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Police Programs Before the Office

Police assistance predated the Office of Public Safety. A memorandum from Acting Secretary of State Chester Bowles to President Kennedy in September 1961 describes police training to be administered by the International Cooperation Administration through its Public Safety program in Panama, El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala, with $726,000 obligated in fiscal 1961.³ In October 1961 the President's military representative, Maxwell Taylor, reported that "AID is currently considering a proposal to establish a U.S. police academy, preferably in a Caribbean location such as the Panama Canal Zone."⁴ In February 1962 Secretary of State Dean Rusk informed the President that AID was reviewing its Public Safety program for Latin America.⁵

National Security Action Memorandum 124 of January 18, 1962 created the NSC Special Group, with the AID administrator among its members. The annex assigned Laos, South Vietnam and Thailand to its cognizance.⁶

An interagency committee chaired at the State Department by U. Alexis Johnson reported to the President on July 20, 1962. It described police assistance as "a very important but neglected part of our intensified effort to help emerging nations counter subversion and insurgency." It recommended that AID be charged with "operating and funding responsibility for all such programs, except for their covert aspects," that AID set up a senior professional office to manage police work, and that the government establish an international police academy under its own management. National Security Action Memorandum 177 of August 7, 1962 approved the recommendations.⁷

Office of Public Safety, 1962 to 1974

On March 14, 1963 the chairman of the Special Group, Johnson, told the President that the worldwide police program had risen from about $14 million in fiscal 1962 to about $30 million in fiscal 1963. He reported that AID had "centralized the administration of the program in a new Office of Public Safety located within AID," with police advisory missions in thirty countries and eight more planned.⁸ The office, usually called OPS, ran police advisers, equipment and training for foreign forces until the Foreign Assistance Acts of 1973 and 1974 ended the funding.

The program's footprint in Latin America grew through the 1960s. A June 1965 memorandum from the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs recommended that the department "continue to push for an expanded Public Safety program to enable the police to deal more effectively with insurgency problems."⁹ A July 1967 review of seven countries with active or potential insurgencies directed that an expanded program for Ecuador's rural police be worked out with AID/Public Safety.¹⁰ In October 1969 the American ambassador in Dominican Republic proposed that responsibility for the Dominican National Police's Department of Special Operations pass to AID's public safety program effective June 30, 1970.¹¹ In August 1970 a memorandum to President Nixon reported that "a modest public safety program is being reinstituted in FY 1971 with a proposed budget of $118,000" in Bolivia.¹²

The public safety program itself began in 1954, with Indonesia the first recipient, and by the end of 1955 it included Iran, South Korea and Cambodia. The Comptroller General reported in 1976 that the Office of Public Safety was set up in AID in 1962 and that the International Police Academy was established the following year. Over the life of the program 52 countries received technical assistance, and more than 10,700 police officers were trained in the United States, 5,204 of them graduates of the academy. The program peaked in fiscal 1968, when 34 countries received about $60 million and the office had about 590 employees; by the end of fiscal 1973 its staff had fallen to 240.¹³

Senator Alan Cranston told the Senate in March 1992 that the program had been channelled mostly through the AID Office of Public Safety, and that by 1968 the government was spending $60 million annually to train police in 34 countries. He wrote that reports of torture and murder by U.S.-trained and U.S.-equipped police in Iran, Vietnam, Brazil and other countries had spurred the 1974 ban.¹⁴

Dan Mitrione in Uruguay

Dan Mitrione served as the office's chief public safety adviser in Montevideo, Uruguay, where the public safety program had begun in 1964.¹³ On August 11, 1970 Representative Gerald R. Ford told the House that the death Monday of an American citizen in Montevideo "at the hands of Communist terrorists" was "a senseless, savage, cowardly act." He commended Byron Engle, the director of the Office of Public Safety in AID, for "the leading role he played in this effort" to secure Mitrione's release.¹⁵ The Tupamaro urban guerrillas kidnapped Mitrione in 1970 and demanded the release of 150 imprisoned Tupamaros; the government of President Jorge Pacheco Areco stated that it could not release them, and Mitrione's body was found on Monday, August 10, 1970.¹⁶

