Washington, D.C. February 7, 2017 – CIA covert aid to Italy continued well after the agency’s involvement in the 1948 elections – into the early 1960s – averaging around $5 million a year, according to a draft Defense Department historical study published today for the first time by the National Security Archive at The George Washington University.
Washington, D.C., November 25, 2016 – Exactly thirty years ago, President Ronald Reagan announced to the nation – after weeks of denials – that members of his White House staff had engaged in a web of covert intrigue linking illicit U.S. support for a guerrilla war in Central America with an illegal and politically explosive arms-for-hostages bargain with the Islamic Republic of Iran. The revelation quickly led to a new phrase – “Iran-Contra” – which became synonymous with political hubris, government incompetence, and dishonesty in the public sphere.
The National Security Archive, working with our partners at ProQuest, just published a new compilation of documents on the President’s Daily Briefs (PDBs) from the Kennedy and Johnson administrations that is now available online. This collection of PDBs (PDBs are Top Secret CIA digests of essential intelligence presented every morning to the president that were previously […]
Washington DC, July 1, 2016 - Fifty years ago on July 4, 1966, Lyndon Johnson signed the landmark Freedom of Information Act while vacationing at his Texas ranch. But the event does not even appear in LBJ’s Daily Diary, which is the first indication that something was amiss on the Pedernales.
At 4:00 PM today President Barack Obama signed the FOIA Improvement Act of 2016 (S. 337) into law. The bipartisan, bicameral bill – introduced by Senators John Cornyn, Chuck Grassley, and Patrick Leahy, and supported by Representatives Jason Chaffetz and Elijah Cummings in the House – will improve FOIA in several meaningful ways and reflects many of the findings of the National Security Archive’s FOIA audits and litigation.
Washington DC, June 13, 2016 – Today the National Security Archive celebrates the Freedom of Information Act’s upcoming 50th birthday by highlighting 50 of the year’s biggest news stories made possible by FOIA. The diverse front-page news shows how FOIA can impact human rights, government accountability, and even what you eat.
Washington, D.C., March 2, 2016 – Marking the 85th birthday of former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, the National Security Archive at George Washington University (www.nsarchive.org) today posted a series of previously classified British and American documents containing Western assessments of Gorbachev starting before he took office in March 1985, and continuing through the end of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Washington D.C., February 26, 2016 – With covert support from the CIA, James Donovan, who is the central figure in the Oscar-nominated movie, “Bridge of Spies,“ conducted the first secret negotiations ever with Fidel Castro, according to White House and CIA records posted today by the National Security Archive--providing a little-known historical foundation for President Obama’s forthcoming trip to Cuba.
Washington, DC, December 18, 2015 - On the first anniversary of the historic breakthrough in U.S.-Cuban relations, the National Security Archive announced that the book, Back Channel to Cuba: The Hidden History of Negotiations Between Washington and Havana, has been released in Spanish under the title, Diplomacia Encubierta con Cuba: Historia de las Negociaciones Secretas Entre Washington y La Habana. The book was published last week in Mexico by Fondo de Cultura y Economica.
Washington, D.C., December 11, 2015 – The Clinton administration came to office in 1993 determined to restore the United States as the preeminent global protector of the environment, but saw its hopes for a major climate treaty run aground on a series of international and domestic political and procedural setbacks, according to a selection of declassified and previously unpublished records posted today by the nongovernmental National Security Archive, based at The George Washington University (www.nsarchive.org).