Threat Levels: CIA Says Climate Change Intelligence is Classified

The Center on Climate Change and National Security. Most people dont know the US even has one of those. It is an arm of the CIA and it was formed to study a threat - though the way the debate has evolved, it is evidently not the threat of which they were originally thinking. No, in this political environment, the problem is not the potential for social unrest stirred by rising sea levels or encroaching deserts, it is that naming such an agency is evidently a declaration of ideological hostilities. Because the very title suggests to some that whoever approved it believes in the possibility of climate change. Which is not a very popular position among certain segments of the polity these days.

The CIA's refusal to release any of the agency's findings - for security reasons - makes sense in that context. But again, the security to which it refers is probably not national security, it is organizational security. Because if the agency has been doing its job properly it may well have found evidence of climate change, knowledge that is of interest to some, but unacceptable apostasy to many.

But whatever your position, dont get too upset. The agency's classification attempt has probably been for naught: the CIA has already issued an advisory that due to budgetary constraints brought on by pressure from lawmakers, the Center for Climate Change and National Security is likely lose its charter. JL

David Kravets reports in Wired:

Two years ago, the Central Intelligence Agency announced it was creating a center to analyze the geopolitical ramifications of “phenomena such as desertification, rising sea levels, population shifts and heightened competition for natural resources.”

But whatever work the Center on Climate Change and National Security has done remains secret. In response to National Security Archive scholar Jeffrey Richelson’s Freedom of Information Act request, the CIA said all of its work is “classified
“We completed a thorough search for records responsive to your request and located material that we determined is currently and properly classified and must be denied in its entirety,” (.pdf) Susan Viscuso, the agency’s information and privacy coordinator, wrote Richelson.

Richelson, in a Thursday telephone interview from Los Angeles, said the CIA has not released anything about its climate change research, other than its initial press release announcing the center’s founding.

“As far as I know, they have not released any of their products or anything else,” Richelson said. “There was a statement announcing its creation and that has been pretty much it.”

Steven Aftergood, who directs the Federation of American Scientists Project on Government Secrecy, blasted the CIA’s response to Richelson.

The CIA’s position, he said, means all “the center’s work is classified and there is not even a single study, or a single passage in a single study, that could be released without damage to national security. That’s a familiar song, and it became tiresome long ago.”

When the center was announced, the CIA said it would become “a powerful asset recognized throughout our government, and beyond, for its knowledge and insight.”

President Barack Obama also promised a transparent administration, which he might not be living up to. For instance, in 2009, the Obama administration played the national security card to hide details of the controversial Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement that is still being negotiated across the globe.

What’s more, consider the 33-page report the White House issued Friday, “The Obama Administration’s Commitment to Open Government.” (pdf)

Aftergood said the report “downplays or overlooks many of the administration’s principal achievements in reducing inappropriate secrecy. At the same time, it fails to acknowledge the major defects of the openness program to date. And so it presents a muddled picture of the state of open government, while providing a poor guide to future policy.”

In any case, the Center for Climate Change and National Security might not continue much longer “because of pressure for intelligence budget cuts and resistance from conservative lawmakers.”