CIA closes office that declassifies historical materials

[Ichingcarpenter]

CIA office that focused on declassifying historical materials, a move scholars say will mean fewer public disclosures about long-buried intelligence secrets and scandals.

The Historical Collections Division, which has declassified documents on top Soviet spies, a secret CIA airline in the Vietnam War, the Cuban missile crisis and other major operations, has been disbanded. The office that handles Freedom of Information Act requests will take over the work.

CIA officials said they closed the Historical Collections Division to accommodate federal budget cuts that the White House and Congress proposed last year to create pressure for a deficit reduction deal. No deal materialized, so across-the-board budget cuts known as the sequester were imposed.





"As a result of sequestration, elements of one program office were moved into a larger unit to create efficiencies, but CIA will continue to perform this important work," said Edward Price, a CIA spokesman.



http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-cia-sequester-20130822,0,1013990.story


WINK WINK NUDGE NUDGE.









MEANWHILE

Bad management drives talent from CIA, internal reports suggest
Frustration with poor managers is costing the CIA some of its most talented staff, internal surveys and former officers say.


http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-cia-management-20130730,0,5485587.story

[KoKo]

1. The "Sequestration" has been convenient. n/t

[Supersedeas]

2. where are the priorities

[Ichingcarpenter]

5. $12,548,710.60 will get you one MQ-9 Reaper

Roughly $5 million will get you a Predator.




THIS ONE COSTS MORE its the Reaper








This is no longer available

[Autumn]

3. They are so obvious it's fucking ridiculous.

rec

[Little Star]

4. Bingo!

[Hydra]

6. *wink wink, nudge nudge*

Yup, we get it...

[Mc Mike]

7. "All inquiries through Information Retrieval, and that's hopeless.

They never tell you anything"

-- Sam Lowry's boss, from the movie Brazil

[Fearless]

8. "the most transparent administration ever"

Well they are transparent, but not in the way we once thought.

[awoke_in_2003]

9. A nod's as good as a wink...

to a blind bat.

[truebluegreen]

10. How curious it is, and what a coincidence.

[Octafish]

11. CIA holds many JFK assassination documents that need to see the light of day.

50 years later, sealed JFK files still raise questions

Serious researchers and conspiracy theorists alike note that several hundred pages of investigative documents related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy remain classified. Many questions hinge on a deceased CIA agent and his activities before the assassination.

By David Porter, Associated Press
Christian Science Monitor / August 17, 2013

Five decades after President John F. Kennedy was fatally shot and long after official inquiries ended, thousands of pages of investigative documents remain withheld from public view. The contents of these files are partially known — and intriguing — and conspiracy buffs are not the only ones seeking to open them for a closer look.

Some serious researchers believe the off-limits files could shed valuable new light on nagging mysteries of the assassination — including what US intelligence agencies knew about accused assassin Lee Harvey Oswald before Nov. 22, 1963.

It turns out that several hundred of the still-classified pages concern a deceased CIA agent, George Joannides, whose activities just before the assassination and, fascinatingly, during a government investigation years later, have tantalized researchers for years.

"This is not about conspiracy, this is about transparency," said Jefferson Morley, a former Washington Post reporter and author embroiled in a decade-long lawsuit against the CIA, seeking release of the closed documents. "I think the CIA should obey the law. I don't think most people think that's a crazy idea."

Morley's effort has been joined by others, including G. Robert Blakey, chief counsel for a House investigation into the JFK assassination in the 1970s. But so far, the Joannides files and thousands more pages primarily from the CIA remain off-limits at a National Archives center in College Park, Md.

CONTINUED...

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Latest-News-Wires/2013/0817/50-years-later-sealed-JFK-files-still-raise-questions

[RainDog]

12. another blow to truth and the historical record n/t

[Octafish]

13. George Joannides was Oswald's minder and CIA liaison to HSCA.

How's that for intel investigatin' itself, hah?

http://jfkfacts.org/tag/george-joannides/

So what? It's only the last President to put the CIA in their place, right?

While Carter tried, and they did a number on him.

[Ichingcarpenter]

14. The CIA is suppose to release their JFK papers

this November.... kind of a coincidence since they no longer have the office to do that.