In what may be a harbinger of new rigor in Congressional oversight, four Democratic members of Congress told the Environmental Protection Agency to cease and desist (pdf) from closing public document libraries and dispersing or destroying their contents unless and until EPA obtains specific approval from Congress. Public interest groups including the Union of Concerned […]
A federal judge ordered (pdf) the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency to respond within 30 days to a Freedom of Information Act request from reporter Joshua Gerstein for a copy of records regarding unauthorized disclosures of classified information (“leaks”). Gerstein, a reporter with the New York Sun, had requested all “criminal referrals” […]
A newly updated Department of Defense Instruction sets forth Pentagon policy on interactions with the Government Accountability Office, the congressional investigative agency. “It is DoD policy that the Department of Defense cooperate fully with the GAO and respond constructively to, and take appropriate corrective actions on the basis of, GAO reports,” the new Instruction (pdf) […]
“The USSR is publicly discussing an ambitious array of manned and unmanned space missions … planned over the next quarter century,” the CIA’s Foreign Broadcast Information Service reported in a 1987 internal assessment (pdf). “Recent items in the Soviet press and scientific literature… have provided new details on Soviet space plans from the present through […]
A key uncertainty affecting our confidence in the long-term reliability of nuclear weapons is the stability of the plutonium in the core, or “pit.” The pit is a sphere or shell of plutonium that is compressed by conventional explosives to create the supercritical mass required to sustain a nuclear chain reaction. In hydrogen bombs, this […]
Habeas corpus refers to the right of a person who has been detained by the government to challenge his detention in a court of law. Although the U.S. Constitution does not permit the suspension of habeas corpus except in case of invasion or rebellion, last September Congress did so anyway at the behest of the […]
The elite JASON defense science advisory panel, most of whose deliberations and conclusions are classified, surfaced publicly for a moment with two new releases. One new JASON report addresses the feasibility of reducing Defense Department dependence on fossil fuels. “In light of an increasing U.S. dependence on foreign oil, as well as rising fuel costs […]
U.S. Navy research on “mind control techniques” cannot be performed on human subjects without the authorization of the Under Secretary of the Navy, according to a new Navy Instruction (pdf). “The Under Secretary of the Navy (UNSECNAV) is the Approval Authority for research involving … severe or unusual intrusions, either physical or psychological, on human […]
U.S. Air Force policy on “information operations” — which includes electronic warfare, psychological operations, military deception, counter-propaganda and more — is described in a recently updated Air Force Policy Document. See “Information Operations” (pdf), AFPD 10-7, 6 September 2006 (revised 8 Oct 06). The apparent involvement of the North Korean government in drug trafficking and […]
An incipient nuclear arms race is emerging between China and the United States, according to a new report published today by the Federation of American Scientists and the Natural Resources Defense Council. The 250-page report, Chinese Nuclear Forces and U.S. Nuclear War Planning, outlines the status and possible future development of China’s nuclear weapons, describes […]
A federal court this month denied a motion that would have eased the government’s prosecution of two former officials of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee who are charged with mishandling classified information. Prosecutors had argued that they should not be obliged to prove that the defendants “actually knew the disclosure of the information was […]
Thousands of sensitive Nuclear Regulatory Commission documents regarding nuclear power plant security and vulnerability are publicly available in public document rooms across the country, NBC News reported on November 27 in a rather breathless “hidden camera” investigation that illustrates the difficulty that some people have in thinking clearly about secrecy and security. “Many of the […]