The "Baker" explosion, part of Operation Crossroads, a nuclear weapon test by the United States military at Bikini Atoll, Micronesia, on 25 July 1946. In the case of the first HEXAGON mission in the summer of 1971, the parachute broke off causing the bucket to crash into the ocean, sinking on impact. If youve watched 90s sci-fi showThe X-Files, youll know that one subject that comes up a lot is Area 51, an off-limits staging ground in the Nevada desert, where the U.S. Air Force supposedly conductedclassified alien-related tests (the area around it has become known as the Extraterrestrial Highway). Local legends may have sprung up as a result of this Air Force flop. Documents describing secret writing fall under the CIA's purview to declassify. Denise Chow was the assistant managing editor at Live Science before moving to NBC News as a science reporter, where she focuses on general science and climate change. Luring people with prostitutes and slipping them LSD That memo we just mentioned? If you don't believe this ridiculous program existed, you can read more about it in this memorandum published by the National Security Archive. Government and military secrets can range from terrifying to amusing to downright absurd, but most are nothing short of intriguing. Because of its scope and the introduction of so many characters, the narrative could have been improved if the author had focused on a shorter list than the 89 individuals profiled and maintained more topical continuity. They then "borrowed" the Soviet orbiter taking it apart and photographing its components before putting it back on the truck. The Central Intelligence Agency today declassified the United States Government's six oldest classified documents, dating from 1917 and 1918. [In Photos: Dive to USS Independence Wreck]. The Kennedy administration recognized the folly of Operation Northwoods and rejected it, according to news reports. The four volumes comprise (I) Air Operations, March 1960-1961; (II) Participation in the Conduct of Foreign Policy; (III) Evolution of CIA's Anti-Castro Policies, 1959-January 1961; and (IV) the Taylor Committee Investigation of the Bay of Pigs. Another Air Force study, this one submitted in 1959, involved detonating a nuclear weapon on the moon. Access Some CIA documentation is available for ready use. During the Cold War, the CIA played a role in distributing the book "Doctor Zhivago" throughout the Soviet Union. At the CIA Museum in Washington, DC, you can get a glimpse of the gadgets used in past spy missions. Many people believe that the Israeli government meant to open fire on the so-called "spy ship" to prevent it from intercepting sensitive information about upcoming battles, according to the declassified NSA report. Operation Paperclip's most famous recruit was rocket scientist Wernher von Braun, who would go on to mastermind NASA's Apollo moon missions. CIA Covert Operations: From Carter to Obama, 1977-2010 - ProQuest The collection includes more than 1,200 pages from various studies, memos, letters, and other official records documenting the CIA's efforts to examine, address, and improve the status of women employees from 1947 to today. Dubbed Operation Crossroads, the tests marked the first atomic explosions since the bombings of Japan during World War II in August 1945. Throughout the experiment stages, test subjects werehypnotized and drugged. Live Science is part of Future US Inc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. CIA's 1960s OXCART Program and its use of U-2s are examples of collection innovations that have kept US leaders informed about adversaries' capabilities and intentions. According to the just-declassified CIA-authored history of the operation, "It was the potential to leave Iran open to Soviet aggression at a time when the Cold War was at its height and . Its free. The Cold War and the emerging space race were in full swing in the late 1950s. Often compared to the Bermuda Triangle, Mapim is frequented by tourists looking for a paranormal adventure. Bound in unmarked blue linen and wrapped in brown paper, the books made their way into the Soviet Union, where the CIA hoped they would stir up anti-communist sentiment among disgruntled citizens. Copyright 2023 InsideHook. This collection of documents pertains to these issues, the responses and analysis of this event in history. The records center around 1995, the year in which the Dayton Accords were signed. The report also states that the FBI operates these planes without judicial approval. During the Cold War, the CIA played a role in distributing the book "Doctor Zhivago" throughout the Soviet Union. The Pentagon conducted a now-declassified official investigation into the incident in 1988 and did not find fault with the naval officers who brought down Flight 655. Another program, this one developed by the U.S. Air Force, sought to establish a "Lunar Based Earth Bombardment System" that met specific military requirements. Declassified documents are revealing more about cases such as his. An important part of CIA's ongoing effort to be more open and to provide for more public accountability has been a recognition of the importance of declassifying historically significant Agency documents. Records of the Central Intelligence