SECURITY POLICY ON TRAVEL AND ASSIGNMENT OF PERSONNEL WITH ACCESS TO SENSITIVE INTELLIGENCE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP82M00591R000400100009-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 23, 2005
• Sequence Number: 9
• Publication Date: May 27, 1975
• Content Type: MEMO

Approved For Rej se 2005/04/18: CIA-RDP82M00591 RQ00400100009-9
DEPARTMENT OF THE AIR FORCE
HEADQUARTERS OFFICE OF SPECIAL INVESTIGATIONS
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20314
R TO
ATTNY OF IVO
2 7 MAY 1975
SUBJECT: Security Policy on Travel and Assignment of Personnel with Access to
Sensitive Intelligence
TO: Chairman, USIB Security Committee
1. The working group to study assignment and travel restrictions was
formed on our motion to examine the "real" threat involved before
attempting to rewrite the current policy. We found it difficult to
determine the adequacy of the then proposed policy because we were
unsure of the real security dangers.
2. After more than a year, the Working Group still has not determined
whether official or unofficial travel to communist countries poses a
threat to sensitive programs.
3. As currently implemented within the Air Force, assignment and travel
restrictions lean heavily toward restriction of unofficial travel to
"denied" or "hazardous" areas. This results not from a judgment that
unofficial travel poses a greater threat than does official travel,
but rather, from a pragmatic view that the job must get done and that
the advantages of mission accomplishment may, and often do, outweigh
any real or imagined risks involved.
4. The point has been made that the current restriction program may
be subject to legal challenge. We must agree. However, we are not
convinced that a constitutional question is involved nor that legisla-
tive relief is impossible. In fact, we believe that legislative relief
should be explored if it is found that a threat exists which is suffi-
cient to warrant continuation of a restriction program.
5. One of the points made by the subject paper is that risk is implicit
in continuing divergence in individual agency security policies. How-
ever, the policy recommended provides much more room for divergence
and much less hard guidance than does the current policy. For example,
under the proposed policy, each USIB Agency determines which areas are
hazardous and which are not. This could obviously lead to many
different lists of hazardous areas. It is our contention that community
policies and implementation should be as uniform as possible considering
the various mission requirements involved.
M
b
'1'76 19g6Approved For Release 2005/04/18 : CIA-RDP82M00591R000400100009-9
 Approved For Release 2005/04/18 : CIA-RDP82M00591 R000400100009-9
6. We have not introduced an alternative policy statement because,
as stated above, we do not believe the actual threat has yet been
delineated sufficiently to decide what approach would be adequate.
We must acknowledge that briefing on the CIA Risk-of-
Capture program was bent Mal dno resting. However, his comments
were generally applicable to situations involving trained intelligence
agents and POW's. We believe that a great many other individuals in
different situations may be targets of exploitation and that the over-
all threat to sensitive programs remains unclear.
7. Therefore, we recommend that this matter be referred to the
Compartmentation Subcommittee with instructions that the threat to
compartmented intelligence systems posed by official and unofficial
travel in overseas areas be thoroughly evaluated and that a new policy
raftesed upon that threat. Further, the Subcommittee should
to explore all possible avenues including legislative
late
LEO F. 0 SEN,'JR., Co nel, U,fF' Copy to: USIB Compartmentation
Air Fore Member // Subcommittee
USIB S curity Co ttee
Approved For Release 2005/04/18 : CIA-RDP82M00591 R000400100009-9