Central Intelligence Agency/Related Articles
From Citizendium, the Citizens' Compendium

- See also changes related to Central Intelligence Agency, or pages that link to Central Intelligence Agency or to this page or whose text contains "Central Intelligence Agency".
Parent topics
- Office of Strategic Services [r]: The United States' first unified agency for clandestine intelligence collection, all-source intelligence analysis and covert action [e]
- National Security Act of 1947 [r]: Core of legislation that restructured the U.S. military from its traditional structure of a separate Army and Navy, creating the United States Air Force, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Central Intelligence Agency, and the predecessor to the U.S. Department of Defense [e]
- Director of National Intelligence [r]: The professional head of the United States Intelligence Community, reporting to the President, with Dennis Blair being replaced by James Clapper [e]
- United States intelligence community [r]: The United States' intelligence agencies coordinated by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. [e]
Subtopics
- Director of Central Intelligence [r]: Formerly, the U.S. official that headed both the Central Intelligence Agency and the United States intelligence community; the responsibility is now split between the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (currently Leon Panetta) and the Director of National Intelligence (currently Dennis Blair) [e]
- Director of the Central Intelligence Agency [r]: After the Director of National Intelligence was created to head the overall United States intelligence community, the official responsible for the remaining functions of the Central Intelligence Agency in intelligence analysis and research into intelligence methodology, clandestine human-source intelligence and some covert action [e]
Former staff
- David Addington [r]: U.S. lawyer, closely affiliated with Dick Cheney, who is an advocate of extremely strong Presidential power [e]
- Robert Ames [r]: National Intelligence Officer for the Near East and a Central Intelligence Agency employee killed in the 1983 bombing of the U.S. embassy in Beirut [e]
- James Jesus Angleton [r]: Long-time OSS and CIA counterintelligence officer, who headed the CIA Counterintelligence Staff and constantly searched for conspiracies — which, in the world of intelligence, might or might not exist; he did not suspect Kim Philby [e]
- Robert Baer [r]: Central Intelligence Agency operations officer between 1976 and 1997; left in dissatisfaction; currently intelligence columnist for Time [e]
- Richard Bissell [r]: Central Intelligence Agency official involved in a wide range of operations and high-technology projects; involved in the original creation of the National Reconnaissance Office; resigned over the Bay of Pigs [e]
- Cofer Black [r]: Central Intelligence Agency officer who headed the Counterterrorism Center before the 9-11 attack, reporting directly to Jim Pavitt under George Tenet [e]
- Dino Brugioni [r]: Former senior official at the CIA's National Photographic Interpretation Center who helped establish imagery intelligence (IMINT); after retirement, worked on the use of imagery in historical research; discovered, well after WWII, photographic evidence of Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp [e]
- William Bundy [r]: Central Intelligence Agency officer who shifted to the Department of Defense during the John F. Kennedy administration, and then became Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs during the Lyndon B. Johnson administration. [e]
- Vincent Cannistrano [r]: President of Cannistrano Associates, former Central Intelligence Agency officer who headed the Counterterrorism Center; Director for Intelligence Programs at the National Security Council in the Ronald Reagan Administration; Special Assistant for Intelligence in the office of the Secretary of Defense. [e]
- Kathleen Christison [r]: Central Intelligence Agency officer who retired in 1979; charter member of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity who resigned, along with her spouse, William Christison, over the specific recommendation to ask for Dick Cheney's resignation; she continues as an author on topics related to Palestine [e]
- William Christison [r]: Retired Central Intelligence Agency officer, a founding member of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity who resigned when the group went beyond what he and Kathleen Christison considered policy, in calling for the resignation of Dick Cheney; he was a very early CIA officer, joining in 1950 serving in analysis for 28 years; he was also, from the 1970s a National Intelligence Officer for several regions; his last assignment was Director of the CIA's Office of Regional and Political Analysis; spouse of CIA veteran Kathleen Christison [e]
- Lucien Conein [r]: (1919-1998), a U.S. clandestine operations officer working both for the Office of Strategic Services and the Central Intelligence Agency; he was the direct contact to the 1963 coup against Ngo Dinh Diem. [e]
- Hank Crumpton [r]: Coordinator for Counterterrorism in U.S. State Department, with the rank of Ambassador; long a Central Intelligence Agency covert action officer [e]
- Raymond Garthoff [r]: Guest Scholar, Brookings Institution: specialist on arms control, the Cold War, the former Soviet Union and NATO; former U.S. Ambassador to Bulgaria and has also advised the State Department on missile treaties; was Central Intelligence Agency analyst on weapons of mass destruction [e]
- Reuel Marc Gerecht [r]: Researcher and commentator on the Middle East and radical Islam, generally associated with neoconservatism; former Central Intelligence Agency operations officer [e]
- Philip Giraldi [r]: Francis Walsingham Fellow, American Conservative Defense Alliance; Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity; contributor to AntiWar.com contributing editor on terrorism, intelligence, and security issues for the American Conservative magazine; signatory, "Beyond Guantanamo"; Former Central Intelligence Agency Chief of Base in Barcelona (1989-1992), senior officer for Olympic Games support, liaison to the Spanish Security and Intelligence services [e]
