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Pointless Secrecy

Thomas Lippman writes that the U.S.-Bahrain ten-year defense agreement was supposed to be renewed this year, but the extension of the agreement had already happened (via Andrew): One might think this would have been an important agenda item when President Obama met with Bahrain’s crown prince, Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa, in June. But nothing was […]

Thomas Lippman writes that the U.S.-Bahrain ten-year defense agreement was supposed to be renewed this year, but the extension of the agreement had already happened (via Andrew):

One might think this would have been an important agenda item when President Obama met with Bahrain’s crown prince, Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa, in June. But nothing was said.

That, it turns out, is because President George W. Bush and Bahrain’s regime in 2002 secretly added five years to the defense pact’s term, extending its expiration date to October 2016. There have been no renewal negotiations because none have been needed.

The terms of the extension have never been made public. The agreement’s existence is classified. Not even Congressional Research Service analysts, who write detailed reports for Congress and often have access to classified material, were aware. A comprehensive CRS report on the situation last month said flatly that the defense pact would be up for renewal in October. In effect, White House secrecy on this issue put the research service in the position of reporting misleading information to Congress.

Leaving aside the question of whether this agreement should have been renewed had it come due this year, this information ought to trouble us. First of all, there was no need for this extension to remain secret. It’s not as if Bahrain’s close security relationship with the U.S. is something that has been hidden, so why keep this information from the public and Congress? Sometimes secrecy may be essential to the making of foreign policy, but in this case there seems to be no reason for it all.

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