2006年VOA标准英语-Is US Sacrificing Openness for Security?

By Margaret Besheer
Washington
05 April 2006

Before the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States, the public had access to declassified¹ documents concerning U.S. policy that were housed in the National Archives in Washington. But at some point over the past few years, many of these documents have disappeared from the Archives' shelves, because the government decided² to make them secret again.  This development has historians and others worried about a trend toward secrecy³ in the name of national security.

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Until 2001, anyone could walk into the National Archives in Washington and read, for example, how the United States badly miscalculated China's intervention⁴ in the Korean War in 1950.  They could also read a 1958 government plan for responding to a nuclear attack on the United States.

Not anymore. The government's efforts to make public documents secret again accelerated in the wake of the September 11th, 2001, attacks on the United States. 

Since then, historians say, nearly 10,000 documents, totaling more than 55,000 pages, have been reclassified, and removed from public access. Many of the missing documents contain references to the Korean War, the Cold War between the Soviet⁵ Union and the United States, nuclear proliferation and the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. They say other documents simply contain information that the government might find embarrassing.

Critics of the reclassification program say the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and other U.S. spy agencies are the driving force behind the move to reclassify the documents. A CIA spokeswoman disputes that the agency is trying to keep information from the public, telling VOA that it works closely with the National Archives and has released 26 million pages of declassified documents to the Archives since 1998. The spokeswoman added that the CIA is "committed to the highest quality process" for deciding what should be kept secret.

The government's move to make secret again information about events that took place as much as 50 years ago and no longer have an impact on national security is troubling to historians, journalists and legislators.

Republican Party Congressman⁶ Christopher Shays of Connecticut, questions what the point is of making documents secret again that have, in many cases, already been published elsewhere.

"I think it is somewhat stupid, because once it is out, it is out," he said.

At the heart of the reclassification debate is the question of whether government can be truly open and accountable, when it suppresses the public's right to know.

Joan Bertin is the executive director of the National Coalition⁷ Against Censorship. She says the more people know about their government, the better they will be governed.

"The electorate⁸ cannot know how to judge people, unless they have access to critical information about what they are doing, why they are doing it, and how they are doing it," she explained.

Others argue that too much government secrecy can actually hurt national security.  Thomas Blanton, the director of the National Security Archive at George Washington University, says that was the conclusion of the bipartisan commission that investigated the 2001 terrorist attacks. He recently appeared on the U.S. public affairs channel, C-SPAN.

"It is not being safe to withhold⁹ information. That is the great lesson of September 11th," he noted¹⁰.  "The 9/11 Commission found that it was precisely¹¹ because of all this government secrecy that we cannot connect the dots."

It was that inability to "connect the dots," or link pieces of information that might have prevented the attacks, that many say led to the terrorists' success on September 11th.

Keeping information from the public is also expensive. The U.S. government currently spends nearly $8 billion each year to classify documents. 

A government report illustrates¹² the trend toward classifying information.  From 1999 until 2004, the number of documents classified doubled to nearly 16 million.  During the same period, the release of declassified documents dropped by 100 million pages, to just 28 million.

Dennis Kucinich, a Democratic Party congressman from the state of Ohio, finds the trend troubling.

"By any measure, the administration has been classifying documents at a dizzying pace," he said.  "Under this administration, more agencies have been given authority to classify documents."

Historian Matthew Aid is one of the researchers who discovered recently that previously¹³ declassified documents were missing from the National Archives.  He says the administration decision to re-classify those documents is symptomatic of a larger, growing problem.

"What worries me about the reclassification program, is it is just a small part of many other things that we have lost since September 11th, which will make it very difficult to get these things back," said Mr. Aid.

Aid says the government is essentially¹⁴, in his words, "stealing our history," when documents are locked up in a vault¹⁵. And, he worries about what else the government may be doing in the name of national security.

1 declassified   

adj.解密的v.对（机密文件等）销密( declassify的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Thousands of classified documents have now been declassified. 数以千计的保密文件现在被解密了。
• The software used for Siemens S7-300 encryption logic block declassified. 此软件用于对西门子S7-300加密逻辑块解密。

2 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

3 secrecy   

n.秘密，保密，隐蔽

参考例句：

• All the researchers on the project are sworn to secrecy.该项目的所有研究人员都按要求起誓保守秘密。
• Complete secrecy surrounded the meeting.会议在绝对机密的环境中进行。

4 intervention   

n.介入，干涉，干预

参考例句：

• The government's intervention in this dispute will not help.政府对这场争论的干预不会起作用。
• Many people felt he would be hostile to the idea of foreign intervention.许多人觉得他会反对外来干预。

5 Soviet   

adj.苏联的，苏维埃的；n.苏维埃

参考例句：

• Zhukov was a marshal of the former Soviet Union.朱可夫是前苏联的一位元帅。
• Germany began to attack the Soviet Union in 1941.德国在1941年开始进攻苏联。

6 Congressman   

n.（美）国会议员

参考例句：

• He related several anecdotes about his first years as a congressman.他讲述自己初任议员那几年的几则轶事。
• The congressman is meditating a reply to his critics.这位国会议员正在考虑给他的批评者一个答复。

7 coalition   

n.结合体，同盟，结合，联合

参考例句：

• The several parties formed a coalition.这几个政党组成了政治联盟。
• Coalition forces take great care to avoid civilian casualties.联盟军队竭尽全力避免造成平民伤亡。

8 electorate   

n.全体选民；选区

参考例句：

• The government was responsible to the electorate.政府对全体选民负责。
• He has the backing of almost a quarter of the electorate.他得到了几乎1/4选民的支持。

9 withhold   

v.拒绝，不给；使停止，阻挡

参考例句：

• It was unscrupulous of their lawyer to withhold evidence.他们的律师隐瞒证据是不道德的。
• I couldn't withhold giving some loose to my indignation.我忍不住要发泄一点我的愤怒。

10 noted   

adj.著名的，知名的

参考例句：

• The local hotel is noted for its good table.当地的那家酒店以餐食精美而著称。
• Jim is noted for arriving late for work.吉姆上班迟到出了名。

11 precisely   

adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地

参考例句：

• It's precisely that sort of slick sales-talk that I mistrust.我不相信的正是那种油腔滑调的推销宣传。
• The man adjusted very precisely.那个人调得很准。

12 illustrates   

给…加插图( illustrate的第三人称单数 )； 说明； 表明； （用示例、图画等）说明

参考例句：

• This historical novel illustrates the breaking up of feudal society in microcosm. 这部历史小说是走向崩溃的封建社会的缩影。
• Alfred Adler, a famous doctor, had an experience which illustrates this. 阿尔弗莱德 - 阿德勒是一位著名的医生，他有过可以说明这点的经历。 来自中级百科部分

13 previously   

adv.以前，先前（地）

参考例句：

• The bicycle tyre blew out at a previously damaged point.自行车胎在以前损坏过的地方又爆开了。
• Let me digress for a moment and explain what had happened previously.让我岔开一会儿，解释原先发生了什么。

14 essentially   

adv.本质上，实质上，基本上

参考例句：

• Really great men are essentially modest.真正的伟人大都很谦虚。
• She is an essentially selfish person.她本质上是个自私自利的人。

15 vault   

n.拱形圆顶，地窖，地下室

参考例句：

• The vault of this cathedral is very high.这座天主教堂的拱顶非常高。
• The old patrician was buried in the family vault.这位老贵族埋在家族的墓地里。