SLOPPY SILENCE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91-00561R000100010017-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 6, 2012
• Sequence Number: 17
• Publication Date: August 14, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/06: CIA-RDP91-00561 R000100010017-2
ARTiCLEAM D LOS ANGELES TIMES
ONPA GE-7i 14 August 1986
Sloppy Silence
Measured by what its highest officials say or
don't say, the Reagan Administration seems to
have a curious sense of priorities when it comes to
dealing with the loss of sensitive information. Let
word of some politically embarrassing blunder or
dubious covert enterprise leak to Congress or the
press, and the highest officials rush to warn that
the very foundations of the Republic may have
been imperiled, while threatening lie-detector
tests for everyone in sight. But let an administra-
tive fiasco occur that could genuinely jeopardize
national security, and top people keep silent while
lesser functionaries are sent to mumble uninfor-
mative explanations. Two recent cases illustrate
the point.
Last month, to take the more current example
first, a House subcommittee revealed-no doubt on
the basis of a leak-that Lockheed Corp. had
managed to lose an incredible 1,400 documents
dealing with a project so secret that the Defense
Department refuses even to acknowledge its exist-
ence. Some of the documents have been missing
since 1983. An official of the Pentagon, which sets
security standards for contractors working on
classified projects, described the loss of the docu-
ments as a "near-disaster," but now says that his
department has either located or knows what hap-
pened to them. The ambiguity of the second part of
that statement is somewhat less than reassuring.
Losing documents is bad enough. Losing people
is worse. A few years ago the CIA hired Edward
Lee Howard and trained him to become an
espionage agent in Moscow, telling him a lot of
secrets in the process. Then the CIA found out that
Howard had certain disqualifying character de-
fects, and fired him. It let a year go by, though,
before it told the FBI that Howard might be some-
one to keep an eye on. Meanwhile, the unhappy
Howard had established contact with Soviet
intelligence. The FBI got on to him, but one night
Howard evaded surveillance and disappeared.
Now, the Russians say, he is in Moscow, telling
all. At least one Russian working for the CIA is
believed to have been killed as a result.
It is impossible to say how much harm may have
been done by the Howard defection, or what if any
damage was done in the Lockheed case. What is
clear is that here are two recent examples-there
have been others in the near past, including that of
KGB defector/redefector Vitaly Yurchenko-in
which inexplicable sloppiness has occurred in the
security area. The Administration has had little to
say about these serious matters, and what explana-
tions it did offer came only under congressional
pressure. Left to its own, the Administration
probably would have had nothing to say at all.
lwl~
STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/06: CIA-RDP91-00561 R000100010017-2