325 lines
117 KiB
Markdown
325 lines
117 KiB
Markdown
# List of Atrocities commited by US authorities
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*Definition: An extremely wicked or cruel act, typically one involving physical violence or injury.*
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## Contents
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<!-- toc -->
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* [Notes](#notes)
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- [Imperialism](#imperialism)
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* [Western hemisphere](#western-hemisphere)
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* [Middle East](#middle-east)
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* [Africa](#africa)
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* [Europe](#europe)
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* [Asia](#asia)
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- [Internal Repression](#internal-repression)
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* [Native Americans](#native-americans)
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* [Black people](#black-people)
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* [LGBTQ People](#lgbtq-people)
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* [Women](#women)
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* [Latinos](#latinos)
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* [Asians](#asians)
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* [Workers](#workers)
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* [Poor people](#poor-people)
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* [Prisoners](#prisoners)
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* [Homeless people](#homeless-people)
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* [Religious minorities](#religious-minorities)
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* [Pervasive](#pervasive)
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* [Sources / Starting points](#sources--starting-points)
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* [Backlog](#backlog)
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<!-- tocstop -->
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### Notes
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- Try to convey a sense of moral outrage, not be a factsheet.
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- This is a living document, it will be updated as new atrocities pour in.
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- Feel free to make pull requests(changes), or fork it if you'd like to make your own versions.
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- Name the specific source and recipient of the atrocity, and provide a source for the claim.
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- Try to do chronologically from recent to past; it should seem like a running log.
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******
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## Imperialism
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### Western hemisphere
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- In 2009, [a coup in Honduras](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Honduran_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat) has led to severe repression and death squad murders of political opponents, union organizers and journalists. At the time of the coup, U.S. officials denied any role in the coup and used semantics to avoid cutting off U.S. military aid as required under U.S. law. But two Wikileaks cables revealed that the U.S. Embassy, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, was the main power broker in managing the aftermath of the coup and forming a government that is now repressing and murdering its people.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Honduran_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat)</sup>
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- In 1990 in Haiti, Competing against 10 comparatively wealthy white candidates, leftist priest [Jean-Bertrand Aristide](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Bertrand_Aristide) captures 68 percent of the vote. A few months later, the CIA-backed military [deposes him in a coup](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1991_Haitian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat). More military dictators brutalize the country, as thousands of Haitian refugees escape the turmoil in barely seaworthy boats. As popular opinion calls for Aristide’s return, the CIA begins a disinformation campaign painting the courageous priest as mentally unstable.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1991_Haitian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat)</sup>
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- In 1989, The U.S. invades Panama to overthrow a dictator of its own making, [General Manuel Noriega](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manuel_Noriega), with the state goal of "Defending democracy and human rights in Panama". Noriega had been on the CIA’s payroll since 1966, collecting at least $100,000 per year from the U.S. Treasury. As he rose to be the de facto ruler of Panama, he became even more valuable to the CIA, reporting on meetings with Fidel Castro and Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua and supporting U.S. covert wars in Central America, and had been transporting drugs with the CIA’s knowledge since 1972. By the late 80s, Noriega’s growing independence and intransigence had angered washington. Between 500-4,000 people died in the US invasion. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manuel_Noriega)</sup>
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- In 1986, the Nicaraguan government under the Sandinistas shoots down a C-123 transport plane carrying military supplies to the Contras. The lone survivor, [Eugene Hasenfus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_Hasenfus), turns out to be a CIA employee, as are the two dead pilots, contradicting Reagan's claims that the US was not aiding the contras. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_Hasenfus)</sup>
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- In the 1980s the CIA supported [Battalion 316](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battalion_3-16_(Honduras)), a torture/assasination squad in Honduras, which kidnapped, tortured and killed hundreds of its citizens. Battalion 316 used shock and suffocation devices in interrogations , and prisoners often were kept naked and, when no longer useful, killed and buried in unmarked graves. Declassified documents and other sources show that the CIA and the U.S. Embassy knew of numerous crimes, including murder and torture, yet continued to support Battalion 316 and collaborate with its leaders. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battalion_3-16_(Honduras))</sup>
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- In 1980, In El Salvador, The Archbishop of San Salvador, [Oscar Romero](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%93scar_Romero), pleads with President Carter to stop aiding the military government slaughtering his people. Carter refuses. Right-wing leader Roberto D’Aubuisson has Romero shot through the heart while saying Mass. The country soon dissolves into [civil war](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvadoran_Civil_War), with the peasants in the hills fighting against the military government. The CIA and U.S. Armed Forces supply the government with overwhelming military and intelligence superiority, training death squads to roam the countryside, committing atrocities like that of [El Mozote in 1982](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Mozote_massacre), where 800 civilians were massacred. By 1992, some 63,000 Salvadorans were killed. Back then Salvador was controlled by a mafia of 13 families who owned 50% of the land and wealth. The 13 families were heavily linked with the United States. CIA provided weapons and military training to the Salvadorean Army. As soon as the CIA discovered the priests were indoctrinating the masses, they began killing them.