Agency (RG 263) OSS Records | National Archives CREST currently houses over 10 million pages of declassified Agency documents. The tense relationship between the United States and Cuba during the Cold War led the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to hatch a slew of bizarre schemes aimed at taking down the Castro regime. The flying discshaped vehicle was supposed toreach speeds of Mach 4;an altitude of 100,000 feet; and have a range of over 1,000 nautical miles. Naval Undersea Museum, where theTrieste II(DSV-1) is on permanent display. While Area 51 was not a top-secret base designed to study extraterrestrials, the U.S. Air Force did study the existence of UFOs. (Image credit: SF photo | Shutterstock.com). The capsules, called "buckets," reentered the Earth's atmosphere and deployed a parachute as they descended toward the primary reentry zone near the Hawaiian Islands. The Central Intelligence Agency has now located and declassified files on a substantial number of individuals suspected of involvement in criminal activity for the Nazi regime or its allies and satellites. For a variety of technical and other reasons, none of the programs ever became operational. These documents cover the period from January 1977 through March 1979 and were produced by the CIA to support the Carter administrations diplomatic efforts leading up to President Carters negotiations with Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin at Camp David in September 1978. 1. The agency has declassified 600 out of some 20,000 objects used by CIA operatives throughout . One document outlines the chemicals and techniques necessary for developing certain types of secret writing ink and a method for opening sealed letters without detection. The program was canceled in 1966 after shifting ice created unstable conditions. The Current/Central Intelligence Bulletin grew longer than its predecessor over time with the addition of more items and more analysis, and would eventually contain more graphics as printing technology improved. Abigail Spanberger spent almost a decade as a CIA operations officer. Oleg Penkovsky was a high-ranking Soviet military intelligence officer who worked as a spy for the United States and Great Britain during the Cold War. 1Domestic wiretapping 2Extraordinary rendition 3Security failures 4Counterintelligence failures The Central Intelligence Agency today declassified the United States Government's six oldest classified documents, dating from 1917 and 1918. "When historical information is no longer sensitive, we take seriously our responsibility to share it with the American people.". The scheme, dreamed up in 1962 by the Joint Chiefs of Staff (uniformed members of the U.S. Department of Defense who advise the president and others), involved committing acts of violence against U.S. and Cuban civilians and then blaming those acts on the Cuban government, according to the NSA documents. These documents, which describe secret writing techniques and are housed at the National Archives, are believed to be the only remaining classified documents from the World War I era. Wernher von Braun, who helped get us on the moon in 1969. At least one valid email address is required. No. [Photos: Top-Secret, Cold War-Era Military Base in Greenland]. As early as 1955, OSI had alerted President Eisenhower to the Soviet program through briefings and finished intelligence products. Fri 11 Feb 2022 12.51 EST Last modified on Fri 11 Feb 2022 13.16 EST The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has been secretly collecting Americans' private information in bulk, according to. While the FBI told the AP that its aerial surveillance program is not a secret, details about what information the planes collect is highly censored in publicly available documents, according to the AP. The Missile Gap was in essence a growing perception in the West, especially in the USA, that the Soviet Union was quickly developing an intercontinental range ballistic missile (ICBM) capability earlier, in greater numbers, and with far more capability than that of the United States. Vietnam Histories. This claim by a respected publication led the Danish prime minister to request a new investigation of the declassified documents used for the BBC report. Flying saucers to mind control: 24 declassified military & CIA secrets The release of this collection coincides with a panel discussion at the Wilson Center on April 5, 2011. While only one of the incidents could be explained with high confidence, the report in no way suggested that aliens have anything to do with UAP; most UAP incidents can likely be explained as foreign surveillance drones or airborne clutter, such as weather balloons, Pentagon officials said in Nov. 2022. With this release, the CIA collection of records on the CREST system increases to nearly 13 million declassified pages. Declassified Documents - United States Federal Government Information It's free. The study was spearheaded by Leonard Reiffel, then a physicist at the Illinois Institute of Technology, and also included contributions from the astrophysicist Carl Sagan. Before the civilian space organization NASA put the first astronaut on the moon in 1969, at least two U.S. military organizations drew up