He held a Henry Chauncey Jr. '57 Postdoctoral Fellowship at Yale and was a fellow of the Remarque Institute at New York University.

McMeekin's 2011 book The Russian Origins of the First World War was initially praised by the popular press as an insightful revisionist study for its use of Tsarist documents.

[13] It also received positive reviews from historians Simon Sebag Montefiore, Geoffrey Wawro, and Antony Beevor who called it "...both original and refreshing, written as it is with a wonderful clarity.

[13][15][16] Similarly, historian Mark Edele noted that the book misquotes Stalin's speeches, and included sources refuted decades beforehand, or long ago shown to be fraudulent.

"[17]Nina L. Khrushcheva observed that "weighing in at some 800 pages, Stalin’s War compiles an impressive amount of historical information.