June 27, 2007

The CIA's "Family Jewels" document was released to the National Security Archive yesterday, 15 years after the Archive filed a Freedom of Information request for the documents. The document consists of almost 700 pages of responses from CIA employees to a 1973 directive from Director of Central Intelligence James Schlesinger asking them to report activities they thought might be inconsistent with the Agency's charter.

Happy hunting!

posted by sugarmilktea 17 years ago
  • This is why the current Administration has gotten into the practice of deleting emails.
  • This is a very exciting release. I'm sure there'll be a lot of good work to come out of this kind of thing. Having said that, the other part of the release is even more interesting to me. They're declassifing their studies of Soviet and Chinese leadership, and the relationship between the two. This will give us a valuable insight into one of the most well developed and controversial aspects of intelligence analysis during the Cold War. Incidentally, is it just me, or is every release of information the 'crown jewels' or the 'familiy jewels' or what have you?
  • Oh, and you can get all these documents, and many more, here. Lots o' intelligence primary source goodness.
  • My favorite from this so far is the bungled CIA plot with Mafia gangsters to murder Castro.
  • *appeal to #1 to fix my obvious typo in the sidebar title*
  • The [redacted], [more redacted], [most redacted] family junk jewelry that no one cares about.
  • That's not a typo, sugarmilktea, that is a new Internet Meme.
  • I thought it was deliberate, SMT. Sort of like Goatse?
  • I think he meant "jewelses". In the pocketses, my preciousssss.
  • Goatse worked for the CIA?!
  • No, but he was in their pocketses.
  • It's interesting from a historical perspective. For instance, the Castrassination plots have long been a source of speculation and it's nice to have them confirmed. OTOH, it's pretty damn scary.
  • Is there something about Oswald and the Magic Bullets? Or will we have to wait for this to be revealed a few more decades more?
  • I'd like to point out that I, also, just released my family jewels.
  • I'd like to announce that I, also, just splurgitated my family jewels.
  • Is there something about Oswald and the Magic Bullets? Yes, it's revealed that they played at the CIA annual holiday party for three years in a row during the 60s.
  • Ah, yes, I remember their big hit ballad, "I Act Alone."
  • Sick-making.