The first is by George Packer, writing in Prospect: Some of the instances are more subtle than others, but spread over the several hundred pages of this book, they reveal a mind that has liberated itsel...

Earlier today I explained why the President almost certainly disregarded Section 1035 of the 2014 NDAA when he swapped the GTMO detainees for Bergdahl.  The President probably disregarded another statute...

Marty Lederman tries mightily to interpret Bergdahl’s release as consistent* not inconsistent with the wishes of Congress, but I don’t think he succeeds. Section 1035 of the 2014 NDAA authorizes the Def...

Rahul Sagar is Associate Professor at Yale NUS and the author of the terrific and timely Secrets and Leaks: The Dilemma of State Secrecy (reviewed favorably by Steven Aftergood on Lawfare and Eric Posner...

Some wonderful (and quite NDAA-relevant) news, here reported by Talking Points Memo:  WASHINGTON (AP) — The only American soldier held prisoner in Afghanistan has been freed and is back in U.S. custod...

Let’s give Edward Snowden his due: He did himself a lot of good in his interview with NBC’s Brian Williams, which aired last night. He presents well, coming across as earnest, thoughtful and intelligent....

The ODNI Tumblr site today posted April 2013 e-mail correspondence between Edward Snowden and the NSA's Office of General Counsel---the only such correspondence NSA says it has found.

One of the nice things about major presidential speeches is that they often are occasions during which reporters separately get to grill unnamed "senior administration officials" for clarification.  So i...

Gabriel Schoenfeld, author of the indispensable Necessary Secrets, has a new essay in Hoover’s Emerging Threats series entitled “Secrecy, Leaks, and Selective Prosecution.”  He offers this description of...

Michael Kinsley, in his review of Glenn Greenwald’s book, made the following claims about leaks of national security secrets: The question is who decides.

Scooping his own speech tomorrow at West Point, President Obama today announced his decision on future US force levels in Afghanistan.  Assuming that the winner of the Afghan presidential election will i...

I am struck by the circumspection of the American press in not revealing the name of the CIA Station Chief in Afghanistan whom the Obama Administration inadvertently disclosed over the weekend.  That nam...