THE CIA VAULT: Operation Mockingbird
When the CIA got caught working with journalists and others to manipulate the American people.
Operation Mockingbird was a secret CIA program created to influence the media and manipulate public opinion during the Cold War era. The program launched sometime around the 1950s and lasted for two decades. Its primary goal was to spread anti-communist propaganda and shape the public’s view on foreign policy issues. The CIA manipulated news content and recruited journalists, news organizations, and student groups to disseminate that propaganda.12
THE CHURCH COMMITTEE
The program was exposed in the 1970s with the help of the “Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities” (The Church Committee).3 The revelations shocked the American public and led to a short-lived push for greater transparency and accountability in government agencies. Thanks to the committee’s efforts and public pressure, President Jimmy Carter signed the FISA into law, establishing the FISA courts.4 These courts would later be criticized as “rubber-stamp courts” for the US government.5
“In 1978 Congress approved and President Jimmy Carter signed into law the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), requiring the executive branch to request warrants for wiretapping and surveillance purposes from a newly formed FISA Court.”6
Damage Control
“The first major step to impose restrictions on the use of U.S. journalists was taken by former Director Colby in the fall of 1973. According to Mr. Colby's letter to the Committee:
(a) CIA will undertake no activity in which there is a risk of influencing domestic public opinion, either directly or indirectly. The Agency will continue its prohibition against placement of material in the American media. In certain instances, usually where the initiative is on the part of the media, CIA will occasionally provide factual non-attributable briefings to various elements of the media, but only in cases where we are sure that the senior editorial staff is aware of the source of the information provided.
(b) As a general policy, the Agency will not make any clandestine use of staff employees of U.S. publications which have a substantial impact or influence on public opinion. This limitation includes cover use and any other activities which might be directed by CIA.
(c) A thorough review should be made of CIA use of nonstaff journalists; i.e., stringers and free-lancers, and also those individuals involved in journalistic activities who are in nonsensitive journalist-related positions, primarily for cover backstopping. Our goal in this exercise is to reduce such usage to a minimum.”7
https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP88-01315R000300660001-9.pdf
In response to the growing backlash, CIA Director George H. W. Bush announced a new policy in 1976:
"Effective immediately, CIA will not enter into any paid or contractual relationship with any full-time or part-time news correspondent accredited by any U.S. news service, newspaper, periodical, radio or television network or station.”89
Trust, but Verify
Journalist Carl Bernstein, writing in a 1977 Rolling Stone article, said that the Church Committee report covered up CIA relations with news media, and named a number of journalists and organizations who worked with the CIA.10
“Alsop is one of more than 400 American journalists who in the past twenty‑five years have secretly carried out assignments for the Central Intelligence Agency, according to documents on file at CIA headquarters. Some of these journalists’ relationships with the Agency were tacit; some were explicit. There was cooperation, accommodation and overlap. Journalists provided a full range of clandestine services—from simple intelligence gathering to serving as go‑betweens with spies in Communist countries. Reporters shared their notebooks with the CIA. Editors shared their staffs. Some of the journalists were Pulitzer Prize winners, distinguished reporters who considered themselves ambassadors without‑portfolio for their country. Most were less exalted: foreign correspondents who found that their association with the Agency helped their work; stringers and freelancers who were as interested in the derring‑do of the spy business as in filing articles; and, the smallest category, full‑time CIA employees masquerading as journalists abroad. In many instances, CIA documents show, journalists were engaged to perform tasks for the CIA with the consent of the managements of America’s leading news organizations.“11
“Some members of the Church committee and staff feared that Agency officials had gained control of the inquiry and that they were being hoodwinked. “The Agency was extremely clever about it and the committee played right into its hands,” said one congressional source familiar with all aspects of the inquiry. “Church and some of the other members were much more interested in making headlines than in doing serious, tough investigating. The Agency pretended to be giving up a lot whenever it was asked about the flashy stuff—assassinations and secret weapons and James Bond operations. Then, when it came to things that they didn’t want to give away, that were much more important to the Agency, Colby in particular called in his chits. And the committee bought it.”
The Senate committee’s investigation into the use of journalists was supervised by William B. Bader, a former CIA intelligence officer who returned briefly to the Agency this year as deputy to CIA director Stansfield Turner and is now a high‑level intelligence official at the Defense Department. Bader was assisted by David Aaron, who now serves as the deputy to Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter’s national security adviser.”12
Operation Mockingbird was one of the most insidious CIA operations ever, having shaped the very narrative of reality that the American public was exposed to on a daily basis. As such, Mockingbird is a powerful reminder of the importance of transparency and accountability in government and media. The need for vigilant and critical media that is able to expose and challenge attempts to manipulate public opinion is paramount.
If the public is not able to trust the media and government to present accurate and unbiased information, then how can we make informed decisions about important issues?
We can’t.
If the government and media are actively manipulating the people to further their own agendas, then who is really in control of our society?
They are.
Thanks for reading.
References
Worldwide Propaganda Network Built by the C.I.A. The New York Times. 1977.
The 1967 Central Intelligence Agency Scandal: Catalyst in a Transforming Relationship between State and People. Tity de Vries. Journal of American History. 2012.
White House Efforts to Blunt 1975 Church Committee Investigation into CIA Abuses Foreshadowed Executive-Congressional Battles after 9/11. John Prados & Arturo Jimenez-Bacardi. The National Security Archive, The George Washington University. 2015.
FISA Court Appears To Be Rubber Stamp For Government Requests. Dina Temple-Raston. NPR. 2013.
Church Committee Final Report, Vol 1: Foreign and Military Intelligence. p. 196-197. 1976.
Central Intelligence Agency, Office of the Director. CIA Director George H. W. Bush. 1976.
The CIA and The Media. Carl Bernstein. Rolling Stone. 1977.
The CIA and The Media. Carl Bernstein. Rolling Stone. 1977.
The CIA and The Media. Carl Bernstein. Rolling Stone. 1977.