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sep 18, 1947 - The CIA is establish in the USA

Description:

"By 1948, The newly established Central Intelligence Agency CIA had neither the capability nor the authority at the time to conduct covert operations: such was the relative innocence of the era. But with the state department’s encouragement, it stepped into the breach….it quickly organised secret financing for the Christian Democrats and other non-communist parties in Italy, while supporting a letter-writing campaign by Italian-Americans to friend and relatives there" (Gaddis 2006, p. 162).

"The National security council expanded the role of the CIA to include:
“propaganda, economic warefare; preventive direct action, including sabotage, anti-sabotage, demolition and evacuation measures; subversion against hostile states, including assistance toundeground resistance movements, guerrillas and refugee liberation groups, and support for indigenous anti-communist elements in threatened countries of the free world.”
All of these activities were to be conducted in such a way that if uncovered the US government could plausibly disclaim any responsibility for them." (Gaddis, 2006, p. 162-163)

"The number of CIA employees involved in covert operations grew from 302 in 1949 to 2812 in 1952
It was financing ostensibly independent radio stations broadcasting to those countries, as well as labour unions, academic conferences, scholarly journals, and student organisation – some of them inside the US. It was cooperating with the Air Force to fly reconnaissance missions that routinely violated airspace of the USSR and other communist states. It was experimenting with toxins and mind-control drugs. It was mounting counter-insurgency operations in the Philippines. And, working with local supporters and exile groups, it would successfully overthrow the left-leaning government of Mohammed Mossadegh in Iran in 1953, and of Jacobo Arbenz Guzman in Gitemal in 1954, both of whom had nationalised foreign-owned properties in their respective countried, causing Washington to suspect them of sympathy for communism." (Gaddis 2006, p. 164)

Added to timeline:

Date:

sep 18, 1947
Now
~ 78 years ago