Black budget

A black budget is a budget that is allocated for classified and other secret operations of a nation, a corporation, a society of any form, a national department, and so on. A black budget usually covers expenses related to military research and covert operations. The black budget is mostly classified due to security reasons.

United States

Data visualization of U.S. intelligence black budget (2013)

The United States Department of Defense has a black budget it uses to fund black projects—expenditures it does not want to disclose publicly. The annual cost of the United States Department of Defense black budget was estimated at $30 billion in 2008,^[1] but was increased to an estimated $50 billion in 2009.^[2]

A black budget article by the Washington Post, based on information given by Edward Snowden, detailed how the US allocated $52.8 billion in 2012 for the black budget.^[3]

See also

• Special access program

References

1. Broad, William J. (2008-04-01). "Inside the Black Budget". The New York Times. Retrieved 2010-04-26.
2. "Pentagon's Black Budget Grows to More Than $50 Billion" Wired, May 2009]
3. Gellman, Barton; Miller, Greg (2013-09-05). "National Security". The Washington Post.

External links

• "Paint it Black", a 1997 metroactive article very critical of the use of Black budgets in the US
• "Exposing the Black Budget", a 1995 Wired article with the same stance