Talk:CIA influence on public opinion

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Restructure, rewrite[edit]

This article was an incomplete unstructured grab bag when added 10 years ago, and it has been virtually untouched since, except to take out repetitive bits or unsourced bits. Unfortunately, an important article, CIA and media, was merged into it some time ago, so many things which should logically go here have tended to go other places.

I've restructured the article, dumping the impossible to understand chronological sequence, the long sections pasted from the FRUS historical documents series, and the items that seemed to have nothing to do with influencing public opinion. I'll try to make the remaining sections coherent in the near to mid-term, then begin moving what I think are the items that really belong here from their now scattered and hard to find locations. Rgr09 (talk) 07:29, 14 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

This article appears as though it could be yet another dumping ground for various allegations rather than for facts. With that in mind, I've removed material attributed to Philip Agee. If his claims on this have been discussed in reliable secondary sources outside the walled garden of fringe books, then it's possible they could be mentioned here. -Location (talk) 00:35, 17 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

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Removed section on National Endowment for Democracy[edit]

I have removed the long section on the National Endowment for Democracy. I have found no sources that would support a claim that NED was ever managed, controlled by, affiliated with, or influenced by CIA. A lengthy section in this article on NED seems completely misplaced. Rgr09 (talk) 10:40, 17 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

"A lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA." -Allen Weinstein 2601:601:8580:7550:8508:BE37:8AE4:916A (talk) 04:20, 27 March 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Removed citation from libcom[edit]

The article originally used a lengthy quote from a post at a website/blog libcom.org, authored by "Steven". This is not reliable source material, so I have removed both citations to it. There are plenty of reliable sources for CIA covert sponsorship of private/non-profit organizations. Rgr09 (talk) 08:05, 10 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Mockingbird[edit]

I would think operation mockingbird would warrant a mention here, but I don't know much about this topic — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tomatoswoop (talk • contribs) 04:44, 21 March 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Sources[edit]

Rgr09, I found a few relevant sources that you may have stumbled across or read previously:

  • The FIRST, called "Worldwide Propaganda Network Built by the C.I.A.", in an article published in The New York Times on December 26, 1977. I gave it a brief read and it seems to discuss the CIA's manipulation of non-domestic journalism. I have seen this article cited in many books and every reference to "Propaganda Assets Inventory" seems to stem from the quote: "Although the network was known officially as the 'Propaganda Assets Inventory,' to those inside the C.I.A. it was 'Wisner's Wurlitzer.'"
  • The SECOND, called "The CIA and the Media", is an inquiry by the Subcommittee on Oversight of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence of the House of Representatives in 1977 and 1978. There is a lot of good stuff in this one. On page 5, William Colby states (the day after the NYT article): "Indeed, the recent New York Times review of this subject essential confirms that CIA's efforts to affect public opinion were aimed abroad, conforming to its mission assigned by a series of American Presidents and supported by a series of American Congresses." In his written statement on page 65, Ray Cline states: "I believe the recent wave of sanctimony implying that and and all journalists' contacts with CIA are in some way sinister and immoral is misguided — a kind of presumed guilt by association which in other areas of society our free press would be to protest." He then outlines the CIA's various relationships with journalists over the next two pages. (BTW: Page 63 is missing in this particular link, but it can be found elsewhere.)
  • The THIRD, called "CIA's Use of Journalists and Clergy in Intelligence Operations", is an inquiry by the Select Committee on Intelligence of the United States Senate in 1996. John Deutch states that it is the CIA's policy not to use American journalists, American clergy, or those in the Peace Corps, but that exceptional circumstances may call for a waiver of that policy. Various journalists and clergy then discuss their views, with the idea that many outside of the US think they could be working on behalf of the CIA.