A. J. Langguth wrote in Hidden Terrors (1978) that the Montevideo police were torturing prisoners with a rudimentary electric needle from Argentina when Mitrione arrived, that Mitrione arranged newer needles of varying thickness which a Uruguayan police officer understood to have come in through the embassy's diplomatic pouch, and that Mitrione conveyed instructions on the interrogation of Tupamaro suspects through senior Uruguayan officers. Langguth reported that Mitrione advised interrogators to learn a suspect's breaking point and reach it quickly, and that a police officer recalled Mitrione entering a room where a suspect was being given electric shocks. He also wrote that the police commissioner Alejandro Otero was told by a detainee that Mitrione had watched and assisted at an interrogation, which led Otero to complain to Mitrione.¹⁶

Manuel Hevia Cosculluela, a Cuban who had worked alongside Mitrione in Montevideo and who afterward appeared in Havana, gave a separate account in Pasaporte 11333: Ocho años con la CIA (Havana, 1978). Hevia wrote that Mitrione took part in a course for Uruguayan police in which beggars from the outskirts of Montevideo, and a woman, were used for a demonstration of electric shock at different voltages and of drugs, and that "the four of them died." Hevia attributed to Mitrione the maxim "the precise pain, in the precise place, in the precise amount, for the desired effect." In a statement reported in The New York Times of August 5, 1978, Hevia said that Mitrione had personally tortured four beggars to death with electric shocks.¹⁷ The Comptroller General reported in 1976 that congressional criticism of the public safety program in 1973 centered on charges that its advisers had "approved, advocated, or taught torture techniques to civil police in some countries."¹³

Cranston's 1992 statement named Iran, Vietnam and Brazil among the countries where such reports arose.¹⁴

Congress Restricts Police Training, 1973 to 1975

The Senate Committee on Foreign Relations wrote on August 2, 1973 (Senate Report 93-377) that "United States participation in the highly sensitive area of public safety and police training unavoidably invites criticism from persons who seek to identify the United States with every act of local police brutality or oppression in any country in which this program operates. It matters little whether the charges can be substantiated."¹³ The Foreign Assistance Act of 1973, enacted December 17, 1973, added section 112 to the 1961 act, which prohibited the use of funds made available under the act for police training or related programs in a foreign country; training of foreign police in the United States was not prohibited.¹³ On January 3, 1974 AID notified its missions that all public safety projects were to be phased out by August 17, 1974. At that time there were active programs in 17 countries and 95 advisers overseas. The scheduled phaseout dates included Bolivia and Panama in May, Colombia and Guatemala in June, Ecuador in July, and Laos, Thailand and Uruguay in August 1974.¹³

In August 1973 the CIA's legislative summary quoted Senate Report 93-189, which explained the Senate bill's police-training prohibition: "The prohibition is meant to cover all advisory or training programs involving all phases of law enforcement, including prison administration." The same report stated that "We have troubles enough with police / community relations in our own society."¹⁸ The summary recorded that the House had rejected a floor amendment by Representative Michael Harrington that would have extended the prohibition to other acts.¹⁸

Section 30 of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1974, approved December 30, 1974, added section 660 to the 1961 act. From July 1, 1975 no funds made available under the act could "be used to provide training or advice, or provide any financial support, for police, prisons, or other law enforcement forces for any foreign government," with exemptions for certain drug enforcement authorities of the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.¹⁹ Cranston later said that "I and others in Congress prevailed and we banned foreign aid to police forces in 1974." He wrote that the ban remained virtually ironclad until 1985, and that a dozen exemptions had been granted in the meantime.¹⁴

International Police Academy

The Inter-American Police Academy in Panama trained 121 Latin American police officers by March 1963, and 272 trainees from other parts of the world received instruction in the United States during the period covered by the same memorandum.⁸ The International Police Academy in Washington, D.C. was the second training facility the office used.

