For release Wednesday, 
August 2, 2000
For more information:
Tom Blanton/Kate Martin (Archive) 202 / 994-7000
Tom Susman/Todd Richman (Ropes & Gray) 202 / 626-3900

CIA SECRECY CLAIMS ARE “FACIALLY INCREDIBLE,” SAYS LAWSUIT
Plaintiff Challenges CIA’s Stonewalling on 50-Year-Old Operations in Iran, Italy;
Freedom of Information Case Cites Previous CIA Promises and Releases

Plaintiff's Original Complaint
and Today's Court Filing
Exhibits in Support of
Today's Court Filing
WASHINGTON, D.C., August 2, 2000 – Lawyers for the National Security Archive today filed in federal district court (in paper and CD-ROM formats) a legal challenge to the CIA’s claim that only one line out of 350 pages of internal histories can be released under the Freedom of Information Act without damaging U.S. national security.

The histories cover CIA operations in Italy in 1948 and in Iran in 1953, two subjects that CIA directors Robert Gates, James Woolsey, and John Deutch all specifically identified as priorities for CIA declassification and promised the release of documents.  But when the National Security Archive, the George Polk Award-winning research institute at George Washington University, filed Freedom of Information requests for the histories in 1998, the CIA refused to release the documents.  Represented pro bono by Thomas Susman and Todd Richman of the law firm Ropes & Gray, the Archive filed suit in May 1999.  The original complaint and today’s filing are posted on the Archive’s Web site.

The CIA submitted a sworn affidavit to the court last August, written by the chief information officer in the CIA Directorate of Operations, William McNair, claiming that only one line of the histories (a line previously included in a memoir by a former CIA officer) could be released.

The Archive’s filing today describes the McNair affidavit as “facially incredible, given the vast quantity of information the CIA has already declassified or cleared for release about the events addressed by the requested histories….”  The filing provides the court with hundreds of pages of officially declassified CIA information, including the prior CIA acknowledgements of the Iran and Italy operations, the CIA’s released history of the contemporaneous Guatemala 1954 covert action, the CIA’s declassified Inspector General’s report on the Bay of Pigs operation in 1961, the texts of three memoirs by high-ranking CIA and British intelligence officers discussing in detail the Iran and Italy operations, and two dozen CIA intelligence reports on Iran and Italy.

The Archive also filed with the court a copy of one of the documents at issue, a history of the Iran 1953 coup that was leaked and published by The New York Times in April and is widely available on the World Wide Web.

Archive director Tom Blanton said, “The CIA’s Directorate of Operations seems to have no clue how badly it damages U.S. national security to make ludicrous secrecy claims like these.  The CIA is not only wasting taxpayers’ money to cover up public information, it is actively discrediting the whole secrecy system.”


Plaintiff's orignal complaint and today's court filing

The following are exhibits submitted in support of today's court filing:
NOTE: You will need the Adobe Acrobat Reader to download these files.
Exhibits G, H and I are copyrighted material and are not reproduced here.
Exhibit A: Declaration of William H. McNair, Information Review Officer, Directorate of Operations, United States Central Intelligence Agency
Exhibit B: Memorandum from Task Force on Greater CIA Openness to Director of Central Intelligence, Task Force report on Greater CIA Openness, December 20, 1991
Exhibit C: Memorandum from Director of Central Intelligence, Task Force Report on Greater CIA Openness, January 6, 1992
Exhibit D: Statement of DCI James Woolsey before the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, U.S. House of Representatives, September 28, 1993
Exhibit E: Nicholas Cullather, Operation PBSuccess, The United States and Guatemala, 1952-54, Center for the Study of Intelligence, 1994
Exhibit F: Inspector General's Survey of the Cuban Operation and Associated Documents, October 1961
Exhibit G: Kermit Roosevelt, Countercoup: The Struggle for the Control of Iran (McGraw-Hill 1979)
Exhibit H: C.M. Woodhouse, Something Ventured (Granada Publishing 1982)
Exhibit I: William E. Colby, Honorable Men (Simon and Schuster 1978)
Exhibit J: Iran Communiques: (Entire set of documents in one pdf file)
Fears of Tehran Merchants Concerning the Tudeh Party, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, July 20, 1953; approved for release October 5, 1999

