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Secrecy, overclassification, and the the CIA’s hidden history
- readhn 7y agoTo better understand this organization and its inner workings i highly recommend the book "Overthrow" by Stephen Kinzer.
- Communitivity 7y agoI also recommend the book "The Company", by Bob Littell. Overall it's fiction, but has the feel of realism.
- coldtea 7y agoI'd also recommend https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Veins_of_Latin_America https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Veins_of_Latin_America
- zby 7y agoHow about "Legacy of Ashes"? https://www.amazon.com/Legacy-Ashes-History-Tim-Weiner/dp/0307389006 https://www.amazon.com/Legacy-Ashes-History-Tim-Weiner/dp/03...
- nyolfen 7y agoyou know this one is good because the cia denounced it. i started it earlier this week.
- _iyig 7y agoCame here to post this. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. For one thing, the quality of the author’s research speaks for itself: “The book is based on more than 50,000 documents, primarily from the archives of the CIA, and hundreds of interviews with CIA veterans, including ten Directors of Central Intelligence.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legacy_of_Ashes_(book) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legacy_of_Ashes_(book)
- teddyh 7y agoSee also: Brought to Light, written by Alan Moore and drawn by Bill Sienkiewicz.
- lioeters 7y agoThe author's name looked familiar - then I found that this year he published a book titled _Poisoner in Chief: Sidney Gottlieb and the CIA Search for Mind Control_. Looking forward to reading that soon, and will search for your recommendation too.
- eternalban 7y ago'The Secret Team: The CIA And Its Allies In Control Of The United States And The World' L. FLETCHER PROUTY, Col., U.S. Air Force (Ret.) 1973 https://archive.org/details/pdfy-JnCrjsoqI22z8p9i https://archive.org/details/pdfy-JnCrjsoqI22z8p9i
- zarro 7y agoI always found it annoying how things get "declassified" only after anyone that could have provided context and good points of objection, in order to develop a better system of rules, is dead. How can you expect to perfect a system by making the negative feedback loop ineffective.
- vonmoltke 7y agoIt's a tricky balance between that and protecting the people involved from harm, as well as protecting methods that may still be of use. I think the US government is too conservative about when to release information, but in many cases even less conservative standards will result in information being withheld until most or all of the principals are dead.
- zarro 7y agoI agree that's the argument used, but you have to weigh that against the possibility that it also incentivises malicious actor(s) to subversive behavior because they will not be held accountable for their actions. In the grand scheme of things it comes to a subjective decision point, and I would tend to argue that an increase in accountability toward the customers (us), wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing.
- vonmoltke 7y agoHence why I think the US government is too conservative in deciding these matters. The accountability to us is supposed to come via our Congresscritters, but that clearly has issues.
- opportune 7y agoIt’s to protect themselves, usually the really nasty stuff doesn’t get declassified until the perps are dead or in adult diapers for the same reason
- pmiller2 7y agoGreat article. It brings back to mind a question I had recently: what gives the federal government, specifically the executive branch, the power to classify information at all? I know there are laws and executive orders that say they can do that, but I’m wondering what the ultimate authority derives from in the Constitution. If it’s not a simple explanation, are there any scholarly legal articles I can look at?
- handedness 7y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powers_of_the_president_of_the_United_States#Executive_privilege https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powers_of_the_president_of_the...
- pmiller2 7y agoUpvote for trying, but executive privilege isn't quite it, IMO. All that does is protect the papers and communications of government officials in a way that makes them less accessible to the courts. State secrets privilege[0] is closer, but not quite it. All that does is allow the executive to say in court "sorry, that's classified, state secrets privilege," and have certain evidence excluded. It doesn't really get to the root of what allowed the government to classify the information in the first place. My suspicion is that it derives somehow from the president's role as commander-in-chief, but I'm not very familiar with the legal scholarship behind it.
- HenryKissinger 7y agoThe federal government has the power to classify information because it owns it. The primary purpose of a state is to preserve itself. The ability to control access to secrets is critical to this. It's a bit like asking "What gives the government the right to execute the laws?" Because that's what it's meant to do.