AID closed the academy on February 28, 1975, and on March 1, 1975 the Customs Service took over the facilities.¹³ In January 1975 the columnist Jack Anderson reported that the academy had trained more than 5,000 foreign police over eleven years, drawn from 77 governments, and that it operated from an old street-car garage known as the "Car Barn." He reported that Senator James Abourezk had charged that the academy was a "CIA-controlled police training school under AID cover in Washington, D.C." Anderson wrote that some academy students had written theses "on the use of torture as one technique of interrogation of prisoners." He reported that the investigative reporters John Marks and Taylor Branch would report that the CIA had run a commercial cover, International Police Services, Inc., from a Washington brownstone from 1952 until a few months before the column.²⁰ An academy spokesman, quoted by Anderson, insisted that "the CIA has never controlled the International Police Academy." The CIA told Anderson that all agency support for the academy had been terminated.²⁰

Anderson also quoted a letter from CIA Director William E. Colby, dated August 1974, describing how "relationships" built with policemen through these programs had been useful in "obtaining foreign intelligence."²⁰ A CIA routing sheet dated January 16, 1975 forwarded, for information, the reply that the AID Office of Public Safety, under its director Lauren Goin, had sent to Anderson's inquiry about the CIA's relationship with the academy.²¹

Labor Institutes and AFL-CIO Programs

The American Institute for Free Labor Development (AIFLD), the AFL-CIO's Latin American institute, was financed largely by AID. The opening statement at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing in 1969 recorded that AIFLD had "received a little over $28 million in foreign aid funds for its operations in Latin America" since 1962.²² George Meany, president of the AFL-CIO, testified in the same hearing.²²

William Greider of the Washington Post reported on April 21, 1969 that AID had supplied $16 million of the roughly $18 million AIFLD received from 1962 through 1967, which he put at 87 per cent of the money from the government. He reported that AID's deputy administrator, Rutherford Poats, described the arrangement as "we are financing a union-to-union relationship."²³ Greider's article was reprinted in the hearing record.²²

Laos

The Special Group's assignment of Laos under NSAM 124 placed the country under the same interagency counterinsurgency mechanism that included the AID administrator.⁶ The March 1963 progress report records that an internal defense plan had been prepared for every assigned country except Laos, where, "owing to the unique situation, an Internal Defense Plan is not considered to be useful at this time."⁸

The United States Operations Mission (USOM) was established in Vientiane in January 1955 to administer economic assistance, and at the end of that year a Programs Evaluation Office, staffed by reserve or retired military officers and described by the CIA historian William M. Leary as akin to a Military Assistance Advisory Group, was set up within USOM to handle military aid. Civil Air Transport, the predecessor of Air America, flew its first rice airdrops for USOM in September 1955.²⁴ By 1971 the military assistance program was, in the words of a Senate staff report, "operated ostensibly under AID in Laos," and the AID Requirements Office administered it.²⁵

A January 17, 1964 memorandum from the Bureau of Intelligence and Research to the Special Group, reporting on a subcommittee review of support for foreign paramilitary forces, listed Laos as one of two countries then receiving covert U.S. support for paramilitary forces. It described a CIA program that had grown to about 19,000 armed Meo guerrillas (23,000 authorized), with further forces among the Yao, Kha and Lao, at a budget of $11,625,000 for fiscal 1963 and $14,008,000 for fiscal 1964. The memorandum stated that the covert air support, "conducted by an ostensibly private and commercial company, has been able to continue operations in Laos under USAID contractual arrangements and through the flexibility of CIA's cover and funding mechanisms."²⁶

On October 28, 1969 the Director of Central Intelligence appeared before the Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee on United States security agreements and commitments abroad, chaired by Senator Stuart Symington. A CIA record of the session lists as follow-up that Senator Mike Mansfield was promised a list of the directors of Air America.²⁷ The subcommittee staff members James G. Lowenstein and Richard M. Moose visited Laos from April 22 to May 4, 1971, and their report, printed on August 3, 1971 with deletions made at the request of the State and Defense Departments and the CIA, stated that the AID program in fiscal 1971 was estimated at $52 million, that a partial total of estimated U.S. expenditure in Laos in that year was $284.2 million, and that "within Laos, the CIA trains and advises irregular forces, but until last week AID had provided these forces with rice in Military Regions I and II." It stated that the civilian air fleet in Laos, run by Air America, Continental Air Services and Lao Air Transport, operated "under contracts with AID, although funds are provided by AID, the Defense Department, CIA, and the State Department," with air transport contract costs in fiscal 1970 of $5 million for AID, a deleted amount for the CIA and $11.7 million for the AID Requirements Office. Half of AID's fixed-wing contract of $3.5 million was for refugee relief, and part of the CIA contract paid for flights carrying Americans to Long Tieng, Sam Thong and refugee sites.²⁵