plans for establishing strategic lunar military outposts. In the aftermath of the crash, American and Danish officials launched a project to clean up radioactive debris and collect the scattered pieces of the nuclear bombs. This remained the format of the president's daily digest through Dwight Eisenhower's two terms, although it was titled the Central Intelligence Bulletin from 1958-1961. [The 10 Craziest Military Experiments], In 1973, then-CIA director Richard Helms ordered that all documents from Project MK-ULTRA be destroyed, but a formal investigation into the program was launched several years later. This collection of declassified documents highlights the diverse programs involving the feasibility of using marine and avian animal capabilities in support of intelligence operations. Visit our corporate site. In January 1946, however, President Harry Truman directed the newly-formed Central Intelligence Group to provide him with a coordinated intelligence report known as the Daily Summary. This collection comprises 59 documents and 440 pages with insight on CIA intelligence and analysis of Sputnik-1, -2, and -3, as well as the Soviet ballistic missile program from 1955 to the early 1960s. From carrier pigeons in World War I to today's explosives-detecting dogs, government agencies have turned to animals to do the important jobs humans couldn't do. Within a short time, a young officer named Muammar Qadhafi emerged as a leader of the group, and he would rule Libya for the next 40 years. Previous U.S. intelligence and counterintelligence efforts had been conducted by the military and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and . Aquiline (July 30, 2020) Aerial intelligence collection platforms have played a critical role in US national security from the earliest beginnings of aviation. [Top 10 Soviet and Russian Space Missions]. " contains a partially declassified CIA report on the status of the Soviet Atomic energy Program as of July 4, 1950 which lists assumptions about Soviet activities along with comments on specific production . These and other declassified documents regarding Vietnam War crimes can be accessed through the National Archives. Department of Energy OpenNet The OpenNet database provides easy, timely access to over 495,000 bibliographic references and 147,000 recently declassified documents, including information declassified in response to Freedom of Information Act requests. In 2015, the AP broke the news of an FBI surveillance program that uses small aircraft to spy on suspects on the ground. The Nixon administration believed that Washington need not be overly distressed by the coup and felt the US could have a working relationship with the new regime. RIO DE JANEIRO The assassination squad created by Argentina's military dictatorship . If you think the government has too much power these days, just see what the CIA was up to in the 50s and 60s. "In fiscal year 2010 alone, the Agency declassified and released over 1.1 million pages of documents.". Records of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) - National Archives In his book on the topic, Edward J. Ruppelt, Air Force Captain and director of Project Grudge, wrote: "[I]t doesn't take a great deal of study of the old UFO files to see that standard intelligence procedures were not being followed by Project Grudge. That's the case with this document, titled "The Kidnapping of the Lunik." Erected literally overnight, the building of the Berlin Wall was the culmination of over a decade of escalating confrontations and contentious blockades contrived to encourage the west to abandon Berlin to the Communist Bloc. One of its most famous graduates? Another memorandum dated June 14, 1918 - written in French - reveals the formula used for German secret ink. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) | History, Organization This collection consists of some 120 declassified documents, the majority of which are being released for the first time. The OSS gathered intelligence information about practically every country in existence, but was not allowed to conduct operations in the Pacific Theater, which General Douglas MacArthur claimed as his own. Sign up now. Delta Force: Missions and History | Military.com Is Carmy From The Bear Unrealistically Fit? Newly declassified information revealed that President George W. Bush gave an order to the . In light of news reports, an official inquiry was made into the events at My Lai and was concluded in March 1970. In the 1960s, the U.S. Army launched a secret program to build mobile nuclear missile launch sites under the Greenland ice sheet. [1] Producers collaborate with prominent intelligence, military and government agencies such as CIA, FBI, NSA, DIA, DOD, Homeland Security, The State Department, et al., to tell their stories in a non-political, objective way that spotlights the perspective of people that do the work. Under guidelines laid out for the program, historical records are released except in instances where disclosure would damage national security-that is, for example, where it would reveal sensitive foreign government information or identify intelligence sources and methods that are currently in use and that are subject to denial and/or deception. In 