Briefing Books

“Briefing Books” are one-stop resources covering a full range of topics in U.S. foreign policy. Containing from 5 to 100+ documents, each briefing book features an introductory essay, individual document descriptions, related photo or video content, plus links for further reading.
Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Environmental Security Sherri Goodman
Climate Change and the Military: Examining the Pentagon’s Integration of National Security Interests and Environmental Goals under Clinton
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., May 26, 2022 – The Pentagon’s role in U.S. environmental policy expanded during the Clinton presidency as the Pentagon became a more active player at international climate change…
Chernyaev diary 1982
The Chernyaev Diary, 1982—"The run up to perestroika"
| Briefing Book
Washington D.C., May 25, 2022 –The National Security Archive marks what would have been Anatoly Sergeyevich Chernyaev’s 101st birthday today with the publication for the first time in English of his…
East German soldiers
The Secret War for Germany: CIA’s Covert Role in Cold War Berlin Explored through Recently Declassified Documents
| Briefing Book
Washington, DC, May 11, 2022— The Central Intelligence Agency aggressively pursued clandestine efforts to undermine East German morale at the height of the Cold War, recently declassified CIA records…
Republics of Myth book jacket
Republics of Myth: National Narratives and the US–Iran Conflict
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., April 14, 2022 – After weeks of uncertainty over ongoing multilateral nuclear negotiations with Iran, it is still an open question whether they will actually produce a signed…
AnAir Force photo of an earlier version of the B61 nuclear bombthat has been the mainstay of NATO’s nuclear stockpile. (Photo from Hill Air Force Base Website)
NATO’s European Nuclear Deterrent: The B61 Bomb
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., March 28, 2022 – Russia’s increasingly grueling invasion of Ukraine has given rise to chilling talk over whether the conflict might go nuclear, reminding the world that atomic…
Mt. Hebo AFS, OR with the FPS-24 under a Radome in 1966
Colonel Odom’s “Chilling” Four A.M. Phone Call
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., March 24, 2022 – At four in the morning on 3 October 1979, Colonel William Odom, military assistant to national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, received a phone call from the…
U-2 in Nevada
CIA U-2 Collection of Signals Intelligence, 1956-1960
| Briefing Book
CIA U-2 Collection of Signals Intelligence, 1956-1960 By James E. David*
Memorial's statement against the war
The “Liquidation” of Memorial
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., March 3, 2022 – While Russian troops invaded Ukraine this week, the Russian Supreme Court turned down the appeal by the legendary human rights group Memorial against the “…
Cyber Brief: The NSA's Cryptolog
| Briefing Book
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)…
A crop of Kennedy's exec order
Cuba Embargoed: U.S. Trade Sanctions Turn Sixty
| Briefing Book
Washington D.C., February 2, 2022 – On the eve of the 60th anniversary of President John F.
US ambassadors
U.S. Ambassadors to Russia Interviewed
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., January 25, 2022 – The National Security Archive updates today the publication last year of interview transcripts from eight former U.S.
Convening of a COP session at the Kyoto climate change conference in late 1997. (Photo credit: UN image, Frank Leather)
National Security and Climate Change:
  Behind the U.S. Pursuit of Military Exemptions to the Kyoto Protocol
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., January 20, 2022 – Pentagon demands for military exemptions during the 1997 Kyoto climate negotiations posed a substantial challenge for the Clinton administration both internally…
The New York Times December 26, 1991, front page.
The End of the Soviet Union 1991
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., December 21, 2021 – On Christmas Day 30 years ago, the last leader of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev, stepped down and the hammer-and-sickle flags over the Kremlin were…
Kosygin Luncheon
Strategic Stability and Instability during the Middle Years of the Cold War
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., December 10, 2021 – As the United States engages in strategic stability talks with Russia and seeks similar talks with China, it is worth looking back to the origins of the concept…
NATO Logo overlaid with code
BALTIC GHOST: Supporting NATO in Cyberspace
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., December 6, 2021 — This week, as NATO concludes its annual flagship cyber exercise, Cyber Coalition 21, newly declassified documents detail American collaboration with NATO allies…
NATO Expansion – The Budapest Blow Up 1994
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., November 24, 2021 – The biggest train wreck on the track to NATO expansion in the 1990s – Boris Yeltsin’s “cold peace” blow up at Bill Clinton in Budapest in December 1994 – was the…
The Walter Rodney Murder Mystery in Guyana 40 Years Later
| Briefing Book
Washington D.C., November 12, 2021 (Updated February 3, 2022) – More than four decades after the murder of Guyanese scholar-political activist Dr.
The Abraham Lincoln (SSBN-602) cut through the Atlantic Ocean in this undated photo. (U.S. Navy photo posted on NavSource, original provided by Pelican Harbor Submarine Veterans)
"How Much is Enough?": The U.S. Navy and "Finite Deterrence"
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., October 14, 2021 – The Pentagon’s plan for a trillion-dollar spending program to build new ICBMs, submarines, and bombers has met pushback from critics in and out of Congress who…
The paramilitary known as “Macaco” (Carlos Mario Jiménez) is arrested upon his arrival in Colombia on July 20, 2019. (Source: Colombia Attorney General’s Office)
Declassified Documents Key to Judgment Against Colombian Paramilitary
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., October 4, 2021 – Declassified State Department and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reports that “acknowledge the long-standing relationship between [Colombian] state security…
khalilzad-baradar
Newly Published Documents Cast Doubt on Claims Taliban Will Give Up al Qaeda
| Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., September 23, 2021 - The Taliban will not – and perhaps cannot – contain al Qaeda, despite hopeful United States government assurances that the Taliban will be an