Historians Win Over Spy Agencies (For Now)

"After complaints from historians, the National Archives directed intelligence agencies ... to stop removing previously declassified historical documents from public access and urged them to return to the shelves as quickly as possible many of the records they had already pulled," reports the New York Times. There will be a "moratorium" on reclassifications until the archives' Information Security Oversight Office completes an audit "to determine which records should be secret." Allen Weinstein, the chief U.S. government archivist, told historians that reclassifications might continue post-audit, but any future program would be "guided by better standards" and "more transparent." Intelligence historian Matthew Aid called the moratorium "a positive first step," but noted that "the real deals are going to get made" when the National Archives meets with the intelligence and military agencies who are behind the reclassification program, on March 6.