[NYTr] FAS Secrecy News - 12/06/2007

Thu Dec 6 16:19:21 EST 2007

SECRECY NEWS
from the FAS Project on Government Secrecy
Volume 2007, Issue No. 119
December 6, 2007

Secrecy News Blog:  http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/

Support Secrecy News: http://www.fas.org/static/contrib_sec.jsp

     **   CIA BUNGLES DECLASSIFICATION OF OFFICIAL HISTORIES

CIA BUNGLES DECLASSIFICATION OF OFFICIAL HISTORIES

When the Central Intelligence Agency released several declassified
histories of its clandestine services program this week, it seemed like
a solid indication of progress towards opening up the historical record
of U.S. intelligence (Secrecy News, 12/05/07).

But upon closer inspection of the newly released documents, the
opposite appears to be closer to the truth.  It turns out that CIA has
engaged in pointless multiple reviews of the same document, and has
even attempted to classify and to withhold information that had
previously been declassified and disclosed.

Today, the Federation of American Scientists asked the Information
Security Oversight Office to investigate the matter.

The 1961 "Record of Paramilitary Action Against the Castro Government
of Cuba" that was posted on the CIA web site this week was first
processed for declassification in 1997 in response to a request from
Peter Kornbluh, the Cuba expert at the National Security Archive, and
the lightly redacted document was posted on the Archive web site in
1998.

In 2007, the same document was again subjected to declassification
review.  It was re-scanned by CIA reviewers and this time the
redactions were made by whiting out the text instead of blacking it out
as had been done ten years ago.  But appearances aside, a comparison of
the two documents indicates that no new information was released since
1997.

In other words, despite the CIA's expenditure of scarce
declassification resources to process the document twice, no value was
added by doing so.

Even more problematic is the Agency's handling of the declassified
history of "The Berlin Tunnel Operation, 1952-1956," because the CIA
attempted to withhold portions of that report as classified even though
they had previously been released.

The Berlin Tunnel history has been reviewed several times for
declassification.  The latest version that was released by the CIA this
week was "approved for release" in July 2007.  Another version of the
same document was previously "approved for release" in February 2007
(Secrecy News, 04/05/07).

Astonishingly, much of the text that was released in February is marked
as classified in the July version!

So, for example, the codename of the Berlin Tunnel Operation --
PBJOINTLY -- was published in the February edition of the history (at
page i), but censored in the July edition that was released this week.

More substantively, a fifteen page appendix (App. A) entitled
"Discovery by the Soviets of PBJOINTLY" was published in full in
February but was almost entirely redacted in July.

Likewise, a six page appendix (App. B) entitled "Recapitulation of the
Intelligence Derived" was published in full in February but redacted in
July.  And there are many other examples of such attempted
reclassifications scattered throughout.

A copy of the more complete February 2007 version is posted here:

     http://www.fas.org/irp/cia/product/tunnel-200702.pdf

And for comparison, the more recent but less revealing July 2007
version is here:

     http://www.fas.org/irp/cia/product/tunnel-200707.pdf

"For the CIA to represent the material that was newly redacted in July
2007 as classified when in fact it has been declassified and published
by the CIA itself is, I believe, a violation of the executive order," I
wrote in a letter to the Information Security Oversight Office today.
"It generates confusion and suggests poor quality control, if not
something worse."

"I hope that ISOO may be able to help clarify the source of CIA's
defective declassification practice in this instance and to identify an
appropriate corrective."

     http://www.fas.org/sgp/news/2007/12/fas120607.pdf

"We'll look into it," replied Bill Leonard, the ISOO Director.

_______________________________________________
Secrecy News is written by Steven Aftergood and published by the
Federation of American Scientists.

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_______________________
Steven Aftergood
Project on Government Secrecy
Federation of American Scientists
1725 DeSales St NW, 6th floor
Washington, DC  20036

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email:  saftergood at fas.org
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