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- In 1979, The CIA began to destabilize Grenada after [Maurice Bishop](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maurice_Bishop) became president, for his pro-cuba, anti-racism, and anti-apartheid stances. Under Bishop's leadership, Women were given equal pay and paid maternity leave, and sex discrimination was made illegal. Organisations for education (Center for Popular Education), health care, and youth affairs (National Youth Organization) were also established. The campaign against him resulted in his overthrow and the [invasion by the U.S. of Grenada](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Grenada) on October 25, 1983, with about 277 people dying.
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- In 1979, the US-backed dictator Anastasios Samoza II falls, beginning the popular [Nicaraguan Revolution](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicaraguan_Revolution). Remnants of his Guard will become the Contras, who fight a CIA-backed guerilla war against the left-wing [Sandinista](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandinista_National_Liberation_Front) government throughout the 1980s, with Reagan authorizing covert support to anti-Sandinista forces. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicaraguan_Revolution)</sup>
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- In 1976, several CIA-linked anti-Castro Cuban exiles and members of the Venezuelan secret police [DISIP](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Directorate_of_Intelligence_and_Prevention_Services) were responsible for a terrorist bomb attack on [Cuban flight 455](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cubana_de_Aviaci%C3%B3n_Flight_455), killing 73 people. CIA venezuelan operative [Luis Posada Carriles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luis_Posada_Carriles), one of the bombers, fled and was granted amnesty in the US in 2007. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cubana_de_Aviaci%C3%B3n_Flight_455)</sup>
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- In 1976, The CIA backed an overthrow of Argentinan leader [Isabel Martínez de Perón](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabel_Mart%C3%ADnez_de_Per%C3%B3n) by right wing anti-communist dictator [Jorge Rafael Videla](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jorge_Rafael_Videla). In 1983, two years after the return of a representative democratic government, he was prosecuted in the Trial of the Juntas for large-scale human rights abuses and crimes against humanity that took place under his rule, including kidnappings or forced disappearance, widespread torture and extrajudicial murder of activists, and political opponents as well as their families at secret concentration camps, and harboring nazis. An estimated 13,000 -30,000 political dissidents vanished during this period. Videla was also convicted of the theft of many babies born during the captivity of their mothers at the illegal detention centres and passing them on for illegal adoption by associates of the regime. In his defence, Videla maintains the female guerrilla detainees allowed themselves to fall pregnant in the belief they wouldn't be tortured or executed. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jorge_Rafael_Videla)</sup>
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- On 11 September 1973, The CIA backed a [military coup](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_Chilean_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat) to remove democratically elected socialist president Salvador Allende, in favor of right-wing dictator [Augusto Pinochet](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augusto_Pinochet). His US-supported regime was characterized by the systematic suppression of political parties and the persecution of dissidents to an extent that was unprecedented in the history of Chile, backed by the neoliberal free-market economic policies of the [Chicago Boys](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_Boys). Over-all, the regime left over 3,000 dead or "dissappeared", tortured thousands of prisoners, and forced 200,000 Chileans into exile. He's known for the [Villa Grimaldi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Villa_Grimaldi), a torture complex, and his [Caravan of Death](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caravan_of_Death), a Chilean Army death squad guilty of countless atrocities, including dropping pregnant women and teenagers out of helicopters in the ocean, and executions where prisoners were shot by parts, over extended periods of time. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_Chilean_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat)</sup>
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- In 1971 in Bolivia, after half a decade of CIA-inspired political turmoil, a CIA-backed military coup overthrows the leftist President [Juan Jose Torres](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Jos%C3%A9_Torres), eventually being kidnapped and murdered by CIA backed right wing death squads, as part of [Operation Condor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Condor). In the next two years, dictator [Hugo Banzer](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Banzer) will have over 2,000 political opponents arrested without trial, then tortured, raped and executed.
