Earlier this month, Representative Mike Rogers (R-MI) submitted the House version (H.R.5533) of the `Biodefense and Pandemic Vaccine and Drug Development Act of 2006′ (BARDA). The bill was introduced in the Senate by Senator Richard Burr (R-NC) (S.2564). The two bills are essentially the same with the exception of two controversial sections included in the […]
The government’s increasing use of the “state secrets privilege” to resist civil litigation on national security matters has often been met by courts with uncritical, even abject deference to the executive agencies that invoke the privilege. But another, more assertive response is possible. “The state secrets privilege is absolute,” wrote Judge Royce C. Lamberth categorically […]
One of the most vivid allegations made by the U.S. government regarding Iraqi weapons of mass destruction was the claim that Iraqi had developed mobile laboratories for the production of biological weapons. The allegation, based on reports from a source known as “Curveball,” proved to be false. But the U.S. intelligence assessment of the supposed […]
“Sensitive Security Information (SSI) is information that would be detrimental to transportation security if publicly disclosed,” according to a Department of Homeland Security directive released last week under the Freedom of Information Act. See DHS Management Directive 11056 (pdf), “Sensitive Security Information,” December 16, 2005. Confusingly, however, SSI is also a control marking used by […]
In a somewhat gruesome but unblinking new publication (pdf) prepared for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the U.S. military prescribes doctrine for the recovery, identification, handling and burial of deceased soldiers, enemy combatants and civilian detainees. The violent, horrible death of combatants and non-combatants is of course a defining characteristic of war. And the strange […]
A Written Declaration presented in the European Parliament calls for the withdrawal of US nuclear weapons from Europe by the end of 2006. The Declaration has until December 10 to gather support from at least half of the Parliament’s 732 members to be adopted and formally submitted to the US government. The initiative comes as […]
In an op-ed in last Wednesday’s Washington Post, IAEA Secretary General Mohammad elBaradei endorsed the US-India nuclear deal without reservation. The Secretary makes several good points but he fails to demonstrate his assertion that the deal will help reach his own objectives.
One way to supplement and improve intelligence oversight would be to employ the Government Accountability Office (GAO), an investigative arm of Congress, to perform routine audits of key intelligence functions. Yet this potentially valuable oversight tool lies dormant due to opposition from the CIA and other intelligence agencies. The GAO will not even attempt to […]
Gen. Michael Hayden, who is now the new CIA director, presented himself as a committed proponent of intelligence oversight in an April 2005 hearing on his nomination to become Deputy Director of National Intelligence. But the record of that hearing, which has just been published, takes on a different aspect in light of the NSA […]
In a December 14, 2005 Executive Order, President Bush directed government agencies to review their Freedom of Information Act programs, evaluate their performance, and develop plans to reduce backlogs and improve efficiency. Those plans were due on June 14 and some of them, not all, have now been published by the Department of Justice Office […]
The Department of Justice Inspector General released a newly declassified version of its 2004 audit of the FBI’s handling of intelligence information related to the September 11 attacks, including a newly disclosed chapter (large pdf) on the case of Zacarias Moussaoui. In a previously released version of the report, the entire chapter 4 on Moussaoui […]
Al Qaeda terrorists contemplated an attack on New York subways in 2003 using an “easily constructed” device called a “mubtakkar” to release cyanide gas, according to a story in Time Magazine this week. But there are reasons to question the reliability and significance of the story, suggested chemist George Smith of GlobalSecurity.org. For one thing, […]