![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | Archive 4 | Archive 5 |
Isn't keeping foreign prisoners hidden from the red cross a war crime?
I'm not trying to debate I'm just trying to find out the facts before I post anything.
--grazon 21:18, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
The problem with the "foreign prisoners" classification is that the prisoners have to actually be claimed by a foreign country. If no foreign country claims them, then they remain classified as "detainees" and do not fall within the Geneva Convention protections. The assumption is that these men were not acting at the behest of or in the interest of their country of origin and so the appropriate foreign ambassador has not filed a petition on their behalf. (unsigned January 2006)
The CIA has been criticized for being a front for Bavarian Intelligence, and that this German influence began when the Nazis were first allowed to work for the CIA in te 1940s. The CIA's torture, assassinations, secret policing, brainwashing, political influence, and other crimes are said to be a continuation of the same characteristic Nazi methods. The question is whether the CIA controls the Nazis or have the Nazis control the CIA through gradual influence. The NSA and MJ-12 are said to be similar fronts. There is a widespread belief that the Bavarians or Germans partially run a 'secret government' within the U.S. governement, kept secret through the CIA's non-disclosure status. Any who discover this secret are assassinated, so believers say. (Added to article by 66.53.216.174 ( talk · contribs))
Well I think we can be pretty sure at least the Nazis didnt infiltrate the Mossad!... 83.78.169.134 00:38, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
That and the whole idea that the CIA wasn't formed until 1947 do to the national security act of 1947 makes them working with the Nazi's completly plausibe being that they were disbanded in 1945. Drew1369 19:54, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
The CIA grew out of previous organizations like OSS, it just didnt appear out of nowhere, and Nazi germans didnt start the CIA. It is indeed a fact that american intelligence brought over many previous members of the Nazi party, both intelligence people and scientists. Werner von Braun for instance who helped found the american space program. But its not like such things are not done typically after large wars between powers, and the CIA bringing in some German intel people was some new precendent in human history. The CIA also worked heavily with former Nazi intelligence that had detailed helpful information & contacts for infiltrating and spying on the Russians. The question of just how much influence the former Nazis were able to exert over their new american masters is highly debatable of course, as is their own various allegiances to Nazi ideals after the war. One could make a case that former Nazi german intelligence was able to create a larger conflict between the US and Russia than what may have been there, yet its all speculation really, even for those few with all the information...Of course there surely was some Nazi influence into the CIA as would naturally occur when absorbing a large number of foreign agents, yet likely somewhat greater american intelligence influence over the viewpoints of the former Nazis. Anyways, really any intel agency of the nature of the CIA from any country or nation has a somewhat nationalistic rightwing mentality to begin with, they dont need to take in some Nazi germans to have sometimes hard right types of ways and means, and any failings or excesses of american intelligence cant really be all put off on "the nazis". To look for the true earliest precursors of the CIA you could go back i think to the first small societies in the top universities, and the cliques & connections between the educated powerful americans in the elite institutions, it may sound slightly conspiracy theory, yet really such secret societies like "skull and bones" were indeed the earliest examples of what might be termed "american central intelligence" and a coordinated "intelligence network" part "business network". Then during the world wars official organizations were formed to deal with the complex matters of those wars, and many of the (mostly men) from these secret societies became a part of the OSS or CIA or always had a hand in them, to this day. And I would argue that to this day these small secretive elite societies are still the backbone of the true american intelligence network, (perhaps less so than a hundred years ago, its much more complex these days) and the CIA is one "tool" of these networks, and im not putting a negative or positive on that. A current typical CIA operative has far far less power than those who move in the truly powerful intelligence-business networks, yet they could rise into that network, or may have started out in that network and are a part of it, and have then taken a position in CIA 83.78.169.134 00:38, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
I have to take issue with the direction this article is taking. There seems to be a systematic campaign by people to remove any positive mention of CIA accomplishments. In fact, there used to be a section dedicated to that which has gotten lost along the way. Like or hate the CIA, this article needs balance in a big way. If we are unable to find balance, then at least the section on successes needs to be reinstated. — Joseph/N328KF (Talk) 17:20, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
Sadly this is what's bound to happen. I want to say it's because people with a bias against the CIA and/or US government (especially in it's current form) have more motivation to take the time to edit things here for PoV reasons then people neutral or pro. It's the same reason volunteer surverys get a slightly higher negative response then more neutral ones... people who are content don't go out of their way, people who are upset do. Unfortunatly that is my conservative bias coming through and I don't think the more extreme posters here have lived up to that fear. Many have gone to lengths to link valid sources not questionable ones. So sadly I think the reason is grounded in much more reasonable fact behind that trend, the CIA is an intelligence agency. For every ninety nine stellar success it has, every key piece of information it gains that helps the free word, every bad guy it ever helped put a bullet in that keeps him from putting bullets in thousands of others, for every nation it helped bring a positive change to upon request, it will have ONE operation that was illconceived and failed, or was overly self serving and dastardly. The problem is, the 99 good things are... well... secret! You don't go bragging to the world how you did what you just did right, because that just helps the other guy counter you next time. Unfortunatly that one horribly stupid thing you did and maybe shouldn't have done (and okay, the CIA has racked up more then a few of those I'll concede)... that gets blown all over the headlines. The whole world sees how you screwed up, usually because it's in the best interest of the other party to make it very, Very public. Like it or not, if I ever see an intelligence agency on Wikipedia that has more good stuff then bad listed (not counting historical stuff so old it would be declassified like WWII stuff), then I'll know the article is crap (or maybe Mossad, but their almost more relgious agency then a national agency). The PoV of any intelligence agency article will, over time, degrade to more negative then positive. If you know about all the positive, then they aren't an intelligence agency.
