Where Does A Classified US Document Begin?.....

[global1]

It seems to me that almost any agency in the government can issue a classified document.

If not - which agencies or government departments can issue a classified document? What is this issuing agency or department responsible for when issuing such a document? How do they determine which level of classification gets assigned to such a document?

If that is so - how is the National Archives able to track a classified document - if it is not informed by the issuing agency or department that issued it?

It's not like the National Archives issues these documents - so how can they be responsible for tracking them?

With the questions I'm asking here in this post - one could see that this whole thing is more complicated than meets the eye.

I've read here where people say that a library is more efficient in tracking their materials than that of the National Archives. But know that a library has more control - because any materials they track start and end within their premises. Not so with the National Archives.

It seems to me that the responsibility for the tracking of a classified document either starts with the issuing agency or department or the receiving governmental body that receives the classified document - and that it is the issuer or receivers responsibility to pass that info on to the National Archives.

I can't believe that such a complicated system couldn't let some classified documents slip between the cracks.

It seems like we're comparing 'apples and oranges' here when they try and compare the finding of the Biden documents with the knowingly and wantonly taking and concealing the documents that were attributed to Tr**p.

[unblock]

1. It's even messier than you can imagine.

First there's classified materials (documents, hardware, etc.), then there's classified information.

A document can be lost or misplaced easily. There are good protocols to reduce such problems, but any engineer can tell you that no process is error-free, especially when humans are involved and even more so when tasks are manual.

People forget. They're human. It happens. If it's a problem, you may get the moral equivalent of a yellow card in soccer. A warning and a talking to. They don't lock people up or even fire them for making innocent mistakes. Real punishment is for clear criminal intent or a large scale problem.


But then there's classified information. The content of what's on those documents. If I write that down on a paper napkin, then that napkin is technically now also a classified document. And there are procedures for disposing of classified documents, so you can't just throw it in the trash or even erase it.


We used to joke about pinning someone down and writing something classified on their underwear so they couldn't go home, they'd have to take their underwear off and turn it in to get a registration number (as "classified briefs"!) and it would later be destroyed in a government incinerator.


Fighter pilots are notorious for telling tales involving classified information. They never get punished because the government spent way too much training them to let them go to prison for talking a little too freely at happy hour.

[Model35mech]

2. I remember counting garbage bags and tracking them through burning

One of the crap jobs that my shop got because as maintenance people our schedules could be adapted to the burn teams.

As the end of a shift of burning came said classified paper waste was reduced to ashes... more or less... and we had to beat the ashes with cut-off broom handles to be sure they were 'unreadable'. On some paper some inks leave an image on ashes. So ashes had to be beat to powder.

Sure made the beer taste better at the NCO club.

[jmowreader]

3. We had a shredder, not an incinerator

Our shredder was so awesome the stuff that came out of it looked like dryer lint. It had a 150-horsepower motor on it. We called it Jaws.

The last thing you did on Jaws duty was clean the shredder. You did this by throwing a couple two-foot-long pieces of 2x4 into it, one at a time. They came out looking like dryer lint too.

The only reason we even bothered to open the burn bags was because the people who bought the bales of waste didn’t want ground-up three-ring binders in it. Strangely enough, someone at the State Department had made a deal with an East German company to buy this stuff. They made insulation out of it.

[Deep State Witch]

4. Pizza Boxes

When I worked at one of the 3-letter agencies, they sold the pulp from burn bag destruction to a company that made pizza boxes.

[jmowreader]

5. That's one of the reasons incinerators have gone away

Shredders are cheaper to run, more environmentally friendly, etc., etc., etc., but the biggest advantage is the agency can turn a profit selling the waste.

[Model35mech]

7. Did using a shredder still make the Beer taste better at the end of the shift?

jes vondring

[Happy Hoosier]

6. It's starts with classification guides...

These are documents which describe the type of information that needs to be classified and at what level. The generator of information is responsible for reviewing the classification guides and ensure any documents created are properly classified. Each agency has designated officials which review and log new classified documents. There’s a whole process. Documents are supposed to be accounted for in logs, but it’s pretty easy for things to slip through the cracks, particularly if the classified is otherwise of a fairly mundane nature. For example, routine ship schedules or threat reports.