United States and Canada

Washington, D.C., July 26, 2022 – 75 years ago, President Harry S. Truman signed the National Security Act into law, marking a major restructuring of the U.S. government’s military and intelligence apparatus in the years following World War II. U.S. strategists saw the act as essential for enabling America’s future global mission of protecting and advancing Western interests.  The law’s architects could not have foreseen how this fundamental restructuring would revolutionize U.S. policy making in later years, especially after earth-shaking events like 9/11.

Washington, D.C., July 14, 2022 – For decades starting in the late 1940s, influential internal U.S. government analyses provided civilian and military leaders with staggering estimates of likely casualties in a nuclear conflict with the Soviet Union, but the sheer scale of those projected fatalities kept the reports classified until after the end of the Cold War. 

Washington, D.C., June 9, 2022 – As the House Select Committee tonight launches its televised hearings into the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, the National Security Archive marks the event by posting former President Donald Trump’s “Shadow Call Log,” a new visual aid that helps fill in the blanks from the famous seven-and-a-half hour gap in Trump’s official call records, a gap that may be critical in the panel’s attempt to prove criminal intent.

Washington, DC, March 20, 2015 – For decades the Central Intelligence Agency has conducted a major signals intelligence (SIGINT) effort that often placed it in competition with other members of the Intelligence Community, according to a significant collection of declassified documentation posted today by the National Security Archive (www.nsarchive.org).

Washington, D.C., May 29, 2012 - A secret exercise in 1986 by a U.S. government counter-terrorist unit uncovered a host of potential problems associated with disrupting a nuclear terrorist plot in the United States. Declassified documents released under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and posted today by the National Security Archive offer the first detailed public look at the inner workings of the agencies, military units and other U.S. entities responsible for protecting the country from a terrorist nuclear attack.

Washington, D.C., March 16, 2022 - Former President Donald J. Trump has the dubious honor of winning the National Security Archive’s infamous Rosemary Award for worst performance in open government in 2021; a remarkable achievement considering Trump was out of office for much of the year. During his time in office, Trump was widely reported to have both destroyed records and prevented their creation in the first place.

Washington, D.C., March 11, 2022 - The National Archives and Records Administration’s (NARA) budget has remained stagnant in real dollars for nearly thirty years. At roughly $320 million dollars when adjusted for inflation, its budget represents 0.0076% of the federal budget — this according to a National Security Archive Audit released today to mark the beginning of Sunshine Week.[1]  

Washington, D.C., February 9, 2022 – The National Security Archive and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) have formally requested that the Justice Department and FBI investigate former President Donald Trump’s mutilation and destruction of presidential records as possible violations of federal criminal law.

Washington, D.C., January 6, 2022 - On the first anniversary of the January 6, 2021, attack on the United States Capitol, a review of government materials by the National Security Archive’s Cyber Vault project shows the double-edged impact of social media during the episode.  While the Internet played a large role in the planning and execution of the riot, as well as creating various cybersecurity risks, it also enormously facilitated subsequent investigations.  At the same time, its use in surveillance by government agencies has been