President Biden’s denial that the US government is committed to regime-change in Russia is a lie. Ever since its inception, the core mission of the US national-security establishment, specifically the Pentagon and the CIA, has been regime change. The goal has always been to oust from power political leaders who operate independently of the Pentagon and the CIA and replace them with local stooges who obey the orders of the US national-security establishment, oftentimes on payment of large sums of cash in the form of “foreign aid.”
In fact, Russia, which was the principal member of the Soviet Union, was used as the principal justification for many of the early regime-change operations.
In 1953, for example, the CIA regime-changed the democratically elected prime minister of Iran, Mohammad Mosaddegh, because the CIA perceived that he was leaning toward Russia and the rest of the Soviet Union. That was considered verboten by US officials. The CIA engineered a coup that succeeded in ousting Mosaddegh from power and replacing him with the unelected Shah of Iran, one of the most brutal US-supported tyrants in the world.
The following year, the CIA regime-changed the democratically elected president of Guatemala, Jacobo Arbenz, because he established friendly relations with Russia and the rest of the communist world. By this time, the CIA had adopted assassination as a regime-change tool. Fortunately for Arbenz, he was able to escape the country before the CIA could assassinate him. The CIA replaced him with a favorite Guatemalan general, who, not surprisingly, turned out to be one of the world’s most brutal US-supported tyrants.
From 1961-1963, the CIA repeatedly attempted to regime-change Cuba by repeatedly trying to assassinate Cuban leader Fidel Castro. The CIA also invaded Cuba with a proxy army of US-trained Cuban exiles. The Pentagon also continuously pressured President Kennedy to order a full-scale invasion of Cuba for the purpose of regime change.
The reason for all this regime-change activity against Cuba? Castro had established friendly relations with Russia and the rest of the Soviet Union.
As I detail in my new book An Encounter with Evil: The Abraham Zapruder Story, in 1963 the CIA regime-changed President Kennedy with a state-sponsored assassination that replaced him with Vice-President Lyndon Johnson. The reason? The same reason they regime-changed Mosaddegh and Arbenz. JFK had not only struck a deal with the Soviets to leave Cuba permanently in communist hands, he was also establishing friendly relations with the Soviets, especially the Russians, as well as with Cuba. LBJ, on the other hand, was on the same page as the national-security establishment with respect to their old Cold War racket.
In 1973, the CIA regime-changed Chile by ousting the country’s democratically elected president, Salvador Allende, from power and replacing him with a military general named Augusto Pinochet, who was another of the world’s most brutal US-supported tyrants. The reason? Allende was doing what Mosaddegh, Arbenz, Castro, and Kennedy had been doing — playing nice with the Reds and and making friends with them, even though, the Pentagon and the CIA steadfastly maintained, they were coming to get us.
The US invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan? Once again, regime-change operations, not through assassination but through brutal, deadly, and destructive military invasions and long-term occupations.
The US sanctions against North Korea, Iran, Venezuela, and China? Yep, you guessed it — the goal is regime change in all of them. The idea is that the populace, faced with death by starvation, will rise up in a violent revolution, oust their leaders from power, and then replace them with loyal US stooges or puppets.
The 60-year-old embargo against the Cuban people? Regime change, especially given that the CIA has never — and will never — forgive the Cuban communist regime for inflicting the humiliating defeat on the CIA at the Bay of Pigs.
What about NATO’s evil machinations that succeeded in bringing about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, along with the extensive system of economic sanctions against Russia for invading Ukraine? It’s all designed to give Russia its own “Afghanistan” in the hope of bringing regime change to Russia.
To get a fuller account of US regime-change operations from 1948 through 1996, go to “Foreign Policy of the United States” on Wikipedia and scroll down the right side until you find the box that is titled “Covert United States Involvement in Regime Change.” Be prepared to be shocked, or maybe not.
Again, my new book is entitled An Encounter with Evil: The Abraham Zapruder Story. Purchase it at Amazon. $9.95 Kindle. $14.95 print. I know I’m biased, but I am very confident that you will enjoy reading it and that you will find that it deepens your understanding of the US national-security establishment’s long policy of regime change, including through assassination.
Reprinted with permission from Future of Freedom Foundation.