Category Archives: Agency issues

Issues with records from specific agencies (NSA, CIA, etc)

New CIA docs at MFF

More ARC docs are up on the MFF website, straight from the vaults of the AARC. The latest additions: over 160 CIA records, including some very interesting docs on Cuban matters.

What’s in the docs?

The new docs at MFF are in two sets: 84 records from CIA’s Latin American Division (JFK-Work Files), and 85 miscellaneous records, mostly from the hard copy JFK records in the HSCA-CIA segregated collection, as well as three docs from the HSCA-CIA staff records, and a handful from the CIA microfilm docs.…

New HSCA docs at MFF

The Mary Ferrell Foundation continues to dig out ARC records from its vaults. The latest find is a box of HSCA docs which fill some gaps and add a deposition from Bruce Solie.

HSCA-CIA boxes

This set of docs comes from several boxes in the HSCA-CIA segregated collection. Like the recent release of several sections of the HSCA-FBI liaison file, the box sat uncatalogued in the AARC vaults for who knows how long, but MFF is finally digging this stuff out and putting it on line.…

The FBI-Church Committee liaison file

This note discusses the FBI-Church Committee liaison file, FBI file number 62-116395. The liaison file uses “SSC” as its abbreviation for the Church Committee, since their official title was the “Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Activities.” In the discussion below, I will therefore use SSC to refer to the Committee.

The SSC conducted a major inquiry into the United States intelligence community from 1975-1976.…

New docs from the FBI-HSCA liaison file

The Mary Ferrell Foundation continues to dig out ARC records from its vaults. The latest find is a box of folders from the FBI-HSCA liaison file.

FBI file 62-117290 is a massive compilation of docs requested by the HSCA during the course of its inquiry, plus various and sundry administrative docs.…

FBI files in the ARC: Core and related

This note begins an introduction to the main FBI files in the JFK Assassination Records Collection. FBI records make up about 46 percent of the ARC. The next largest contributor to the Collection, the CIA, makes up only about 27 percent. FBI records are thus by far the largest component of the ARC, and well worth a careful look.…

CIA working files and DCI minutes

This note concludes my survey of CIA record categories in the JFKARC. It is the fourth and last note in the series. Links to the series are available here. The two categories summarized below include fewer than 540 records, but some of these are quite interesting.

The DCI morning meeting minutes

From the early days of the CIA, the DCI (head of the CIA) held a meeting every morning with CIA executive officers, a practice that lasted up until the mid-1970s.…

CIA files on Oswald

This is another long-overdue note giving a brief overview of CIA files on Lee Oswald, the man who shot President Kennedy. It is the second in a series of notes on CIA records in the JFKARC. The first note, on CIA docs in HSCA records, is available here.

Note the plural in the title of this post; there were multiple CIA files devoted to Oswald over the years, as well as files where Oswald was mentioned, but was not the main subject.…

CIA documents in the HSCA records

[Corrected and revised on 1/17/24; new refs added 1/23/24]

This long-overdue note gives a brief overview of CIA documents that were collected by the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA), a special Congressional committee that investigated the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr.

During its 1976-78 investigation, the Committee acquired a massive collection of CIA records, dating from World War 2 all the way up to the 1970s.…

SISS records from the ARC now on line at Mary Ferrell

Some interesting ARC docs have recently been posted online at the Mary Ferrell Foundation website. These docs are records of executive session testimony before the SISS (Senate Internal Security Subcommittee), which conducted a “limited inquiry” into the JFK assassination in late 1963. The session records were acquired by the Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB) all the way back in 1995, and are noted in the ARRB’s Final report (see here and here).…