40 YEARS OF FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACTION
2018 postings and publications
This page shows all EBBs, News, Books, and Unredacted postings.
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Briefing Book 650
Edited by Michael Martelle and Rosemary Tropeano;
update by Cristin J. Monahan
Update
Washington, D.C., February 24, 2022 – The nongovernmental National Security Archive’s Cyber Vault today supplemented one of its more popular resources – the National Security Agency’s (NSA)…
Briefing Book 654
Edited by Michael Evans
Washington, D.C., December 21, 2018 – Banana executives with Chiquita Brands now the subject of a major criminal investigation in Colombia were instrumental in the development and execution…
Unredacted blog
The National Security Archive, working with our partners at ProQuest, is publishing a new compilation of documents on Soviet-U.S. relations at the end of the Cold War. The 1,911-document…
Briefing Book 653
Edited by James E. David
Washington, D.C., December 17, 2018 – During the dark days of the Cold War, spying on the enemy often took place in broad daylight. Some of the best opportunities for Western intelligence…
Unredacted blog
(B)(3) Exemptions Find Way Into Farm Bill Two proposed (B)(3) exemptions that will prevent the public from knowing information it should have access to are included in the Farm Bill. The carve-…
Briefing Book 652
Edited by William Burr
Washington, D.C., December 11, 2018 – In the Fall of 1966, as part of an ongoing debate about the U.S. troop presence in Western Europe and the role of NATO during the Cold War,…
News
By Svetlana Savranskaya and Tom Blanton
Washington, D.C., December 10, 2018 – The National Security Archive mourns the passing of Lyudmila Mikhailovna Alexeyeva, our dear friend, colleague and inspiration for all our work documenting human…
Special Exhibit
The Reagan-era Iran-Contra affair lit up the political skies over Washington for well over a year in the late 1980s. The biggest scandal since Watergate, it dominated the news starting in late…
Briefing Book 651
Update to EBB 261
published December 8, 2008
Edited by Dr. Svetlana Savranskaya and Thomas Blanton
The U.S. and NATO allies worried about losing control of the public narrative of the Cold War in December 1988 after Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev’s offer of an arms race in reverse in his famous…
Unredacted blog
FOIAonline Still Broken Six Months After Disastrous Redesign Six months ago the would-be government-wide FOIA portal, FOIAonline, was redesigned and the site lost much of its functionality as a…
Briefing Book 649
Edited by Michael Evans
November 29, 2018 – The formal launch today in Colombia of the Commission for the Clarification of the Truth, Coexistence and Non-Repetition (Truth Commission) is an important step forward in the…
Unredacted blog
The Air Force Couldn’t Have Sent a More Unprofessional, Unlawful FOIA Response Letter to a Worse Place The Air Force has sent a shockingly informal, candid, unprofessional, and unlawful FOIA response…
Briefing Book 648
Compiled and edited by Jenny and Sherry Thompson with contribution from Svetlana Savranskaya and Tom Blanton
The National Security Archive is publishing a set of documents to commemorate the life and achievements of Llewellyn Thompson and highlight the publication of a biography of him written by his…
Unredacted blog
FOIA and Public Universities A recent New York Times article chronicling several instances of big businesses and lobbyist groups weaponizing FOIA to target researchers at public universities has…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle and Rosemary Tropeano
The Cyber Vault has gathered a selection of presidential orders related to communication and cyber policy. They are a complement to other compilations on our site consisting of cyber-related…
Briefing Book 647
Edited by Nate Jones
Washington, D.C., November 5, 2018 – Beginning in 1981, the KGB’s “main objective” became “not to miss the military preparations of the enemy, its preparations for a nuclear strike, and…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
Earlier today Zach Dorfman and Jenna McLaughlin reported on a "catastrophic" failure of a CIA communications system which resulted in the potential compromise of "close to 70 percent of operations"…
Unredacted blog
Long-Sealed Watergate Road Map Released Chief Judge Baryl Howell of the D.C. Circuit recently ordered the disclosure of the long-secret Watergate “Road Map,” which was compiled by Watergate Special…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
The Cyber Vault has gathered below selections from the US Code related to cyber security. These selections are key to understanding the complex delegation of legal authorities governing the actions…