Wikipedia and the CIA - How US Intelligence Can Embed in Wikipedia,Plant Propaganda, Delete Facts, Deceive and Attack US Citizens
Excerpt: "Staffers of the Wikipedia online "encyclopedia" - now one of the most dominant media websites in the entire world - show signs of being CIA-type operatives, directly engaged in US-funded propaganda operations against US citizens.
This has significance far beyond the particular instance here of false statements and propaganda, that have been maintained on Wikipedia in order to cover for a wealthy donor to the President George Bush family, and to try to sabotage American legal reform and a critic of the US empire.
What we are facing, is that Wikipedia may already be the ultimate Trojan horse of US government intelligence operations. Via this one overwhelmingly dominant website, the thousands of nameless agents at CIA and NSA headquarters, can now deceive and defraud millions of US citizens and much of the rest of the world as well. These agents can smear and attack those who challenge the government; they can easily launch lies and propaganda on this powerful web forum that can falsify anything and undermine almost anyone. .." - Dna4salE 11:59, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
that was silly! 83.78.169.134 00:00, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
fools! you are all CIA!, all of you with american citizenships contributing material to wikipedia are american intelligence. Your CIA and you dont even know it!!! They are everywhere! When you look in the mirror its CIA staring back! 83.78.169.134 00:00, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
Re: this edit: "This cannot be considered an assassination attempt, however, as al-Zawahiri is named as terrorist and an enemy combatant by the United States."
There are problems with the sentence:
For example, the Church Committee found that the US CIA had attempted to assassinate many foreign leaders, including Cuba's Fidel Castro. The committee did not play the definition game and say, it wasn't really an assassination because Fidel Castro is a communist who overthrew a dictatorship favorable to America.
In fact, I know of no major news outlet who has this defintion, the definition actually coberates what I said:
signed: Travb 00:08, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
There, I've cited LEGAL sources for you. Want the quoted text?:"Executive Order 12333 in no way restricts the lawful use of violence against legitimate enemy targets." from [2], as well as other links I provided from harvard law, FAS.org, court citings. It's legal precedent that a surprise attack on a named enemy combatant is not assassination. Zawahiri is a named enemy combatant, as cited in my links. Therefore, it's NOT AN ASSASSINATION. ⇒ SWATJester Ready Aim Fire! 00:30, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
Want more? "An individual combatant's vulnerability to lawful targeting (as opposed to assassination) is not dependent upon his or her military duties, or proximity to ...: archives.his.com/intelforum/2004-April/msg00025.html. "It is clear that targeted killing of an enemy combatant in wartime is not assassination" www.fas.org/sgp/news/secrecy/2003/08/080603.html ⇒ SWATJester Ready Aim Fire! 00:37, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=317&invol=1
Here is Lexis Nexus summary of this famous case:
This has nothing to do with the defintion of an assination. I see were you are going with this, that the president has the authority to deal with enemy combants. Your legal arguments are much more on point, and have been kept in the article.
If I had the time right now and desire, I could probably dig up law review articles which dispute this interpretation of the Ford Exectutive order. Suffice it to say, in my edit, I simply put that several legal authorities disputed the definition of assassination, and that these "targeted killings" do not fall under the EXecutive Order. I hope this satisfies both of us.
I should have known that I was dealing with an aspiring lawyer or practicing lawyer. Lawyers (and politicians) are very good at arguing what the real definition of "is", is.
Two similar cases come to mind, one with Rwanda and Slick Bill's administration arguing that the Genocide in Rwanda isn't really a genocide, and the recent definition of torture, as defined by the current administration. I am sure you can come up with more, as you have today with the definition of "assassination".
Web bloggers do the same thing, but the have much less practice using there tongues as weapons, and are therefore less effective.
I apologize for my negative words and I was 100% wrong in my assumptions above. I was wrong assuming:
signed: Travb 02:40, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
After the election of Socialist President Salvador Allende in 1970 the CIA covertly worked to prevent him from taking office through bribery of Chilean officials, which failed. Afterwards, an attempted coup was plotted by the CIA with anti-Allende factions, but it eventually was forced to abort the project.
This sentence reads as if Allende was trying to bribe Chilean officials. If this is the case, I request source or removal of the sentence (it's a serious allegation not to be backed up by a source), if not, a rephrasing is necessary to make the point more clear. -- 67.68.31.143 21:44, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
The following was removed as per WP:RS:
It has now been firmly established (see references below) that the OSS actively recruited and protected many high ranking Nazi officers immediately following World War II, a policy that was carried on by the CIA. [1] These included, the CIA now admits, the notorious "butcher of Lyon" Klaus Barbie, Hitler's Chief of Soviet Intelligence General Reinhard Gehlen, and numerous less-renowned Gestapo officers. General Gehlen, due to his extensive (if dubious) intelligence assets within the Soviet Union, was allowed to keep his spy-network intact after the war in the service of the United States. The Gehlen organization soon became one of America's chief sources of Intelligence on the Soviet Union during the cold war, and formed the basis for what would later become the German intelligence agency the BND.
