The Central Intelligence Agency began at a time the country needed it most. They have saved the lives of millions around the world. Throughout history, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has served a key role in acquiring national intelligence for the security purposes of the Untied States of America.
The CIA came forth on September 18, 1947, by President Harry S. Truman through the National Security Act (“About CIA” 1). The agency was created to replace the National Intelligence Agency. The CIA’s purpose was to aid other intelligence agencies in the country.
In the middle of 1946, the Central Intelligence Agency Act laid the foundations and placed strict guidelines on responsibility of the agency’s officials. Until 1955, the CIA did not have a central headquarters, but in August of that year President Eisenhower funded forty-six million dollars for the construction of a headquarters for the CIA (“Key Events” 1). In March of 1991 the
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The best example of one of those operations is The Bay of Pigs. “On 1 January 1959, Cuban President Fulgencio Batista fled Havana, and a guerilla leader named Fidel Castro Ruz assumed power on the island” (Monje 29). Castro formed an alliance with the Soviet Union and turned Cuba into a communist country. During this time period, the CIA was already concerned and began gathering as much information about Cuba as they could. The CIA formed a task force under the control of Jacob Esterline to train and arm a group of Cuban exiles to invade Cuba, and they planned to rally the Cubans to join the revolt (31). Castro was tipped off of the invasion so rebels lost the element of surprise, which ultimately led to the loss of the invasion. At the Bay of Pigs, at least 20,000 Cuban troops met the 1,500 Cuban exiles and the Cuban troops suppressed the attack. Castro used the attack to down the United States and to expose the country as a threat to Cuba
Taubman, Philip. “Death of a Spy Satellite Program.” Public Administration: Concepts and Cases. Stillman, Richard Joseph. Boston, MA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2010. 361-369.
Russian leader Nikita Khrushchev was affiliated with Castro, and the two countries made many military decisions together. As Kennedy and the United States tried to stop Cuba and Russia from becoming a threat to the world, an invasion was planned out and executed. The results were a disaster. The Bay of Pigs invasion was the largest military mistake ever made by the United States government and the CIA in the 20th century and brought America to the brink of war with Cuba and Russia. The Bay of Pigs invasion was not a quick decision, many hours of meetings and conferences occurred before President Kennedy gave permission for the attack.
COINTELPRO was necessary because of the great social unrest, individuals posed threats to society, and created operations that were beneficial to the United States. COINTELPRO was founded by the FBI in 1956 as a government program for counterintelligence. The FBI director, J. Edgar Hoover, was instrumental in the program’s creation. After the age of McCarthyism, best known as the Second Red Scare, Hoover was concerned about the institution of Communism gaining popularity within the United States. This gave way to the creation of COINTELPRO.
Prados, John. Safe for Democracy The Secret Wars of the CIA. Chicago, IL: Ivan R Dee, Publisher, 2006.
Kennedy took office in January 1961 and he trusted the CIA and his advisors, and in April 1961 the exiles were on their way to Cuba. The plan failed terribly with Castro anticipating the attack. Cuba held the exiles hostage, and Kennedy was confronted with the issue of using American forces to liberate the hostages. Kennedy’s hawk advisors and the CIA all urged the use of American forces, but Kennedy was resilient against it.
In the beginning, Jenkins explores the sources of the CIA’s decision to participate with Hollywood from the 1990s and forward. The main reason is a want to counter its essentially negative portrayal in Hollywood programs. The first Chapter summarizes this image by showing how CIA agents have always been interpreted as assassins, dishonest leaders, unprotected by their hierarchy, morally bankrupt, and ineffective. Jenkins asserts nonetheless that other reasons were just as if not more conclusive: ‘...