2014, declassified documents from the U.S. Air Force and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) revealed a plan dreamed up in 1950 for a "covert intelligence and evasion and escape operation in Alaska.". Nineteen CIA "name files" being opened today . The "new and improved" version, called the Current Intelligence Bulletin, began production on 28 February 1951. This study continues CIAs efforts to provide a detailed record of the intelligence derived from clandestine human and technical sources from that period. The project began in 1939, and was cloaked in secrecy as physicists investigated the potential power of atomic weapons. And these clandestine armies weren't just kept secret from the Soviet Union. PDF Review of 'Operation Paperclip: The Secret Intelligence Program - CIA The documents in this collection highlight the bloodless coup by a group of Libyan military officers which removed King Idris I. The so-called Mapim Silent Zone is a small stretch of desert in Durango, Mexico, where, according to local legend, radio waves cannot be transmitted. The project's estimated cost was more than $3 million, which in today's dollars would be more than $26 million. The mission of the secret armies was simple: Prepare for a potential communist takeover and lead an armed resistance should such a takeover occur. Stories 10 Fascinating CIA Missions September 7, 2022 Intelligence and Operations Did you know that we secretly plucked a soviet submarine off of the ocean floor, used a fake movie production company to rescue six American diplomats trapped in Iran, and dug a secret tunnel beneath Berlin to spy on Soviet communications during the Cold War? The release of these documents is in conjunction with the conference, "New Documents and New Histories: Twenty-First Century Perspectives on the Korean War," co-hosted by the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library and the CIA in Independence, Missouri. Unlike Special Forces clandestine operations, since 1974 CIA covert operations required a Presidential finding and notification to the US Congress. Historical Collections | CIA FOIA (foia.cia.gov) - The World Factbook Sometimes, declassified documents read like a scene out of a James Bond film. Declassified (2016 TV series) - Wikipedia The release of this collection, which coincides with the 60th anniversary of the start of the war, makes available to the public the largest collection of Agency documents released on this issue. In 2008, the BBC published an article based on declassified documents regarding the Thule accident, asserting that one of the four hydrogen bombs was never recovered from the crash site. For more, visit our Collections archive. Documents describing secret writing fall under the CIA's purview to declassify. CIA is no exception, and it once worked on developing ways animals could help with intelligence collection. Prior to October 6, the CIA concluded that the Arabs would not attack, so the offensive surprised US policymakers as well as Israel. World War II 'horror bunker' run by infamous Unit 731 discovered in China. The collection--made up of intelligence assessments, National Intelligence Estimates, high-level memos, and DCI talking points--consists of over 200 documents, some 60 of which are either being made available to the public for the first time or are being re-released with new material. Understanding how the Soviet Union envisioned the next combat situation required in-depth knowledge of both their high-level theory of warfare and probable tactical behavior. (Keystone/Getty Images), A Soviet soldier inside the 350 yard tunnel extending from the American Sector of Berlin into the Soviet Sector on April 26, 1956. Crafting an Intelligence Community : Papers of the First Four DCIs. Declassified CIA documents show that Britain was fearful of Iran's plans to nationalize its oil industry and pressed the U.S. to mount a joint operation to depose the prime minister and install a puppet regime. In 1970, an ATHENA V-123-D rocket carrying two small vials of cobalt 57 (a radioactive isotope that is sometimes used in salted bombs) crashed in the Durango desert. The trove contains files covering a wide range of secrets, from the mundane to the mind-blowing and, yes, even UFOS. During the Cold War, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NATO, developed a classified plan for keeping Europe "safe" in the event of a Soviet invasion. The Most Astonishing Declassified Military and CIA Secrets NASA Deputy Administrator Robert Seamans stands to the left of von Braun. On 4 October 1957, the USSR successfully launched the Sputnik-1 earth satellite into space - an achievement that stunned the American public and press but not the US policy and intelligence communities. In 1951 the Iranian parliament voted to nationalize the petroleum fields of the country. This report evolved over the years and its name has changed --its now called the Presidents Daily Brief or PDB-- but the tradition begun in 1946 of informing the President with a coordinated daily report continues to this day. The Czech communist leadership embarked on a program of dramatic liberalization of the political, economic, and social orders. The idea here was that the CIA could gain confessions from enemy