Signed: Travb ( talk) 23:48, 19 August 2006 (UTC)
I noticed the statement about the CIA charter fitting under the FBI's definition of terrorism. I think this violates NPOV as it is a clear attempt to imply that the CIA is a terrorist organization without explicity stating it. In other words, it is an attempt to circumvent NPOV rules in order to preach the author's high controversial, personal viewpoint. The implication that the CIA engages in terrorism is endlessly debatable and, thus, a statement or implication toward one side or the other is, by definition, not neutral. Therefore, I've removed it. If people have a problem and want it added back, then I strongly request that I NPOV flag be placed on the article.
Sbstern 18:52, 15 September 2006 (UTC)scott
Question. In the paragraph pertaining to links with other non-US agencies, MI6 etc, why is Pakistan's ISI not included? Considering the current climate, and its obvious links with terrorism and the war in Afghanistan i believe it must be added to highlight the CIA's integration with and influence over other countries. The Saudi secret Service is another.
While reading through this article, it definitely seemed to be pervasively negative towards the CIA, in ways that seemed to me to be in direct violation of the neutral point of view. It also seemed to jump on theories that are not necessarily grounded in fact and to provide them as though they were (ie the MK-ULTRA project, Mafia hitmen, drug scandals, etc). If someone else is willing to do a quality check as well that would be much appreciated, however, it seems to me that this article should be cleaned up to meet Wikipedia's NPOV standards.
Commander Cool, part deux 07:13, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
RPJ 02:43, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
I made the change because the body of the section is more equivocal than the heading. In addition, "highly illegal" is POV, especially since it gives the impression that the CIA is violating US laws, when the laws being broken are foreign laws. As a sort of compromise, I am willing to have the section titled "Illegal Activities". Ramsquire 18:42, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
“ | The [Clandestine Service] is the only part of the [Intelligence Community], indeed of the government, where hundreds of employees on a daily basis are directed to break extremely serious laws in countries around the world in the face of frequently sophisticated efforts by foreign governments to catch them. A safe estimate is that several hundred times every day (easily 100,000 times a year) DO [Directorate of Operations] officers engage in highly illegal activities (according to foreign law) that not only risk political embarrassment to the U.S. but also endanger the freedom if not lives of the participating foreign nationals and, more than occasionally, of the clandestine officer himself. | ” |
It varries. Many CIA officers operate under diplomatic cover, meaning they have diplomatic immunity. That's pretty standard for all national intel services across the board. The agents recruited by these officers are usualy foreign nationals who do violate foreign law, and are subject to prosecution if caught. Why people continue to be surprised and shocked that an espionage agency conducts espionage is beyond me, however. If you want another shock, I hear the Ford Motor Company builds vehicles, most of which have motors in them. Shock! Horror!
Crimes committed by those with diplomatic immunities are still crimes under the laws of whichever country they're in. The immunity prevents them being prosecuted, unless the nation from which the diplomat comes waives that immunity. 212.219.158.129 11:23, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
I placed a {citeheck} tag over the JFK Assassination section. This page just states John Newman's opinions and accusations against some CIA agents based on his interpretation of CIA documents. Because it is on a PBS Frontline website it appears to give his statement more weight than they deserve. It is is not a news article, with any attempt to balance his position with any rebuttal. I think the section need to go. Mytwocents 17:39, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
{{Citecheck}}
Documents obtained and disclosed by the John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Review Board revealed that the CIA concealed documents, for more than thirty years, about its direct knowledge that a Lee Harvey Oswald impersonator tried to contact an assassin in the Cuban Consulate in Mexico City, Mexico, less than two months before President Kennedy was assassinated. The PBS "Frontline" documentary news program reported that said information already was known to the CIA, was learned by President Lyndon Johnson and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover hours after President Kennedy was assassinated; it "electrified" top Washington insiders. [2]
Nice catch User:Mytwocents.
I didn't read the PBS article, nor have I.
I removed this section to the talk page. I suggest it remain here, unless someone else cuts and pastes a small snippet of the actual words of the PBS show, so there will be no argument or doubt what the PBS special says.
The other JFK conspiracy sections which have been deleted are found here: [6] for anyone who cares. Travb ( talk) 13:13, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
The editor above is deleting information without even reading the source?
I didn't read the PBS article."
Wikipedia policy prohibits:
someone added a category to the article: "american assassins". i've commented it out pending discussion, as i feel that it's controversial. if i should not have done this, please revert the change, but i think there should be discussion and that the category's placement is not NPOV. Vbdrummer0 21:44, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
I've re-removed the category. To follow this path to its logical conclusion, we'll also put on Category:American criminals, and then add Enron. The category is clearly not intended to be used in this manner, and when it's the only entry of this kind in the category it does not serve as a useful navigational tool. - 152.91.9.144 23:25, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
ODCI Redirects here, but it is not mentioned anywhere on the page. 74.104.177.80 01:17, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
I was reading through this article and in the history section in the second to last paragraph it states, "all fifteen Intelligence Community agencies are under the authority of the Director of National Intelligence." However, if one follows the link to the Intelligence Community, this article states, "The United States Intelligence Community is a cooperative federation of sixteen United States government agencies," One of these articles must be in error, and somebody who knows which is correct should fix this.
