Central Intelligence Agency Quotes

See Banjamin Disraeli for an earlier expression of this idea.

Pinkerton worked out a plan to spirit Lincoln through Baltimore where he had to change trains.

The reference was to Iraq president Sadaam Hussein. The CIA had determined his location and to implement the George W. Bush administration’s policy of regime change, the Air Force had been ordered to send two Stealth Bombers with “bunker buster” bombs to assassinate Sadaam. The mission was completed flawlessly and both planes hit the target destroying it completely. However, it turned out that the CIA intelligence was inaccurate, and Sadaam was not at the location. This quotation is often used to illustrate the problem of believing early action reports and the fallibility of CIA intelligence at the time.

The statement was made with respect to the possible overthrow of President Diem of South Vietnam, who was murdered anyway during the coup.

During the Cold War, Yugoslavia was a part of the Eastern Communist Bloc, but was very independent. They had a very experienced military and were the one country of the Eastern Bloc who the Russians could not easily militarily dominate. Tito was a great and feared military leader having killed More Germans per soldier with his army than any of the Allies in WWII. He was also very independent of Moscow and would not follow Russia directives. The Russians decided on assassinating Tito but the attempts failed.

The meeting was about the Congo. Patrice Lumumba was an extremely popular Congo leader who had just led the independence fight against Belgium and been elected Prime Minister and one of the few African leaders at the time who was not corrupt but he was a socialist. The mineral rich Katanga Province then seceded just a few weeks after Independence. Lumumba asked the UN. for supplies and trucks to allow him to keep the country together but the UN was bogged down in debate where the US thought that he might become, Russia then unilaterally offered the aid. Thinking that the Congo might become part of the Soviet Bloc, President Eisenhower called the meeting. Lumumba had not only claimed that he was not a communist but stated that Communism was just as bad as colonialism. A few weeks later the CIA engineered a coup of the Congo Military which had previously been organized and led by Colonial Belgium. The coup deposed Lumumba in favor of a corrupt incompetent Army Officer, Joseph Mobuto. Lumumba was arrested, and the UN Secretary General demanded that he be treated properly while Russia demanded that he be released as he could not have committed any crimes as he had been in office such a short time. While under "arrest" Lumumba was mysteriously murdered. The United States denied that America had anything to do with the murder. Johnson gave similar testimony under oath before the Senate Church Committee Investigating the Intelligence Agencies.

This is one of the early descriptions of Islamic Terrorists and Assassins. Tutuses employed them to kill his brother, the Sultan. This passage also illustrates part of the history of Islamic sultans being deposed and/or killed by their own relatives which explains the hostility of Sultans to their own family during the Ottoman Empire. Note also the glorification of their own death which has been characteristic of many Islamic subgroups throughout history. So the modern suicide bomber is in a sense not a new phenomenon; the weapon is what has changed.