Briefing Book 646
Edited by William Burr
Washington D.C., October 29, 2018 — Sixty years ago, in October 1958, Irish Minister of External Affairs Frank Aiken bought before the United Nations the first version of a resolution addressing the…
Unredacted blog
Judge Tells DHS that FOIA isn’t Battleship U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper sided with the Government Accountability Project in its FOIA lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security,…
News
Edited by Rosemary Tropeano
From 1949 until the late 1960s the Office of Naval Research (ONR) published the Digital Computer Newsletter to “provide a medium for the interchange among interested persons of information…
Briefing Book 645
Edited by Tom Blanton and Lauren Harper
Washington, D.C., October 18, 2018 – The National Security Archive’s Freedom of Information lawsuit against the CIA has won release of the previously censored dates and times on cables sent by…
Unredacted blog
Gina Haspel CIA Torture Cables’ Dates and Times Declassified The National Security Archive’s FOIA lawsuit for cables authored and authorized by CIA director Gina Haspel during her tenure as chief of…
Briefing Book 644
Edited by Robert Wampler
Washington D.C., October 16, 2018 – Recent news reports out of Okinawa underscore the extent to which the long-standing U.S. military presence on the island is a perennial source of…
Briefing Book 643
Compiled and edited by Svetlana Savranskaya
Wasington D.C., October 11, 2018 -The end of the Cold War was a magical moment in international relations, which scholars and diplomats will continue to study and interpret for ages. In addition to…
News
The United States Government Accountability Office has issued a report finding that the Department of Defense’s early adoption of computers and information technology but late prioritization of…
Briefing Book 642
Edited by Peter Kornbluh
Washington D.C., October 5, 2018 – On the 30th anniversary of the historic plebiscite in Chile, the National Security Archive today posted key documents revealing General Augusto Pinochet’s secret…
Unredacted blog
As documents age, the likelihood that they will be released to FOIA requesters should increase. But because of a quirk of the US record keeping system, this is often not the case. Usually…
Unredacted blog
FOIA’s Foreseeable Harm Standard Gets Boost from The Court A recent U.S. District Court for the DC Circuit ruling has given some teeth to the “foreseeable harm” standard codified by the FOIA…
Briefing Book 641
Edited by Svetlana Savranskaya and Tom Blanton
Washington, D.C., October 4, 2018 – Twenty-five years ago last night in Moscow, Russian President Boris Yeltsin ordered tanks and airborne troops to shell and storm the “White House,” the Russian…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
Several recent attacks targeting major sea port operations have demonstrated the ability of a cyber-attack to stall maritime shipping:
News 641
Edited by Kate Doyle
Washington D.C., October 2, 2018—Today marks the fiftieth anniversary of the notorious Tlatelolco massacre, when the Mexican government killed dozens of students and bystanders protesting the…
Briefing Book 640
Edited by Svetlana Savranskaya and Mary Sarotte
William Burr contributed to headnotes
Washington, D.C., October 2, 2018 – President Bill Clinton saw Russian leader Boris Yeltsin as indispensable for promoting American interests following the collapse of the Soviet Union, often…
Unredacted blog
NARA to Re-Open Public Comment on Controversial ICE Records Schedule The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) will re-open a 15-day public comment period for a controversial…
News
Edited by: Michael Martelle and Rosemary Tropeano
Last week the White House and the Defense Department issued new documents on cyberspace strategy. This posting includes the new issuances and presents them with current national security and strategy…
Briefing Book 632
Edited by William Burr
Online blustering about nuclear “buttons” has brought new attention to the issue of presidential control over nuclear weapons, and to the special satchel or “Football” of emergency and nuclear…
Briefing Book 639
Edited by Robert A. Wampler
Washington, D.C., September 24, 2018 – President George H.W. Bush initially sought a leadership role for the United States on the environment, according to declassified documents obtained and posted…
Unredacted blog
NARA Report Says 98% of Agencies are on Track to Manage Digital Records by 2019 Deadline. Really? The National Archives and Records Administration’s Federal Agency Records Management 2017 Annual…
News
