I’ve been reading the CIA docs released and on page 00285 there’s this mention of corporations/contractors working with the Government and CIA, and the contractors having “Q Clearances”
2 July 1971
“DD/S __ attended a meeting at the White House yesterday of the interagency group which is reviewing classification and classification policy. The President….said he wants:….(6) the revocation of all clearances and return of all classified material held at Harvard, Brookings, Rand and Cal Tech, as well as the withdrawal of
Q clearances held by the Regents if the University of California.
…and the Executive Director notes the DOD has asked us to provide information on all contracts with Rand, as well as all security clearances held by Rand personnel for our purposes…. Acting Director asked we assemble data pertaining to the President’s remarks but we will take no action until the President’s guidance has been confirmed and the DD/S has provided a memorandum on it.”
8 July 1971
Page 00286
“…DOD security team is going to Santa Monica to repossess classifies materials held at Rand…we have seven contracts with Rand; only one is classified…
Houston commented that according to DOD General Counsel Buzhart, DID technically is under instructions to lift the security clearances Of Rand contractors but has taken no action.
“….DDCI reported John Ehrlichman had telephoned to advise us that the White House is appointing former CIA employee Howard Hunt as a security consultant. Later in the meeting the Director asked all Executive Committee members to review their lists of consultants to determine whether each us really needed.”
My comments: First of all President Nixon specifically mentions Q Clearances.
And this discussion sounds like to me, President Nixon gave an order to remove all security clearances from outside contractors, organizations due to release of the Pentagon Papers, and the DOD Director didn’t implement it, even though it was memorialized. They second guessed the order and didn’t implement the full scope of the order, which if they had there wouldn’t be this sprawling behemoth of contractors having security clearances today. Another thing, our confidential national information is spread far and wide with 100s of organizations, universities, even companies such as Fusion GPS, Perkins Choie (both CIA orgs).
I think some digging is in order to identify everyone, company etc that are outside contractors with universities, corporations etc. to our government today. Rand plays a huge roll in this.