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- In 1971, A CIA operative told a reporter he delivered a strain of the [African Swine Fever](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_swine_fever_virus#Cuba) virus from an army base in the Canal Zone to anti-Castro Cubans. An outbreak of the disease then occurred in Cuba, resulting in the slaughter of 500,000 pigs to prevent a nationwide animal epidemic. It was labeled the "most alarming event" of 1971 by the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_swine_fever_virus#Cuba)</sup>
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- Starting in the 1970s, a CIA-backed coalition of right wing governments in Argentina, Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia and Brazil, began [Operation Condor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Condor), a campaign of political repression and state terror involving intelligence operations and assassination of opponents, with the stated aim of "eliminating Marxist subversion." Victims included dissidents and leftists, union and peasant leaders, priests and nuns, students and teachers, intellectuals and suspected guerillas. An estimated 30,000 to 80,000 leftists or sympathizers were killed. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Condor)</sup>
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- In 1969, amid a collapsing economy, labor and student strikes in Uruguay, CIA operative [Dan Mitrione](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Mitrione) initiates a campaign of torture and violence against the left-wing student group [Tuparamos](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tupamaros). Former Uruguayan police officials and CIA operatives stated Mitrione had taught torture techniques to Uruguayan police, including the use of electrical shocks delivered to his victims' mouths and genitals. It has been alleged that he used homeless people for training purposes, who were executed once they had served their purpose.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Mitrione#cite_note-9)</sup>
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- In 1968, a CIA-organized military operation in Bolivia led by cuban exile and CIA agent [Félix Rodríguez](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F%C3%A9lix_Rodr%C3%ADguez_(soldier)) captures legendary guerilla [Che Guevara](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Che_Guevara), defeating the [Ñancahuazú Guerrilla](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%91ancahuaz%C3%BA_Guerrilla). The Bolivian president ordered his immediate execution to prevent worldwide calls for clemency, and the drama of a trial. Nazi war criminal [Klaus Barbie](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaus_Barbie) aka "The Butcher of Lyon", advised and possibly helped the CIA orchestrate Guevara's eventual capture.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%91ancahuaz%C3%BA_Guerrilla#cite_note-ObserverChe-1)</sup>
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- In 1964, [A CIA-backed military coup in Brazil](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1964_Brazilian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat) overthrows the democratically elected government of [Joao Goulart](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jo%C3%A3o_Goulart). The junta that replaces it will, in the next two decades, become one of the most bloodthirsty in history. [General Castelo Branco](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humberto_de_Alencar_Castelo_Branco) will create Latin America’s first death squads, or bands of secret police who hunt down "communists" and political opponents for torture, interrogation and murder. Later it is revealed that the CIA trains the death squads. Thousands were tortured, and hundreds were killed.
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- In the 1962 [Cuban missile crisis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Missile_Crisis), the Joint Chiefs of Staff unanimously agreed that a full-scale nuclear attack and invasion was the only solution, nearly plunging the world into nuclear war. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Missile_Crisis)</sup>
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- From 1961 onward, The US [School of Americas](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Hemisphere_Institute_for_Security_Cooperation), a US Department of Defense institute in [Fort Benning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Benning), Georgia, was assigned the specific goal of teaching "anti-communist counterinsurgency training," to CIA-supported right wing paramilitaries. It trained more than 19,000 students from 36 countries in the western hemisphere, including [several Latin American dictators](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Hemisphere_Institute_for_Security_Cooperation#Graduates_of_the_School_of_the_Americas), and, during the 1980s, included [torture](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torture) in its curriculum. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Hemisphere_Institute_for_Security_Cooperation)</sup>
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- In 1961, in Ecuador, the CIA-backed military forces the democratically elected President [José María Velasco Ibarra](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Mar%C3%ADa_Velasco_Ibarra) to resign. Vice President Carlos Arosemana replaces him; the CIA fills the now vacant vice presidency with its own man. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Mar%C3%ADa_Velasco_Ibarra)</sup>
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- In 1961, the CIA assassinated [Rafael Trujillo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rafael_Trujillo), a murderous dictator responsible for the deaths of more than 50,000 people, who Washington had supported since 1930. Trujillo’s business interests had grown so large (about 60 percent of the economy) that they had begun competing with American business interests. The US later provided troops on the side of the loyalists in the 1965 [Dominican civil war](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominican_Civil_War), to ensure US interests. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominican_Civil_War)</sup>
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- In 1961, the CIA sent 1,500 Cuban exiles to invade Castro’s Cuba in the failed [Bay of Pigs Invasion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bay_of_Pigs_Invasion). B26 bombers attacked cuban airfields, providing initial air support. The planners had imagined that the invasion would spark a popular uprising against Castro -– which never happened. Several hundred were killed in the action. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bay_of_Pigs_Invasion)</sup>
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- In 1959, following the [US occupation of Haiti](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_occupation_of_Haiti), The U.S. military helps ["Papa Doc" Duvalier](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran%C3%A7ois_Duvalier) become dictator of Haiti. He creates his own private police force, the [Tonton Macoutes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonton_Macoute), who terrorize the population with machetes. They kill over 100,000 during the Duvalier family reign. The U.S. does not protest their dismal human rights record.