Iran:  Miscellaneous Information Concerning Tudeh Party, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, July 10, 1953; approved for release October 5, 1999

Iran:  Activities of Pro and Anti-Mossadeq Forces, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, June 10, 1953; approved for release October 5, 1999

Measures Taken by Mossadeq to Quell Opposition, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, June 2, 1953; approved for release October 5, 1999

Iran:  Anti-Mossadeq Activities, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, April 30, 1953; approved for release October 5, 1999

Iran:  Shiraz Riots, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, April 25, 1953; approved for release October 5, 1999

Opposition Test of Strength with Mossadeq, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, April 16, 1953; approved for release October 5, 1999

Iran:  Statements by Prime Minister Concerning Sale of Oil and Possibility of Military Coup, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, April 6, 1953; approved for release October 5, 1999

Activities of Pro-Massadeq and Anti-Mossadeq Forces, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, April 1, 1953; approved for release October 5, 1999

First Progress Report on Paragraph 5-a of NSC 136/1, 'U.S. Policy Regarding the Present Situation in Iran, Top Secret Memorandum from the Department of State to James S. Lay, Jr., Executive Secretary, National Security Council, March 20, 1953, approved for release February 29, 2000 ("March 20 Report")

Iran:  Situation March 1953, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, March 12, 1953; approved for release October 5, 1999

Iran:  Rumored Coup d'Etat, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, March 12, 1953; approved for release October 5, 1999

The Iranian Situation, Top Secret, U.S. Department of State, March 3, 1953, approved for release February 29, 2000

Iran, National Socialist Worker's Party, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, October 8, 1952; approved for release October 5, 1999.

Repression by Shah of Projected Military Coup, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, August 19, 1952; approved for release October 5, 1999

Assessment of the Current Situation, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, July 31, 1952; approved for release October 5, 1999 ("July 31 Communique")

Possible Successor to Prime Minister Mossadegh; Illness of Mullah Kashani, Secret Information Report, Central Intelligence Agency, March 20, 1952; approved for release October 5, 1999

Exhibit K: Italy Security Briefings  (Entire set of documents in one pdf file)
Italian and French Struggle Against Communism, Top Secret Summary for Secretary Marshall, National Archives and Record Administration, Secretary of State's Weekly Summaries, May 1947-January 1949, May 26, 1947; released March 6, 1995

Communist Threat in Italy, Top Secret Summary for Secretary Marshall, National Archives and Record Administration, Secretary of State's Weekly Summaries, May 1947-January 1949, September 15, 1947; released March 6, 1995 ("September 15 Report")

Communist Violence in Italy and France, Top Secret Summary for Secretary Marshall, National Archives and Record Administration, Secretary of State's Weekly Summaries, May 1947-January 1949, November 24, 1947; released March 6, 1995 ("November 24 Report").

Position of Italian Communists, Top Secret Summary for Secretary Marshall, National Archives and Record Administration, Secretary of State's Weekly Summaries, May 1947-January 1949, January 19, 1948; released March 2, 1995 ("January 19 Report")

Reactions to President's Speech, Top Secret Summary for Secretary Marshall, National Archives and Record Administration, Secretary of State's Weekly Summaries, May 1947-January 1949, March 29, 1948; released March 2, 1995

Top Secret Summary for Secretary Marshall, National Archives and Record Administration, Secretary of State's Weekly Summaries, May 1947-January 1949, April 12, 1946; released March 2, 1995

Prospective Communist Strategy, Top Secret Summary for Secretary Marshall, National Archives and Record Administration, Secretary of State's Weekly Summaries, May 1947-January 1949, April 26, 1948; released March 2, 1995

Exhibit L: Clandestine Service History: Overthrow of Premier Mossadeq of Iran, November 1952-August 1953, March 1954
Exhibit M: Excerpts of Husak and Kadar biographies
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