What is the purpose of the CIA and some other questions

I was wondering about something.

What's the purpose of the CIA? Why do we need it? Isn't our military sufficient to protect the borders and the country itself?

Why do we need the CIA?

Is it just a legalized excuse to spy on and maybe assassinate anyone, foreign or domestic, who is a threat to the establishment, secretly and covertly?

Does it carry out James Bond type operations against crime syndicates in foreign countries? What for? Why get involved?

How come the American people don't care about this?

Also, how do so many ex-CIA operatives get away with claiming that the CIA conducted covert activity and assassinations? How come they don't get arrested or shot? Are they not afraid?

In a lot of hippie homes, there's this drawing on the wall of this revolutionary in South America. I heard he got shot by the CIA. Is that true? Do you know who I'm referring to? I heard he was the guy whose life was portrayed in the movie "The Motorcycle Diaries". What's the story behind that?

And why do hippies and counter culture groups often hang up a drawing of him on the wall?


[edit on 22-5-2009 by WWu777]

The purpose of the CIA, at least in theory, is to help gather intelligence on the plans and activities of our actual and potential enemies. This is not to say that that is how it works in practice, though it has had some successes, along with some failures. The military, at least in theory, is meant to protect our borders from enemy attack. again, as with the CIA, there have been some successes as well as failures (i.e., Pearl Harbor). The NSA, while engaged in intelligence work, is engaged mainly in sigint, the interception of communications. The FBI is a domestic counterintelligence and law enforcement agency. To be honest, some of the work they all do either overlaps or sometimes gathers too much information to the point that they can't analyze it properly, which has led to some of the most horrific intelligence failures that this country has had. I suppose that it is better than not having enough in the way of intelligence. I am sure that there are others here on ATS who can add nore, and probably better, information than I have, so I encourage others here at ATS to jump in and add to this thread.

The one South American Revolutionary you allude to is Ernesto "Che' Guevaro. He was an Argentinian Doctor turned revolutionary who helped Fidel Castro overthrough the Batista Regime in Cuba. After the success of the Cuban Revolution he stayed on in Cuba for a while. then he got a hankering to aid other revolutionary groups in South America and wound up fighting with geurilla's in Bolivia, where he was wounded, captured, and then executed by Bolivian Soldiers in the presence of CIA Officers.
Under it's Charter, the CIA is not supposed to operate domestically, as it is set up to operate against foreign countries and organizations. But during the Church Committe hearings in the early to mid 1970's, it came out that a CIA operation known as CHAOS had been operating in New York City and San Francisco where they were opening the mail of U.S. citizens that were being sent to people in Communist countries, looking for information to see if these people were spying for them. This was clearly illegal under the CIA charter. It still would have been illegal even if the FBI had done it without having first gotten a warrant from a judge first for a legitimate law enforcement purpose.
As far as Crime syndicate individuals go, the CIA is more likely to use them to help gather information or to try to help assassinate foreign leaders, as they tried to have the U.S.afia do with Castro and the plots they had to try to assassinate him.
I hope that the information in this post and the other post to your thread have helped answer at least some of your questions.

So why do so many hippies have Ernesto "Che' Guevaro on the wall? Why is he an idol to them?

reply to post by WWu777


For the same reason they have Pictures of Mao. They just want to be different and appear "Anti-Establishment" Mostly for show.

Here prove to yourself that most wont even know who he really was or what he was famous for. Read up on him and get to know the topic then go ask those "hippies" as you called them about him and see if they know anything.


Ernesto "Che" Guevara

(June 14,[1] 1928 – October 9, 1967), commonly known as Che Guevara, El Che, or simply Che, was an Argentine Marxist revolutionary, politician, author, physician, military theorist, and guerrilla leader. After death, his stylized image became a ubiquitous countercultural symbol worldwide.[4]

[edit on 22-5-2009 by SLAYER69]

Originally posted by WWu777
So why do so many hippies have Ernesto "Che' Guevaro on the wall? Why is he an idol to them?

Maybe because as a young Doctor from Buenos Airies, Ernesto took his motorbike with a friend and went through all of south Americas and saw the suffering of the people in these minings-towns that multinational corporation and American companies were running!

They let these people die!

They could get no health care! - and they were coughing blood from their lungs

He saw these poor beaten miners dying in front of his eyes, so he decided to help the poor people of Latin America against the exploiters!

He also helped a lot of people in the Amazonas!

wouldn't you do the same?

entonces!

Que pasa con la vaina ?



[edit on 22-5-2009 by Chevalerous]

Whether you agree with communism or not (and I, for one, do not), Che Guevara was certainly passionate about aiding the poor. And he was certainly willing to stand up for what he believed in, even to the point of sacrificing his life for it. It takes true idealism to do what he did. And I admire him for that. There are a lot of lesson's that even someone like me can take from Che's example.

Originally posted by WWu777

Is it just a legalized excuse to spy on and maybe assassinate anyone, foreign or domestic, who is a threat to the establishment, secretly and covertly?

[edit on 22-5-2009 by WWu777]

That's pretty much it right there.

reply to post by Wally Conley


Well said, but I would consider Pearl Harbor to be an intelligence victory from the establishment point of view. They wanted the USA in WWII, and the American people did not. Who got their way? Also, it seems that the 'patriot acts' made the CIA's operating inside the USA legal now. So we now have our own Stasi, our very own secret police. How nice.

reply to post by resistor

Point well taken. I stand corrected. There is a lot of evidence that Roosevelt launched a lot of the embargoes against Japan to push her into attacking the U.S. The last straws were when he embargoed tin and oil to Japan, as we, at the time, were the biggest suppliers of both to her. And both were vital to Japan's war industries.