Moved to talk, reason:
removed to talk, link to article is enough info, wikiusers can argue about the facts at the Project FUBELT page, not here
Best wishes, Travb ( talk) 06:25, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
I want to gauge everyones opinion on moving the controversy section to a new article. This was done a few weeks ago. Being the contributor to several dozen of the refrences here (possible the most references in this article were added by myself), and large sections of this article, I personally am opposed to the move, and in the interm I have moved this section back.
I have seen moves like this before.
Bad past examples
1. Wal-Mart is probably the worst example. From what I gather, two groups argued for months about creating a Wal-Mart controvery page. It was created Criticism_of_Wal-Mart, and now there are two competing articles: one within the Wal-Mart article, Wal-mart#Criticism and one with Criticism of Wal-Mart. These articles copy each other in content.
2. Another example is Ford. Someone moved the Firestone and Ford tire controversy to its own article, and it is currently in my opinion, not a very good article. There is not one source in this article.
3. A current example is Firestone Tire and Rubber Company where a user in two cases began to move out the criticism sections to other articles.
What happens in these cases? In my experience: Worst case scenerio: Wikipedians write two articles in tandem, repeating there efforts on two seperate articles, like Criticism_of_Wal-Mart. It leads to edit wars and prolonged anomosity. Best case scenerio: The article is orphaned like Firestone and Ford tire controversy, and eventually the link is edited out of the article. Result: No controversy section.
I am sure there are positive examples of splitting off articles. I am sure those that support splitting off this article will mention them. Microsoft was mentioned in the Wal-Mart debate. I think it is clear though, no matter how well the split goes, that the smaller split off article suffers. Based on my experiences, CIA controversies will suffer.
Something this important deserves more community input from everyone.
Thanks, Travb ( talk) 11:09, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
This page is 80 kilobytes long. It may be appropriate to split this article into smaller, more specific articles. See Wikipedia:Article size.
It's kinda needed... F.F.McGurk 14:28, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
added information about the rosenholz archives, see for example http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/703303.stm for reference. I would have plenty of finnish references if the one who reverted the edit would understand them :) -Thor-
Is Jose A. Rodriguez really the director of the NCS?
From the CIA's web site:
The National Clandestine Service is responsible for the clandestine collection of foreign intelligence. The current director is under cover and cannot be named at the present time.
I heard the same thing from a CIA agent at NCS.
Air Phloo 07:17, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
It's very clear that this article has taken on a negative bias. There is now little-to-no reference of positive actions performed by the CIA. Sure, the CIA is surrounded by a lot of controversy, much of which is conjecture. It just seems that any time someone posts something that paints the United States Government in a neutral-to-positive light, people jump at the chance to scream, "POV! POV! BIAS! BIAS!" Present both sides and let people draw their own conclusions. Jackryan 17:03, 7 March 2007 (UTC)
Copied from PoV post above... Sadly this is what's bound to happen. I want to say it's because people with a bias against the CIA and/or US government (especially in it's current form) have more motivation to take the time to edit things here for PoV reasons then people neutral or pro. It's the same reason volunteer surverys get a slightly higher negative response then more neutral ones... people who are content don't go out of their way, people who are upset do. Unfortunatly that is my conservative bias coming through and I don't think the more extreme posters here have lived up to that fear. Many have gone to lengths to link valid sources not questionable ones. So sadly I think the reason is grounded in much more reasonable fact behind that trend, the CIA is an intelligence agency. For every ninety nine stellar success it has, every key piece of information it gains that helps the free word, every bad guy it ever helped put a bullet in that keeps him from putting bullets in thousands of others, for every nation it helped bring a positive change to upon request, it will have ONE operation that was illconceived and failed, or was overly self serving and dastardly. The problem is, the 99 good things are... well... secret! You don't go bragging to the world how you did what you just did right, because that just helps the other guy counter you next time. Unfortunatly that one horribly stupid thing you did and maybe shouldn't have done (and okay, the CIA has racked up more then a few of those I'll concede)... that gets blown all over the headlines. The whole world sees how you screwed up, usually because it's in the best interest of the other party to make it very, Very public. Like it or not, if I ever see an intelligence agency on Wikipedia that has more good stuff then bad listed (not counting historical stuff so old it would be declassified like WWII stuff), then I'll know the article is crap (or maybe Mossad, but their almost more relgious agency then a national agency). The PoV of any intelligence agency article will, over time, degrade to more negative then positive. If you know about all the positive, then they aren't an intelligence agency.
Two external links sections make the article look very confused. I think some of the second section can be moved to ==Further reading==. Moreover, I see some exlinks seem not to be very reliable. Can anyone help me clean and classify them? Apple ••w••o••r••m•• 13:25, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
much of the shadow world is left handed. see for yourself www.abaddon.helrazers.com/ <spook hangout or.. just do it the easy way & look up the webpages/memestreams of spook types 'lynn' is a common name for the same reason 'li' is.
do whatever you want, but dont lie to yourself or others about what the truth is. ;)
Agengy? See the logo(CIA.svg) carefully please. ——Nussknacker胡桃夹子 ^.^tell me... 09:31, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
I think there is some very real bias present in this article. For example, there is no attempt made to describe the Phoenix Program, which was a campaign to assassinate Viet Cong leaders; it is simply compared as a "Nazi atrocity". Clearly whoever wrote that is more interested in having the reader draw the conclusion "CIA = Nazis" then presenting an actual objective viewpoint. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.126.123.244 ( talk • contribs) 05:00, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | Archive 4 | Archive 5 |
Isn't keeping foreign prisoners hidden from the red cross a war crime?