We once again hear problems with governmental agency overly using their power and taking away rights of citizens unjustly. With these problems comes societies weary eye over the government, should society trust them or fear them. With internal problems also come international problems. Oil runs the world and the United States can’t have small oil producing countries have to much power over them. However if these countries wanted they could slow the world down and create huge problems. This is what happened in the nineteen seventies, when a few of the OPEC countries decided that they wanted more money. This caused many problems in the United States and other countries; here in the US the auto industry had to change their thinking on car and engine size. With the CIA committing illegal acts against the public and OPEC raising the price for oil, the United States had many problems to face at this time. The government caused these to happen, they allowed the CIA to go on unchecked in their performance and activities.
Aldrich Ames was one of the most notorious spys in United States history, single handily crippling the United States spy network in the Soviet Union, and compromising hundreds of Intelligence Operations around the world. Ames’ impact on the national security of the United States was devastating and the ramifications of his actions can still be felt today in the Intelligence Community. This paper will provide details into the background and the events surrounding Ames’ espionage and subsequent arrest for treason.
The FBI's size and jurisdiction during the second World War greatly increased and included intelligence matters abroad. At the end of World War II, and the introduction of the Atomic Bomb, the FBI began working on background security investigations for the White House and other government agencies, as well as internal security for the executive branch of the government. In 1945, the FBI raided a magazine company that was particularly interested in the Far East and discovered a multitude of classified state documents. Around this time, Americans feared the invasion of Communism, which triggered the FBI to investigate people within the U.S. whom were suspected of sabotage and undermining Democracy in the name of Communism.
The CIA had turned around a little when President Eisenhower had appointed Allen Dulles the new director of the CIA. Allen Dulles had made cover operations the secret ...
to collect and analyse information on threats to US security as well. to perform other functions, which was by undermining the enemy by covert means of a. During the Truman presidency the CIA powers were rarely used, but once Eisenhower came to office this attitude changed and the The CIA expanded its operations greatly under the influence of Eisenhower. The biggest success of the CIA is said to have been the overthrow of the left-wing government in Guatemala, 1954 and also the overthrow of the left-wing government of Allende in Chile, 1973.
...e community have had conflicting views and opposing agendas. Lack of cooperation and communication between intelligence agencies; such as the FBI and the CIA refusing to share information prior to the terrorist attacks of 2001, resulted in limited information and failure on the part of the intelligence community and policy decisions regarding US safeguards against terrorist.
knowledge of the CIA and who would later would be involved in the clash between the
The CIA is one of the U.S. foreign inteligency agencies, responsible for getting and analyzing information about foreign government, corporations, individuals, and reporting such information to the various branches of the U.S. government. The State Department's Bureau or inteligence and reserch and theDefense Department'sdefense inteligence agency comprise the other two. Its headquarters is inLangley, Virginia, across the Potomac River from D.C. The Agency, created in 1947 by President Harry S. Trueman, is a descendant of the Office of stratigic Services(OSS) of World War 2. The OSS was dissolved in October 1945 but William J. Jonavan, the creator of the OSS, had submitted a proposal to President Roosevelt in 1944. He called for a new organization having direct Presidential supervision, "which will procure intelligence both by overt and covert methods and will at the same time provide intelligence guidance, determine national intelligence objectives, and correlate the intelligence material collected by all government agencies." Despite strong opposition from the military, the State Department, and the FBI, Truman established the Central Intelligence Group in January 1946. Later under the National Security Act of 1947, the National Security council and the Central Intelligence Agency were established.
The tropical island of Cuba had been an object of empire for the United States. Before the Missile Crisis, the relationship between Castro and the US were strained by the Bay of Pigs occurrence in 1961. This was where counterrevolutionary Cubans were American funded and tried to invade Cuba and overthrow Castro. However, the counterrevolutionaries failed. Castro then found an alliance with the Soviet Union and an increase of distrust that Castro had on the US. On January 18, 1962, the United States’ Operation Mongoose was learned. The objective would be “to help the Cubans overthrow the Communist regime” so that the US could live in peace. Consequently, Castro informed the Soviet Union that they were worried about a direct invasion on Cuba, thus longed for protection against th...