- mch82 7y agoThat’s not the primary purpose of government in the United States. And that’s not how government derives the right to execute laws in the United States. We govern ourselves. The government is given the right to execute laws by the people who vote. The Bill of Rights clarified that any other rights are reserved by the people. Additionally, most federal information is public domain and owned by the people. That’s why Freedom of Information Act requests are effective. Freedom isn’t free and things might not always be this way if we don’t protect our freedoms.
- no_opinions 7y agoIt's perfect timing this gets brought up because with all this news about Xinjiang, HK, East Ukraine, etc. we need to make sure China, Russia and so on also let us examine their transparency and protocols so we can give a rigorous, thorough checkup for human rights abuses. This being all about fairness and truth and we need to make sure everyone else can be held accountable to the same standards. I look forward to a new muckrock feature where FOIA can be sent to Iran, China, and Russia to open up like USA and other European countries. Also since US journalists evangelize Snowden and Assange, I'm sure Russia/China/other countries targeting USA won't have any leakers themselves. Their people being so well treated and obedient, such great gentlemen, even if they feel flustered and out of place over there, no matter, they can just trust in the virtues of their system and everything will be just fine. :) /s
- boomboomsubban 7y agoSo in your eyes, "probably better than China" is the optimum?
- jessaustin 7y agoIf USA government employees are more accountable than China government employees, China wins!
- no_opinions 7y agoI doubt US Department of Agriculture or Department of Education operate abroad or have human rights issues to FOIA, you can try. > If USA government employees are more accountable than China government employees, China wins! "Transparency and accountability in foreign policy/information gathering only applies to the country with a FOIA system conveniently available and uses english!"
- jessaustin 7y agoITT we're complaining about "overclassification" and other sins of USA's unsupervised services. (I hadn't been familiar with the atrocities in Indonesia linked by TFA...) We're not sure what you're on about. Do you mean that China and other nations have not respected human rights? We all agree. What else do you intend to say? Do you really think that "US journalists evangelize Snowden and Assange"? If that were the case, surely a name-brand media firm like WaPo, NYT, MSNBC, FoxNews, CNN, etc. would have published such evangelizing in the last several years, but they haven't. Some smaller firms do mention them, but I note that TFA doesn't. Why have you introduced this red herring?
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- mpiedrav 7y agoWould it be safe to say that CIA (and NSA and other parts of the intelligence community) is the actual "State within the State" (i.e., the so-called "Deep State")? "National security", almost at any cost, became the paramount prerogative of US intelligence agencies. However, they seem to be using a military criteria in a civil environment, which was supposed to be transparent enough for accountability.
- IfOnlyYouKnew 7y agoI'd argue today's situation is, despite many problems, still comparatively better than the past: the Hoover era, as the most salient example, was vastly more corrupt and undemocratic. It's crucial in this regard to distinguish two issues: (a) to what degree do these institutions wield power unchecked by democratically-elected/legitimized institutions (President/Congress/Courts), and (b) those institutions commanding certain secret programs you (or I) disagree with (i. e. the stuff Snowden revealed). Despite some regression in the last two years, there is still at least _some_ accountability, as the current whistleblower demonstrates. But, of course, the safety margin is shrinking. With enough turnover in some key positions, a future whistleblower may just find their legitimate complaint buried.
- nexuist 7y ago> With enough turnover in some key positions, a future whistleblower may just find their legitimate complaint buried. Couldn't you say this has already happened with e.g. Snowden?
- Aloha 7y agoDid Snowden try to go they official channels? I don't think he did, Snowden (mostly rightly) decided to bypass the existing reporting systems.
- eggsthedev 7y agoHe didn't, and I recall that Snowden was motivated to do so outside the reporting systems after he saw the Director of National Intelligence straight-up lie to Congress. Snowden was pretty smart; it's quite a good thing that he chose to act in good faith.
- wildduck 7y agoThere are academic researchers have written about this topic: Amy Benjamin: The Many Faces of Secrecy https://ssrn.com/abstract=3038640 https://ssrn.com/abstract=3038640 "Political secrecy in the United States has never been more studied – and less understood – than it is today. This irony is due in large part to the slippery nature of the phenomenon: Secrecy presents in different guises depending on the area of governmental activity under consideration. In the classified world of the U.S. national security state, secrecy results from affirmative governmental acts designed to enforce a sharp distinction between official and public knowledge...."