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Frank Wisner's photo covered with official seals.

The Making of a Cold War Spy

The life and work of Frank Wisner, one of the CIA’s founding officers, offers us a portrait of American intelligence’s excesses.
by Adam Hochschild via The Nation on March 11, 2025
Brown Berets protesting white supremacy in San Diego in 2017.

The CIA Illegally Spied on Puerto Rican and Mexican American Activists for Decades

And is probably still at it. As newly released classified documents confirm activists’ long-held suspicions, the disclosures should also alert us to current dangers.
by Roberto Lovato via The Nation on January 16, 2025
The bombing of Baghdad during the US invasion of Iraq, March 21, 2003.

A Terrible Mistake

The long history of confusions, misconceptions, and miscalculations in the relationship between the US and Iraq, from 1979 to 2003.
by Charlie Savage via New York Review of Books on August 29, 2024
Hands manipulating the earth like a Rubik's cube.

When the C.I.A. Messes Up

Its agents are often depicted as malevolent puppet masters—or as bumbling idiots. The truth is even less comforting.
by Daniel Immerwahr via The New Yorker on June 10, 2024
The Chesapeake 1000 crane at Tradepoint Atlantic in Sparrows Point, Md., on Friday.

A Crane with Cold War CIA Origins Will Help the Baltimore Bridge Cleanup

The Chesapeake 1000, which can lift 1,000 tons, arrived in Baltimore on Friday. Decades ago, it helped build a ship for a CIA mission to recover Soviet secrets.
by Dan Rosenzweig-Ziff, Praveena Somasundaram via Retropolis on March 31, 2024
Refugees board an Air America plane in Da Nang, Vietnam, on Jan. 23, 1968.

Pensions for the “Deep State:” Republicans Push Benefits for the CIA’s Secret Vietnam-Era Airline

Marco Rubio and Glenn Grothman want to recognize the contribution of Air America, the CIA airline that supported secret wars in Laos and Cambodia.
by Ken Klippenstein via The Intercept on January 22, 2024
The crime scene. A woman's body lies in the middle of a clearning next to the river, surrounded by coroners and police

Bad Shot, Mary

The mistress of JFK, there was a lot more than wealth, whiteness, and femininity to make Mary Pinchot Meyer a target of murder.
by Devin Thomas O’Shea via Apocalypse Confidential on November 22, 2023
Collage of women's profiles, CIA reports, and Osama bin Laden, by Joan Wong.

The Women Who Saw 9/11 Coming

Many of the CIA analysts who spotted the earliest signs of al-Qaeda’s rise were female. They had trouble getting their warnings heard.
by Liza Mundy via The Atlantic on November 18, 2023
Photographs of Lee Harvey Oswald and of George Joannides.

What Really Happened to JFK?

One thing’s for sure: The CIA doesn’t want you to know.
by Scott Sayare via Intelligencer on November 9, 2023
Congo Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba, hands bound, sits in the bed of an army truck under guard of Congolese soldiers on Dec. 2, 1960, one day after his arrest by troops loyal to Col. Joseph Mobutu.

Open the Congo Files and Face Up to What the CIA Did

When Congo gained independence during the Cold War, secret U.S. actions undermined its young democracy. It’s time to make up for that.
by Stuart A. Reid via Washington Post on October 24, 2023
Frank Church.

The Senator Who Took On the CIA

Frank Church and the committee that investigated the US intelligence agencies.
by Adam Hochschild via The Nation on September 5, 2023
Museum display of Nixon and Kissinger on the phone, a telephone, and the transcript of their call.

Chile: The Secrets the US Government Continues to Hide

Fifty years after the military coup that brought down Salvador Allende and installed Pinochet as dicator, top secret US documents still need to be declassified.
by Peter Kornbluh via The Nation on August 31, 2023
Mexican president José López Portillo at a press conference on May 19, 1980.

Declassified Documents Uncover Yet Another Mexican President’s CIA Ties

Recently declassified documents have exposed former Mexican president José López Portillo as a CIA asset.
by Fernando Herrera Calderón via Jacobin on June 13, 2023
CIA director William Colby, left, and President Gerald Ford, right.

