In the early 1970s, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) undertook a covert operation, code-named AZORIAN, to raise a sunken Soviet submarine 16,500 feet from the floor of the Pacific Ocean using a commercial vessel known as the Glomar Explorer. The effort was only partially successful. When word of the mission eventually leaked out, the CIA … Continue reading “Neither Confirm Nor Deny” Before the Glomar Explorer
In mid-February 1967, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Chicago Tribune published articles revealing that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had been supporting various international youth groups and student organizations with financial assistance. As a Cold War measure, the U.S. Government, through the CIA, had been funding those private organizations to help … Continue reading Foreign Policy Fallout From CIA Funding Disclosures, 1967
An earlier post discussed the Department of State reaction to the publication of The Invisible Government by David Wise and Thomas Ross. That book was one of the first “exposés” of Central Intelligence Agency activities. As the 60s wore on, critical books appeared in ever greater numbers, some penned by former CIA officers. One of … Continue reading The Department of State Reacts to Public Revelations of Intelligence Activities, 1969
Today’s post was written by Lynn Nashorn, textual processing and accessioning archivist at the National Archives at College Park. Called many names from the Iran-Contra Scandal to the McFarlane affair (after National Security Advisor under President Ronald Reagan Robert McFarlane) to simply Iran Contra, the Iran-Contra affair involved United States officials illegally funding Central American … Continue reading The Iran-Contra Affair: Faded in Time, but not Forgotten
Today's post was written by Christen Brown, Archives Technician in the Special Media Division at the National Archives in College Park, MD. April 17 to April 20, 2021 marks the 60th Anniversary of the Bay of Pigs Invasion when Cuban refugees banded together to invade Cuba and overthrow the Castro regime. When the Cuban Revolution … Continue reading The Ex-Men Did It: 60th Anniversary of the Bay of Pigs Invasion
Today’s post is written by David Langbart, an Archivist in the Textual Records Division at the National Archives at College Park. The book The Invisible Government, published by Random House Publishers in 1964, is one of the first major exposés of the activities of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The book was written by the … Continue reading The Department of State Reacts to Public Revelations of Intelligence Activities, 1964
Today’s post is written by David Langbart, an Archivist in the Textual Records Division at the National Archives at College Park. Recently, I located the following 1951 Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) report analyzing Soviet nylon stockings: When I first saw this, I was amused that the CIA would spend time on what appears to be … Continue reading Window into the Soviet Union, 1951/Introduction to CREST
Today’s post was written by Dr. Greg Bradsher, Senior Archivist at the National Archives in College Park. Recently I went to look in the stacks in the National Archives at College Park, MD for some information in the records of the Army’s Adjutant General (Record Group 407) about the relationship between the War Department’s Military … Continue reading President Truman Creates the National Intelligence Authority and the Central Intelligence Group, January 22, 1946: The Documents
By Jason Clingerman In June 1954, Guatemalan president Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán was overthrown in a coup that was orchestrated by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and carried out by the Guatemalan exile Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas. Arbenz was targeted in large part because of his land reform policies that affected U.S. companies, namely the United … Continue reading The CIA in Guatemala
Today's post is written by James Rush, a supervisory archivist in the textual processing unit at Archives II. On June 8, 2011, the National Security Agency announced that it had declassified and released to the National Archives and Records Administration over 50,000 pages of historic records relating to cryptology and the history of intelligence gathering. … Continue reading After 200 years, a glimpse into The Art of Secret Writing
