I had a certain amount of trepidation as I started reading this book. I knew I was entering the heart of the ugliness of the USA, for 620 pages. I’m a notoriously slow reader, so I knew I would be there for awhile.
I shouldn’t have been so concerned. This is a well written history of the CIA. It is loaded with information that was new to me as well as stories I have been hearing for decades like the assassination of Patrice Lumumba, the Bay of Pigs invasion, and the murder of JFK..
This is really the big story of the 20th Century when global technological resources developed to the extent that the have nots were in a position to move on the haves.
Dulles helped developed the CIA into a secret army working to buttress the holdings of the haves. The book is a working bio of Dulles as a spy. He began as a Harvard educated Wall Street corporate lawyer. He ended as a government official who really functioned as a Wall Street corporate lawyer. The interest of big business was always at the center of his actions and the actions he manipulated the USA into.
He goes through the story of the CIA engineering the coup in Iran in 1953 which put the Shah back in power until 1979. During this time the CIA assisted him in setting up Secret police units that eliminated all opposition other than that embedded in religion, which lead to the religious sectors of society to eventually gaining control rather than a more secular setup that could have been possible with Mossadegh. But this is the history of much of the CIA meddling on behave of corporate business, keeping countries business friendly even if large sections of the population suffered as a result. The USA spreads a good deal of suffering over the world.
The end of the book spends a good deal of space to evidence linking the CIA to the JFK and RFK assassinations. He certainly presents a powerful case of motivation and procedural ability. Of course I’m familiar with and tend to go along with this view of events.
I had not heard of the 1961 coup attempt in France, to ouste Charles de Gaulle and install a right wing government. That was rather shocking to read about and of course there was the good old CIA helping to establish and supporting the perpetrators.
Unfortunately, I’m not able to generate much anger about this stuff anymore, I mean anger that the country I live in spends a great deal of its resources making the lives of people in other countries miserable without much person autonomy under some thuggish government that is friendly the international business interests. And it’s not like these international corporations are even Americans, they aren’t particularly loyal to the USA as their business interests are pushed on other countries by CIA action as in the 1973 CIA supported coup in Chile, the other 9/11.
No, I’m not angry, just frustrated and sad that this has been the trajectory of the USA my entire life span.
I hope you can do something about it in the future, and that the blowback is not as horrible as it might justifiably be.
Anyway, this mysterious institution, that does more or less what it pleases secretly with an enormous amount of tax money, just goes on its merry way. Maybe we hear about what they do later, but probably not since the government at behest of big business is growing more and more fascistic secretive and controlling.
I shouldn’t have been so concerned. This is a well written history of the CIA. It is loaded with information that was new to me as well as stories I have been hearing for decades like the assassination of Patrice Lumumba, the Bay of Pigs invasion, and the murder of JFK..
This is really the big story of the 20th Century when global technological resources developed to the extent that the have nots were in a position to move on the haves.
Dulles helped developed the CIA into a secret army working to buttress the holdings of the haves. The book is a working bio of Dulles as a spy. He began as a Harvard educated Wall Street corporate lawyer. He ended as a government official who really functioned as a Wall Street corporate lawyer. The interest of big business was always at the center of his actions and the actions he manipulated the USA into.
He goes through the story of the CIA engineering the coup in Iran in 1953 which put the Shah back in power until 1979. During this time the CIA assisted him in setting up Secret police units that eliminated all opposition other than that embedded in religion, which lead to the religious sectors of society to eventually gaining control rather than a more secular setup that could have been possible with Mossadegh. But this is the history of much of the CIA meddling on behave of corporate business, keeping countries business friendly even if large sections of the population suffered as a result. The USA spreads a good deal of suffering over the world.
The end of the book spends a good deal of space to evidence linking the CIA to the JFK and RFK assassinations. He certainly presents a powerful case of motivation and procedural ability. Of course I’m familiar with and tend to go along with this view of events.
I had not heard of the 1961 coup attempt in France, to ouste Charles de Gaulle and install a right wing government. That was rather shocking to read about and of course there was the good old CIA helping to establish and supporting the perpetrators.
Unfortunately, I’m not able to generate much anger about this stuff anymore, I mean anger that the country I live in spends a great deal of its resources making the lives of people in other countries miserable without much person autonomy under some thuggish government that is friendly the international business interests. And it’s not like these international corporations are even Americans, they aren’t particularly loyal to the USA as their business interests are pushed on other countries by CIA action as in the 1973 CIA supported coup in Chile, the other 9/11.
No, I’m not angry, just frustrated and sad that this has been the trajectory of the USA my entire life span.
I hope you can do something about it in the future, and that the blowback is not as horrible as it might justifiably be.
Anyway, this mysterious institution, that does more or less what it pleases secretly with an enormous amount of tax money, just goes on its merry way. Maybe we hear about what they do later, but probably not since the government at behest of big business is growing more and more fascistic secretive and controlling.
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