An important issue in publishing security classified documents is whether to release the names of former intelligence officers. This is an important reason for continued redaction of JFKARC documents. Based on the CIA’s own index, it is probably the single largest reason for CIA redactions.
Unfortunately, because of the “chicken and egg” nature of the problem, we very seldom hear from the affected officers themselves.…
In a post I did a little more than a week before the 12-15-2022 releases, I profiled several CIA docs as samples of “heavy redaction”. Now the new releases are out. How did these documents fare? Behold!
The doc is self-explanatory. Here is a link to the 2018 version that I posted last time:
Here is the same doc this time around:
This time the list is released in full.…
Earlier this year, I tried to summarize the state of CIA files on Lee Oswald, the assassin of President Kennedy (the note is here). The new releases are up, so another update is in order. Unfortunately, this will not be the last update I do on this subject!
There are multiple CIA files on Oswald.…
If this title perplexes you, read this note first.
Did you read the note? If not, don’t complain that you’re lost. Anyway, as I observed last week, “A zombie redaction is a redaction in copy X of a document which has already been released in copy Y of the same document, tucked away in some other file or folder or microfilm reel.”…
As NARA’s press release informs us, after the December 2022 redaction releases, fewer than 4,400 records have “Section 5” redactions left in them. Good to know, but where and what are these redactions? What are the justifications for continuing to hold back the information the little rectangular boxes conceal?
There is now some new documentation for the curious, as mandated by President Biden’s 2021 memo, and posted at NARA.…
NARA has released another set of redacted texts from the President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection (JFKARC, or just plain ARC below). Since I am not a newspaper or journalist, I will not rush to get out all the new news from this latest, but not last, set of previously redacted texts.…
Judge John Tunheim served as chair of the Assassination Records Review Board from 1994 to 1998, and together with the other four Board members, deserves much credit for the important accomplishments of the Board, the greatest of which was the successful creation of the massive JFK Assassination Records Collection (JFKARC or ARC), a most valuable contribution to the history of both the JFK assassination and to the historiography of the cold war as a whole.…
If NARA can stick to its schedule, next week we will see more redacted text released from the JFK Assassination Records Collection. Since not much time is left, I had better hurry up with my predictions of what that “new” material will include.
Calling future roulette rolls can be tricky, but I’m confident about the predictions I will offer here.…
[Note that some material linked in this post has moved from my Google Drive to Dropbox, I have changed the links and refs for these.]
This post discuses my recent attempt to count redactions in the John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection (JFKARC) at the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA).…
[Note! The compilations discussed in this post have moved from Google Drive to Dropbox. Let me know if you have any trouble with viewing or downloads.]
This post introduces a long term project which I have finally finished. As noted many times, on this website and elsewhere, there are over 10,000 CIA documents in the JFKARC that still have redactions.…