Intelligence and Espionage
Aug 8, 2000 | News
WASHINGTON D.C., 8 August – U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly has overruled the CIA’s claim that it can neither confirm or deny the existence of CIA-prepared biographies of nine former Communist leaders of Eastern European countries, seven of whom are now dead. The judge last week granted the National Security Archive’s motion for partial summary judgment against the CIA’s “Glomar” claim, named after a lawsuit over the ship Glomar Explorer in which the courts allowed the CIA neither to confirm or deny information sought under the Freedom of Information Act.
Aug 2, 2000 | News
Plaintiff's Original Complaint
and Today's Court Filing
Exhibits in Support of
Today's Court Filing
WASHINGTON, D.C., August 2, 2000 – Lawyers for the National Security Archive today filed in federal district court (in paper and CD-ROM formats) a legal challenge to the CIA’s claim that only one line out of 350 pages of internal histories can be released under the Freedom of Information Act without damaging U.S. national security.
Jun 29, 2000 | News
From: Center for National Security Studies, Federation of American Scientists, National Security Archive
Re: Freedom of Information Act Exemption for Defense Intelligence Agency Files in S. 2549, Defense Authorization Act.
Jun 26, 2000 | News
On Friday, June 23, the National Security Archive published on the Internet a selection of recently declassified documents detailing restrictions intended to ensure that U.S. persons are not improperly identified in reports drawn from foreign communications intercepts. The documents, including formerly secret training guides and memoranda from the National Security Agency (NSA), were released under the Freedom of Information Act. NSA is the organization responsible for the interception and processing of foreign communications and other electronic signals (SIGINT) for the U.S.
Mar 31, 2000 | Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., March 31, 2000 – During late 1998 and 1999, the Wen Ho Lee espionage controversy and debate over U.S. corporate technology transfers to China made the Chinese nuclear weapons program the subject of heated debate in the U.S. media and in American politics.
Mar 17, 2000 | News
On March 17, 2000, Long Island University named The National Security Archive as winner of a Special George Polk Award for 1999 "for serving as an essential journalistic resource and for expanding access to previously classified documents" including, over the past year:
Mar 14, 2000 | Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., March 14, 2000 – Today's Washington Post features an op-ed on page A17 titled "Hardly a Distinguished Career," written by National Security Archive director Tom Blanton and commenting on the CIA's decision to award the Distinguished Career Intelligence Medal to the highest-ranking CIA official fired in a 1995 scandal for failing to inform Congress about the CIA's ties to human rights abuses in Guatemala.
THE DOCUMENTS
Document 1: The Biographic Register, U.S. Department of State, July 1973, p. 402
Jan 13, 2000 | Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., January 13, 2000 – The National Security Agency (NSA) is one of the most secret (and secretive) members of the U.S. intelligence community. The predecessor of NSA, the Armed Forces Security Agency (AFSA), was established within the Department of Defense, under the command of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on May 20, 1949.
May 27, 1999 | News
Several years ago, the National Security Archive initiated a project to obtain critical declassified documentation on key aspects of the U.S.-China relationship, focusing on the period from 1969 to the present. Through Freedom of Information Act requests, collection of relevant publications, and archival research, the Archive has amassed a collection of more than 2,000 documents, consisting of over 15,000 pages, covering major foreign policy issues, U.S.-China security cooperation, technology transfer, economic issues, and intelligence.
Apr 14, 1999 | Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., April 14, 1999 – The use of overhead platforms to observe events on the earth can be traced to the French Revolution, when France organized a company of aerostiers, or balloonists, in April 1794. The United States employed balloons during the Civil War, although little intelligence of value was obtained. In January 1911, the San Diego waterfront became the first target of cameras carried aboard an airplane. Later that year the U.S. Army Signal Corps put aerial photography into the curriculum at its flight training school.