Question

Defend or oppose Eisenhower's use of the cia for covert operations during the cold war

Answer 1

In the context of the Cold War, the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency), created in 1947 from the new National Security Act sanctioned that same year, became a key piece of American anti-communist policy. As different authors point out, a sort of parallel state structure was articulated - a State within another State, with a large, separate and partially concealed budget, endowed with enormous powers and resources for the deployment of military activity without congressional control. If before the Eisenhower administration the so-called "covert activities" of the CIA were increasing ("the budget for covert operations had grown, from 4.7 million in 1949, to 82 million in 1952, the personnel involved in 302 to 2,812 with an additional 'staff per contract' of 3,142 overseas "), with his government they further increased their scale, with the CIA headed by Allen Dulles. In March 1954 the scope of what were considered "covert operations" was expanded: "propaganda, political action, economic warfare, flight measures, evasion and evacuation, subversion against hostile states or groups that include assistance to resistance movements, guerrilla and liberation groups; support for vernacular and anti-communist elements in the threatened countries of the free world; deceptive plans and operations, and all compatible activities that are necessary to achieve the purposes of this directive".

During the Eisenhower administration various covert actions were carried out by the CIA, highlighting the overthrow in August 1953 of the Iranian left-wing prime minister, Mohammad Mosaddeq, who had nationalized Iranian oil on March 20, 1951, and the establishment of a dictatorship by Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi with the support of the United States; the overthrow in June 1954 of the government of Jacobo Arbenz Guzman in Guatemala; the coup d'état in South Vietnam in April 1955 and the establishment of the dictatorship of Ngo Dinh Diem; and the attempted coup in Indonesia in 1958. The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 was also discreetly supported, although without any direct involvement in a country that was a member of the Warsaw Pact.

The policies of covert actions carried out during the Eisenhower administration were positive and necessary, since we must remember that the country was immersed in the Cold War, so the threat of communism was latent and effective. Then, any action designed to weaken it should be carried out.

Answer 2

I will defend. The threat of nuclear war was very real during the Cold War. No expense could be spared in preventing this.