Hardback
National Security Lies
This thought-provoking book details the national security lies told by presidents of the United States throughout history, both to Congress and to the public. Tung Yin explains how current laws do not set up sufficient prevention measures and proposes legislative reform to regulate such lies.
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Critical Acclaim
More Information
This thought-provoking book details the national security lies told by presidents of the United States throughout history, both to Congress and to the public. Tung Yin explains how current laws do not set up sufficient prevention measures and proposes legislative reform to regulate such lies.
Utilizing a strong moral and legal foundation, Yin analyzes the difference between political, personal, and national security lies, and underlines the importance of checks and balances. In this book, he presents a legislative proposal which would allow for a contemporaneous record of every national security lie, free from post-hoc rationalization. Yin argues that keeping an operation covert is defensible, but that covering up government misconduct is not fit for a functioning democracy. Highlighting dozens of national security lies from Roosevelt through to the Biden administration, chapters provide a useful categorization of the lies by context and purpose, ultimately stimulating discussion about the appropriateness of national security lies in the USA’s constitutional structure.
National Security Lies is a useful resource for students and researchers in law and politics as well as terrorism and security law. It is also an invigorating read for political scientists focused on constitutional separation of powers, as well as historians and journalists focused on national security.
Utilizing a strong moral and legal foundation, Yin analyzes the difference between political, personal, and national security lies, and underlines the importance of checks and balances. In this book, he presents a legislative proposal which would allow for a contemporaneous record of every national security lie, free from post-hoc rationalization. Yin argues that keeping an operation covert is defensible, but that covering up government misconduct is not fit for a functioning democracy. Highlighting dozens of national security lies from Roosevelt through to the Biden administration, chapters provide a useful categorization of the lies by context and purpose, ultimately stimulating discussion about the appropriateness of national security lies in the USA’s constitutional structure.
National Security Lies is a useful resource for students and researchers in law and politics as well as terrorism and security law. It is also an invigorating read for political scientists focused on constitutional separation of powers, as well as historians and journalists focused on national security.
Critical Acclaim
‘In this provocative new book, Tung Yin explains why Jack Nicholson may have been right in A Few Good Men after all: ‟You can’t handle the truth!” Sometimes, Yin explains, it may be defensible for the government to conceal truths about national security from the public. Yin addresses the fundamental tension between the protection of national security and government transparency, and proposes legal and political mechanisms to police the line between the two. This will be a welcome addition to the libraries of all those who work, think, and write in the field of national security.’
–John Yoo, University of California at Berkeley, USA
–John Yoo, University of California at Berkeley, USA
