Part 1: “The History.” "On Company Business" is an in-depth look into the origins, history, and inner-workings of one of the world’s most powerful, but least understood, covert intelligence gathering organization: the Central Intelligence Agency. The documentary’s three parts are entitled “The History,” “Assassination,” and “Subversion.”
Dusko Doder’s case has ominous reverberations in the era of Cold War 2.0 Late one February night in 1984, Dusko Doder, The Washington Post’s Soviet correspondent, noticed hundreds of lights blazing at the Soviet Defense Ministry and KGB offices in Moscow. He surmised that the Soviet leader, Yuri Andropov, who had...
Louis Wolf:  Our first question relates to Gina Haspel. I should just point out that we have just posted on our webpage the transcripts of the torture documents which were obtained by the Federation of American Scientists... Chris Agee:  And the National Security Archive, right? Louis Wolf:  ...and the National Security Archive...in which...
New Documentary Explores Life and Legacy of Fletcher Prouty, who wrote about CIA covert operations in his classic book The Secret Team In a famous scene in Oliver Stone’s epic 1992 film JFK, Kevin Costner’s character confers with a shadowy CIA operative played by Donald Sutherland known as Mr. X...
Part 3: “Subversion.” "On Company Business" is an in-depth look into the origins, history, and inner-workings of one of the world’s most powerful, but least understood, covert intelligence gathering organization: the Central Intelligence Agency.
Just over a year ago we reported on Chanda Creasy, a courageous yoga coach, who had previously managed to work with militants in Africa, making her way up to the position of special assistant to CIA director on global operations. Recently, we found new details of Chanda’s trip to...
Armenia is another battleground of the new cold war In July 2022, CIA Director William Burns made a surprise visit to Yerevan in Armenia. He was there officially to support his Agency’s financing of “non-profit organizations” whose stated purpose is to “spread democratic values.” The United States Agency for International Development...
Mike Pompeo, CIA Director and Secretary of State in the first Trump administration, has long been a Ukraine war hawk, calling Russia’s actions genocide, stating that Crimea should be returned to Ukraine (when its people voted overwhelmingly to be part of Russia) and consistently advocating for increased...
The CIA likes to fashion itself as a heroic agency that helps to protect national security and uphold democracy around the world. However, Hugh Wilford’s book, The CIA: An Imperial History (Basic Books, 2024), shows that the CIA draws directly from British and French colonial precedents, and adopts the same...
In this episode, we highlight the struggle of the workers at the Ford Cuautitlán Assembly Plant, just outside Mexico City. On January 8, 1990, workers at the plant were attacked by police and private hired thugs wearing Ford jackets. This happened during a prolonged period of labor action by the workers, and kicked off an occupation of the plant. This attack didn’t happen in a vacuum and the CIA played a role in squashing labor at the plant.