-Caveat Lector- Cross-posted from H-ANTISEMITISM
CLARIFICATION OF RELEASE OF NAZI WAR CRIMES FBI FILES By Michael Ravnitzky , [EMAIL PROTECTED] December 18, 2002 The purpose of this note is to clarify a previous announcement of a list of Nazi War Crimes related FBI Files being transferred from the FBI to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), and to identify the existence of additional Japanese War Crimes FBI files being transferred. SUMMARY The main three clarifications are that the release of the records will be delayed because of agency reviews -- the CIA and OSI may redact or hold back entirely some of these files -- and that there are a substantial number of Japanese War Crimes related files in a separate list. A staff member at the Nazi War Crimes and Japanese Imperial Records Interagency Working Group (hereafter Interagency Working Group, or IWG) was concerned because I distributed the entire list of Nazi War Crime FBI Files transferred to NARA via IWG. I obtained this list through proper channels. The IWG thinks that only a portion of the records may ultimately become available, and in this respect the list might be misleading. In my opinion, it is useful for researchers to see which files are NOT opened as well as which files become opened. In any case, I agreed to distribute this clarification. I would appreciate if you could forward on this note to anyone to whom you sent the original note or list. DETAILS: My original message said that these files would be opened in January 2003. This is incorrect. According to an IWG press officer, http://www.archives.gov/iwg/index.html these records will be opened in due course at an undefined date after the materials have been processed by the IWG. The IWG says that: 1) The materials must be reviewed for CIA equities (material of CIA interest); 2) The materials must be reviewed for material of concern to the Office of Special Investigations (hereafter OSI). OSI is the branch of the Department of Justice Criminal Division that investigates and deports people who took part in Nazi-sponsored acts of persecution; and http://www.usdoj.gov:80/criminal/osi.html 3) The National Archives must preserve the most fragile records for public handling by researchers (such as placing onionskin or thermofax paper between mylar sheets). These steps will take additional time and will likely delay the release of the records to an unspecified degree. However, the IWG says that they don�t plan to wait until all the processing is complete, they plan to release the records at the National Archives on a rolling basis, that is the records will be released in batches as the reviews are completed. IMPORTANT NOTE REGARDING JAPANESE WAR CRIMES FBI FILES NARA has received an important group of Japanese War Crimes Files from the FBI. However, the IWG has not released a list of the Japanese War Crimes FBI files it received, saying that it would be premature to release the list of transferred records. According to the October 24, 2002 meeting minutes of the IWG (soon to be posted at http://www.archives.gov/iwg/meetings/meetings.html "The FBI reported that it had completed its review of Japanese documents in August 2002. After screening 127, 085 pages, 71,485 were determined to be relevant and transferred to NARA." An interesting interim report on the Japanese War Crimes records is at: http://www.archives.gov/iwg/declassified_records/japanese_war_crimes_disclos ure.html MY OPINION In my opinion, the IWG should release the list of transferred Japanese records so researchers can ascertain which records are kept closed when the records eventually become public. As I understand it, a major underpinning of archival records management is that researchers in a particular records set should be provided a sense of which records from the collection are not available. The strategy of not informing the public of the records which were to be sequestered and removed from the open collection is not the correct one, in my humble opinion. If there are criminal prosecution concerns relating to OSI efforts, my intuition tells me that the public interest in opening these records now (after 55 years) outweighs any concern about jeopardizing OSI prosecutions and subsequent deportations in a handful of cases. Whether I am right or wrong, this debate deserves to occur in the public domain. I encourage interested parties to attend the next meeting of the IWG, planned for January or more likely February. IWG meetings are open to the public. You can get information on the date of the next IWG meeting by contacting IWG at: http://www.archives.gov/iwg/contact_information/contact_information.html __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now. http://mailplus.yahoo.com <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. 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