The population of Yemen has quadrupled over the last 30 years, the Congressional Research Service noted in a newly updated report, exacerbating that nation’s widespread poverty and contributing to the upheaval that is now unfolding. See Yemen: Background and U.S. Relations, January 21, 2015. The United States currently provides refuge to over 300,000 foreign nationals […]
It has become popular among military and congressional leaders to argue that the United States has had a “procurement holiday” in nuclear force planning for the past two decades. “Over the past 20-25 years, we took a procurement holiday” in modernizing U.S. nuclear forces, Major General Garrett Harencak, the Air Force’s assistant chief of staff […]
In an unusual gesture, the U.S. Government last week apologized to Abdullah al-Kidd, a U.S. citizen who was arrested in 2003 and detained as a material witness in connection with a terrorism-related case. Mr. Al-Kidd, represented by American Civil Liberties Union attorney Lee Gelernt, challenged his detention as unconstitutional and inhumane. Now the case has […]
Updated below There is a new sheriff in town. Is that the message that Senator Richard Burr, the new chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, is trying to send? Senator Burr reportedly wrote to President Obama last week to ask that all copies of the classified 6,700 page Committee report on CIA interrogation […]
National security secrecy, which remains a source of conflict and consternation, inspires a steady flow of books and journal articles. As in other policy-related fields, much of this literature is tendentious, derivative or dull. Some of it is insightful, original or usefully provocative. Most works naturally occupy a middle ground including both virtues and defects. […]
The Federation of American Scientists this week petitioned the Department of Energy to declassify the annual rate at which the United States built new nuclear weapons throughout the cold war. “The proposed declassification would enrich public understanding of the historical development of the U.S. stockpile. Disclosure of the actual build rate per year would add […]
New or newly updated reports from the Congressional Research Service include the following. China and Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction and Missiles: Policy Issues, January 5, 2015 China Naval Modernization: Implications for U.S. Navy Capabilities — Background and Issues for Congress, December 23, 2014 Marine Corps Amphibious Combat Vehicle (ACV) and Marine Personnel Carrier […]
The government-wide effort to contain the threat to classified information and sensitive facilities from trusted insiders is falling behind schedule. Currently, the anticipated achievement of an Initial Operating Capability for insider threat detection by January 2017 is “at risk,” according to a new quarterly progress report. Meanwhile, the date for achieving a Full Operating Capability […]
“We do overclassify,” Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper, admitted at his 2010 confirmation hearing. It’s a theme he has reiterated on a number of occasions on which he has spoken of the need for increased transparency in intelligence. So it comes as a surprise and a disappointment that a new study of the […]
A new report from the Congressional Research Service presents an introduction to U.S. military operations in cyberspace and the thorny policy issues that arise from them. “This report presents an overview of the threat landscape in cyberspace, including the types of offensive weapons available, the targets they are designed to attack, and the types of […]
The U.S. government will not categorically declassify the number of weapons in the U.S. nuclear arsenal once and for all, but it will consider declassification of the size of the prior year’s arsenal on a case by case basis, the Department of Energy said last week. In May 2010, the Obama Administration declassified the fact […]
The Congressional Research Service has updated its Congressional Oversight Manual. The 150-page document describes the tools and procedures that Congress has at its disposal to perform the oversight function. Other noteworthy new CRS reports that Congress has withheld from online public distribution include the following: The Political Question Doctrine: Justiciability and the Separation of Powers, […]