Ludicrous, Lethal Government Secrets Cited

[Rose Siding]

WASHINGTON - A former dictator's cocktail preferences and a facetious plot against Santa Claus were classified by the government to prevent public disclosure.

Also stamped "secret" for six years was a study that concluded 40 percent of Army chemical warfare masks leaked.

These and other ludicrous and lethal examples of classification were cited Tuesday by members of Congress and witnesses at a House subcommittee hearing into the Sept. 11 commission's conclusion that secrecy is undermining efforts to thwart terrorists.

Some classifications were made in error or to save face.

The CIA (news - web sites) deleted the amount Iraqi agents paid for aluminum tubes from page 96 of a Senate report on prewar intelligence. The report quoted the CIA as concluding, "Their willingness to pay such costs suggests the tubes are intended for a special project of national interest."......MORE........

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/ap/20040824/ap_on_go_co/government_secrets

[mom cat]

1. Rate...please.

[Rose Siding]

2. Makes leakers for the public benefit,

as opposed to govt manipulation of the media for political gain, even more vital.

[truthisfreedom]

3. god forbid we should find out how much we gouged saddam for on aluminum

tubes.

[struggle4progress]

4. National Security Archive put together a nice collection of examples ...

... like this about a year and a half ago:


For Immediate Release: May 21, 2003

CIA Stamped Secret on Santa Claus,
Blacked Out Joke on North Pole Terrorism

Declassified Documents Show Excessive Secrecy,
Arbitrary and Subjective Classification Decisions,
"Icons" and "Secrets of Convenience"
Rather than Real Protection of National Security

Washington DC, May 21, 2003 - The Central Intelligence Agency classified and withheld from a Freedom of Information Act release a 25-year-old joke item in a weekly terrorism report about the terrorist threat to Santa Claus and the North Pole, among many other examples of "dubious secrets" published today on the Web by the National Security Archive at George Washington University.

The CIA's secret Santa leads the Archive's lengthy compilation of declassified documents that illustrate the arbitrary and capricious decision making that all too often characterizes the U.S. government's national security secrecy system. Edited by Archive senior fellow Dr. Jeffrey Richelson, Archive senior analyst Dr. William Burr, and Archive director Thomas Blanton, the electronic briefing book highlights the reflexive thinking embodied in "classification icons," such as intelligence budgets that are still classified from 1947 (!) and the locations of nuclear weapons such as the Jupiter missiles in Italy that were only deployed for a few years. Other dubious secrets reveal cover-ups, such as death squad activities in El Salvador that would have undermined Congressional approval for military aid.

"Government secrecy is dramatically on the rise in the U.S.," commented Blanton, "but the declassified record is highly instructive - the new secrecy may not improve our security, in fact the reverse."

Go to the Electronic Briefing Book
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB90/press.htm

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