I'm not trying to debate I'm just trying to find out the facts before I post anything.
--grazon 21:18, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
The problem with the "foreign prisoners" classification is that the prisoners have to actually be claimed by a foreign country. If no foreign country claims them, then they remain classified as "detainees" and do not fall within the Geneva Convention protections. The assumption is that these men were not acting at the behest of or in the interest of their country of origin and so the appropriate foreign ambassador has not filed a petition on their behalf. (unsigned January 2006)
The CIA has been criticized for being a front for Bavarian Intelligence, and that this German influence began when the Nazis were first allowed to work for the CIA in te 1940s. The CIA's torture, assassinations, secret policing, brainwashing, political influence, and other crimes are said to be a continuation of the same characteristic Nazi methods. The question is whether the CIA controls the Nazis or have the Nazis control the CIA through gradual influence. The NSA and MJ-12 are said to be similar fronts. There is a widespread belief that the Bavarians or Germans partially run a 'secret government' within the U.S. governement, kept secret through the CIA's non-disclosure status. Any who discover this secret are assassinated, so believers say. (Added to article by 66.53.216.174 ( talk · contribs))
Well I think we can be pretty sure at least the Nazis didnt infiltrate the Mossad!... 83.78.169.134 00:38, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
That and the whole idea that the CIA wasn't formed until 1947 do to the national security act of 1947 makes them working with the Nazi's completly plausibe being that they were disbanded in 1945. Drew1369 19:54, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
The CIA grew out of previous organizations like OSS, it just didnt appear out of nowhere, and Nazi germans didnt start the CIA. It is indeed a fact that american intelligence brought over many previous members of the Nazi party, both intelligence people and scientists. Werner von Braun for instance who helped found the american space program. But its not like such things are not done typically after large wars between powers, and the CIA bringing in some German intel people was some new precendent in human history. The CIA also worked heavily with former Nazi intelligence that had detailed helpful information & contacts for infiltrating and spying on the Russians. The question of just how much influence the former Nazis were able to exert over their new american masters is highly debatable of course, as is their own various allegiances to Nazi ideals after the war. One could make a case that former Nazi german intelligence was able to create a larger conflict between the US and Russia than what may have been there, yet its all speculation really, even for those few with all the information...Of course there surely was some Nazi influence into the CIA as would naturally occur when absorbing a large number of foreign agents, yet likely somewhat greater american intelligence influence over the viewpoints of the former Nazis. Anyways, really any intel agency of the nature of the CIA from any country or nation has a somewhat nationalistic rightwing mentality to begin with, they dont need to take in some Nazi germans to have sometimes hard right types of ways and means, and any failings or excesses of american intelligence cant really be all put off on "the nazis". To look for the true earliest precursors of the CIA you could go back i think to the first small societies in the top universities, and the cliques & connections between the educated powerful americans in the elite institutions, it may sound slightly conspiracy theory, yet really such secret societies like "skull and bones" were indeed the earliest examples of what might be termed "american central intelligence" and a coordinated "intelligence network" part "business network". Then during the world wars official organizations were formed to deal with the complex matters of those wars, and many of the (mostly men) from these secret societies became a part of the OSS or CIA or always had a hand in them, to this day. And I would argue that to this day these small secretive elite societies are still the backbone of the true american intelligence network, (perhaps less so than a hundred years ago, its much more complex these days) and the CIA is one "tool" of these networks, and im not putting a negative or positive on that. A current typical CIA operative has far far less power than those who move in the truly powerful intelligence-business networks, yet they could rise into that network, or may have started out in that network and are a part of it, and have then taken a position in CIA 83.78.169.134 00:38, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
I have to take issue with the direction this article is taking. There seems to be a systematic campaign by people to remove any positive mention of CIA accomplishments. In fact, there used to be a section dedicated to that which has gotten lost along the way. Like or hate the CIA, this article needs balance in a big way. If we are unable to find balance, then at least the section on successes needs to be reinstated. — Joseph/N328KF (Talk) 17:20, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
Sadly this is what's bound to happen. I want to say it's because people with a bias against the CIA and/or US government (especially in it's current form) have more motivation to take the time to edit things here for PoV reasons then people neutral or pro. It's the same reason volunteer surverys get a slightly higher negative response then more neutral ones... people who are content don't go out of their way, people who are upset do. Unfortunatly that is my conservative bias coming through and I don't think the more extreme posters here have lived up to that fear. Many have gone to lengths to link valid sources not questionable ones. So sadly I think the reason is grounded in much more reasonable fact behind that trend, the CIA is an intelligence agency. For every ninety nine stellar success it has, every key piece of information it gains that helps the free word, every bad guy it ever helped put a bullet in that keeps him from putting bullets in thousands of others, for every nation it helped bring a positive change to upon request, it will have ONE operation that was illconceived and failed, or was overly self serving and dastardly. The problem is, the 99 good things are... well... secret! You don't go bragging to the world how you did what you just did right, because that just helps the other guy counter you next time. Unfortunatly that one horribly stupid thing you did and maybe shouldn't have done (and okay, the CIA has racked up more then a few of those I'll concede)... that gets blown all over the headlines. The whole world sees how you screwed up, usually because it's in the best interest of the other party to make it very, Very public. Like it or not, if I ever see an intelligence agency on Wikipedia that has more good stuff then bad listed (not counting historical stuff so old it would be declassified like WWII stuff), then I'll know the article is crap (or maybe Mossad, but their almost more relgious agency then a national agency). The PoV of any intelligence agency article will, over time, degrade to more negative then positive. If you know about all the positive, then they aren't an intelligence agency.
