21 levels of Security Clearances above POTUS

Some time ago the husband held a TS SCi and a Q. Id never heard of a Q clearance before that... and dont see it on that chart. Maybe because its a NRC/DOE clearance within the job he did for the DoD?? You had to have the TS with the Q to hold that position within the NRC.

wofat18
"There can be no levels of security clearance above the POTUS"

REMEMBER: The POTUS is only a politician. Do you really think they let the leader of a country know EVERYTHING? He just runs the country, and some things are better kept away from a person who has that much power. Even if he does have the highest security clearance, do YOU think the government will show him EVERYTHING? I don't think so.

So, I disagree, I can't prove it, but I think the President doesn't know what some of these agencies keep locked up behind those doors.

edit on 25-9-2013 by wofat18 because: (no reason given)

Security clearances only exist by executive order (EO 12968). They are a function of executive power. Per the vesting clause, and common sense, there can be no level of clearance above the President (who, in fact, does not hold a security clearance). This is not the same as saying everyone in the government will show the President everything, even if the President has the time and inclination to learn every detail of every government function (he does not). One cannot make a blanket statement about human behavior like that. But one can make a blanket statement about policy, when the policy is clear, and only requires a few pages of reading to understand.

reply to post by Advantage


Minor correction (pardon my pet peeves). Your husband had a TS clearance "with SCI access" based on a Special Background Investigation or a Single Scope Background Investigation.

What drew my interest to your post: Q clearance. I'm not familiar with NRC or DoE programs. Is that an actual clearance or is it a program he was "read on" to. Was it a clearance, or was it access to "Q Data?"

reply to post by FurvusRexCaeli


Star for you, Sir! Denying ignorance one post at a time!!

MrSpad

wofat18
"There can be no levels of security clearance above the POTUS"

REMEMBER: The POTUS is only a politician. Do you really think they let the leader of a country know EVERYTHING? He just runs the country, and some things are better kept away from a person who has that much power. Even if he does have the highest security clearance, do YOU think the government will show him EVERYTHING? I don't think so.

So, I disagree, I can't prove it, but I think the President doesn't know what some of these agencies keep locked up behind those doors.

edit on 25-9-2013 by wofat18 because: (no reason given)

Yes they will and do. I know this from experience.

You KNOW?

I'm skeptical, I can't imagine that there's that many people out there that know something like that by experience. Do you have any proof? I don't imagine you would even be allowed to explain how you would know something like that.

It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.

TheLaughingGod

MrSpad

wofat18
"There can be no levels of security clearance above the POTUS"

REMEMBER: The POTUS is only a politician. Do you really think they let the leader of a country know EVERYTHING? He just runs the country, and some things are better kept away from a person who has that much power. Even if he does have the highest security clearance, do YOU think the government will show him EVERYTHING? I don't think so.

So, I disagree, I can't prove it, but I think the President doesn't know what some of these agencies keep locked up behind those doors.

edit on 25-9-2013 by wofat18 because: (no reason given)

Yes they will and do. I know this from experience.

You KNOW?

I'm skeptical, I can't imagine that there's that many people out there that know something like that by experience. Do you have any proof? I don't imagine you would even be allowed to explain how you would know something like that.

It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.

I used to be the OPR for several special access programs. Some would have couple hundred people read in and some only couple dozen. In any of those cases the director or head what ever agency that the program ran under had access despite not being on the list. This also held true with people like President, Chief of Staff, etc. The director of the NSA was another one because everything and I mean everything travels over his systems. Now that is not to say the director of the NSA has a need to know and could justtify reading things he has no buisness but techniaclly he would have the access. The President has access to whatever he wants and if he wants to see it, he has a need to know. Most of the time he does not have the time not want to go into every detail of every program. That is why he has other people. Now one might say but the President is only in office for X amount of years. This is true. This is also true of all the top positions from the Directors of agencys to NSC, JCS etc. As for my proof? My proof is in my name.

reply to post by FlyersFan


"He's just an elected politician and being elected doesn't mean he has a right
to know everything about our security and our projects. "

Our?

reply to post by TheProphetMark


Nope, not even close. You have to understand that in the world of "Security Clearances" there are only:
When related to people:
Top Secret
Secret
Classified

When related to documents:
Top Secret
Secret
Classified
For Internal use Only

That's it. It doesn't mean that within those levels there aren't various level of access. For example;
Within the Top Secret clearance level you could have a guy with a Category 1 level of clearance (this allows them to be armed with a loaded firearm around the POTUS) while a guy with a Category 2 is only allowed to have a fire arm around the POTUS (the difference between the two is night and day. The Cat 2 guy can only have a non-functional firearm around the POTUS, Think Drill team, while the Cat 1 guy has to have a working firearm to protect the POTUS.

There are also something that not to many people will be aware of but that is this:
Sometime things that should be "Top Secret" aren't even classified. The Stealth Fighter program is the most famous of these items. They (the Government) will sometimes do this because friendly nations (and sometimes not so friendly nations) will only go after classified documents, or pay traitors for classified material. I mean think about it, does "WikiLeaks" deal with anything that's not classified?

That particular picture suggests that it is about rank. Information is declassified on an as needed level, whoever needs the information for a certain operation has it declassified. I imagine somebody with enough status and involvement can have anything declassified for his eyes, Dick Chenney for example. Who is gonna say no to him?

reply to post by TheProphetMark


Not commenting on whether or not your info is valid, but rather on the responses to same, it may serve you well to keep this in mind:

Those that know don't tell. Those that tell, don't know.

Should any actual "info" find it's way out, it will be buried, obfuscated, psy-op'd, etc such that most people would be right back where they started - having no clue as to the actual truth/validity of said info.

