SECRETS THAT SERVE AS A STATUS SYMBOL

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00561R000100030091-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 9, 2012
• Sequence Number: 91
• Publication Date: May 17, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

S1 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/09: CIA-RDP91-00561 R0001 00030091-8
ARTlCL t PP'? _a
ORS pknr
Letters
That .means at least 75,000 czpee-
sive and unnecessary detailed beck.
ground investigations; hundreds-of
Secrets That Serve
As a Status Symbol
Tothe Editor:
That 100,000 people have access ito
"Sensitive Compartmmted lntotma-
tion" (Anthony Lewis's May 5 !ool-
umm) is sump ng news. No security
system -can protect information cap
widely disseminated. .. -
Such information .takes on--,its
"sensitive" character only because it
provides a direct link to the technical
or human intelligence sources .t>lat
produce it. Breaking that link is. a
simple matter of paraphrasing,.Qr
synthesis. That should be done as .a
routine part of the process of analy-
sis. In virtually all cases theintoime-
tion can then be declassified or-dis-
tributed at a much lower level. of
classification.
The only people who have a used
for direct access to the information
prior to analysis are the people
who work directly with the sources,
the analysts and a few hcmdred,aifi.
cials at the very summit of the Sov-
ernmeit. -11.
Given the most liberal allowance,
there cannot possibly be more than
25,000 people for whom access-to
S.C.I. can be justified. The other
75,000, and possibly several thousand
more, have acquired such access be.
cause they or their agencies wan to
bethought of as "in the know."
NEW YORK TIMES
17 I/IAY 1983
expensively secured rooms where
these extraneous people can ? pore
through unprocessed reports, ? and
hundreds of excess "black book";atti-
cers tramping around in search of
someone to whom they can whisper
their secrets, so as to seem to jet
tiheir existence. - ,
Although I had no idea the problem
had gotten so wildly out of caatactl,
the tact that some such "states sym--
boa" problem existed with S.C.1-was
brought to the attention of William P.
Clark, the National Security
Adviitt,
At first Mr. Clark.said tbat:be
agreed with we "ia principle'-iDd
would conduct an "evaluation "
Months later, when I asked forthsre.
suits of the "evaluation," I was told
to take my .'complaint. to the -De-
tense Department, as the Security Council had nothing q,-do
with the matter.
Yet in the meantime Mr. Clark
signed off an the outrageous Presi-
dential security directive that Mr.
Lewis describes, thereby making the
status seekers virtually impregnable
while continuing to assure that them-
formation supposedly being pro-
tected would be common gossip. m
every officeas' wives' club in the
world.
So much for Reagan Administra-
tion claims to be dealing forcef ly
with waste and mismanageme t"
W ILLu M V. KE? NEDY
Mechanicsburg, Pa., May5,1983
The writer is a military journalist..
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/09: CIA-RDP91-00561 R0001 00030091-8