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- In 1958, The United States supported the [Batista dictatorship](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fulgencio_Batista) in Cuba. Batista aligned with the wealthiest landowners who owned the largest sugar plantations, and presided over a stagnating economy that widened the gap between rich and poor Cubans. Eventually most of the sugar industry was in U.S. hands, and foreigners owned 70% of the arable land. As such, Batista's increasingly corrupt and repressive government then began to systematically profit from the exploitation of Cuba's commercial interests, by negotiating lucrative relationships with both the American Mafia, who controlled the drug, gambling, and prostitution businesses in Havana, and with large U.S.-based multinational companies who were awarded lucrative contracts. To quell the growing discontent amongst the populace—which was subsequently displayed through frequent student riots and demonstrations—Batista established tighter censorship of the media, while also utilizing his Bureau for the Repression of Communist Activities secret police to carry out wide-scale violence, torture and public executions; ultimately killing anywhere from hundreds to 20,000 people. After the [Cuban revolution](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Revolution), the CIA launched a long campaign of terrorism against Cuba, training Cuban exiles in Florida, Central America and the Dominican Republic to commit assassinations and sabotage in Cuba. These include the [cuban embargo](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_embargo_against_Cuba), and [over 638 failed assasination attempts on fidel castro](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_attempts_on_Fidel_Castro). <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fulgencio_Batista)</sup>
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- In 1954, the CIA overthrows the democratically elected Guatemalen [Jacobo Árbenz](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacobo_%C3%81rbenz) in a [military coup](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat) in [operation PBSucess](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_PBSuccess). Arbenz threatened to nationalize the Rockefeller-owned United Fruit Company, in which CIA Director Allen Dulles also owns stock. Arbenz is replaced with a series of US-backed right-wing dictators whose bloodthirsty policies will kill over 100,000 Guatemalans in the next 40 years, until 1996. The coup has been described as the definitive deathblow to democracy in Guatemala.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat)</sup>
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### Middle East
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- On February 15th, 2017, US-backed Saudi planes [bombed a funeral](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/15/yemen-funeral-saudi-led-airstrike-houthi-insurgents) in Yemen, killing 5 women and wounding dozens more. In the [2015 - Present Yemeni Civil War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yemeni_Civil_War_(2015%E2%80%93present)), 16,200 people have been killed including 10,000 civilians, 3 million have been displaced and left homeless, and over 200,000 people are facing shortages of food, water and medicine. The US has use drone bombers in Yemen, and has supported Saudi interests in the region, with military contracts providing weapons and planes. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yemeni_Civil_War_(2015%E2%80%93present)),[2](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/15/yemen-funeral-saudi-led-airstrike-houthi-insurgents)</sup>
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- In 2010, President Obama [directed the CIA](http://www.salon.com/2010/04/07/assassinations_2/) to [assassinate an American citizen](https://theintercept.com/2017/01/30/obama-killed-a-16-year-old-american-in-yemen-trump-just-killed-his-8-year-old-sister/) in Yemen, Anwar al-Awlaki, despite the fact that he had never been charged with any crime, killing him [with a September, 2011 drone strike](https://www.theguardian.com/world/blog/2011/sep/30/anwar-al-awlaki-yemen-live). Two weeks later, a separate CIA drone strike in Yemen [killed his 16-year-old American-born son](http://www.salon.com/2011/10/20/the_killing_of_awlakis_16_year_old_son/), Abdulrahman, along with the boy’s 17-year-old cousin and several other innocent Yemenis. In January 2017, Trump ordered a SEAL strike, and reports from Yemen [quickly surfaced](http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-usa-yemen-qaeda-idUKKBN15D094) that 30 people were killed, including 10 women and children. Among the dead: the 8-year-old daughter of Anwar Awlaki, brother of the 16 year old killed by Obama. <sup>[1](https://theintercept.com/2017/01/30/obama-killed-a-16-year-old-american-in-yemen-trump-just-killed-his-8-year-old-sister/)</sup>
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- From 2011 up to the present day, the US ousted Mummar Gaddafi in Libya, and began conducting an extensive bombing campaign in the [Libyan Civil Wars of 2011 and 2014](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libyan_Civil_War_(2014%E2%80%93present)). This includes 7,700 air strikes, resulting in 30,000 -100,000 deaths. Loyalist towns were bombed to rubble and ethnically cleansed, and the country is in chaos as Western-trained and armed Islamist militias seize territory and oil facilities and vie for power. The Misrata militia, trained and armed by Western special forces, is one of the most violent and powerful in the world.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libyan_Civil_War_(2014%E2%80%93present))</sup>