- Fiona Hill [r]: National Intelligence Officer for Russia and Eurasia, National Intelligence Council, Office of the Director of National Intelligence, 2009-2010 [e]
- Edward Lansdale [r]: A U.S. Air Force general on assignment to the CIA, key counterinsurgency advisor to Philippine President Ramon Magsaysay, involved in French Indochina and South Vietnam 1954-1960, although lost influence in U.S. policymaking through bureaucratic infighting [e]
- Jami Miscik [r]: Vice-Chairman of Kissinger Associates; member of the board of Council on Foreign Relations; previously, Global Head of Sovereign Risk at Lehman Brothers; Central Intelligence Agency Deputy Director for Intelligence from 2002 to 2005; Director for Intelligence Programs at the National Security Council during the Clinton Administration from 1995 to 1996 [e]
- Paul Pillar [r]: Director of graduate studies at the Georgetown University Center for Peace and Security Studies, previously 28 years as an officer at the Central Intelligence Agency with experience in counterterrorism; has written much on intelligence reform and has been politically controversial [e]
- Michael Scheuer [r]: Former head of the Osama bin Laden/al-Qaeda unit in the Counterterrorism Center of the Central Intelligence Agency; critical of U.S. policies but with insightful analysis on what he sees as a complex enemy; contributor to AntiWar.com [e]
- Valerie Plame Wilson [r]: Add brief definition or description
Analytic products
- National Intelligence Estimate [r]: Add brief definition or description
- Special National Intelligence Estimate [r]: Add brief definition or description
Clandestine sources
- Peter Popov [r]: Add brief definition or description
- Oleg Penkovsky [r]: (1919-1963) Colonel in Soviet military intelligence (GRU), possibly the most important Cold War defector, who remained in place, providing information, until shot [e]
Covert action
- Bay of Pigs invasion [r]: Failed attempt to invade Cuba in April 1961, by Cuban exiles trained by the Central Intelligence Agency and approved by President John F. Kennedy; Joint Chiefs of Staff recommended against the plan but the U.S. military was not involved in its execution [e]
- Project Phoenix [r]: Add brief definition or description
- Operation MONGOOSE [r]: Carried out under orders of President John F. Kennedy, an unsuccessful Central Intelligence Agency program to assassinate Fidel Castro. [e]
Defectors
- Philip Agee [r]: Add brief definition or description
- Edward Howard [r]: Add brief definition or description
Staff now at ODNI
- Alan Pino [r]: National Intelligence Officer for the Near East (2005-); Central Intelligence Agency analyst (1983-2005), Chief of the Arab-Israeli Group in the Office of Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs, team chief for the Near East South Asian Terrorist Team (1994-2000); Counterterrorism Center (1998-2000) [e]
- Julie E. Cohen [r]: National Intelligence Officer for Transnational Threats (February 2009-); Central Intelligence Agency Senior Intelligence Service; previously Chair of the National SIGINT Analysis and Production Subcommittee of the National SIGINT Committee; Group Chief for two different groups in CIA's Counterterrorism Center; Office of the Inspector General [e]
Publications
- World Factbook [r]: A freely available publication of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), containing extensive basic data, including maps, on the countries of the world. [e]
- Clandestine human-source intelligence and covert action [r]: Intelligence and military special operations functions that either should be completely secret (i.e., clandestine: the existence of which is not known outside the relevant government circles), or simply cannot be linked to the sponsor (i.e., covert: it is known that sabotage is taking place, but its sponsor is unknown). [e]
Historians
- National Security Archive, George Washington University [r]: A nonprofit organization that collects, through legal action when necessary, government documents, especially declassified information [e]
- Jeffrey Richelson [r]: Senior Fellow at the National Security Archive, George Washington University, and author of a number of books on the United States intelligence community [e]
Intelligence community
- Intellipedia [r]: Wikis, of different security levels, which are used by individuals with appropriate clearances from the 16 agencies of the United States intelligence community; at least one more is accessible to trusted intelligence agencies of a small number of countries. [e]
Cooperating agencies
- Secret Intelligence Service [r]: Britain's national-level civilian organization for intelligence and covert action [e]
- Australian Security Intelligence Service [r]: Add brief definition or description
- Canadian Security Intelligence Service [r]: The civilian intelligence analysis and counterintelligence organization of Canada [e]
- Mossad [r]: The civilian foreign intelligence and covert action agency of Israel, roughly comparable to the British Secret Intelligence Service or U.S. Central Intelligence Agency [e]
Operations involving predecessors
- Intelligence on the Korean War [r]: The collection and analysis, primarily by the United States with South Korean help, of information that predicted the 1950 invasion of South Korea, and the plans and capabilities of the enemy once the war had started [e]
- U.S. intelligence involvement with World War II war criminals [r]: Choices by U.S. intelligence agencies, after the Second World War, not to seek prosecution of certain war criminals in return for perceived important intelligence information [e]
- U.S. intelligence involvement with World War II Japanese war criminals [r]: Actions by intelligence agencies, primarily in the U.S. Army, where Japanese strongly suspected of war crimes were not prosecuted in exchange for information, such as details of the biological weapons program [e]
- U.S. intelligence involvement with World War II Nazi war criminals [r]: Actions by intelligence agencies, primarily in the U.S. Army, where Nazi strongly suspected of war crimes were not prosecuted in exchange for information, such information on the Soviet Union [e]