Just to be clear. There is a need to know at all levels, on all types of classified information, regardless of the content. Or as we say, you need the clearance and the need to know.
In theory, if there was the lowest of the low information, classified as Confidential, if the President didn’t need to know, he couldn’t have access to it.
I’ve held TS/Crypto. All it really meant (in my case, anyway) was that I was allowed to handle the physical key for STUs (Secure Transmission Units - secure phones, faxes, and servers) and manage the equipment. It also meant that I was allowed to know how some of the crypto works (ugh… algorithms).
I think I did sloppy snipping/truncating, but got the parts that I’m referring to.
Back when I was a Classified Systems Administrator, one of my “pets” was an interagency network that we’ll call “Pickles” (not the real name). I was managing several networks at the time, and someone asked me for some BS on a different network. I replied with, "give me 10 - I gotta’ go do a thing with “pickels”). An intel supervisor freaked the hell out and dragged me to the big boss’s office (think Congressional level). She was under the impression that because it was part of a Special Access Program, you couldn’t utter it’s name outside of an appropriate area (which was true at one time - but someone decided that us being able to communicate with other agencies with a network with a nonsensical name wasn’t really earth-shattering)…
Boss man’s laughing and response were awesome - “Who the f**k doesn’t know about ‘pickles’? Go do some intell research and find out who it is - they’re getting transferred to somewhere we need idiots.”
Even as theory, I think this has an absurd ring to it. If I say the President wants it, that’s one thing. If the President picks up the phone and ask for it, he has, by law, a need to know–
We had a thread not too long ago about a President wanting to know the names, or meet, crazy secret humint sources, and how CIA would try to stall and dance around. I believe the consensus of the SD Special GQ Inquiry held that CIA had to cough up.
This is probably a silly question then, but I’ll ask it anyway. There is an episode of NCIS that involves an old top secret unit from Reagan’s days. William Devane is a guest star as one of the old agents involved in this program. Gibbs asks him for information and Devane tells him his clearance isn’t high enough. Gibbs asks him who’s clearance is high enough, and Devane tells him the president. Gibbs then reaches for his phone to call the president at which time Devane says that only the president buried in Simi Valley, meaning Reagan, had a high enough clearance. Is that something completely made up for the show, or is there any kind of validity to this?
I didn’t realize I was responding to a zombie thread. Sorry about that :smack:
[quote=“Leo_Bloom, post:44, topic:210628”]
Even as theory, I think this has an absurd ring to it. If I say the President wants it, that’s one thing. If the President picks up the phone and ask for it, he has, by law, a need to know-- . . .
[QUOTE]
Can’t see the forest for the trees.
Total fiction. Presidents (like members of Congress) do not hold security clearances. Their access to information is by virtue of their office.
Furthermore, the Constitution clearly states that the executive power of the government is invested in the President. There is no executive power that could be exercised by the President’s subordinates, but not the President himself. The President is the ultimate authority on both the establishment and the administration of the classification system.
As others stated, the whole mystique around clearance levels is mostly something that is perpetuated by popular culture. There’s two basic rules when dealing with classified information: Is that person cleared to see it? Does that person have a need to know? That’s it. The classification is just about how dangerous it is, and I don’t remember the specific wordings, but it’s something like Serious, Grave, Extremely Grave. Really, what’s beyond that, except maybe instant annihilation? Stuff like battle plans and troop movements are the type of thing that will be TS.
The part that really matters is need to know. I work with computers, so I had particular need to know related to computer stuff like IP addresses, various security stuff, and I might happen to come across certain information. That said, I didn’t have a need to know, say, specifics about certain investigations, negotiations, boat/troop locations, or even active ongoing activities. Hell, there was one specific case that was computer related, but unless someone was specifically included in that briefing, they didn’t have need to know and I couldn’t say anything other than I was doing work regarding a particular operation, even to someone who had the same clearance and generally had the same types of work duties.
And, really, that’s the point. Classified information is compartmentalized to minimize damage. I may, theoretically, have potential access to a huge amount of information, but if I don’t need to know it, I don’t, so I can’t reveal it even by accident. Similarly, if I’m working on one part and someone else on another, one might really need both parts to REALLY cause a problem, but if only one of us is compromised, it’s much more manageable.