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- In 2010, Chelsea Manning's leak of the [Iraq War Logs](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_War_documents_leak) revealed US army reports on civilian deaths; [66,081 out of 109,000 recorded deaths were civilians](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War). They show that US authorities failed to investigate hundreds of reports of abuse, torture, rape and even murder by Iraqi police and soldiers", and that US troops killed almost 700 civilians for coming too close to checkpoints, including pregnant women and the mentally ill, and countless other atrocities.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_War_documents_leak)</sup>
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- From 2000 up to the present day, the US has been carrying out a campaign of drone strikes and asassinations in the Middle East and Africa, including Yemen, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Somalia, resulting in thousands of civilian deaths, including women, [children](https://theintercept.com/drone-papers/manhunting-in-the-hindu-kush/), and US citizens. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_casualties_from_US_drone_strikes) </sup> Drone strikes are used by the military and the CIA to hunt down and kill people the [Obama administration](https://prod01-cdn07.cdn.firstlook.org/wp-uploads/sites/1/2015/10/KC_Heads01.png) has deemed — through secretive processes, without indictment or trial — worthy of execution. Drone strike targets are usually pinpointed through cell phone usage. The Obama asassination complex is detailed in the [drone papers](https://theintercept.com/drone-papers).
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- On 3 October 2015, a United States Air Force AC-130U gunship attacked and killed 42 people and wounded 30 more in the [Kunduz Trauma Centre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunduz_hospital_airstrike) operated by Doctors Without Borders, in northern Afghanistan. The airstrike constitutes a war crime(attacks on hospitals are considered war crimes), and is the first instance of one Nobel peace prize winner(Obama) bombing and killing another(Doctors without borders). CNN and the New York Times deliberately obscured the US's responsibility for the bombing, with the headline, "US is blamed after bomb hits afghan hospital". <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunduz_hospital_airstrike),[2](https://theintercept.com/2015/10/05/cnn-and-the-nyt-are-deliberately-obscuring-who-perpetrated-the-afghan-hospital-attack/)</sup>
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- On May 9, 2006, U.S. troops executed 3 male Iraqi detainees at the Muthana Chemical Complex, called the [Iron Triangle Murders](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Iron_Triangle#Iron_Triangle_Murders).<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Iron_Triangle#Iron_Triangle_Murders)</sup>
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- On April 26, 2006 in the [Hamdania incident](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamdania_incident), US troops killed an unarmed civilian, staging a fake firefight to cover it up. Members of the squad were shooting the stolen AK-47 rifle into the air to make it sound like a firefight was occurring, and after the Iraqi man was dead, the Marines scattered the expended AK-47 brass next to the body, removed the plastic restraints, and placed the AK-47 rifle next to the body.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamdania_incident)</sup>
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- On 22 August 2008, A US airstrike killed ~90 civilians, mostly children, in the village of [Azizabad, Afghanistan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azizabad_airstrike). <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azizabad_airstrike)</sup>
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- On September 16, 2007, employees of [Blackwater]((https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academi)) (since renamed Academi), a private military company, killed 17 Iraqi civilians and injured 20 more in the [Nisour Square massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nisour_Square_massacre), revealing a wide-spread policy to employ and enable private security firms to use deadly force. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nisour_Square_massacre)</sup>
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- On July 12, 2007, US AH-64 Apache helicopters bombed and [killed ~15 Iraqi civilians](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_12,_2007_Baghdad_airstrike), including two reuters journalists, and wounding two children, in Al-Amin al-Thaniyah, New Baghdad. The attacks received worldwide coverage following the leaking of 39 minutes of classified gunsight footage, in a video released by wikileaks titled collateral murder. 22-year-old American Army intelligence analyst, Chelsea Manning (then known as Bradley Manning) was arrested for leaking the video, along with a video of another airstrike and around 260,000 diplomatic cables, to WikiLeaks. She is still being held in prison under the [Espionage act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Espionage_Act_of_1917), a law used to jail dissidents, intended to prohibit any interference with military operations. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_12,_2007_Baghdad_airstrike)</sup>