On February 6, 1971 the New York Times reported that the General Accounting Office had concluded in two censored reports that much of the money allocated for assisting refugees in Laos had been used to finance paramilitary operations directed by the CIA, and that almost half the funds of AID's village health program were supporting military activities. The reports were released by Senator Edward M. Kennedy, chairman of the Judiciary subcommittee on refugees. According to the Times, the subcommittee staff said the reports provided official documentation of the extent to which refugee programs had been used "as a cover by the C.I.A. for financing its military activities." An AID spokesman acknowledged that some assistance went to guerrilla forces but said that a larger percentage went to dependents. Kennedy said about half the refugee funds had gone to guerrilla operations, and the subcommittee estimated that 45 per cent of the more than 280,000 persons receiving refugee assistance in 279 villages in July 1970 were guerrillas and their dependents. Refugee assistance in the last fiscal year was $17 million.²⁸

A CIA memorandum for the record of January 6, 1972 describes a General Accounting Office official showing the CIA the final drafts of two further reports, on medical support and refugee programs in Laos, prepared for Kennedy's subcommittee from a survey in Laos in August and September 1971. At Kennedy's request the General Accounting Office had not submitted them to AID, State or the CIA for review. The memorandum compiled the CIA references in the reports, noted that an "AID/CIA Working Fund Agreement" appeared as an appendix to the medical support report, and set out two options: to accept the references and their classifications, or to insist that references to the CIA be removed from the unclassified sections.²⁹ On May 3, 1972 a CIA officer wrote that an AID witness was to testify before Kennedy's subcommittee on May 9, and that "in view of largely unfounded allegations about CIA use of AID funds and facilities, there would be some benefit to a balanced unclassified discussion of these arrangements in open session."³⁰ The Laos public safety program was among those phased out in August 1974.¹³

Brazil, 1964

Lincoln Gordon, the ambassador in Rio de Janeiro, was in Washington from March 13 to 22, 1964 for consultation and for the conference of U.S. ambassadors and AID mission directors to Latin America. According to a National Security Council staff memorandum of March 19, the AID director for Brazil, Jack B. Kubisch, said at the conference that many people in Washington wanted the United States to stand off from Brazil until the Brazilians behaved, and that this ignored the many segments of Brazilian society that were with the United States.³¹ On March 28, 1964, three days before the coup against President Joao Goulart, a State Department telegram to Gordon, cleared in substance at a White House meeting, stated that it was doubtful the United States could provide "plausible cover for naval operation," raised the attribution of unmarked arms to a U.S. covert operation, and asked: "Should we hold up approval or announcement of AID loans? Are other non-military measures desirable further to polarize situation to Goulart's disadvantage?"³²

Gordon replied on March 29 that he saw "no present point in foot-dragging on debt negotiations or hold action on AID loans, unless preceded by some clear indication of United States government concern with basic problem of Brazilian political regime," and that for "AID projects of direct interest to clearly democratic elements, such as Cemat, we believe approvals and announcements should continue." He wrote that suspending aid publicly, which "would be especially dramatic if wheat included," would be better done in response to more obvious political developments. The telegram was forwarded to the White House on March 30.³³ On March 31 an interagency task force chaired by a Deputy Assistant Secretary of State met to consider economic assistance to Brazil on the assumption that a "democratically-inclined pro-Western group" came to power, and recommended that creditor nations join a voluntary three-month moratorium on Brazil's debt payments.³⁴

After the coup of April 1, 1964, Gordon wrote to Assistant Secretary of State Thomas C. Mann on August 10, 1964 about the strategy of economic assistance, setting out orders of magnitude for outside support in which AID and the Export-Import Bank accounted for $250 million of a total of $650 million to $700 million, with a complementary program loan from AID.³⁵ On November 2, 1964 AID Administrator David E. Bell approved a proposal to provide Brazil with $100 million for project loans and $150 million for a program loan "on the most concessionary terms legally available," and the United States and Brazil signed the agreement on December 14, 1964.³⁶ The loans went to the government of President Humberto Castelo Branco.

