Throughout history we've been taught that our government has always defended freedom and Democracy and that we're the "Leader of the Free World," and traditional media rarely questions this, while helping provide the propaganda to make it seem like it's true. Traditional media often reports on some of the problems with this claim, but only for brief periods of time, while repeating propaganda glorifying our country over and over again. But, of course there have been numerous occasions where even our own government has disclosed information raiding doubts about this, even if they only discuss it for short periods of time, like the Church Committee report, including the first and most notable book on assassinations, where they admit they tried to assassinate at least five foreign leaders.
Four of these five cases including Patrice Lumumba, Rafael Trujillo, General Rene Schneider and Ngo Dinh Diem were all assassinated, although somehow the official conclusion is that there was inadequate evidence to prove that the CIA was responsible for them. The fifth one was Fidel Castro; and in this case the only reason there's no doubt that they failed in their attempts to assassinate him is that he didn't die until long after the Church Committee Report, and eight years after retiring, and he died of natural causes at the age of ninety. The report also indicated that there were plots to assassinate President Sukarno of Indonesia and "Papa Doc" Duvalier of Haiti, but didn't investigate these two thoroughly; and there were many more coups or other attempts to intervene in countries all over the world investigated by other researchers, but most of these weren't sanctioned by the government and may not involve official omissions; although some like the coups in Iran in 1953 and Gautama in 1954 were so obvious there were eventually some admissions from declassified documents or other official statements. However, the fact that they tried to assassinate these leaders, whether you believe their claims that there's no evidence that they succeeded or not, is only a small fraction of the damage they did to these countries, since our governments imposed tyrannical regimes on these governments after the deaths which resulted in wars, death squads and much worse. And the most common justification for supporting assassinations never happens in real life.
We often hear claims about how many lives could have been saved if someone had assassinated Hitler and stopped the holocaust, which someone did try, but it failed. In reality assassination has never been used to transfer power to a Democratic government that is better than tyrannical regimes, and the ones our government participated in certainly aren't exceptions, although the French and Russian Revolutions could have been exceptions if they weren't replaced by wild mobs that were eventually replaced by new tyrants just as bad, if not worse than the old tyrants. In all fairness, a couple of the possible targets, Rafael Trujillo and Ngo Dinh Diem, for assassination discussed in the Church Report were tyrants that were abusing their people badly, but this wasn't the reason they were overthrown; they were overthrown because they no longer served our governments, or the wealthy corporations that our government answer to, best interests. In both cases these tyrants terrorized their own people and didn't have popular support, but for years, since they acted in our governments best interests, our government backed them and helped them stay in power. The same went for Saddam Hussein, Manuel Noriega, and many other tyrants that our government backed for years, before turning on them.
There were also many other cases where they overthrew Democratically elected leaders, like Patrice Lumumba and Salvador Allende, who were both covered in the Church Report, although they focused on the assassination of General Rene Schneider instead of Salvador Allende, who was either killed or committed suicide, depending on which version you read; but even if it was suicide, it never would have happened if not for the coup on the same day. And, of course there were many other examples not covered in the Church Report where the CIA or US government overthrew Democratically elected governments, or governments that at least had much more popular support from their own people than the puppets installed by the United States, including the 1953 Iranian coup d'état 1954 Guatemalan coup d'état and the 1973 Chilean coup d'état and more recently the 2009 Honduran coup d'état and the 2019 Honduran coup d'état, which Wikipedia refers to as 2019 Bolivian political crisis.
These are only a small fraction of examples where the United States has supported coups in other governments, including many that were democratically elected, but they establish a pattern of behavior. Numerous other researchers that went into more details about CIA coups or lies to start wars have gone much further than the Church Committee Reports including William Blum who wrote "Killing Hope" 1995/2003 and "Rogue State" 2000 which probably covers many more interventions than any other researcher, although many other researchers go into more detail, including Naomi Klein author of "The Shock Doctrine The Rise Of Disaster Capitalism" 2007 which describes how shock tactics were used to impose an economic ideology largely inspired by Milton Friedman which was imposed on over half a dozen countries by suppressing Democracy and often creating death squads, Vincent Bevins author of "The Jakarta Method" 2020 who describes similar methods in Indonesia, Brazil and several other countries, and many more some of which I'll list below. But, in many cases, the government or traditional media often denies these claims, even when there's overwhelming evidence, and refers to those that take it seriously as conspiracy theorists. However, the Church Committee Reports are official government documents based on hearing and testimony from people they consider credible, showing a pattern of behavior that is similar to the claims they try to portray as conspiracy theories.
