DigTruth 1971 is building the permanent record of the Bangladesh genocide — the declassified cables, survivor testimony, named perpetrators, and active legal proceedings that governments spent decades hoping no one would organise.
Built for researchers, journalists, legal advocates, survivors, and anyone who refuses to let three million dead become a footnote.
The event
On 25 March 1971, the Pakistani military launched Operation Searchlight — a systematic campaign to crush Bengali nationalist sentiment. Nine months of mass killing, organised sexual violence, and the displacement of ten million people followed.
U.S. diplomats on the ground called it selective genocide. Nixon and Kissinger called it a regional matter and continued arming Pakistan. The cables proving what they knew were classified for decades.
Operation Searchlight begins. Pakistani military targets Dhaka University, Hindu neighbourhoods, and Bengali intellectuals overnight.
Archer Blood sends the "Blood Telegram" — a formal dissent signed by 20 U.S. diplomats, calling the Pakistani action selective genocide.
CIA estimates 200,000 killed. Nixon and Kissinger continue arms shipments. The cables are classified.
Pakistan surrenders. Bangladesh is liberated. Genocide trials would not begin for another four decades.
Why this exists
Thousands of pages of declassified cables, CIA estimates, and diplomatic reports documenting the 1971 genocide are technically public — but buried across the U.S. National Archives, FOIA databases, and academic repositories.
Survivor testimony exists in oral history projects, tribunal transcripts, and family records. The names of victims — children, intellectuals, Birangona war heroines — are dispersed across documents that were never meant to be found together.
Legal proceedings are ongoing right now — universal jurisdiction cases in the UK, FOIA litigation in the U.S., ICT-BD trials in Bangladesh — with no single place tracking all of them. Justice moves slowly. It stops moving when no one is watching.
DigTruth 1971 is the place that watches. A permanent, searchable, citable record.
What the archive holds
Declassified under FOIA. Verified. Citable. Here.
Nixon–Kissinger Call: Tilt Toward Pakistan
Henry Kissinger, National Security Advisor
CIA Intelligence Estimate: Death Toll
CIA Directorate of Intelligence
Blood Telegram — Selective Genocide
Archer Blood, U.S. Consul General, Dacca
Sample from the archive. The full collection, drawn from FOIA releases and the U.S. National Archives, is searchable in the Evidence section.
What's inside
Nine months. The chronology, the mechanics, and what the world knew and chose to ignore. Drawn from declassified intelligence estimates, diplomatic reporting, and academic scholarship.
→Primary SourcesU.S. State Department and CIA cables released under FOIA — including the Blood Telegram — archived as searchable, citable primary evidence. The paper trail governments hoped would stay buried.
→RecordThose who risked everything to speak — and those who chose power over humanity — named plainly. Drawn from ICT-BD verdicts, declassified communications, and witness records.
→ArchiveIf you carry testimony, documentation, or evidence — the archive wants to hear from you. Submissions are reviewed and, where verified, added to the permanent record.
→Who it's for
Primary-source evidence with full provenance. Cross-searchable across cables, tribunal records, and named individuals — cite-ready from day one.
Declassified cables, CIA estimates, named perpetrators, active litigation — in one place. Verify, reference, and publish with confidence.
Live litigation register. Evidence base for universal jurisdiction applications. Built to be used in court, not just cited.
A permanent place where names are recorded and testimony is preserved. History will not be written by those who buried it.
“They did not disappear.
They were erased.”
Dedicated to the three million · 1971
DigTruth 1971 is in active development. Cables are being indexed, names verified, proceedings tracked.
If you carry testimony, documentation, or evidence — this is where it belongs.
Contact the Archive →