The Cyber Glossary is a compilation of specialized terms to help experts and the public alike navigate the complex field of cybersecurity. This resource combines definitions from a variety of…
Unredacted blog
DC Circuit: Trump Tweets on Investigation Don’t Undercut Glomar The District Court for the DC Circuit is upholding the DOJ’s Glomar response – in which an agency claims it can neither confirm nor…
News
Edited by Mary Curry and William Burr
Washington, D.C., September 10, 2018 – Staffers at the National Security Archive were saddened by the news of Matthew Aid’s untimely passing on August 20, 2018. We had the good fortune to…
Unredacted blog
Guatemalan President Shuts Down UN-Backed Anti-Corruption Probe Guatemalan president Jimmy Morales recently announced he will not renew the mandate of the UN-backed anti-corruption probe, the…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
The United States Department of Justice today unsealed a criminal complaint (here) and arrest warrant for North Korean hacker Park Jin Hyok detailing his involvement in numerous cyber operations…
Unredacted blog
NARA Could Have Troubleshot the USPS’ Release of Abigail Spanberger’s Security Clearance Application by Processing the FOIA Request Itself The confusion is only growing surrounding the Post Office’s…
Unredacted blog
State’s Historical Advisory Committee Report Slams DOD’s FRUS Performance The State Department’s Historical Advisory Committee (HAC) takes the Defense Department’s Office of Prepublication and…
Briefing Book 638
Edited by William Burr
U.S. nuclear war plans during the Johnson administration included the option of a retaliatory strike against nuclear, conventional military, and urban-industrial targets with the purpose of removing…
News
Edited by Kate Doyle
Washington, D.C., August 13, 2018—Guatemala’s renowned Historical Archive of the National Police (AHPN) is in crisis after its director Gustavo Meoño Brenner was abruptly removed in one of a series…
Briefing Book 637
Edited by Michael Martelle
Washington, D.C., August 13, 2018 – U.S. Cyber Command’s strategy for curtailing ISIL’s ability to exploit the internet may at least partially be paying off, according to an analysis of recently…
Briefing Book 636
Edited by Tom Blanton
Washington D.C., August 10, 2018 – Current CIA director Gina Haspel described graphic acts of deliberate physical torture including the waterboarding of a suspected Al-Qa’ida terrorist under her…
Unredacted blog
Intel.gov’s Tet Declassified A Step Backwards – More Dubious Secrets Did Intel.gov post new, high-quality documents for the first release of its Tet Declassified project? In short, no. The National…
Briefing Book 635
Edited by Danielle Siegel
Washington, D.C., August 8, 2018 – U.S. allies from Europe and the Persian Gulf warned the Clinton administration that it would be “very dangerous” and “pose risks for the entire region” if Iran were…
Unredacted blog
In one of his last actions as Director of National Intelligence, in December 2016 James R. Clapper announced a new declassification review of secret intelligence records on the Tet Offensive, in…
Unredacted blog
Tet Declassification Project Releases First Batch of Documents The Office of the Director of National Intelligence recently published the first set of documents for its Vietnam War Tet Offensive…
Briefing Book 634
Edited by Michael Martelle
Washington, D.C., August 1, 2018 – An early classified Defense Department cybersecurity exercise named “Eligible Receiver 97” (ER97) featured a previously unpublicized series of mock terror attacks,…
News
Edited by William Burr
Washington D.C., August 1, 2018 - On 31 July 2018, the Japanese Atomic Energy Commission announced that “Japan will reduce the size of its plutonium stockpile.” The move marks a potential…
News
Edited by Lauren Harper
Washington, D.C., July 27, 2018 - Federal Judge Katherine Failla agreed with government lawyers and is allowing the Secret Service to hide the White House visitor logs in a FOIA lawsuit brought…
Unredacted blog
Emails Shed Light on Contentious Census Question Redacted Commerce Department emails released as part of an ongoing lawsuit show that the Trump administration discussed adding a citizenship question…
Briefing Book 633
Edited by:
Brad Simpson, Founder and Director of the National Security Archive’s Indonesia and East Timor Documentation Project, Associate Professor of History and Asian Studies, University of Connecticut;
Megan Streit, PhD Candidate, University of Connecticut;
Mark Reyes, PhD Candidate, University of Connecticut;
Susan O’Hara, and Andrew Conroe.
Declassified documents detail US policy in period leading up to, following Suharto’s May, 1998 ouster, knowledge of military involvement in student abductions and killings.
