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.
Nov 5, 2018 | Briefing Book
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 not to miss...
Oct 29, 2018 | Briefing Book
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...
Oct 18, 2018 | Briefing Book
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 future...
Oct 16, 2018 | Briefing Book
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 political...
Oct 11, 2018 | Briefing Book
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.
Oct 5, 2018 | Briefing Book
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...
Oct 4, 2018 | Briefing Book
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...
Oct 2, 2018 | Briefing Book
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...
Sep 25, 2018 | Briefing Book
Bill Clinton-Boris Yeltsin Discussions of the Nuclear Football
Yeltsin: “Let Us ... Get Rid of the Nuclear Footballs” – “No Need to Drag Around ... These Briefcases”
Clinton Emphasized the Football’s...
Sep 24, 2018 | Briefing Book
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...
Aug 15, 2018 | Briefing Book
U.S.
Aug 13, 2018 | Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., August 13, 2018 – U.S.
Aug 10, 2018 | Briefing Book
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...
Aug 8, 2018 | Briefing Book
Washington, D.C., August 8, 2018 – U.S.
Aug 1, 2018 | Briefing Book
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,...
Jul 24, 2018 | Briefing Book
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.
Jul 9, 2018 | Briefing Book
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...
May 25, 2018 | Briefing Book
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...
May 25, 2018 | Briefing Book
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 documents posted...
May 24, 2018 | Briefing Book
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...