In the Iran, Guatemala and Chile coups traditional media and the government denied they were involved for years, if not decades, and often dismissed those who disagreed as conspiracy theorists, even when there was overwhelming evidence for their participation in the coups. But eventually they admitted they were involved in these coups, showing the so-called conspiracy theorists, were right all along, but they did so in brief disclosures, which only got minimal media attention, and they virtually never associated these coups with activities that happened as an indirect result of the coups, including death squads, civil war, the Iranian Revolution that put the Shah in power, and much more. Furthermore, when these admissions were made the government and media seems to have quickly forgotten them after a brief period of time and rarely ever mentioned them again, while some high profile pundits may try to treat them as conspiracy theories again, and those that know better in the media remain silent and don't correct them.
The more recent coups in Honduras and Bolivia, however, are still in the stage where considering them a United States sponsored coup is still being described as a conspiracy theory, and there are still few if any government admissions to their involvement, except for a few politicians in the minority, like Bernie Sanders, who openly admitted the Bolivian crisis was a coup, although he didn't go so far as to say it was supported by our government, even though it almost certainly was. If you go to the talk pages for the Bolivian coup which they refer to as a "political crisis" you'll find there are numerous people arguing to have it changed to a "coup" and on the talk page for Honduras, which is referred to as a coup, there are people claiming it's not a coup, and that it should be called a "political crisis." Alternative sources similar to the ones exposing the coups in Guatemala and Iran are providing much more evidence, which I suspect will eventually lead to admissions that both these coups were real and they had support from our government and the corporations they serve, but for now they're creating an enormous amount of propaganda to confuse people not familiar with more reliable sources for news.
But if you read the Church Committee Report and other government reports, as well as more reliable sources, it will be clear that intentionally distorting the truth is routine for our government and the media.
Throughout the Report there are numerous people saying that when they discussed assassination the often used circumlocutious language which often didn't quite get to the point; and they often admitted that this was because they were concerned about plausible deniability, if records were leaked or someone blew the whistle. This is part of the reason why many people were able to say they felt assassination was authorized at the highest level, which was assumed to be the president. For example the following excerpt, referring to Richard Bissell, is one of many times high ranking officials used this term:
DDP Richard Bissell was “almost certain” that he was informed about the Dulles cable shortly after its transmission. He testified that it was his “belief” that the cable was a circumlocutious means of indicating that the President wanted Lumumba killed.’ (Bissell, 9/10/75., pp. 12,33,64-65) p.16
There was also testimony that someone referred to as Joseph Schneider (sometimes spelled Scheider) was sent to the Congo to deliver poisons that could be used to assassinate Lumumba, but numerous credible sources including Susan Williams author of "White Malice" and even Wikipedia have reported this was actually Sidney Gottlieb, the leader of MKULTRA, which is another admission made by the government including many declassified documents, one report is PROJECT MKIULTRA, THE CIA'S PROGRAM OF RESEARCH IN BEHAVIORAL MODIFICATION, posted on the government web site, as well as testimony that many more were destroyed, show massive efforts, however effective, to try to learn how to brainwash people, and also included research into attempted assassination. The Church Report mentions this in the following excerpt showing that both Gottlieb and Dulles were involved in the attempted assassination, although they claim there's inadequate evidence to show they were ultimately responsible for Lumumba's assassination:
.... Scheider’s mission to the Congo was preceded and followed by cables from Headquarters urging the “elimination” of Lumumba transmitted through an extraordinarily restricted “Eyes Only” channel-including two messages bearing the personal signature of Allen Dulles.