Wikipedia and the CIA - How US Intelligence Can Embed in Wikipedia,Plant Propaganda, Delete Facts, Deceive and Attack US Citizens
Excerpt: "Staffers of the Wikipedia online "encyclopedia" - now one of the most dominant media websites in the entire world - show signs of being CIA-type operatives, directly engaged in US-funded propaganda operations against US citizens.
This has significance far beyond the particular instance here of false statements and propaganda, that have been maintained on Wikipedia in order to cover for a wealthy donor to the President George Bush family, and to try to sabotage American legal reform and a critic of the US empire.
What we are facing, is that Wikipedia may already be the ultimate Trojan horse of US government intelligence operations. Via this one overwhelmingly dominant website, the thousands of nameless agents at CIA and NSA headquarters, can now deceive and defraud millions of US citizens and much of the rest of the world as well. These agents can smear and attack those who challenge the government; they can easily launch lies and propaganda on this powerful web forum that can falsify anything and undermine almost anyone. .." - Dna4salE 11:59, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
that was silly! 83.78.169.134 00:00, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
fools! you are all CIA!, all of you with american citizenships contributing material to wikipedia are american intelligence. Your CIA and you dont even know it!!! They are everywhere! When you look in the mirror its CIA staring back! 83.78.169.134 00:00, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
Re: this edit: "This cannot be considered an assassination attempt, however, as al-Zawahiri is named as terrorist and an enemy combatant by the United States."
There are problems with the sentence:
For example, the Church Committee found that the US CIA had attempted to assassinate many foreign leaders, including Cuba's Fidel Castro. The committee did not play the definition game and say, it wasn't really an assassination because Fidel Castro is a communist who overthrew a dictatorship favorable to America.
In fact, I know of no major news outlet who has this defintion, the definition actually coberates what I said:
signed: Travb 00:08, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
There, I've cited LEGAL sources for you. Want the quoted text?:"Executive Order 12333 in no way restricts the lawful use of violence against legitimate enemy targets." from [2], as well as other links I provided from harvard law, FAS.org, court citings. It's legal precedent that a surprise attack on a named enemy combatant is not assassination. Zawahiri is a named enemy combatant, as cited in my links. Therefore, it's NOT AN ASSASSINATION. ⇒ SWATJester Ready Aim Fire! 00:30, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
Want more? "An individual combatant's vulnerability to lawful targeting (as opposed to assassination) is not dependent upon his or her military duties, or proximity to ...: archives.his.com/intelforum/2004-April/msg00025.html. "It is clear that targeted killing of an enemy combatant in wartime is not assassination" www.fas.org/sgp/news/secrecy/2003/08/080603.html ⇒ SWATJester Ready Aim Fire! 00:37, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=317&invol=1
Here is Lexis Nexus summary of this famous case:
This has nothing to do with the defintion of an assination. I see were you are going with this, that the president has the authority to deal with enemy combants. Your legal arguments are much more on point, and have been kept in the article.
If I had the time right now and desire, I could probably dig up law review articles which dispute this interpretation of the Ford Exectutive order. Suffice it to say, in my edit, I simply put that several legal authorities disputed the definition of assassination, and that these "targeted killings" do not fall under the EXecutive Order. I hope this satisfies both of us.
I should have known that I was dealing with an aspiring lawyer or practicing lawyer. Lawyers (and politicians) are very good at arguing what the real definition of "is", is.
Two similar cases come to mind, one with Rwanda and Slick Bill's administration arguing that the Genocide in Rwanda isn't really a genocide, and the recent definition of torture, as defined by the current administration. I am sure you can come up with more, as you have today with the definition of "assassination".
Web bloggers do the same thing, but the have much less practice using there tongues as weapons, and are therefore less effective.
I apologize for my negative words and I was 100% wrong in my assumptions above. I was wrong assuming:
signed: Travb 02:40, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
After the election of Socialist President Salvador Allende in 1970 the CIA covertly worked to prevent him from taking office through bribery of Chilean officials, which failed. Afterwards, an attempted coup was plotted by the CIA with anti-Allende factions, but it eventually was forced to abort the project.
This sentence reads as if Allende was trying to bribe Chilean officials. If this is the case, I request source or removal of the sentence (it's a serious allegation not to be backed up by a source), if not, a rephrasing is necessary to make the point more clear. -- 67.68.31.143 21:44, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
The following was removed as per WP:RS:
It has now been firmly established (see references below) that the OSS actively recruited and protected many high ranking Nazi officers immediately following World War II, a policy that was carried on by the CIA. [1] These included, the CIA now admits, the notorious "butcher of Lyon" Klaus Barbie, Hitler's Chief of Soviet Intelligence General Reinhard Gehlen, and numerous less-renowned Gestapo officers. General Gehlen, due to his extensive (if dubious) intelligence assets within the Soviet Union, was allowed to keep his spy-network intact after the war in the service of the United States. The Gehlen organization soon became one of America's chief sources of Intelligence on the Soviet Union during the cold war, and formed the basis for what would later become the German intelligence agency the BND.