Vietnam: CORDS and the Phoenix Program

The Office of Civil Operations and Rural Support (CORDS) was organized on May 28, 1967 under the commander of the U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam. Its Public Safety Directorate developed policy for the U.S. public safety program and "advised and assisted the GVN National Police." A CORDS directorate negotiated resource levels with USAID and the Government of Vietnam.³⁷ The Phung Hoang Directorate, which supported the Government of Vietnam's Phung Hoang Plan for intelligence coordination, had as its goal "the neutralization of the Viet Cong infrastructure." The National Archives states that the directorate was "known as the Phoenix program by the Americans assisting in the program."³⁷ The Phoenix program is described on its own page, Phoenix Program.

Nicaraguan Humanitarian Assistance Office

Congress appropriated $27 million for humanitarian assistance to the Contras of Nicaragua in August 1985. On August 29, 1985 President Reagan created the NHAO in the State Department to administer the funds, and Ambassador Robert W. Duemling set up the office within the department.³⁸ The Iran-Contra independent counsel's report states that Oliver North intruded in the office's operations in at least two ways: by insisting that Richard B. Gadd be the contractor for NHAO flights, and by persuading Duemling to add Robert W. Owen to the staff. Duemling's notes also reflect that North volunteered the services of Felix Rodriguez for the humanitarian resupply.³⁸

ZunZuneo

In 2009 Creative Associates International, a Washington-based firm, obtained a half-million Cuban cellphone numbers for a text-messaging network called ZunZuneo, slang for a Cuban hummingbird's tweet. The Associated Press reported on April 3, 2014 that USAID funded the project and that its contractors concealed the American connection through front companies in Spain and the Cayman Islands.³⁹ A 2010 memorandum from Mobile Accord, one of the project's creators, stated that "There will be absolutely no mention of United States government involvement." The network reached at least 40,000 subscribers over more than two years.³⁹

USAID told the Associated Press that ZunZuneo stopped in September 2012 when a government grant ended. The agency said its work was found to be "consistent with U.S. law." Senator Patrick Leahy said that the program's clandestine nature "was not disclosed to the appropriations subcommittee with oversight responsibility." The project was publicly launched shortly after the 2009 arrest in Cuba of Alan Gross, a USAID subcontractor.³⁹

Closure in 2025

Executive Order 14169 of January 20, 2025, "Reevaluating and Realigning United States Foreign Aid," ordered a 90-day pause in new obligations and disbursements of foreign development assistance, to be enforced by the Office of Management and Budget, pending reviews of each program.⁴⁰ On March 28, 2025 the State Department sent Congress a notification of its intent to realign certain USAID functions to the Department by July 1, 2025 and to discontinue the remaining functions. Senators who wrote to Secretary of State Marco Rubio on April 8, 2025 described the notification as ending USAID's status as an independent establishment in the executive branch and abolishing multiple USAID bureaus and offices.⁴¹

