From the Blogs
CIA: Cost of Personal Computer in 1987 is a Secret: Under
the information policies of the CIA, even well known public information
such as the cost of a personal computer may be withheld from public
disclosure. In an article in the CIA's journal Studies in Intelligence,
the cost of the 1987 Commodore Amiga computer was redacted. Yet upon
review, a CIA official said the redaction was made in error and the full
cost was revealed.
Nuclear Attribution and Hot Cognition: The
challenges of identifying the perpetrators of a nuclear attack on the
United States and communicating that information to senior leadership
were considered in a 2009 workshop sponsored by the Office of the
Director of National Intelligence. A declassified report on the workshop
was released last week in heavily redacted form and obtained by Secrecy
News.
New START Data: US and Russia Increase Deployed Nuclear Arsenals: Three
and a half years after the New START Treaty entered into force, many
would expect that the United States and Russia had reduce their deployed
strategic nuclear weapons. However, the latest aggregate treaty data
shows that the two nuclear superpowers both increased their deployed
nuclear forces compared with the previous count made in March
2014. Russia has increased its deployed weapons the most: by 131
warheads on 23 additional launchers. Hans Kristensen writes that the
data is disappointing for both nuclear superpowers – almost embarrassing
– because it shows that neither has made substantial reductions.
Additionally, the meager performance is risky in the run-up to the
nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty review conference in April 2015 where
the United States and Russia – together with China, Britain, and France –
must demonstrate their progress toward nuclear disarmament to ensure
the support of the other countries that have signed the NPT
in strengthening the non-proliferation treaty regime.
DNI Issues Directive on Polygraph Policy: Polygraph
testing is here to stay, per a new directive issued by James Clapper,
Director of Intelligence. The directive governs the use of polygraph
testing in vetting executive branch agency personnel for security
clearances or determining their eligibility for “sensitive” positions.
Use of US Armed Forces Abroad from 1798-2014, and More from CRS: Secrecy
News has obtained recently released CRS reports on topics such as
instances of the US using force abroad, Russia's compliance with the INF
Treaty and Syria.
CIA Asks to Destroy Email of Non-Senior Agency Officials: The
CIA has asked for authority to destroy email messages sent by
non-senior officials of the Agency; the National Archives and Records
Administration (NARA) has tentatively approved the proposal. In
consideration of the request, a NARA official wrote that any permanently
valuable material in the emails would almost certainly be captured in
other permanent CIA records.
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In Memoriam: Martin Perl
Dr. Martin Perl,
Nobel Laureate and member of FAS's Board of Sponsors, passed away on
September 30, 2014 at the age of 87. In 1995, Dr. Perl won the Nobel
Prize in Physics for discovering a new subatomic particle that is a key
part of the foundation of the universe.
Dr. Perl served as professor emeritus at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory at Stanford University. The full obituary in the New York Times is available here.
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