a fertile recruiting environment for rightwing extremists and even result in confrontations between such groups and government authorities,” according to a new assessment (pdf) from the Department of Homeland Security Office of Intelligence and Analysis. […]
“When… dealing with multiple targets, such as two hostage-takers, [snipers] must coordinate to fire simultaneously,” according to a U.S. Army sniper training manual. “Taking [the targets] out one at a time may allow the second suspect time to harm the hostages.” This was the scenario facing Navy SEALs on the Indian Ocean on April 12. […]