Footnotes

Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, Public Law 87-195, approved September 4, 1961, 75 Stat. 424. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-75/pdf/STATUTE-75-Pg424.pdf ↩︎
Records of the U.S. Agency for International Development, Record Group 286, U.S. National Archives and Records Administration. https://www.archives.gov/research/guide-fed-records/groups/286.html ↩︎
Memorandum from Acting Secretary of State Bowles to President Kennedy, September 29, 1961, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961-1963, vol. XII, American Republics, document 85. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1961-63v12/d85 ↩︎
Memorandum from the President's Military Representative (Taylor) to President Kennedy, October 7, 1961, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961-1963, vol. XII, document 87. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1961-63v12/d87 ↩︎
Memorandum from Secretary of State Rusk to President Kennedy, February 20, 1962, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961-1963, vol. XII, document 93. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1961-63v12/d93 ↩︎
National Security Action Memorandum No. 124, January 18, 1962, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961-1963, vol. VIII, National Security Policy, document 68. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1961-63v08/d68 ↩︎
Memorandum from the Interagency Committee on Police Assistance Programs to President Kennedy, July 20, 1962, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961-1963, vol. VIII, document 99, citing National Security Action Memorandum 177 of August 7, 1962. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1961-63v08/d99 ↩︎
Memorandum from the Chairman of the Special Group (Counter-Insurgency) (Johnson) to President Kennedy, March 14, 1963, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961-1963, vol. VIII, document 128. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1961-63v08/d128 ↩︎
Memorandum from the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs (Sayre) to the President's Special Assistant for National Security Affairs, June 12, 1965, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964-1968, vol. XXXI, South and Central America; Mexico, document 75. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v31/d75 ↩︎
Memorandum from the President's Special Assistant (Rostow) to President Johnson, July 6, 1967, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964-1968, vol. XXXI, document 61. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v31/d61 ↩︎
Telegram 4140 from the Embassy in the Dominican Republic to the Department of State, October 21, 1969, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969-1976, vol. E-10, Documents on American Republics, 1969-1972, document 272. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1969-76ve10/d272 ↩︎
Memorandum from Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Johnson to President Nixon, August 22, 1970, with interagency report "Insurgency in Bolivia: A Summary Statement," Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969-1976, vol. E-10, document 90. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1969-76ve10/d90 ↩︎
U.S. General Accounting Office, Stopping U.S. Assistance to Foreign Police and Prisons, Report ID-76-5 to the Congress by the Comptroller General of the United States, February 19, 1976, chapter 2 (quoting S. Rept. 93-377, August 2, 1973, p. 17, and describing section 112 of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1973) and chapter 3 (evolution of the program, phaseout steps, International Police Academy). https://www.gao.gov/assets/id-76-5.pdf ↩︎
Senator Alan Cranston, Senate statement, Congressional Record, March 5, 1992, p. S2874. https://irp.fas.org/gao/920300-train.htm ↩︎
Gerald R. Ford, House floor statement, August 11, 1970, "House Speech Assassination of Dan Mitrione, August 11, 1970," Ford Congressional Papers, Press Secretary and Speech File, Box D30, Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library. https://www.fordlibrarymuseum.gov/library/document/0054/4526305.pdf ↩︎
A. J. Langguth, Hidden Terrors: The Truth About U.S. Police Operations in Latin America (New York: Pantheon, 1978), account of Mitrione's Montevideo posting (the Tupamaro demand for 150 prisoners, the discovery of the body on Monday, August 10, 1970, the electric needles, the interrogation of a labor official, and the Otero complaint). ↩︎
Manuel Hevia Cosculluela, Pasaporte 11333: Ocho años con la CIA (Havana: Editorial de Ciencias Sociales, 1978), pp. 284-287; Hevia's later statement reported in The New York Times, August 5, 1978, p. 3. ↩︎
Central Intelligence Agency, "Foreign Aid Legislation: Restrictions and Prohibitions on Foreign Police Training," August 17, 1973, quoting Senate Report 93-189, pages 33-34, and House Report 93-388, page 93. https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp75b00380r000600170041-7 ↩︎
Foreign Assistance Act of 1974, Public Law 93-559, section 30 (adding section 660, "Prohibiting Police Training"), approved December 30, 1974, 88 Stat. 1804. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-88/pdf/STATUTE-88-Pg1795.pdf ↩︎
Jack Anderson, column, The Washington Post, January 1975, reproduced in CIA reading room file CIA-RDP77M00144R000600140027-5. https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp77m00144r000600140027-5 ↩︎
Central Intelligence Agency routing and record sheet, January 16, 1975, forwarding the response of the Director, AID Office of Public Safety, Lauren Goin, to Jack Anderson's inquiry concerning the International Police Academy. CIA reading room, CIA-RDP77M00144R000600140027-5. https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp77m00144r000600140027-5 ↩︎
Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, hearing on the American Institute for Free Labor Development, 91st Congress, 1st session, 1969, with statement of George Meany and reprinted press material. Serial CHRG-91shrg33948. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-91shrg33948/pdf/CHRG-91shrg33948.pdf ↩︎
