Garwin's notebooks are a veritable who's who of contemporary geopolitics. Throughout his work with and through dozens of educational, consulting, governmental and nongovernmental organizations, Garwin notes encounters with countless business leaders, advisors, and heads of state, including George Soros (4/15/1997), Bob Dole and Pat Buchanan (1/19/1998), Benjamin Netanyahu (5/5/1999), John Bolton (2/26/2001), Paul Wolfowitz (3/16/2001), Condoleezza Rice (5/12/1999, 1/15/2002), and Bill Clinton and Barack Obama (5/23/2010). In fact, he uses his notebooks as scrapbooks, recording names, addresses, and phone numbers, to-do lists, web URLs and IP addresses, and a trove of ephemera, including newspaper clippings, business cards, post-it notes, and various sketches, diagrams, and formulas. Interspersed are glimpses into his personal life, such as visits to the theater (e.g. Romeo & Juliet, 5/4/1988) and personal accounts (3/15/1990, 2/6/1997, 9/3/1997).
 
While these notebooks will captivate a range of scholars, they may be divided into three core research interests: the culmination of the Cold War and diplomatic efforts towards nuclear non-proliferation
 
Middle East military engagement, including the 1990-91 Gulf War, 9/11, and 2003 Iraq invasion
 
and personal computing between the years of 1990-2010.
 
Garwin was deeply engaged in nuclear non-proliferation, particularly via the first Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty. In an 8/29/1989 entry, he observes "Soviets are rational about their own survival," and adds that "Progress in START dominates all other operations" (9/19/1990). After the signing of the treaty, Garwin continues to follow Russia with interest: he records notes from the Secretary of Defense (3/25/1992), a meeting with James Baker (5/1/1993), a "seismic false alarm in Russia" (12/12/1997), and personal concerns over nuclear missile defense systems (3/17/1999). In later entries, he regularly references the revised treaty, including the geopolitical constraints of Dmitry Medvedev with regards to Vladimir Putin (10/19/2009).
 
Garwin also offers insider accounts of U.S. Middle East policy between 1991 and 2003. In the last month of the Gulf War, he writes, "oil well fires: how to put out fires in Kuwait…oil wells are set by demo charges" (1/10/1991). Several months later he adds, "Kuwait not sitting well with people of US" (4/5/1991). Ten years later, he records internal divisions between cabinet members favoring coalition-building and unilateral action (9/19/2001), and, soon after, notes a "new policy of preemption" (6/13/2002). Garwin himself appears resistant to military intervention. In a 11/29/2002 entry, for example, he presents "problems" with the Iraq program.
 
Finally, Garwin's notebooks evince a sustained interest in computer technology. He records a computer purchase in one of his earliest notebooks (4/28/1988), meets with a UPS executive about barcode technology (12/22/1993), includes ephemera related to a Columbia University text retrieval project (6/27/1993), and even alludes to GPS technology (12/14/1997). His twenty-first century entries include a New York Times news clipping on space weapons (5/8/2005), a note about Google Voice (10/19/2009), and a reference to Google's self-driving car (11/3/2010).

With the exception of the Blumberg diaries, the Richard Garwin notebooks are perhaps the foremost collection to provide personal insights into late twentieth and early twenty-first century media, technology, and geopolitics in the APS archives. Spanning 1988-2011, these 57 notebooks offer an aerial view of Garwin's career and professional networks at consulates, consulting firms (especially Rand and Booz Allen), research universities, and prominent organizations such as the United Nations, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), National Security Council (NSC), and the National Science Foundation (NSF). Over the course of his illustrious career, Garwin crossed paths with nearly every leader in contemporary geopolitics, and researchers investigating post-Vietnam American politics, the end of the Cold War, nuclear non-proliferation, globalization, and various Middle East military interventions, will be richly rewarded. For those interested in the history of computing, his notebooks also record key developments of the past three decades, from the rise of the personal computer to the proliferation of GPS technology to the emergence of autonomous vehicles.
 
Garwin's notebooks are a veritable who's who of contemporary geopolitics. Throughout his work with and through dozens of educational, consulting, governmental and nongovernmental organizations, Garwin notes encounters with countless business leaders, advisors, and heads of state, including George Soros (4/15/1997), Bob Dole and Pat Buchanan (1/19/1998), Benjamin Netanyahu (5/5/1999), John Bolton (2/26/2001), Paul Wolfowitz (3/16/2001), Condoleezza Rice (5/12/1999, 1/15/2002), and Bill Clinton and Barack Obama (5/23/2010). In fact, he uses his notebooks as scrapbooks, recording names, addresses, and phone numbers, to-do lists, web URLs and IP addresses, and a trove of ephemera, including newspaper clippings, business cards, post-it notes, and various sketches, diagrams, and formulas. Interspersed are glimpses into his personal life, such as visits to the theater (e.g. Romeo & Juliet, 5/4/1988) and personal accounts (3/15/1990, 2/6/1997, 9/3/1997).
 
While these notebooks will captivate a range of scholars, they may be divided into three core research interests: the culmination of the Cold War and diplomatic efforts towards nuclear non-proliferation
 
Middle East military engagement, including the 1990-91 Gulf War, 9/11, and 2003 Iraq invasion
 
and personal computing between the years of 1990-2010.
 
Garwin was deeply engaged in nuclear non-proliferation, particularly via the first Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty. In an 8/29/1989 entry, he observes "Soviets are rational about their own survival," and adds that "Progress in START dominates all other operations" (9/19/1990). After the signing of the treaty, Garwin continues to follow Russia with interest: he records notes from the Secretary of Defense (3/25/1992), a meeting with James Baker (5/1/1993), a "seismic false alarm in Russia" (12/12/1997), and personal concerns over nuclear missile defense systems (3/17/1999). In later entries, he regularly references the revised treaty, including the geopolitical constraints of Dmitry Medvedev with regards to Vladimir Putin (10/19/2009).
 
Garwin also offers insider accounts of U.S. Middle East policy between 1991 and 2003. In the last month of the Gulf War, he writes, "oil well fires: how to put out fires in Kuwait…oil wells are set by demo charges" (1/10/1991). Several months later he adds, "Kuwait not sitting well with people of US" (4/5/1991). Ten years later, he records internal divisions between cabinet members favoring coalition-building and unilateral action (9/19/2001), and, soon after, notes a "new policy of preemption" (6/13/2002). Garwin himself appears resistant to military intervention. In a 11/29/2002 entry, for example, he presents "problems" with the Iraq program.
 
Finally, Garwin's notebooks evince a sustained interest in computer technology. He records a computer purchase in one of his earliest notebooks (4/28/1988), meets with a UPS executive about barcode technology (12/22/1993), includes ephemera related to a Columbia University text retrieval project (6/27/1993), and even alludes to GPS technology (12/14/1997). His twenty-first century entries include a New York Times news clipping on space weapons (5/8/2005), a note about Google Voice (10/19/2009), and a reference to Google's self-driving car (11/3/2010).