Pentagon Papers go public today (Politico)

Forty years after they were first leaked, the Pentagon Papers will finally be declassified and publicly released on Monday.

All 7,000 pages of the famed report examining two decades of U.S. involvement in Vietnam will be published, unredacted, by the National Archives and Records Administration, ending a saga that was a watershed development in an unpopular war and an important case on First Amendment rights.

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The New York Times began publishing the papers ? which detailed the Johnson administration?s lies to Congress and the nation about the progress of the Vietnam War ? on June 13, 1971 and, within days, the Washington Post joined in. By the end of the month, the Supreme Court ruled in New York Times Co. v. United States that details of the report could be published because ?only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government,? Justice Hugo Black wrote in a 6-3 decision.

But the versions of the report published over the last four decades have never been complete and unredacted. On Monday, the National Archives will post the whole document online.

The release of the Pentagon Papers comes as there is renewed attention on leaked classified documents, namely those conveyed by Julian Assange?s WikiLeaks to U.S. and international news outlets.

?It?s absurd? that it?s taken four decades long for the papers to be declassified, Daniel Ellsberg, who worked on the report and later leaked it, told the Times last week. The papers should have been public by the time he leaked them in 1971, he said.

?The reasons are very clearly domestic political reasons, not national security at all. The reasons for the prolonged secrecy are to conceal the fact that so much of the policy making doesn?t bear public examination. It?s embarrassing, or even incriminating.?

Though the contents of much of the report have been public knowledge for decades, much of the report ? including its cover image ? has been classified and off-limits for government use all this time.

What?s not clear yet is whether, after all these years, the full report will break any news of its own.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/politics/*http%3A//us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/external/politico_rss/rss_politico_mostpop/http___www_politico_com_news_stories0611_56807_html/41840290/SIG=11mbj448i/*http%3A//www.politico.com/news/stories/0611/56807.html

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