William Greider, "Washington Post," April 21, 1969, reprinted in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing record cited in footnote 22. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-91shrg33948/pdf/CHRG-91shrg33948.pdf ↩︎
William M. Leary, "CIA Air Operations in Laos, 1955-1974: Supporting the 'Secret War'," Central Intelligence Agency, Studies in Intelligence (reproduced at https://biotech.law.lsu.edu/cases/nat-sec/Vietnam/air-america.htm). ↩︎
Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, Laos: April 1971, a staff report prepared for the Subcommittee on U.S. Security Agreements and Commitments Abroad (James G. Lowenstein and Richard M. Moose), 92d Congress, committee print, August 3, 1971, sections IV (air operations) and VII (the AID program). CIA reading room, CIA-RDP73B00296R000300080001-0. https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp73b00296r000300080001-0 ↩︎
Memorandum from the Deputy Director for Coordination, Bureau of Intelligence and Research (Scott) to the Special Group, January 17, 1964, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964-1968, vol. XXVIII, Laos, document 1. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v28/d1 ↩︎
Central Intelligence Agency, Office of Legislative Counsel, Memorandum for the Record, "DCI Briefing of Subcommittee on U.S. Security Agreements and Commitments Abroad of Senate Foreign Relations Committee - 28 October 1969," OLC 69-0905. CIA reading room, CIA-RDP72-00337R000100150001-1. https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp72-00337r000100150001-1 ↩︎
John W. Finney, "U.S. Refugee Aid in Laos Found to Help Guerrillas," The New York Times, Washington, February 6 [1971]. CIA reading room clipping, CIA-RDP73B00296R000200190001-9. https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp73b00296r000200190001-9 ↩︎
Central Intelligence Agency, Memorandum for the Record, "References to CIA in GAO Reports on Medical Support and Refugee Programs in Laos," January 6, 1972. CIA reading room, CIA-RDP74B00415R000300220041-6. https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp74b00415r000300220041-6 ↩︎
Central Intelligence Agency, speed letter, "Senate Hearing on Refugee Problems in Laos," May 3, 1972. CIA reading room, CIA-RDP74B00415R000300210033-6. https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/document/cia-rdp74b00415r000300210033-6 ↩︎
Memorandum from Gordon Chase of the National Security Council Staff to the President's Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bundy), March 19, 1964, with editorial note on the Chiefs of Mission Conference, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964-1968, vol. XXXI, South and Central America; Mexico, document 185; Telegram from the Embassy in Brazil to the Department of State, March 18, 1964, document 184 (editorial note on Gordon's presence in Washington, March 13-22). https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v31/d185 ↩︎
Telegram from the Department of State to the Ambassador to Brazil (Gordon), March 28, 1964, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964-1968, vol. XXXI, document 190. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v31/d190 ↩︎
Telegram from the Ambassador to Brazil (Gordon) to the Department of State, March 29, 1964 (forwarded to the White House March 30), Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964-1968, vol. XXXI, document 191. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v31/d191 ↩︎
Editorial note, March 31, 1964, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964-1968, vol. XXXI, document 196. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v31/d196 ↩︎
Letter from the Ambassador to Brazil (Gordon) to the Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs (Mann), August 10, 1964, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964-1968, vol. XXXI, document 215. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v31/d215 ↩︎
Memorandum from Robert M. Sayre of the National Security Council Staff to the President's Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bundy), September 30, 1964, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964-1968, vol. XXXI, document 216, editorial note on the November 2, 1964 approval by AID Administrator Bell and the December 14 signing. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v31/d216 ↩︎
National Archives and Records Administration, "The Office of Civil Operations and Rural Support (CORDS)," Military Records, Vietnam War. https://www.archives.gov/research/military/vietnam-war/civil-operations.html ↩︎
Lawrence E. Walsh, Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters, chapter 25, citing the August 29, 1985 creation of NHAO and the Duemling notes of October 1, 1985. https://irp.fas.org/offdocs/walsh/chap_25.htm ↩︎
Alberto Arce and Desmond Butler, "US secretly built 'Cuban Twitter' to stir unrest," Associated Press, April 3, 2014. Copy at Wayback Machine: https://web.archive.org/web/2014id_/https://www.ajc.com/ap/secretly-built-cuban-twitter-stir-unrest/mukdN97BXrDNcPoxJrS7IM/ ↩︎
Executive Order 14169, "Reevaluating and Realigning United States Foreign Aid," January 20, 2025, 90 FR 8619, section 3(a). https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2025/01/30/2025-02091/reevaluating-and-realigning-united-states-foreign-aid ↩︎
Letter from Senators Chris Van Hollen, Jeanne Shaheen and others to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, April 8, 2025, describing the State Department's Congressional Notification of March 28, 2025. https://www.vanhollen.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/sfrc_state_reorg_letter.pdf ; United Press International, "State Department formally notifies Congress of dissolving USAID," March 28, 2025, quoting the Department's statement that it would be "realigning certain USAID functions to the Department by July 1, 2025." https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2025/03/28/State-Departmet-dissolving-USAID/8391743188530/ ↩︎

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