Unredacted blog
OGIS Issues First Advisory Opinion The Office of Government Information Services (OGIS), the federal FOIA Ombuds office, issued its first advisory opinion this week. The substance of the opinion,…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
Robert Mueller, Special Counsel for the US Department of Justice, on Friday, July 13, 2018, indicted twelve Russian intelligence officers for “engaging in cyber operations that involved the…
Book Diane N. Labrosse
Unredacted blog
#TBT Pick – Kavanaugh Ruling Helped CIA Conceal Bay of Pigs History This week’s #TBT pick is chosen with the recent nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh for Supreme Court Justice in mind. Kavanaugh…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
The cyber threat to critical infrastructure (communication, transportation, energy, finance, and vital services) receives a sizeable volume of attention from researchers and policy analysts. This…
News
Edited by Michael EvansResearch assistance by Hannah Lildharrie
Washington D.C., July 9, 2018 – A ranch owned by former Colombian president Álvaro Uribe Vélez and other members of his family was the operational base of a deadly paramilitary group, according to…
Unredacted blog
FBI Tries to Put FOIA Lawsuits on Hold The FBI recently told a government attorney that it is beginning to file “Open America” stays in “all FOIA lawsuits going” forward. This means, according…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
This month the Joint Chiefs of Staff issued an update to Joint Publication 3-12, first published on February 5th 2013. The following changes are prominent:
Unredacted blog
Explore important historical events, like the epic Bay of Pigs disaster, through the lens of little-known or under-explored covert activities in the National Security Archive’s latest digital…
Unredacted blog
ISCAP Directed to Help with FRUS Volume The Interagency Security Classification Appeals Panel (ISCAP), which is housed at the U.S. National Archives and charged with – among other things – …
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
The Department of Defense, GSA, and NASA have issued implementation guidance for the ban on Kaspersky products mandated in the 2018 NDAA. This Cyber Brief includes that guidance, the relevant section…
Unredacted blog
NDAA Includes More Unnecessary B3 Exemptions The current version of the National Defense Authorization Act contains four proposed (b)(3) exemptions that will prevent the public from knowing…
News
A National Security Archive FOIA request filed in January of 2016 produced, in late 2017, a Department of Defense memorandum encouraging department heads and combatant commanders to beat the deadline…
Unredacted blog
The Archive’s New CyberWar Map The National Security Archive is thrilled to announce the launch of our interactive CyberWar Map. The Map is both a visualization of state-sponsored cyberattacks and an…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
The National Security Archive’s Cyber Vault Project is announcing the launch of the CyberWar Map. This resource is both a visualization of state-sponsored cyberattacks and an index of Cyber Vault…
Unredacted blog
Washington, DC—Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) took to the floor of Congress yesterday to voice his support for the international organized crime-fighting commission in Guatemala, CICIG. Leahy’s…
Unredacted blog
Nacropolis: Medellín Cartel “Financed” Senate Campaign of Former President Álvaro Uribe, Colombian Senators Told U.S. Embassy State Department cables released to the National Security Archive shed…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
The use of the internet by terrorist organizations has proven to be a vexing problem for policymakers.
Briefing Book 630
Translated by Anna Melyakova
Edited by Svetlana Savranskaya
Washington D.C., May 25, 2018 - The National Security Archive marks what would have been Anatoly Sergeyevich Chernyaev’s 97th birthday today with the publication for the first time in English of his…
Briefing Book 631
Edited by Michael Evans, Director, Colombia Documentation Project, National Security Archive
A Colombian senator told the U.S. Embassy in 1993 that the founders of the Medellín drug cartel “financed” the election campaign of then-senator Álvaro Uribe Vélez, according to…
Briefing Book 629
Edited by William Burr
Washington D.C., May 24, 2018 - The controversial Article VI of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, requiring "good faith" disarmament measures, arose from the "fear" by non-nuclear weapons states "of…
Unredacted blog
Luis Posada Carriles, CIA-Created “Frankenstein”, Dies at 90 CIA-trained Cuban exile and suspect in the 1976 Cuban jetliner bombing that killed all 73 people on board, Luis Posada Carriles, has died…
News
Edited by Lauren Harper
Washington, D.C., May 23, 2018 - CIA-trained Cuban exile and suspect in the 1976 Cuban jetliner bombing that killed all 73 people on board, Luis Posada Carriles, has died at the age of 90.
