Central Command (CENTCOM)

Headquartered in Tampa, Fla.

| Official Web site

U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) was established Jan. 1, 1983, an expansion of the Rapid Deployment Joint Task Force (RDJTF) created by President Jimmy Carter in March 1980. With Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in August 1990, the command focused away from Soviet threats to the Middle East and sources of oil. On Jan. 17, 1991, U.S. and coalition forces launched Operation Desert Storm with a massive air campaign; a coalition ground assault began on Feb. 24, 1991. The resulting ceasefire and the virtual partition of Iraq, with a northern "no fly" zone, dominated the command’s attention through Sept. 11, 2001.

Source: Adapted from U.S. government regulations, "U.S. Government Manual", and "An Overview of the U.S. Intelligence Community"
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Top Secret Work
Number of Work Locations

6

Number of Contracting Clients

64

Types of Work (19)  
Types of Work
The Post has divided Top Secret work into ten categories. Companies' work for the government falls under the type(s) shown. For a detailed description of a category, click on the function or type it into one of our searches.
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Dana Priest

Investigative reporter Dana Priest has been The Washington Post's intelligence, Pentagon and health-care reporter. She has won numerous awards, including the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for public service for "The Other Walter Reed" and the 2006 Pulitzer for beat reporting for her work on CIA secret prisons and counterterrorism operations overseas. She is author of the 2003 book, "The Mission: Waging War and Keeping Peace With America's Military, (W.W. Norton).

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William M. Arkin has been a columnist and reporter with The Washington Post and washingtonpost.com since 1998. He has worked on the subject of government secrecy and national security affairs for more than 30 years. He has authored or co-authored more than a dozen books about the U.S. military and national security.

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