Operation Paperclip
In the fall of 1944, the U.S. launched a secret mission to secure German weapons, including biological and chemical agents, as well as recruit top Nazi doctors, physicists, and chemists. “Roughly 1,600 of these German scientists (along with their families) were brought to the United States to work on America’s behalf during the Cold War.” President Truman had banned recruiting any Nazi members or active Nazi supporters, but U.S. Government agents “bypassed this directive by eliminating or whitewashing incriminating evidence of possible war crimes from the scientists’ records.”
Operation Mockingbird
The CIA ran Operation Mockingbird, a program to influence the domestic American media, by placing CIA operatives within news organizations and cultivating relationships with prominent journalists. Overseen by CIA Director Dulles, Mockingbird had a major influence in over 25 newspapers and wire agencies, including CBS, Time and Life Magazines, the New York Times, the New York Herald Tribune, the New York Post, and the Washington Post, and Hollywood film companies. The Church Committee identified over 50 U.S. journalists who were employed directly by the Agency, and claimed many more enjoyed a very close relationship with the CIA, who were “being paid regularly for their services [or provided] occasional gifts and reimbursements from the CIA.” Although Mockingbird officially ended in 1976, in 1996 Congressional testimony, Ted Koppel, ABC News Anchor, said “the Agency has ... broken American laws in the past, and I have no doubt that it will continue....”
Operation Bloodstone (1948-??)
This covert operation sought out Nazis and collaborators living in Soviet-controlled areas to work undercover for U.S. intelligence. “In reality, many of Bloodstone’s recruits had once been Nazi collaborators who were now being brought to the United States for use as intelligence and covert operations experts.” The Bloodstone recruits were not low-level Nazis, but leaders, intelligence specialists, and scholars who had been key to the Nazi cause. “Some of them eventually became U.S. agent spotters for sabotage and assassination missions.” State Department official George F. Kennan testified many years later, “it did not work out at all the way I had conceived it.” Documents about this project were released in April 2021.
Operation Aerodynamic / PdDynamic (1949-91)
The CIA has long been involved in directing events in Ukraine. Project Aerodynamic, renewed as PdDynamic, continued until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. A CIA document declassified in 2007 states: “The purpose of Project AERODYNAMIC is to [support] the Anti-Soviet Ukrainian resistance movement for cold war and hot war purposes.” Going back decades, the CIA has trained Ukrainian intelligence units to try and shore up an independent Kyiv. Then, current “CIA training of Ukrainian special operations forces and other intelligence personnel” in the U.S. and Ukraine has been ongoing since 2015, and a former CIA official said “The United States is training an insurgency ... to kill Russians.”
Operation Ajax (1953)
The CIA planned and supported the coup against Iran’s elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh. The effort was led by senior officer Kermit Roosevelt Jr., the grandson of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt. “Over the course of four days in August 1953, Roosevelt would orchestrate not one, but two attempts to destabilize the government of Iran, forever changing the relationship between the country and the U.S.” The U.S. government long denied involvement in the coup, which installed the brutal Shah of Iran Mohammed Reza Pahiavi, but eventually admitted CIA’s role in the coup.
In only a month we will begin to learn whether President Trump’s swearing in will result in a major change in the mission and activities of the CIA.
@NoAgendaLara
🚨🔍 Where the Iran conflict stands: Trump says deal in days — Iran says 'speculative' — Strait remains closed
President Trump called off another round of nighttime military strikes against Iran, then pivoted to announce that a deal is imminent – possibly signed in Europe this weekend, with JD Vance representing the US.
🇮🇷 Foreign Ministry spokesman Baghaei says reports of a signing are "speculative." Most of the text was ready, but the US kept changing its positions. Iran will not compromise on its red lines. The Strait of Hormuz remains closed due to "illegal US actions."
✡️ Netanyahu's office claims Trump assured Netanyahu that any final agreement would require Iran to remove enriched nuclear material, dismantle enrichment infrastructure, limit missiles, and end support for regional armed groups. Israel says it is not a party to the deal. Trump has not publicly confirmed any of this.
⚔️ Reality on the water: IRGC naval forces confronted an oil tanker ...
In case you missed it:
President Trump just effectively announced that the US will be putting boots on the ground to take Kharg Island in Iran in the near future.
Kharg Island, which is one-third the size of Manhattan and located in the Persian Gulf, controls ~90% of Iranian crude oil exports.
That's roughly 1.5 to 2.0 million barrels of crude oil exports per day.
Trump specifically says this would be a "Venezuela" style takeover, where the US would take complete control of Iran's oil and gas infrastructure.
If this happens, it would be the biggest escalation of the Iran War yet.
We expect to receive Iran's response shortly.
(@TheKobeissiLetter)
🛢📈 — The price of Brent crude oil is rising again after the renewed American aggression against Iran. In fact, it has been going up since Trump promised new strikes on Iran will happen today
🇮🇷❗️ — The statement is regarding the closure of the Hormuz:
From this moment on, due to insecurity in the region, the Strait of Hormuz is declared closed to the passage of any type of vessel, including oil tankers and commercial vessels, and any traffic will be targeted.
In continuation of the evils of the criminal America and in light of the beginning of the attacks of that country's aggressor army on some southern regions in Hormozgan province, from this moment on, due to insecurity in the region, the Strait of Hormuz is declared closed to the passage of any type of vessel, including oil tankers and commercial vessels, and any traffic will be targeted.
The US claim that the ship passed through the aforementioned strait is denied.