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
Israel’s national cyber proficiency goes largely unrecognized to those outside the field of cybersecurity. This week’s Cyber Brief highlights documents from the Vault related to Israel’s…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
On May 13, President Trump announced on Twitter that he was working with President Xi Jinping of China to assist the Chinese telecommunications company ZTE. This announcement surprised many in the…
Briefing Book 628
Edited by Malcolm Byrne
Washington, D.C., May 16, 2018 – Incoming National Rifle Association President Oliver North’s conduct during the infamous Iran-Contra affair featured a pattern of deliberate deception, a…
Unredacted blog
Fact-Checking Haspel’s Nomination Hearing Against the Declassified Record PolitiFact reached out to the National Security Archive’s CIA expert John Prados to help fact-check key claims Gina Haspel…
Briefing Book 627
Edited by Kate Doyle
Washington D.C., May 10, 2018—Five years ago today, one of the most celebrated human rights trials in Latin America came to a stunning conclusion when Guatemalan dictator, retired Army general, and…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence has released its report on the use of FISA orders and national security letters during calendar year 2017. This week’s Cyber Brief includes the…
Briefing Book 626
Edited by John Prados, Wendy Valdes, and Tom Blanton
Today’s nomination hearing for Gina Haspel to be CIA director provides an opportunity for the agency and Haspel to fill in the blanks on the CIA “black sites” and interrogation program. The…
Unredacted blog
Mulvaney Moves to Hide Important Consumer Complaint Database Mick Mulvaney, acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, is trying to take a database intended to hold financial…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
In light of significant recent developments on the Korean Peninsula, this week’s brief highlights North Korean cyber-operations. While Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons program has drawn the most attention…
News
Edited by Lauren Harper and Tom Blanton
The National Security Archive filed suit under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) against the CIA today in federal district court in Washington. The case seeks 12 specific cables from November and…
Briefing Book 625
By Tom Blanton and John Prados
The Trump administration’s nominee to be CIA director, Gina Haspel, personally supervised the torture of a CIA detainee in 2002 leading to at least three waterboard sessions, subsequently drafted the…
Unredacted blog
Gina Haspel’s CIA Torture File The Trump administration’s nominee to be CIA director, Gina Haspel, personally supervised the torture of a CIA detainee in 2002 leading to at least three waterboard…
News
Eddited by Michael Martelle
The National Institute of Standards and Technology has released its newest iteration of critical infrastructure cybersecurity framework. Today’s brief includes this document (Version 1.1), two…
Briefing Book 624
Edited by Peter Kornbluh
Washington D.C., April 20, 2018 – Back-channel diplomacy, conducted by an ABC News reporter named Lisa Howard resolved a potential crisis with Cuba in mid-1964, according to documents posted…
Unredacted blog
FOIA Federal Advisory Committee Recs Will Help Agency FOIA Shops Pass “Common-Sense Test” An incredulous Senator Chuck Grassley told the Justice Department Office of Information Policy’s Melanie…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
In March of 2018 the Inspector General for the Department of Justice issued a report on the FBI’s statements on its ability to break into the iPhone of Syed Rizwan Farook, one of the attackers killed…
Unredacted blog
By Michael R. Lemov* & Nate Jones** This article originally appeared in the Southwestern Journal of International Law, Volume 24. INTRODUCTION John Moss was an obscure Congressman from a newly…
Unredacted blog
Mexican investigators have obtained dramatic new leads on the 2014 forced disappearance of a group of 43 students from Ayotzinapa, Guerrero, according to an article in the Mexican newspaper Reforma.…
Unredacted blog
FOIA Shows Steep Rise in Military Aviation Crashes A six-month Military Times FOIA investigation shows an alarming trend – accident rates are soaring among the military’s manned warplanes.…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
Omnipresent in discussions of military use of cyber is how cyberspace fits in with the other warfighting “domains” of land, air, sea, and space. This question is vital to several issues facing future…
Briefing Book 623
Edited by William Burr
Washington, D.C., April 6, 2018 – Secret CIA interviews with East bloc scientists and technicians in the mid-1950s yielded invaluable insights into Soviet nuclear capabilities, according to recently…
Unredacted blog
Judge Finds No Legal Basis for Commerce Dept. Attempt to Charge Hundreds of Thousands for Two Data Sets A federal judge has ruled against the Commerce Department and in favor of reporter David…
Unredacted blog