combatants through unconventional methods like mind-control. The Czechoslovak crisis began in January 1968. A month after the Trinity test, two atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan in the waning stages of World War II. formed CIA. 25 Interesting Declassified Government Secrets - KickassFacts When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. An SH-3 helicopter is near her bow. A Abu Omar case Acoustic Kitty Air Bridge Denial Program MS Alfhem American Committee on United Europe SS Aquila (1940) SS Armonia (1924) CIA assassination attempts on Fidel Castro B Battalion 3-16 (Honduras) Bay of Pigs Invasion William H. Beale Darrell Blocker C Canadian Caper Operation CHAOS 1973 Chilean coup d'tat Since the release of the bombshell videos, The Pentagon has taken a much more transparent stance on UFO/UAP investigations, opening a dedicated UAP case management office called the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) in early 2022. Italian Prime Minister at the time, the late Giulio Andreotti divulged information about Italy's secret Cold War army (known as Gladio) in 1990, becoming the first leader of a NATO country to publicly acknowledge one of these forces. The perceived missile gap that ensued was based on a comparison between US ICBM strength as then programmed, and reasonable, although erroneous estimates of prospective Soviet ICBM strength that were generally accepted. investigation into covert operations during the agency's first three decades the probe that produced the "family jewels" documents was begun in 1973 by James . Category:Central Intelligence Agency operations - Wikipedia Some historians suggest the program was designed to develop a mind-control system that could be used to "program" the brains of potential assassins. But did you know that this was happening even before there was a CIA? It marked the beginning of Project ARTICHOKE, a CIA investigation into mind control that experimented with. Numerous Congressional hearings followed the video leak, and in June 2021 The Pentagon released an unclassified report detailing more than 140 encounters between military personnel and unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), another name for UFOs. The ultimate action-packed science and technology magazine bursting with exciting information about the universe, Subscribe today and save an extra 5% with checkout code 'LOVE5', Engaging articles, amazing illustrations & exclusive interviews, Issues delivered straight to your door or device. The explosion created a mushroom cloud that stretched 40,000 feet (12,200 m), and the bomb's explosive power was equivalent to more than 15,000 tons of TNT. The Historical Review Program coordinates the review of the documents with CIA components and other US Government entities before final declassification action is taken and the documents are transferred to the National Archives. Declassified U.S. Documents Reveal Details About Argentina's Declassified documents associated with the inquiry are available from the Library of Congress. operations in the Southwest Pacific against Japan as well as operations in North Africa, the Mediterranean and Northwest Europe. What is the maximum number of biological parents an organism can have? Records of the Central Intelligence Agency (RG 263) A New Book Makes a Convincing Argument. These reforms triggered increasing Soviet concerns culminating in the invasion of 21 August 1969. The series debuted on CNN on June 19, 2016. In March 1968, American soldiers murdered hundreds of unarmed civilians in the South Vietnamese hamlet of My Lai, according to accounts of the massacre that describe harrowing killings of at least 300 women, children and elderly people. You Can Now Explore the CIA's 'Entire' Collection of UFO Documents ", In July 2016, the National Security Archive posted declassified documents, films and photographs that show U.S. tests of atomic bombs in the Bikini Atoll in 1946. Center for the Study of Intelligence (CSI), CIA Releases Declassified Documents to National Archives. The report also states that the warship was operating in international waters at the time of the missile launch, when it was in fact operating in Iranian territorial waters. No matter what you see or hear, don't believe it.". Now, she's a third-term Virginia . Reaffirming the principle that the US government's records should be open to the public, the program called for significant historical information to be made available unless such release could cause damage to the national security interests of the United States. One of its most famous "graduates"? However, for years later, news reports out of Denmark and the U.S. questioned whether all four bombs had really been located. While much is publicly known about the tests, the declassified documents shed new light on how the tests affected people of Bikini Atoll, who were forced to relocate. As part of a mass declassification of a number of secrets in 2012, the U.S. Air Force revealedthat its Aeronautical Systems Division had plans to produce aUFO-style aircraft back in the 1950s. Dr. Wernher von Braun (center) describes the Saturn Launch System to President John F. Kennedy (right, pointing).

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