Triple Edge Resources

HIID received $50m in USAID funds to advise Russian privatisation and capital market development — a major corruption scandal emerged when USAID found programme directors had invested in the very Russian entities they were advising. Largest US technical assistance programme to Russia.

Overview of the Balcerowicz Plan — the Polish “shock therapy” programme designed with Jeffrey Sachs and implemented from January 1990; the template for post-communist economic transformation across the region.

Philip Short’s definitive biography of Putin — comprehensive account of his KGB formation, rise through St Petersburg politics, and consolidation of power.

Reuters profile of Vladimir Potanin yielding to Deripaska in the four-year Norilsk Nickel dispute — documents the internecine wars between oligarchs and the Kremlin’s role as ultimate arbiter.

History of Ukraine under Nazi occupation 1941–44 — essential background for understanding Ukrainian national trauma and post-Soviet political identity.

Oral history of Nazi genocide in Belarus — documents the deep historical trauma underlying Belarusian national identity and post-Soviet political vulnerability.

History of the 1945 Yalta Conference — documents the territorial and political settlements that shaped the Cold War division of Europe and its eventual collapse.

Academic study of the Russian mafia’s origins, structure and international operations — covers the transition period when organised crime and the state merged.

Account of the intersection of organised crime, Freemasonry and the emerging Russian mafia in the post-Soviet period.

Investigates how kleptocratic wealth from Russia, Kazakhstan and other post-Soviet states has been systematically laundered through British institutions.

History of Soviet scientific institutions — documents the collapse of the research infrastructure after 1991 and the brain drain that followed.

Early account of East-West business relationships during détente — documents the commercial infrastructure that predated and enabled the post-1989 oligarch networks.

Account of the destruction of Yukos and the imprisonment of Mikhail Khodorkovsky — documents Putin’s reassertion of state control over strategic assets.

Accessible narrative history of Russia from medieval times to Putin — companion to the BBC television series.

Academic analysis of Russia’s political and economic trajectory from Brezhnev through Putin — covers shock therapy, the oligarch formation, and the rejection of Western models.

29-page SECRET National Intelligence Estimate (NIE 11/12-9-88, May 1988, Copy 490; declassified 2013). Produced by CIA, DIA, NSA, and State/Treasury intelligence. The NIE assesses Soviet policy toward Eastern Europe under Gorbachev as of May 1988 — 18 months before the Wall fell. Heavily redacted but represents the IC’s formal estimate of whether Gorbachev’s reforms would spread to the satellites, what the Soviets would tolerate, and where the pressure points were. Critical context: this is what US intelligence believed about Soviet intentions in Eastern Europe just over a year before 1989 — useful for understanding both what was foreseen and what was missed.

NSA Electronic Briefing Book No. 238 (December 2007) marking the 20th anniversary of the Washington Summit (December 1987) and INF Treaty signing. Previously secret Soviet Politburo records and declassified American transcripts of the summit between Reagan and Gorbachev. Covers the negotiations that produced the first treaty to actually eliminate an entire class of nuclear weapons — intermediate-range missiles — from European deployment. Key context for understanding what Gorbachev was offering and what Reagan was prepared to accept, and why the summit succeeded where Reykjavik had failed. Companion to the Reykjavik documents already in the library.

NSA Electronic Briefing Book No. 320 on the Washington/Camp David summit of May-June 1990. Key findings from secret Soviet, American and German files: serious domestic challenges to Gorbachev; Bush tries to help with trade agreement but arms cuts are off the table; caution in Washington and reaction in Moscow prevent real progress; summit driven by domestic politics on both sides. Context: the summit was the pivotal moment when the US and Soviet sides were negotiating the terms of German unification while the Two Plus Four process was running in parallel. Documents the gap between summit atmospherics and the substantive state of the relationship.

11-page NSA document (marked CRITICAL23) on Russian assertions about the Two Plus Four Treaty and what commitments were or were not made about NATO expansion during German unification negotiations in 1990. Critical document for the contested historiography of the “not one inch” assurances — whether they were legally binding, what the documentary record shows, and what Russia was told versus what was subsequently agreed. Companion to the NSA “Not One Inch” briefing book collection already in the library. Documents the Russian legal and political claims about the 1990 undertakings that became central to the pre-Ukraine diplomatic confrontation.

3-page memorandum to Boris Yeltsin from the RSFSR parliamentary delegation on their visit to NATO headquarters in Brussels, June–July 1991 — months before the Soviet collapse. The delegation told NATO that Russia “does not intend to create its own armed forces” but wants proportionate influence over Union armed forces. They urged NATO to make “a clearer, more detailed and definitive statement about the need for a gradual decrease in the military efforts” of the organisation — arguing this would strengthen democratic forces in Russia fighting for defence budget cuts. Critical statement: “Expanding NATO to new members, as we emphasized, would be seen negatively in the USSR and the RSFSR. Our statements were met with understanding by our interlocutors.” This is the Russian parliament itself warning NATO against expansion — and being told NATO understood — in July 1991.

NSA Briefing Book No. 422 (April 2013) compiling the Thatcher-Gorbachev conversation records. Key revelation: Thatcher told Gorbachev directly that neither Britain nor France wanted German reunification and wanted it prevented. On nuclear abolition: Thatcher and Gorbachev disagreed sharply — she resisted his proposals to eliminate nuclear weapons, seeing nuclear deterrence as essential to stability. On economic reform: Thatcher offered support and shared her own experience. Landing page / briefing book context for the primary source conversation records in this collection.

5-page record of conversation between Gorbachev and Thatcher in Moscow, 23 September 1989. Thatcher advises Gorbachev on economic reform from her own experience — “I had to wait for two years before the first results. All that time I was criticized.” Gorbachev on the right opposition to perestroika: they advocate “temporarily bring back the old methods” — but he rejects this as a dead end. On nationalities: Gorbachev acknowledges the Soviet federal structure was “only formal” — “in reality everything worked like in a typical unitary state — from the top down.” The Politburo session six weeks later (3 November) shows the pressure had intensified significantly. Companion document to the NSA Briefing Book 422 on Thatcher-Gorbachev conversations (agreement against German unification) already in the library.

5-page transcript of President George H.W. Bush’s press conference remarks and Q&A on the relaxation of East German border controls, 9 November 1989. Bush notably measured and cautious in tone — “I welcome the decision… if it is implemented fully” — deliberately not triumphalist to avoid destabilising Gorbachev. When pressed by reporters on his lack of visible excitement, Bush: “I’m not an emotional kind of guy.” The contrast with how the moment was received publicly is itself historically significant. Documents the careful US management of the most consequential night of the Cold War’s end.

13-page record of conversation between Chancellor Helmut Kohl and Solidarity leader Lech Wałęsa, 9 November 1989 — the day the Berlin Wall fell. Kohl speaks of opening “a new chapter in the German-Polish relationship” and brings an 80-person business delegation demonstrating strong German commercial interest. The conversation captures the exact moment of historical rupture: Kohl and Wałęsa meeting in Warsaw as the Wall opens in Berlin. Critical context for the German-Polish dimension of 1989 and for understanding why Gorbachev’s Politburo feared a German-Soviet rapprochement that excluded the West.