Again, I did not spend too much time looking at these, and my synopses may not be terribly helpful, but I thought I would post them here for future reference. I believe an article called something like CIA and the media that discussed how they worked with journalists to gather information, not just use them for propaganda, would be better; however, I'm not sure I want to do any work on it though! -Location (talk) 20:15, 29 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, Location! Many useful sources, as usual. The material you list is good for a post-Church Committee section. The NYT article is especially interesting. I'm morally certain that this was their response to being scooped by Carl Bernstein in the Rolling Stone.
Regarding the article, I think there are two possibilities; either split off a new article called CIA and the media, or rename the whole article CIA and the media.
The first option, start a new article, would mean moving part of the article into a new namespace, and leaving the somewhat miscellaneous other parts here. One problem with this is that I think there was originally an article called CIA and the media or CIA and news that was actually renamed into the current article. Does reviving a renamed article require discussion? How does one go about it?
I am tempted to go for the second option. The disadvantage is that would mean dumping parts of what is currently here. But no one has really been interested in contributing to this article as currently titled since it was first created around ten years ago by one editor as part of a huge and unwieldy project that eventually left several confused and incomplete articles in its wake. Any comments or suggestions here very welcome. Rgr09 (talk) 01:23, 30 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
I am familiar with the Bernstein article, but I'm not familiar with the background of the NYT getting scooped by him.
CIA and the media was merged with/redirected to this article back in February 2011. The last version before the merge/redirect is here. If the subject matter is different, you can search for CIA and the media, then click on it where you see "(Redirected from CIA and the media)" under the title of this article and start editing it. -Location (talk) 18:04, 30 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Authority for Psychological warfare[edit]

The article now says

Psychological operations was assigned to the pre-CIA Office of Policy Coordination, with oversight by the Department of State.

There is a footnote that cites a State Department document collection: Foreign Relations of the United States, 1950-1955: The Intelligence Community. The footnote shortcut says NSC59-1. NSC59/1 is document 2 of the collection, page 2 (page 31 of the pdf). This document, however, is about who is responsible for preparing a "foreign information program" in times of peace, and a "psychological warfare program" in times of war or national emergency. This is the responsibility of the Secretary of State. The OPC is not mentioned in this document at all.

Perhaps the author of the wikipedia article intended to make a reference to NSC 10/2, which establishes the basis for covert action by CIA and others, but 10/2 is not in this collection, it is in the earlier Foreign Relations of the United States, 1945–1950, Emergence of the Intelligence Establishment.

The article then says

the psychological operations staff [was] placed under the Deputy Directorate of Plans, the Directorate of Operations, or the National Clandestine Service.

DP, DO, NCS are the different names, given at different times, to the covert activities division. It is not clear what the "psychological operations staff" refers to. There was a plethora of boards and committess with confusingly similar titles: "Psychological Strategy Board", "National Psychological Strategy Board", "Psychological Strategy Coordinating Committee", etc. This needs clarification and sourcing, but to what point? I suggest just deleting this whole confused section. Eventually the whole article should go. either merged into other articles, or just plain put out of its misery. Rgr09 (talk) 08:00, 11 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia has a short article on OPC, it is one of many articles I glanced at but did not have time to check citations or figure out what the real story was. Rgr09 (talk) 01:58, 11 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

After reading a hundred pages of Foreign Relations of the United States, 1950-1955, I have decided that this section should just be dropped. Fishing something out of these huge collections to put in here is way too close to original research. Rgr09 (talk) 10:43, 12 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I am OK with that. I imagine the ultimate "authority" to use propaganda in foreign affairs is the President per Article II of the Constitution, but I'm not sure what the point of the section would be. Is it to specify which branch of the CIA usually conducts propaganda campaigns? I found this set of documents from 1945/1946 that might be relevant since it references the Propaganda Branch of the War Department (Psychological Warfare Division?) prior to the National Security Act. - Location (talk) 22:34, 12 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki Education assignment: Introduction to Media Culture[edit]

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 30 August 2022 and 12 December 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Alexander Mitarotonda (article contribs).

— Assignment last updated by Douglas-Suter (talk) 16:50, 27 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

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