The toxic substances were never used. But there is no evidence that the assassination operation was terminated before Lumumba’s death. There is, however, no suggestion of a connection between the assassination plot and the events which actually led to Lumumba.‘s death.’ p.19
If you read the complete report on assassinations you'll find an enormous amount of testimony saying they tried to assassinate most of these leaders, including Lumumba, but when it comes to the actual assassination they claim there's no evidence they were involved; however the report is full of many plans to cover it up, and one of them is to involve others or arrange for them to handle it, probably allies, which is ultimately what happened in the successful assassinations, including Lumumba, as the following excerpts partly show:
The only suggestion that the CIA may have been involved in the capture of Lumumba by Mobutu’s troops after Lumumba left U.N. custody on November 27, is a PROP cable from the Station Officer to Tweedy on November 14. The cable stated that a CIA agent had learned that Lumumba’s
POLITICAL FOLLOWERS in Stanleyville desire that he break out of his confinement and proceed to that city by car to engage in political activity .... Station has several possible assets to use in event of breakout and studying several plans of action. .... p.48
The chain of events revealed by the documents and testimony is strong enough to permit a reasonable inference that the plot to assassinate Lumumba was authorized by President Eisenhower. Nevertheless, there is enough countervailing testimony by Eisenhower Administration officials and enough ambiguity and lack of clarity in the records of high-level policy ‘meetings to preclude the Committee from making a finding that the President intended an assassination effort against Lumumba.
It is clear that the Director of Central Intelligence, Allen Dulles, authorized an assassination plot. There is, however, no evidence of United States involvement in bringing about the death of Lumumba at the hands of Congolese authorities in Katanga.
Strong expressions of hostility toward Lumumba from the President and his national security assistant, followed immediately by CIA steps in furtherance of an assassination operation against Lumumba, are part of a sequence of events that, at the least, make it appear that. Dulles believed assassination was a permissible means of complying with pressure from the President to remove Lumumba from the political scene. p.51-2
Their claim that the only suggestion that the CIA was involved in the capture of Lumumba was limited to a small portion of the story, and the preceding pages from the Report already indicate that even if they weren't involved in his final capture, they had made similar plans to remove him from power, or assassinate him, as indicated by the claim that Allen Dulles authorized an assassination and there's a strong possibility that Eisenhower knew and approved of it. Susan Williams author of "White Malice: The CIA and the Covert Recolonization of Africa" 2021 provides much more detail; even if we rely only on the Church Report, once you read the whole thing, it's far fetched to completely deny the possibility that Eisenhower or the CIA was definitely not involved in assassinations, and they don't quite say it, instead they say they don't think it was proven. But even if you accept that claim, it's only because they failed to cause assassinations, not because they didn't try, and there are many other brazen admission that they routinely try to intervene in one government after another in undemocratic ways.
And some of their attempts to overthrow governments they opposed, along with many of the things they tried in MKULTRA experiments, some mentioned in the report cited above, are right out of the Twilight Zone, like the following plan by Edward Lansdale, who had a history of using superstitions to manipulate people in the Philippines:
"I'll give you one example of Lansdale's perspicacity. He had a wonderful plan for getting rid of Castro. This plan consisted of spreading the word that the Second Coming of Christ was imminent and that Christ was against Castro (who) was anti-Christ. And you would spread this word around Cuba, and then on whatever date it was, that there would be a manifestation of this thing. And at that time — this is absolutely true — and at that time just over the horizon there would be an American submarine which would surface off of Cuba and send up some starshells. And this would be the manifestation of the Second Coming and Castro would be overthrown * * *
Well, some wag called this operation — and somebody dubbed this — Elimination by Illumination." (Parrott, 7/10/75, pp. 49, 50) p.142
Edward Lansdale already had a reputation for strange activities like this, including a story about how they studied the beliefs of the Huks in the Philipines, killed one of their people, puncturing their neck and draining their blood to make it look like they were killed by a vampire. This story was widely told from many sources, including "Killing Hope" 1995/2003 but the original source is Edward Lansdale himself, and he admitted to other insane activities as well, which should raise questions since he was kept in the military for a couple more decades. According to his Biography The Unquiet American p.73 he claimed that he convinced policymakers to approve his plans in the Philippines by threatening to lock them in a room and throw grenades at them; which means either they put up with this absurd behavior, or kept a habitual liar in power, and many other reports indicate that he was irrational, one way or another.