With that said, the "truth seekers" have actually won a few rounds. Not that anyone would know, of course...

You gotta love the circular nature of this particular beast.

There aren't all these wacky levels. It's basically top secret, secret, confidential, and unclassified.

Top secret can have compartmentalization, so you have compartment code words like POLO STEP. That doesn't mean POLO STEP is higher than top secret, it's something that tells you who has access to it and what category of info is relegated to that compartment.

Some of the stuff in the OP is misinterpretation of NATO classifications, like COSMIC. COSMIC just denotes a top secret classified program that has been shared with NATO. It's not a "higher level of classification" in the US.

As far as Q goes, that's a DOE thing. DOE nuclear secrets have their very own pre-made compartment analogs. DOE has L clearances, which is about equivalent to having a Secret clearance, Q comes in two flavors, Q-sensitive and Q non-sensitive. The main difference between a S or TS and an L, Q or Qs is that the latter three give you access to special nuclear materials. QS are generally brainiacs.

In addition to Q and QS, DOE has premade compartments called Sigma levels. Sigma 1/QS grants you the keys to the nuclear kingdom. If you're ESA/WER or a NEST egghead, you're probably more of a Sigma 3/Q guy.

While you get a Q or L clearance for a duration, you generally bounce all over the Sigma map depending on what you are doing.

reply to post by Shoonra


Believe it or not they exist, trust me 100%, I can't get into the details of how I know but just speaking generally here if you have ever had access to certain information there exists the high likelihood that you have seen the levels of clearance via access list that personnel who might come into that area have listed ahead of time, at least back in the eighties , I saw those very clearances that some, who have zero clue,seem to think do not exist,associated with field grades and above or civilians, I imagine that more than likely since I was stationed in Europe they were NATO level and also associated with the unit I was working with in some way, I can't go beyond that though but if you research it is common knowledge in the public domain that they exist.

originally posted by: FlyersFan
I had a TS SCI clearance and I have never heard of the so-called 'majestic' clearance except in UFO circles. Ditto with a bunch of those others listed in that upper frame. Of course things may have changed since I had mine ... but still ... I'm not too sure of the listing.

But for discussion .... if there are clearances over that of the POTUS .. GOOD!
He's just an elected politician and being elected doesn't mean he has a right
to know everything about our security and our projects.

Democrat or republican .. doesn't matter .. he's a temporary employee in DC.

And who is everyone else supposed to be? Everyone is some employee on tax money.... Or do you think you and the army and whatever are special or something? You're just as much employee as everyone else... Even the heads above you all the way to the top, just a bunch of wet ears paid with tax money... You just meddle around eating billions on weapons without having a clue of what's going on.

So many people mix up what a security 'clearance' is and what security 'accesses' are. there is NO security 'clearance' higher then TS, but there is a crap load of different security 'accesses' out there, and those are all the weird names, numbers and letters that people keep wanting to call "clearances". Think of it as a tree, your confidential, secret and top secret, allows you to climb to different levels of the tree and the different accesses allow you to climb out onto different limbs, if you don't have the clearance 'and' the access for a particular limb, you don't get to climb on it. Need to know has been mentioned, and that is how you get to touch the leaves on the limb.

Hope this helps

originally posted by: FlutterByte
I can imagine working your way through all the security levels would be a bit like sitting down and watching every single episode of "lost" in one sitting. Just when you think you have a handle on what the h_ll is going on, another plot twist comes along and you are wondering if it has something to do with that smoke monster

haha, i'm a bit behind times, i'v just started lost last month binge watching at night and I'm totally lost, its got an appropriate name i'm on season 3 and think i'm just about ready to quit


I wonder how it feels to be the President of the United States of America and know your only be half way up the top secret list and don't actually have any control over anything that happens
Do the think the real people in charge tell the runners for presidency before the elections that they are just going to get bent over and shafted or do they wait till after they've won to break all their hopes and dreams of making a better America?

a reply to: TheProphetMark

I refer to them as many layers above. These are agencies with authority above the agencies, branches that we know about.

Then there is a many layers up, above the defense shield. That indicates that this is a protected area. There is a defense shield separating this top layer from all layers below. They are benevolent, though those below don’t always see things that way.

We are a warring, barbaric species. We can’t be trusted.

If the Masons had anything to do with it, there would be 33 levels of Top Secret.
Only makes sense since they were the drivers when America was being born.

originally posted by: Advantage
Some time ago the husband held a TS SCi and a Q. Id never heard of a Q clearance before that... and dont see it on that chart. Maybe because its a NRC/DOE clearance within the job he did for the DoD?? You had to have the TS with the Q to hold that position within the NRC.

No its because that chart is bullsnip

Under 50 U.S. Code § 3341. Security clearances, POTUS is solely responsibility for each and every security classification, unless he delegates it to another office like President Obama did (e.g., Information Security Oversight Office). There can be no higher security classification than "-President's Eyes Only). Example of my last clearance, "TS/SCI-President's Eyes Only". It is not that POTUS does not know what is going on. No president knows everything that goes on is his administration. That's what the various Secretaries are for. If he wants to know about something, all he has to do is make a phone call.

BTW, having a TS clearance DOES NOT mean you get to see every TS document out there. There 2 parts to seeing a TS classified document. Part 1 is the TS clearance. Part 2 is the "need to know". No "need to know" = no access.



a reply to: Advantage

A “Q” Clearance is issued by the DOE. It is the equivalent to a United States Department of Defense Top Secret (TS) clearance. For access to some classified information, such as Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI) or Special Access Programs (SAPS), additional requirements or special conditions may be imposed by the information owner even if the person is otherwise eligible to be granted a security clearance or access authorization based on reciprocity You can’t have a “Q” and a TS at the same time. That would be redundant.

a reply to: Advantage