To celebrate Sunshine Week 2018, the National Security Archive’s FOIA Project director Nate Jones talks to the Export Import Bank about the Freedom of Information Act from a requester’s perspective.…
News
The Cyber Vault has gathered below a compendium of basic documents from certain key cyber-related court cases. Court documents are often crucial to understanding the judicial history of legal…
News
President Trump signed the CLOUD Act into law on March 23, 2018, after the act passed through Congress – without a hearing or even a committee review – attached to an omnibus spending bill. As the…
Unredacted blog
NARA Publishes First Unauthorized Destruction Chart This week the U.S. National Archives published its first “unauthorized disposition of federal records” chart. The chart – which includes both open…
News
Michael Martelle
The United States Department of Justice recently announced the indictment of nine Iranian citizens for actions related to cyber-enabled theft of research, data, and intellectual property, a constant…
Disappearing Messaging Apps Are Subject of Ethics Training Thanks to PRA Suit: FRINFORMSUM 3/22/2018
Unredacted blog
Presidential Records Act Case Draws Attention to White House’s Disappearing Messaging Apps The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia’s Judge Christopher Cooper ruled against Citizens for…
Briefing Book 622
Edited by William Burr
Washington, D.C., March 21, 2018 – The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), widely accepted today as a global standard for international nuclear policy, was in fact a source of significant tension…
News
Edited by Malcolm Byrne and Michael Martelle
USCYBERCOM has put flesh on the bones of its skeletal strategy declaration initially released in February 2018. A month later, on March 23, the Command made public a new, 12-page “Command…
Unredacted blog
By Danielle Siegel The National Security Archive posted the most recently-reviewed version of the partially-declassified internal CIA history of the 1953 coup in Iran, “Zendebad, Shah!” this February…
Briefing Book 621
Compiled and edited by Svetlana Savranskaya and Tom Blanton
Washington, D.C., March 16, 2018 – Declassified documents from U.S. and Russian archives show that U.S. officials led Russian President Boris Yeltsin to believe in 1993 that the Partnership for Peace…
Briefing Book 620
Edited by Nate Jones, Tom Blanton, and Emma Sarfity
Washington D.C., March 15, 2018 - A US Foreign Service officer warned that “blatantly illegal” Congressional requests, including the use of a diplomatic pouch to smuggle gemstones and utilizing…
Unredacted blog
OIP’s Position Doesn’t Pass the “Common-Sense Test” This week the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on “The Freedom of Information Act: Examining the Administration’s Progress on Reforms and…
News
Edited by Maichael Martelle
High-profile U.S. government personnel changes are dominating the news this week. Possibly slipping under the radar for many is the pivotal, pending nomination of Lt. Gen. Paul Nakasone to head…
News , Rosemary Award
Edited by Nate Jones, Lauren Harper, and Tom Blanton
For further information, contact 202.994.7000
Washington, D.C., March 12, 2018 - The Secret Service and the White House have emerged as the dubious winners from the hard-fought competition for the National Security Archive’s infamous Rosemary…
Unredacted blog
New FOIA.gov for Sunshine Week The Justice Department just launched the new FOIA.gov to inaugurate Sunshine Week – the national celebration of open government and freedom of information.…
News , FOIA Audit
Audit compiled and written by Lauren Harper, Nate Jones, and Tom Blanton
Web publication by Rinat Bikineyev
For more information, contact Lauren Harper, Nate Jones, or Tom Blanton at 202.994.7000 or nsarchiv@gwu.edu
Washington, DC, March 8, 2018 – Two out of five federal agencies claimed that they were either unable or not required to respond to a targeted Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for…
Unredacted blog
Just over a year ago, a Freedom of Information Act release by the National Park Service demonstrably proved that the President of the United States was lying about the size of his inauguration crowd…
Briefing Book 619
Edited by Malcolm Byrne and Mark Gasiorowski
For more information contact:
Malcolm Byrne, 202/994-7000 or mbyrne@gwu.edu
Mark Gasiorowski, gasiorowski@tulane.edu
Recently declassified British and CIA documents provide new evidence on the Iran 1953 coup including on the role of Iranian clerics
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
The encryption debate pitting concerns of privacy and civil rights against concerns of law enforcement and national security has grown in significance in recent years. Today’s posting provides a…
Unredacted blog
Agencies Still Trying to Weaken the FOIA Federal agencies are still trying to restrict access to information and weaken the Freedom of Information Act in a variety of ways. With Sunshine Week – the…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
While election interference using the information space continues to demand attention, today’s posting examines questions related to the security of election systems themselves.