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- On March 15, 2006, 11 Iraqi civilians were bound and executed by US troops in the [Ishaqi incident](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ishaqi_incident). <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ishaqi_incident)</sup>
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- On March 12, 2006, US Soldiers gang raped and killed a 14-year-old Iraqi girl named Abeer Qassim Hamza al-Janabi, and murdered her parents, and her six year old sister, in the [Mahmudiyah rape and killings](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmudiyah_rape_and_killings). <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmudiyah_rape_and_killings)</sup>
|
||
- On November 19, 2005, a group of US marines killed 24 unarmed men, women and children in the [city of Haditha](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haditha_massacre) in Western Iraq. Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich admitted to telling his men to "shoot first and ask questions later". The eight marines were found not guilty of voluntary manslaughter. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haditha_massacre)</sup>
|
||
- In 2004, accounts of physical, psychological, and sexual abuse, including torture(whitewashed as *enhanced interrogation techniques*), rape, sodomy, and homicide of prisoners held in the [Abu Ghraib prison](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ghraib_torture_and_prisoner_abuse) in Iraq came to public attention, revealing a systemic policy of torture during the Iraq war, primarily perpetrated by US Military police, and the CIA. Many of the torture techniques used were developed at Guantánamo detention centre, including prolonged isolation; sensory deprivation to induce psychosis, a sleep deprivation program whereby people were moved from cell to cell every few hours so they couldn’t sleep for days, weeks, even months, short-shackling in painful positions; nudity; extreme use of heat and cold; the use of loud music and noise and preying on phobias. Many, such as [Manadel al-Jamadi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Manadel_al-Jamadi), were tortured to death. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ghraib_torture_and_prisoner_abuse)</sup>
|
||
- On April 14, 2004, Lieutenant Ilario Pantano of the United States Marine Corps, killed two unarmed captives. Lieutenant Pantano claimed that the captives had advanced on him in a threatening manner. All charges were dropped, and he received an honorable discharge. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilario_Pantano)</sup>
|
||
- In april, 2004, the US military lied to the family of [Pat Tillman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pat_Tillman), a famous american athlete turned soldier, surrounding his death by friendly fire, and used a fake heroic story about his death as a recruiting poster. The jingoistic media coverage was created by the spin of several top US generals and Bush administration officials, who dictated a memo about how best to handle the embarrassing death of such a high profile soldier. This is chronicled in the documentary, [A Tillman Story](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tillman_Story). <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tillman_Story)</sup>
|
||
- Starting with the Iraq war, the US increasingly began contracting private mercenary companies to do military operations. These private companies are authorized by the US to use lethal force. [Blackwater](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academi#Role_in_the_Iraq_War), one such company known for its ruthless reputation for killing civilians, has been involved in various scandals, such as in Fallujah, and Nisour square. Its founder, [Erik Prince](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_Prince), has close ties to the Trump administration. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academi#Role_in_the_Iraq_War)</sup>
|
||
- On December 10, 2002, US military police, aided by the CIA, tortured and killed [Dilawar](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilawar_(torture_victim)), an Afghan taxi driver, at [Baghram prison](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagram_torture_and_prisoner_abuse), highlighting a scandal of torture and murder at the prison. Dilawar was chained to the ceiling of his cell, and suspended by his wrists for four days. His arms became dislocated from their sockets, and flapped around limply whenever guards collected him for interrogation. During his detention, Dilawar's legs were beaten to a pulp. They would have had to have been amputated because damage was so severe. The murder and US torture complex is chronicled in the 2007 documentary [Taxi to the Dark Side](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxi_to_the_Dark_Side). <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilawar_(torture_victim))</sup>
|
||
- Since 2001, many enemy combatants have been held at the [Guantanamo bay detention camp](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_Bay_detention_camp), a prison camp in Cuba in which suspected enemies are jailed indefinitely without trial. Several inmates have been severely tortured, leading much of the world to decry its existence as a human rights abuse. The military acts as interrogators, prosecutors and defense counsel, judges, and when death sentences are imposed, as executioners. All trials are held in private. Trump has vowed to keep the prison open, saying, "[...] I’d bring back a hell of a lot worse than waterboarding... Don’t tell me it doesn’t work—torture works... if it doesn’t work, they deserve it anyway, for what they’re doing to us." <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_Bay_detention_camp)</sup>
|
||
