$52.6 Billion: U.S. Secret “Black Budget” for 16 Intelligence Agencies Exposed
A story based on documents stolen and leaked by former National Security Agency contract employee Edward Snowden on this day revealed the size of the secret “black budget” for the 16 U.S. intelligence agencies. The documents placed the figure at $52.6 billion.
Released documents revealed that the CIA budget for fiscal year 2013 was $14.7 billion. The human intelligence (HUMINT in CIA lingo) budget was $2.3 billion, while the budget for signals intelligence (SIGINT) was $1.7 billion. Security and logistics for CIA missions was budgeted at $2.5 billion. Various “covert action programs” cost $2.6 billion.
The first media reports based on the Snowden documents were published on June 5, 2013, and continued for more than a year.
The only previous public estimate of the secret budget for intelligence agencies was made by the Pike Committee in 1975–76. The House of Representatives voted not to release the Pike Committee report on January 29, 1976, however, although many of its findings were leaked to the press. A summary of the Pike Committee report was leaked by reporter Daniel Schorr to the Village Voice, which published it on February 16, 1976. No full Pike Committee report has ever been released.
Get the full story: Luke Harding, The Snowden Files: The Inside Story of the World’s Most Wanted Man (2014)
Learn more about the national security industry: Dana Priest and William Arkin, Top Secret America: The Rise of the New American Security State (2012)
Watch an interview with Edward Snowden: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yB3n9fu-rM
Follow a timeline of the Snowden-based revelations about the NSA: http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/multimedia/timeline-edward-snowden-revelations.html