Testimonials
“The [truth] commission [on East Timor] relied on more than 4,500 pages of recently declassified documents collected by the Washington-based National Security Archive, a nonprofit research group, which posted a 119-page portion of the commission’s 2,500-page report on its Web site Tuesday.”
- Colum Lynch, The Washington Post (2006)
“Governments at every level these days are providing less information about their inner workings, sometimes using fear of terrorism as an excuse. But it’s precisely times like these that mandate citizens’ rights to check the efficiency of their government and hold those who fail accountable, open government advocates say. The government itself won’t make it easy, so an increasing number of websites and data crunchers are stepping in to provide information about the inner workings of government … Another trove of information is George Washington University’s National Security Archive, which contains thousands of documents acquired through patient Freedom of Information Act requests.”
- Ryan Singel, Wired.com (2004)
“Outside of government, the National Security Archive at George Washington University maintains the world’s largest library of declassified material and has used it to build a detailed set of online volumes called The September 11th Sourcebooks. Drawing from documents obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests and from individual scholarly research, the sourcebooks provide fascinating primary data and analysis on Afghanistan, U.S. foreign policy, bioterrorism, and U.S. policy against terrorism.”
- National Journal (2001)
“This remarkable book [A Cardboard Castle?] documents in fascinating detail the rise and fall of the Warsaw Treaty organisation – an alliance of unfree nations press-ganged into military collaboration over forty years. How it came about, did its business, and eventually imploded is the story of my lifetime – and that of many others who were affected by it. This is therefore not just a story for experts or historians – it is a chronology of significance and an era we must never forget".
- The Rt. Hon. Lord Robertson of Port Ellen, NATO Secretary General, 1999-2003
“An elegantly written treasure trove of fascinating, forgotten, and previously unrevealed history. For those seeking to understand the roots of modern enmity between the U.S. and Iran, Becoming Enemies is a truly unique and wonderful resource.”
- Karim Sadjadpour, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
“ ... [I]n recognition of your decades of demystifying and exposing the underworld of global diplomacy and supporting the public’s right to know and of your pursuit of a more accountable and just world.”
- Text of the Dr. Jean Mayer Global Citizenship Award from Tufts University’s Institute for Global Leadership (2011)
“In this well-written, carefully documented, and important study [Spying on the Bomb] Jeffrey Richelson describes how and why a succession of nations, beginning with Nazi Germany in World War II, have secretly sought to build nuclear weapons.”
- J. Kenneth McDonald, Journal of Military History (2006)
“I strongly endorse the National Security Archive's research and publications as both unique and invaluable to the public's understanding of and ability to debate the history and role of nuclear weapons. In particular, The Nuclear Vault has been especially useful as a one-stop-shopping for facts and analysis that I frequently rely on in my writings and to guide me in gaining further insight and access. It is a dynamic and focused project that clearly deserves sustained financial support.”
- Hans Kristensen, Federation of American Scientists
“Prados directly engages, and in many cases, demolishes, a host of shibboleths about the war. But this is no mere polemic. Rather, Prados’s powerfully presented and meticulously argued account, buttressed by a staggering amount of documentary evidence, meets the most exacting standards of scholarship. His sweeping history forms the capstone of more than three decades of careful research and measured reflection on the Vietnam War .... It may be the single most important book yet written on the Vietnam conflict.”
- American Historical Review, on Vietnam: The History of an Unwinnable War (2010 winner of the Henry Adams Prize) (2009)
“Journalists occasionally receive well- or not-so-well-intentioned leaks about past or present official misdeeds. Once in a while – less so these days – a congressional investigation or a commission unearths long-buried truths about government-gone-bad. But when it comes to consistently forcing important secrets out of the US government no journalist or investigator rivals the National Security Archive, a nonprofit outfit based at George Washington University.”
- David Corn, The Nation (2005)
“[The Chronology is] the most comprehensive, authoritative, objective and useful summary of the Iran-Contra affair available. It makes the pieces fall into place and brings the individual players into focus.”
- Bob Woodward, The Washington Post (1987)
“There is no publication, in any language, that would even approach the thoroughness, reliability, and novelty of this monumental work .... For the first time in modern Hungarian history, and almost uniquely in the history of modern Europe, we are able to learn from original sources how exactly the decisions were taken that led first to the decline of the Stalinist system in Hungary, then to demonstrations for freedom and against the Soviet occupation .... [The 1956 Hungarian Revolution] will change forever our views of what happened in Hungary between 1953 and 1963.”
- István Deák, Columbia University, review of The 1956 Hungarian Revolution
“I have never read a book quite like this. Becoming Enemies is the latest product of the indispensable National Security Archive, the Washington non-profit that has given new meaning to the Freedom of Information Act. They not only use their skills to get major U.S. policy documents declassified, but they take those documents and find innovative ways to illuminate important historical episodes. This book is a living example.
“No one can emerge from this book without a sense of revelation. No matter how much you may know about these tumultuous years, even if you were personally involved or have delved into the existing academic literature, you will discover new facts, new interpretations, and new dimensions on virtually every page.”
- Gary Sick, Columbia University, review of Becoming Enemies (2012)
“Masterpieces of History ... provides a fascinating array of sources from the late 1980s and early 1990, largely from Russian-language originals. Experts who have seen these documents already at conferences or the archive itself, as I did in the course of writing my book 1989: The Struggle to Create Post-Cold War Europe, already know how valuable they are.”
- Mary Elise Sarotte, University of Southern California
“Thank you very much, especially for your important and intelligent contribution.”
- Mercedes Soiza-Reilly, Prosecutor in the Orletti case (Argentina), to Carlos Osorio