How the Murder of a CIA Officer Was Used to Silence the Agency’s Greatest Critic

A new account sheds light on the Ford administration’s war against Sen. Frank Church and his landmark effort to rein in a lawless intelligence community.
by James Risen, Thomas Risen via The Intercept on May 9, 2023
George W. Bush on the day of the 9/11 attacks, which were used to publicly justify the 2003 invasion of Iraq. But by many accounts, the plan to invade Iraq had already started taking shape months before.

George W. Bush Misrepresented Our Work at CIA to Sell the Iraq Invasion

Two former CIA officials weigh in: "It's time to call him what he is: 'A liar.'"
by Mattathias Schwartz via Insider on March 20, 2023
Lee Harvey Oswald in Police Custody

Decades Later, The JFK Assassination Still Keeps Some Secrets

A helpful way to think about the JFK assassination, and political assassinations more generally, is to be more Dragnet about it than discursive.
by Noah Kulwin via Defector on January 25, 2023
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), left, and Sen. Frank Church (D-Idaho).
partner

The Church Committee Was Nothing Like Republicans’ New Investigation

In practice, aggressive congressional investigations of the intelligence community require consistent levels of public support.
by KC Johnson via Made By History on January 18, 2023
Drawing of a CIA agent and a Judy sex doll.

Trickster, Traitor, Dummy, Doll

How the CIA tried to trick the Soviets with sex dolls (but ultimately got screwed).
by Triple Dream Comics via The Nib on January 10, 2022
A woman walks next to a colorful mural of Patrice Lumumba.

Probing the Depths of the CIA’s Misdeeds in Africa

The CIA committed many crimes in the early days of post-independence Africa. But is it fair to call their interference “recolonization”?
by Alex Park via Africa Is A Country on October 15, 2021
An illustration featuring a man smoking a cigarette.

When the CIA Was Everywhere—Except on Screen

Hollywood was just fine avoiding all portrayals of the Central Intelligence Agency for years after the agency's founding in 1947.
by Simon WIllmetts, Matthew Wills via JSTOR Daily on April 15, 2021
Nelson A. Rockefeller examining one of the paintings to be hung in the museum's new building.

How MoMA and the CIA Conspired to Use Artists to Promote American Propaganda During the Cold War

The Museum of Modern Art was among several institutions that aided the CIA in its propaganda efforts, according to the new book ArtCurious.
by Jennifer Dasal via Artnet News on September 24, 2020
Artistic graphic of two newcaster superimposed on the image of protesters in a Guatemalean city

The (Literally) Unbelievable Story of the Original Fake News Network

In Guatemala, the CIA hired an American actor and two radio DJs to oust a president.
by Sylvia Brindis Snow, Shane Snow via Narratively on August 27, 2020
Seal of the CIA nestled against a background of modern art.

Was Modern Art Really a CIA Psy-Op?

The number of MoMA-CIA crossovers is highly suspicious, to say the least.
by Lucie Levine, Jonathan Harris, Christine Sylvester, Russell H. Bartley, Frank Ninkovich via JSTOR Daily on April 1, 2020
Joe Biden in front of a podium

Joe Biden’s Love Affair With the CIA

Biden’s assistance to William Casey, Reagan’s CIA director, and the rehabilitation of the intelligence service in general has had tragic consequences.
by Daniel Boguslaw via The American Prospect on October 10, 2019

Operation Ajax

How the CIA’s first attempt at regime change nearly failed.
by Bridey Heing via Lapham’s Quarterly on November 26, 2018
The inside of the CIA museum.

Notes from the Attic

Displaying the material history of the CIA.
by Mahan Moalemi via Cabinet on November 7, 2018
Luis Posada Carriles

Death of a Cold War Supervillain

Anticommunist militant Luis Posada Carriles, who popped up throughout Latin America over the past half-century, won’t be missed.
by Hilary Goodfriend via Jacobin on June 11, 2018
The April 1966 cover of “Ramparts," featuring a caricature of Madame Nhu dressed as a Michigan State University cheerleader

The University That Launched a CIA Front Operation in Vietnam

A Vietnamese politician and an American academic led Michigan State University into a nation-building experiment and pulled America deeper into war.
by Eric Scigliano via Politico Magazine on March 25, 2018

Obama's Legacy of Impunity for Torture

Obama's desire to “look forward” on torture has enabled Trump to look backward in his appointment of a new CIA director.
by Adam Serwer via The Atlantic on March 14, 2018

Did you know the CIA _____?

Errol Morris and the hot cold war.
by Malcolm Harris via n+1 on March 7, 2018
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