FY 2001 Defense Authorization Act
The FY
2001 Defense Authorization Act has passed both the Senate and the House. A conference committee is now being
appointed to discuss and resolve differences between the two different versions
of the same bill. The committee will consist of members of both chambers of
Congress.
The
Senate's version of the Bill (# S-2549) contains a provision (section 1045)
that would allow the Defense Intelligence Agency to withhold its operational
files from disclosure to the public.
Any such files would be reviewed for subsequent declassification only
once every 10 years. It should go without saying that defense operational files
would contain significant information pertaining to POW/MIAs. If this provision passes, the effort to
account for missing American servicemen could be seriously undermined. We already fight an uphill battle to get
information that sheds light on the truth of what happened to missing
servicemen. Broad authorization to
withhold critical files would give the government wide latitude in keeping
information from the public.
The House
Armed Services Committee reports that the House version of the Defense
Authorization Bill does not contain a provision similar to the Senate's section
1045. Therefore, when the House and Senate conferees meet to resolve
differences between the two bills, one version or the other will have to be
changed.
We urge
veterans, families of missing men, and all others who are concerned about the
effort to account for missing servicemen, to contact the conferees and ask that
section 1045 of the Senate Defense Authorization Bill be deleted from the final
Defense Authorization Bill. We often
have people ask us what they can do to help our missing servicemen. Contacting
elected officials from time to time when relevant legislation is at stake is
one of the most important ways in which we can make a difference. We are told time and again that politicians
in Washington respond on issues that seem to matter to voters, especially in an
election year.
The
conferees are currently being selected by both the House and the Senate. The
committee should be complete by Friday, we are told, before members of Congress
leave D.C. for their August recess.
They will return after Labor Day and get to work on reconciling the
Defense Bill. We will circulate the
list of conferees, when it comes out, along with their contact
information.
This is an
important legislative matter.
Unfortunately, we are getting notice of it only at the eleventh
hour. It is late in the day, but there
is still time to make our concerns known.