With last week’s disclosure of the total intelligence budget for 2010, including budget figures for the National Intelligence Program ($53.1 billion) and the Military Intelligence Program ($27 billion), the Obama Administration has provided a new degree of transparency on intelligence spending. The National Intelligence Program (NIP) budget total has previously been disclosed each year since […]
The disclosure of the total annual amount of intelligence spending may be seen as the culmination of decades of advocacy and activism. Budget disclosure will help to normalize the intelligence function of government, to promote a new degree of public accountability, and to combat the obfuscation and mystification of intelligence. The move also goes a […]
Last week, on the same day that the 2010 intelligence budget totals were revealed, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence also released another previously undisclosed intelligence budget figure — the 2006 budget appropriation for the National Intelligence Program. “The aggregate amount appropriated to the NIP for fiscal year 2006 was $40.9 Billion,” wrote […]
by Ivanka Barzashka and Ivan Oelrich A year ago, France, Russia and the U.S.—called the Vienna Group—proposed a deal in which Iran would ship out some of its worrying low-enriched uranium (LEU) in exchange for fuel for its medical isotope reactor, called the Tehran Research Reactor (TRR). These narrow technical discussions about the TRR were […]
Because of what appears to have been a computer glitch, a group of nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) was temporarily off-line last week and not ready to launch on a moment’s notice. According to an article in The Atlantic, some Republicans have suggested that this means that New START, the nuclear arms control treaty awaiting Senate ratification, […]
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence has issued new standards for the construction of Sensitive Compartmented Information Facilities (SCIFs). SCIFs (pronounced “skiffs”) are rooms, vaults, or even entire buildings that are specially constructed and certified for the handling and storage of classified intelligence information known as Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI). The total number […]
Sharing of intelligence and other sensitive information within government and with selected private sector entities remains a work in progress. Depending on one’s perspective, there is too little sharing, or too much, or else the right stuff is not being shared. J. Alan Orlob, the Vice President for Corporate Security at Marriott Hotels, told Congress […]
A bill passed by the Senate last month would require U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to administer polygraph tests to all applicants for law enforcement positions within the agency. The move was prompted by reports (originally in the New York Times) and testimony before the Senate Homeland Security Committee that Mexican drug trafficking organizations […]
Thousands of previously unrecognized civilian casualties of the war in Iraq were documented in a collection of classified U.S. military records that were published online October 22 by the Wikileaks organization. The unauthorized release of the records was presented with Wikileaks’ usual understatement and precision. The newly disclosed records are said to be “the first […]
The Washington Post is publishing a rather spectacular series of stories this week tracing the flow of guns through American society and their use in criminal activity. The Post series directly challenges — and partially overcomes — the barriers to public disclosure of gun sales that were put in place by Congress under pressure from […]
The Israeli policy of “nuclear opacity” — by which that country’s presumptive nuclear weapons program is not formally acknowledged — is examined in the new book “The Worst-Kept Secret: Israel’s Bargain with the Bomb” by Avner Cohen (Columbia University Press, October 2010). For a variety of reasons, the author concludes that Israel’s “nuclear opacity” is […]
Noteworthy new reports from the Congressional Research Service that have not been made readily available to the public include the following (all pdf). “Hezbollah: Background and Issues for Congress,” October 8, 2010. “Pakistan’s Nuclear Weapons: Proliferation and Security Issues,” October 7, 2010. “Burma’s 2010 Election Campaign: Issues for Congress,” October 6, 2010. “Drug Courts: Background, […]