The CIA and the Media

Updated: April 2023
Published: June 2016

High-quality documentaries and investigations on CIA media influence.

Introduction: John Stockwell on CIA media manipulation

CIA whistleblower John Stockwell on CIA media manipulation (3 min., source: 1983 interview)

Documentaries

• CIA – Faking The News (Channel 4, 12 min., 1985; archive)
• Operation Gladio (Francovich, BBC, 150 min., 1992; archive)
• The Inslaw Affair (A Current Affair, 20 min., 1993; more)
• Hidden Hands: Art and the CIA (Channel 4, 60 min., 1995)
• The War on Democracy (John Pilger, 90 min., 2007; more)
• The CIA and the News Media 2.0 (Corbett Report, 40 min, 2022)
• Tales of the American Empire (YouTube channel, since 2017)

Articles I (Basics)

• The CIA and the Media (Carl Bernstein, Rolling Stone, 1977)
• Worldwide Propaganda Network Built by the CIA (NYT, 1977)
• Modern Art Was CIA ‘Weapon’ (Independent, 1995)
• Social Media Is a Tool of the CIA (CBS News, 2011)
• The Victory of ‘Perception Management’ (CN, 2014)
• The CIA and the Media: 50 Facts (Tracy, 2015)
• The CIA and Hollywood (Atlantic, 2016)
• CIA Operation CHAOS (Grunge, 2020)

Articles II (Specifics)

• CNN and Psyops (Counterpunch, 2000; more)
• The CIA’s Mop-Up Man (The Intercept, 2014)
• How the CIA made Google (Insurge, 2015; more)
• Pierre Omidyar and the CIA (Grayzone, 2019)
• The Editor-in-Chief and the CIA (SPR, 2019)
• CNN’s Anderson Cooper and the CIA (GZ, 2020)
• The CIA and ‘Progressive’ Media (Defender, 2021)
• Tucker Carlson: A Company Man? (SPR, 2023; video)
• The CIA and Facebook (Mint Press News, 2022)

Articles III (More)

• CIA – Core of the Cancer (David Conde, CAM, 1970/2023)
• How the CIA Manufactures History (Victor Marchetti, 1989)
• The CIA and International Banking: BCCI (Newsweek, 1991)
• How NSA access was built into Windows (Heise, 1999)
• CIA and Encryption: The Crypto AG Scandal (WP, 2020)
• The National Endowment for Democracy (SPR, 2019)
• Wikipedia: A Propaganda Operation? (SPR, 2020)
• A History of CIA Drug Trafficking (ISGP, 2020)
• Barack Obama and the CIA (CAM, 2021)
• Bill Clinton and the CIA (CAM, 2022)

Books

• Inside the Company: CIA Diary (Philip Agee, 1975; interview)
• Who Paid the Piper? The Cultural Cold War (Frances Saunders, 2000)
• The Mighty Wurlitzer: How the CIA Played America (Hugh Wilford, 2008)
• The CIA as Organized Crime (Douglas Valentine, Clarity Press, 2016)
• Surveillance Valley: The Secret Military History of the Internet (Y. Levine, 2018)
• Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions since WW II (W. Blum, 2022)

Quotes

• “We’ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false.” CIA Director William Casey, in a meeting with US President Ronald Reagan in February 1981. Quoted by Barbara Honegger, who was present at the meeting. Casey estimated that over 80% of intelligence was based on open public sources like newspapers and magazines; thus, disinforming the Soviets required disinforming the American public. (Source)

German Resources

Documentaries

• Germany – Made in USA (Phoenix, 2003, 45 Min.; Archiv)
• Künstler im Netz der CIA (ARTE, 2006, 50 Min., Archiv)
• Operation Wunderland (WDR, 2008, 3 mal 45 Min.; Archiv)
• Land unter Kontrolle (3Sat/Foschepoth, 2014, 45 Min.; Archiv)
• Transatlantische Medien-Netzwerke (ZDF/Anstalt, 2014, 5 Min.)
• Schachmatt – Strategie einer Revolution (ARTE, 2003, 60 Min.; EN)

Books

• Geheimdienst, Politik, Medien (Schmidt-Eenboom, 2004)
• Gekaufte Journalisten (Udo Ulfkotte, Kopp Verlag, 2014)
• Unheimlich zu Diensten (Ekkehardt/Spoo/Agee, 1987)