Signed: Travb ( talk) 23:48, 19 August 2006 (UTC)
I noticed the statement about the CIA charter fitting under the FBI's definition of terrorism. I think this violates NPOV as it is a clear attempt to imply that the CIA is a terrorist organization without explicity stating it. In other words, it is an attempt to circumvent NPOV rules in order to preach the author's high controversial, personal viewpoint. The implication that the CIA engages in terrorism is endlessly debatable and, thus, a statement or implication toward one side or the other is, by definition, not neutral. Therefore, I've removed it. If people have a problem and want it added back, then I strongly request that I NPOV flag be placed on the article.
Sbstern 18:52, 15 September 2006 (UTC)scott
Question. In the paragraph pertaining to links with other non-US agencies, MI6 etc, why is Pakistan's ISI not included? Considering the current climate, and its obvious links with terrorism and the war in Afghanistan i believe it must be added to highlight the CIA's integration with and influence over other countries. The Saudi secret Service is another.
While reading through this article, it definitely seemed to be pervasively negative towards the CIA, in ways that seemed to me to be in direct violation of the neutral point of view. It also seemed to jump on theories that are not necessarily grounded in fact and to provide them as though they were (ie the MK-ULTRA project, Mafia hitmen, drug scandals, etc). If someone else is willing to do a quality check as well that would be much appreciated, however, it seems to me that this article should be cleaned up to meet Wikipedia's NPOV standards.
Commander Cool, part deux 07:13, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
RPJ 02:43, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
I made the change because the body of the section is more equivocal than the heading. In addition, "highly illegal" is POV, especially since it gives the impression that the CIA is violating US laws, when the laws being broken are foreign laws. As a sort of compromise, I am willing to have the section titled "Illegal Activities". Ramsquire 18:42, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
“ | The [Clandestine Service] is the only part of the [Intelligence Community], indeed of the government, where hundreds of employees on a daily basis are directed to break extremely serious laws in countries around the world in the face of frequently sophisticated efforts by foreign governments to catch them. A safe estimate is that several hundred times every day (easily 100,000 times a year) DO [Directorate of Operations] officers engage in highly illegal activities (according to foreign law) that not only risk political embarrassment to the U.S. but also endanger the freedom if not lives of the participating foreign nationals and, more than occasionally, of the clandestine officer himself. | ” |
It varries. Many CIA officers operate under diplomatic cover, meaning they have diplomatic immunity. That's pretty standard for all national intel services across the board. The agents recruited by these officers are usualy foreign nationals who do violate foreign law, and are subject to prosecution if caught. Why people continue to be surprised and shocked that an espionage agency conducts espionage is beyond me, however. If you want another shock, I hear the Ford Motor Company builds vehicles, most of which have motors in them. Shock! Horror!
Crimes committed by those with diplomatic immunities are still crimes under the laws of whichever country they're in. The immunity prevents them being prosecuted, unless the nation from which the diplomat comes waives that immunity. 212.219.158.129 11:23, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
I placed a {citeheck} tag over the JFK Assassination section. This page just states John Newman's opinions and accusations against some CIA agents based on his interpretation of CIA documents. Because it is on a PBS Frontline website it appears to give his statement more weight than they deserve. It is is not a news article, with any attempt to balance his position with any rebuttal. I think the section need to go. Mytwocents 17:39, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
{{Citecheck}}
Documents obtained and disclosed by the John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Review Board revealed that the CIA concealed documents, for more than thirty years, about its direct knowledge that a Lee Harvey Oswald impersonator tried to contact an assassin in the Cuban Consulate in Mexico City, Mexico, less than two months before President Kennedy was assassinated. The PBS "Frontline" documentary news program reported that said information already was known to the CIA, was learned by President Lyndon Johnson and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover hours after President Kennedy was assassinated; it "electrified" top Washington insiders. [2]
Nice catch User:Mytwocents.
I didn't read the PBS article, nor have I.
I removed this section to the talk page. I suggest it remain here, unless someone else cuts and pastes a small snippet of the actual words of the PBS show, so there will be no argument or doubt what the PBS special says.
The other JFK conspiracy sections which have been deleted are found here: [6] for anyone who cares. Travb ( talk) 13:13, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
The editor above is deleting information without even reading the source?
I didn't read the PBS article."
Wikipedia policy prohibits:
someone added a category to the article: "american assassins". i've commented it out pending discussion, as i feel that it's controversial. if i should not have done this, please revert the change, but i think there should be discussion and that the category's placement is not NPOV. Vbdrummer0 21:44, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
I've re-removed the category. To follow this path to its logical conclusion, we'll also put on Category:American criminals, and then add Enron. The category is clearly not intended to be used in this manner, and when it's the only entry of this kind in the category it does not serve as a useful navigational tool. - 152.91.9.144 23:25, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
ODCI Redirects here, but it is not mentioned anywhere on the page. 74.104.177.80 01:17, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
I was reading through this article and in the history section in the second to last paragraph it states, "all fifteen Intelligence Community agencies are under the authority of the Director of National Intelligence." However, if one follows the link to the Intelligence Community, this article states, "The United States Intelligence Community is a cooperative federation of sixteen United States government agencies," One of these articles must be in error, and somebody who knows which is correct should fix this.