And the list of support for overthrowing governments around the world, including some Democratically elected ones like Chile is also long, and the Church Report clearly admits Nixon wasn't concerned about defending elected leaders when they challenged his authority about how to run their own country, not that any of these third world countries ever challenged our right to run our country as we chose, as indicated in the following excerpt from the Church Report:
On September 15, 1970, President Richard Nixon informed CIA Director Richard Helms that an Allende regime in Chile would not be acceptable to the United States. The CIA was instructed by President Nixon to play a direct role in organizing a military coup d’etat in Chile to prevent Allende’s accession to the presidency. p.225
Our so-called Democratic government has been overthrowing one democracy after another for decades, if not longer; and as I showed in several articles, including Conclusive Proof Showing Democracy In The USA Is A Lie! our government doesn't even respect the will of the people or Democracy in our own country. This article shows dozens of polls, mostly related to fiscal issues one way or another, and in almost all of them there's a large majority of the public that support one side of the issue, like Medicare for All, protecting the environment, ending wars based on lies, etc. and campaign donors on the other side, with the entire political establishment taking the side of campaign donors. They're able to get away with this since the media only covers candidates that support the Wall Street agenda, ensuring they're the only ones that can win.
And there's little reason to believe this has ever stopped, even though there were numerous official statements claiming otherwise; in fact, there have been numerous assassinations that weren't even hidden in recent years, and many more deaths for other reasons that aren't intentional assassinations. Recent assassinations include Anwar al-Awlaki who was killed under orders from Barack Obama and his sixteen year old son who some claim was collateral damage, although it's hard to be sure, as reported in Obama Killed a 16-Year-Old American in Yemen. Trump Just Killed His 8-Year-Old Sister. 01/30/2017 and his eight year old sister may have also been considered collateral damage, and the Assassination of Qasem Soleimani also by Donald Trump and the most recent high profile one was Biden’s Assassination of al-Qaeda Leader Ayman al-Zawahiri which Was Illegal 08/06/2022 according to credible sources.
Many peiople may think some of these assassinations are justified, like Ayman al-Zawahiri who was a close associate of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, or Osama bin Laden himself, however there's no guarantee we've been given and accurate description of their activities; in fact we almost certainly have not. For starters, like many other of our enemies, Osama bin Laden was once our ally when he fought in Afghanistan against the Russians, and we helped instigate him by placing troops in Saudi Arabia and repeatedly attacking Muslim countries. Not that I'm defending Osama bin Laden, even if he wasn't actually responsible for 9/11; but when we use this as a precedent against our enemies they may feel justified to use this tactic against us. Furthermore, there should be no doubt that the killing of Anwar al-Awlaki's son, Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, was outrageous, and the assassination of Anwar al-Awlaki himself should be considered almost as outrageous, if not as outrageous, especially when you consider his teachings and that they were in response to constant attacks on Muslim countries by our government, and didn't escalate towards advocating violence, assuming our governments claims about him were true, until after escalating violence against Muslims. Furthermore, even if you agree with the leaders of our side this is still leading to a constant state of war and a violation of the right to a fair trial assuming he did something wrong. Anwar al-Awlaki was captured in Yemen and held without a trial.
Once they start taking away other people's basic rights, no matter how much we may not like some of those other people, it may be a matter of time before they take our rights away, and in some cases they already have.
This won't stop as long as we allow a fraction of one percent control powerful institutions, including the media so they can pre-select all out candidates for public office by simply refusing to give honest people media coverage ensuring they never get the name recognition they need to get elected.
The following are additional sources or related articles:
AARC Public Library - Church Committee Reports p.26
The CIA has a long history of helping to kill leaders around the world 05/05/2017
Portraits in Oversight: Frank Church and the Church Committee
Sketches of Five Cited as Alleged Targets 11/21/1975
Pentagon Blocks Sharing Evidence of Possible Russian War Crimes With Hague Court 03/08/2023
Pentagon accused of blocking effort to hand Russia war crimes evidence to ICC 03/08/2023
Biden Administration Splits on Prosecuting Russia for War Crimes in Ukraine 03/15/2023
The Lords of Chaos 03/19/2023 The politicians and shills in the media who orchestrated 20 years of military debacles in the Middle East, and who seek a world dominated by U.S. power, must be held accountable for their crimes.
The Ngo Dinh Diem Coup
Secrets: a memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon papers by Daniel Ellsberg 2003
Spider's web: the secret history of how the White House illegally armed Iraq by Alan Friedman 1993
White Malice: The CIA and the Covert Recolonization of Africa 2021 by Susan Williams