New to the Cyber…
Unredacted blog
Federal Response to Hawaii Missile False Alert Emails released through the FOIA give a detailed look at how the military responded to the false alert – sent by a Hawaii state official unaware…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
On Friday February 16th, 2018 the United States Justice Department indicted three organizations and thirteen Russian individuals for Conspiracy to Defraud the United States and Conspiracy to Commit…
Unredacted blog
By Jeffrey Kimball and William Burr On July 25, 1969, CIA Director Richard Helms notified Henry Kissinger about a “sensitive” report from an informant regarding remarks South Vietnamese President…
Unredacted blog
NARA OK’s CIA’s Damaging Records Retention Schedule The National Archives and Records Administration formally approved a CIA records retention schedule that allows the agency to destroy information…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
With Russian election hacking still in the news, today’s posting features a recent Estonian Foreign Intelligence Service publication that includes an in-depth analysis of Russia's strategy for using…
Briefing Book 618
Edited by Danielle Siegel and Malcolm Byrne
For further information, contact: Malcolm Byrne, 202/994–7000 or nsarchiv@gwu.edu
Washington, D.C., February 12, 2018 – A partially-declassified CIA history of the 1953 coup in Iran, released in late 2017, includes an-depth critique of how the agency approached the operation,…
Unredacted blog
9th Circuit Finds FBI Can Withhold Information on Surveillance of Muslim Communities The Ninth Circuit Court ruled last week that the FBI does not have to release thousands of pages of documents in…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
The January 2018 publication of a draft of the Trump administration’s Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) has raised questions about modern concepts of deterrence and the potential link between cyber and…
Unredacted blog
From Otis Pike to Devin Nunes – Vastly Different Goals Drove Congressional Efforts to Release Secrets If you’ve been watching television, YouTube, listening to radio, streaming on your monitor…
Briefing Book 617
Edited by William Burr
For more information contact William Burr: 202/994-7000 and nsarchiv@gwu.edu
US Government preoccupation with West German nuclear potential contributed to US nonproliferation policy in 1950s and 1960s
Unredacted blog
FOIA Shows Concern at HUD that Carson was Flouting Ethics Rules A FOIA request by the Washington Post won the release of a two-page memo voicing concerns from the Department of Housing and Urban…
News
After a six-year fight with the Department of Defense, the researchers at the National Security Archive obtained thousands of memos written by former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. NPR's Kelly…
Briefing Book 616
Edited by James E. David
For more information, contact: James E. David at davidjj@si.edu
or The National Security Archive at: 202-994-7000, nsarchiv@gwu.edu
Washington, D.C., January 31, 2018 – Like so many treasure hunters, beachcombers, and curio shoppers, U.S. military and intelligence operatives have for decades scoured the planet for access to…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
This report assesses the impact of multiple emerging technologies including advanced networking, quantum computing, autonomous learning, virtual/augmented reality, biometric identification and…
Unredacted blog
Rumsfeld Snowflakes Come in From the Cold On February 27, 2001, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld told Deputy Secretary Rudy de Leon that “The word ‘homeland’ is a strange word. ‘Homeland’…
News
Edited by Michael Martelle
Cyberspace strategy for Strategic Command
Briefing Book 615
Edited by Nate Jones
Washington D.C., January 24, 2018 - On the day before September 11, 2001, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld believed the gravest threat to American national security was Pentagon bureaucracy…
Unredacted blog
Federal Judge Hears Oral Arguments in Presidential Records Act Case Targeting Disappearing Messaging Apps Lawyers for the National Security Archive and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in…
Unredacted blog
Enrico Fermi was the first to create a nuclear chain reaction. He also coined what is now known as Fermi’s Paradox, a question asking, essentially: If, on the grand scale, the probability of…
News
By James G. Blight and janet M. Lang
Department of History
Balsillie School of International Affairs
University of Waterloo
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
Washington, D.C., January 11, 2018 - A new book by long-time colleagues of the National Security Archive, James G. Blight and janet M. Lang, offers a fresh exploration of the 1962 Cuban missile…
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Officials at State Dept. Joke FOIA Office is ‘Siberia’ “The FOIA office was always the punch line of a joke around here, as in: ‘They’ll send me to the FOIA office,’” this, according to State…
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Last year, the National Archives and Records Administration approved an outrageous request by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA). According to the National Archives Request for Records…
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Summits Book Wins Choice Award “Outstanding Academic Title 2017” The journal of the Association of College and Research Libraries, Choice magazine, has picked the National Security Archive’…
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For more information, contact:
Tom Blanton or Svetlana Savranskaya
nsarchiv@gwu.edu, 202 / 994-7000
Washington D.C., January 4, 2018 – The journal of the Association of College and Research Libraries, Choice magazine, has picked the Archive’s most recent book, by Svetlana Savranskaya and Thomas…