- The attacks precipitated the signing into law in 2001 of the [Patriot Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Act), which expanded the powers of the NSA to perform mass surveillance, allowed indefinite detention of immigrants, allowed warrant-less searching of phone and email records without a court order, . Thousands of people were jailed, and questioned under the new power the act granted to law enforcement agencies. [Susan Lindauer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susan_Lindauer), a congressional staffer turned activist, imprisoned from 2005-09 for violating the "acting as an agent of a foreign government" provision of the patriot act; the charges were later dropped after it was discovered no evidence ever existed. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Act)</sup>
|
||
- The September 11th 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York, provoked an international military campaign of middle east imperialism known as [The War on Terror](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Terror). Conflicts include the [Nato led involvement in Afghanistan (2001–2014)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_Afghanistan_(1978%E2%80%93present)), the [Insurgency in Yemen (1992–2015)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Qaeda_insurgency_in_Yemen), the [Iraq War (2003–2011)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_War), the [War in North-West Pakistan (2004–present)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_North-West_Pakistan), and the [International campaign against ISIL (2014–present)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_intervention_against_ISIL). The enemy combatants of the war have mostly been people of the middle east. Casualty numbers are in the millions, detailed [here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Terror#Casualties). <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Terror)</sup>
|
||
- In 1990, The U.S. liberates Kuwait from Iraq in the [Gulf War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_War). Iraq’s dictator, Saddam Hussein, was formerly backed by the US when his regime invaded Iran in 1980, and before that was hired by the CIA in a botched assassination attempt on the then Iraqi president. During this costly eight-year war, the CIA built up Hussein’s forces with sophisticated arms, intelligence, training and financial backing, cementing Hussein’s power at home, and allowing him to crush the many internal rebellions that erupted from time to time, sometimes with poison gas. 20,000–35,000 Iraqis were killed in the Gulf War, along with 75,000+ wounded. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_War)</sup>
|
||
- In 1988, a US navy cruise missile shot down [Iran Flight 655](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655), killing its 290 civilian passengers. In 1996 As part of the settlement, the US did not admit legal liability or formally apologize to Iran but agreed to pay on an ex gratia basis $61.8 million. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655)</sup>
|
||
- In 1980, the US helped Turkish armed forces in the [1980 Turkish coup d'état](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_Turkish_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat), including supplying them with American-made Sikorski helicopters. <sup>[1](1)</sup>
|
||
- In 1979, the CIA begins supplying arms and money to factions fighting against the soviets in their [invasion of afghanistan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_war_in_Afghanistan). Fanatical extremists now possess state-of-the-art weaponry, including [Sheik Abdel Rahman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omar_Abdel-Rahman), and [Osama Bin Laden](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osama_bin_Laden), who were later responsible for the 1993 and 2001 World Trade Center bombings in New York.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_war_in_Afghanistan)</sup>
|
||
- Since the 1960s, the US has given immense economic and military aid to Israel in the [Israeli-Palestinian conflict](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli%E2%80%93Palestinian_conflict), which has taken 100,000 - 200,000 lives. The US has used its UN veto power to block a two-state solution countless times. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli%E2%80%93Palestinian_conflict)</sup>
|
||
- In 1953, the CIA in Iran overthrows the democratically elected [Mohammed Mossadegh](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammad_Mosaddegh) in a [military coup](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat), after he threatened to nationalize British oil. The CIA replaces him with a dictator, the Shah of Iran, whose secret police, [SAVAK](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAVAK), is as brutal as the Gestapo. After the initial coup failed and the Shah and his family fled to Italy, the CIA payed millions of dollars to bribe military officers and pay gangsters to unleash violence in the streets of Tehran. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat)</sup>
|
||
|
||
### Africa
|
||
|
||