And it’s this latter part where the mysterious parts come in. And, generally, one can’t even say what part their working on because that helps people figure out who they need to compromise. That’s why you get vague responses.
The top level of clearance isn’t for the people, it’s for the information. Top level for that is Top Secret - National Security Information. Sometimes there’s another classifier for “No Foreign”, which cannot be exposed to a person of another nationality regardless of clearance. And as others have said, it’s all “need to know”, which means no one has clearance to know everything; if you don’t need to know it, you don’t get to look at it regardless of clearance.
The government is very paranoid about secret information, to the point that any secret information copied on a photocopier must be followed by three blank copies so that no trace of the information remains on the imaging drum and fuser in the machine. A poster in my old workplace said, “Countries don’t have friends. They have interests.”
They are not typed up by secrataries. They are typed up by intelligence analysts and other involved personnel. Military Intel has privates and LTs, just like everything else. High level of clearance does not necessarily mean high ranking.
Is there currently a military secrecy level that calls for certain documents to be handled/seen only by officers? This used to be the case in Germany (Geheime Kommandosache - nur durch Offizer).
Nope.
I’m not aware of any, either. Sometimes very low-ranking U.S. military personnel have access to explosive intel: Chelsea Manning - Wikipedia
I read a history once of the CIA during the Eisenhower years. Ike appreciated cloak-and-dagger stuff, and was briefed from time to time by the DCI about particularly… interesting operations. Ike asked that he not be told the real names of agents and sources, though, as he had no need to know, and couldn’t ever accidentally divulge something he was never told.
Quite. As Washington said, “…it is folly in one nation to look for disinterested favors from another… There can be no greater error than to expect or calculate upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion, which experience must cure, which a just pride ought to discard.” From here: Avalon Project - Washington's Farewell Address 1796
I just can’t imagine the President asking for information and some goon saying no, you don’t have a need to know. If the President says he does have a need to know, then he has a need to know, period.
I don’t think this is the case with cabinet secretaries, if the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development asks for blueprints of a thermonuclear bomb, he’d be denied. Certainly some Congresspeoples will have both clearance and access to request classified materials, somebody has to pay for the program, and only Congress can appropriate the funding.
What I don’t know is whether the selection of the Chairman of the Defense Subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee of the US Senate is, in part, based on having the proper security clearance.
Missed edit window:
ETA: As an E-2, I had full and unfettered access to the World-wide Command and Control network, extremely sensitive …
As to whether the POTUS has the “need to know”, well, yes and no. Legally, yes, he has a “Need To Know”. In reality, well, why the hell would a president need the schematic diagram of a Mk 2* cryptographic device? He’s never going to take a soldering iron to the innards of one. Neither would he need to see the answer sheet to a written test a pilot would need to pass in order to transition to be rated in an F-22.
During WWII, Donovan of the OSS and Hoover of the FBI were careful about some of the intelligence they gave FDR. Not that they didn’t trust FDR, but FDR trusted his wife and Harry Hopkins and neither Donovan or Hoover trusted them.
*I just made that up
Does the POTUS have the same instant access to (the plethora) of information Chelsea Manning had, and by that, I mean: without having to ask an underling first? In other words: When Barack Obama logs on to his computer (he does have one in his Oval Office, does he?), does he have immediate access to informations of a certain secrecy level (like any measly E2 serving in an intelligence unit)?
There’s also the consideration of “want to know” … the President is a busy person. He has solder jockeys like me to fiddle with the innards of one of them Mk 2’s … finest machine of her day that’s for sure. I flat didn’t care what the traffic was, just as long as it was flowing and I could take a nap.
That’s kind of beside the point. The POTUS is charged with oversight of the executive branch. Think of it like this: if you were hiding information about illegal military/intelligence activity in clandestine files, you’d hardly admit to it. So the POTUS could be told, “well, you wouldn’t find that interesting. It’s just design schematics.” But he shouldn’t necessarily just accept somebody’s word for it.
In practice, obviously the POTUS doesn’t have time to review CIA files by himself. But he still has the practical need to know as well as the legal need.