Moved to talk, reason:
removed to talk, link to article is enough info, wikiusers can argue about the facts at the Project FUBELT page, not here
Best wishes, Travb ( talk) 06:25, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
I want to gauge everyones opinion on moving the controversy section to a new article. This was done a few weeks ago. Being the contributor to several dozen of the refrences here (possible the most references in this article were added by myself), and large sections of this article, I personally am opposed to the move, and in the interm I have moved this section back.
I have seen moves like this before.
Bad past examples
1. Wal-Mart is probably the worst example. From what I gather, two groups argued for months about creating a Wal-Mart controvery page. It was created Criticism_of_Wal-Mart, and now there are two competing articles: one within the Wal-Mart article, Wal-mart#Criticism and one with Criticism of Wal-Mart. These articles copy each other in content.
2. Another example is Ford. Someone moved the Firestone and Ford tire controversy to its own article, and it is currently in my opinion, not a very good article. There is not one source in this article.
3. A current example is Firestone Tire and Rubber Company where a user in two cases began to move out the criticism sections to other articles.
What happens in these cases? In my experience: Worst case scenerio: Wikipedians write two articles in tandem, repeating there efforts on two seperate articles, like Criticism_of_Wal-Mart. It leads to edit wars and prolonged anomosity. Best case scenerio: The article is orphaned like Firestone and Ford tire controversy, and eventually the link is edited out of the article. Result: No controversy section.
I am sure there are positive examples of splitting off articles. I am sure those that support splitting off this article will mention them. Microsoft was mentioned in the Wal-Mart debate. I think it is clear though, no matter how well the split goes, that the smaller split off article suffers. Based on my experiences, CIA controversies will suffer.
Something this important deserves more community input from everyone.
Thanks, Travb ( talk) 11:09, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
This page is 80 kilobytes long. It may be appropriate to split this article into smaller, more specific articles. See Wikipedia:Article size.
It's kinda needed... F.F.McGurk 14:28, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
added information about the rosenholz archives, see for example http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/703303.stm for reference. I would have plenty of finnish references if the one who reverted the edit would understand them :) -Thor-
Is Jose A. Rodriguez really the director of the NCS?
From the CIA's web site:
The National Clandestine Service is responsible for the clandestine collection of foreign intelligence. The current director is under cover and cannot be named at the present time.
I heard the same thing from a CIA agent at NCS.
Air Phloo 07:17, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
It's very clear that this article has taken on a negative bias. There is now little-to-no reference of positive actions performed by the CIA. Sure, the CIA is surrounded by a lot of controversy, much of which is conjecture. It just seems that any time someone posts something that paints the United States Government in a neutral-to-positive light, people jump at the chance to scream, "POV! POV! BIAS! BIAS!" Present both sides and let people draw their own conclusions. Jackryan 17:03, 7 March 2007 (UTC)
Copied from PoV post above... Sadly this is what's bound to happen. I want to say it's because people with a bias against the CIA and/or US government (especially in it's current form) have more motivation to take the time to edit things here for PoV reasons then people neutral or pro. It's the same reason volunteer surverys get a slightly higher negative response then more neutral ones... people who are content don't go out of their way, people who are upset do. Unfortunatly that is my conservative bias coming through and I don't think the more extreme posters here have lived up to that fear. Many have gone to lengths to link valid sources not questionable ones. So sadly I think the reason is grounded in much more reasonable fact behind that trend, the CIA is an intelligence agency. For every ninety nine stellar success it has, every key piece of information it gains that helps the free word, every bad guy it ever helped put a bullet in that keeps him from putting bullets in thousands of others, for every nation it helped bring a positive change to upon request, it will have ONE operation that was illconceived and failed, or was overly self serving and dastardly. The problem is, the 99 good things are... well... secret! You don't go bragging to the world how you did what you just did right, because that just helps the other guy counter you next time. Unfortunatly that one horribly stupid thing you did and maybe shouldn't have done (and okay, the CIA has racked up more then a few of those I'll concede)... that gets blown all over the headlines. The whole world sees how you screwed up, usually because it's in the best interest of the other party to make it very, Very public. Like it or not, if I ever see an intelligence agency on Wikipedia that has more good stuff then bad listed (not counting historical stuff so old it would be declassified like WWII stuff), then I'll know the article is crap (or maybe Mossad, but their almost more relgious agency then a national agency). The PoV of any intelligence agency article will, over time, degrade to more negative then positive. If you know about all the positive, then they aren't an intelligence agency.
Two external links sections make the article look very confused. I think some of the second section can be moved to ==Further reading==. Moreover, I see some exlinks seem not to be very reliable. Can anyone help me clean and classify them? Apple ••w••o••r••m•• 13:25, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
much of the shadow world is left handed. see for yourself www.abaddon.helrazers.com/ <spook hangout or.. just do it the easy way & look up the webpages/memestreams of spook types 'lynn' is a common name for the same reason 'li' is.
do whatever you want, but dont lie to yourself or others about what the truth is. ;)
Agengy? See the logo(CIA.svg) carefully please. ——Nussknacker胡桃夹子 ^.^tell me... 09:31, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
I think there is some very real bias present in this article. For example, there is no attempt made to describe the Phoenix Program, which was a campaign to assassinate Viet Cong leaders; it is simply compared as a "Nazi atrocity". Clearly whoever wrote that is more interested in having the reader draw the conclusion "CIA = Nazis" then presenting an actual objective viewpoint. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.126.123.244 ( talk • contribs) 05:00, 25 March 2007 (UTC)