- In 1998, the US bombed the [Al Shifa pharmaceutical factory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Shifa_pharmaceutical_factory) in Sudan, killing one employee and wounding 11. It was the largest pharmaceutical factory in Khartoum, producing medicine both for human and veterinary use. The US had acted on false evidence of a VX nerve agent from a single soil sample, and later used a false witness to cover for the attack. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Shifa_pharmaceutical_factory)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- In June 1982, with the help of CIA money and arms, [Hissene Habre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiss%C3%A8ne_Habr%C3%A9#Support_of_the_U.S._and_France) , dubbed Africa's Pinochet, takes power in Chad. His secret police, use methods of torture including the burning the body of the detainee with incandescent objects, spraying gas into their eyes, ears and nose, forced swallowing of water, and forcing the mouths of detainees around the exhaust pipes of running cars. Habré's government also periodically engaged in ethnic cleansing against groups such as the Sara, Hadjerai and the Zaghawa, killing and arresting group members en masse when it was perceived that their leaders posed a threat to the regime. In May 2016 he was found guilty of human-rights abuses, including rape, sexual slavery and ordering the killing of 40,000 people, and sentenced to life in prison. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiss%C3%A8ne_Habr%C3%A9#Support_of_the_U.S._and_France)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- In the 1980s, Reagan maintains a close relationship with the Apartheid South african government, called [constructive engagement](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructive_engagement), while secretly [funding it](http://www.salon.com/2011/02/05/ronald_reagan_apartheid_south_africa/) in the hopes of creating a bulwark of anti-communism and preventing a marxist party from taking power, as happened in angola. <sup>[1](http://www.salon.com/2011/02/05/ronald_reagan_apartheid_south_africa/)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- In 1975, Henry Kissinger launches a CIA-backed war in Angola, backing the brutal anti-communist leader of UNITAS, [Jonas Savimbi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonas_Savimbi), against the Marxist-Leninst MPLA party, creating a [civil war](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angolan_Civil_War) lasting for 30 years. Congress continues to fund UNITAS, and their south-african apartheid allies until the late 1980s. By the end of the war, more than 500,000 people had died and over one million had been internally displaced. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angolan_Civil_War)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- In 1966, a CIA-backed [military coup](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Liberation_Council#1966_coup) overthrows he widely popular Pan-Africanist and Marxist leader [Kwame Nkrumah](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwame_Nkrumah) in Ghana, inviting the International Monetary Fund and World Bank to take a lead role in managing the economy. With this reversal, accentuated by the expulsion of immigrants and a new willingness to negotiate with apartheid South Africa, Ghana lost a good deal of its stature in the eyes of African nationalists.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwame_Nkrumah)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- In 1965, a CIA-backed military coup installs [Mobutu Sese Seko](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobutu_Sese_Seko), described as the "archetypal African dictator" in Congo. The hated and repressive Mobutu exploits his desperately poor country for billions.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobutu_Sese_Seko)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- In 1961, the CIA assists in the assassination of the democratically elected congolese leader [Patrice Lumumba](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrice_Lumumba), throwing the country into years of turmoil. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrice_Lumumba)</sup>
|
||
|
||
### Europe
|
||
|
||
- In 1967 in Greece, the CIA installed [Georgios Papadopoulos](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgios_Papadopoulos), a CIA agent and former nazi collaborator, as the military ruler of Greece. He's seen today as an relic of authoritarianism , xenophobia, and anti-communism. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgios_Papadopoulos)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- In 1956, Radio Free Europe(a CIA funded propaganda outlet) incites [Hungary to revolt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_Revolution_of_1956) by broadcasting Khruschev’s Secret Speech, in which he denounced Stalin. It also hints that American aid will help the Hungarians fight. This aid fails to materialize as Hungarians launch a doomed armed revolt, inviting a major Soviet invasion. The conflict kills 7,000 Soviets and 30,000 Hungarians. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_Revolution_of_1956)</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
- From 1948 onwards, the CIA under [Allen Dulles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_Dulles) developed a program of media manipulation called [Project Mockingbird](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird), having major influence over the media, including >25 newspapers. The usual method was placing reports developed from intelligence provided by the CIA to cooperating or unwitting reporters, or employing media directly as american assets.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- In 1948, the [CIA corrupts the elections in Italy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_activities_in_Italy), where Italian communists threaten to win the elections. The CIA buys votes, broadcasts propaganda, threatens and beats up opposition leaders, and infiltrates and disrupts their organizations. The communists are defeated.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_general_election,_1948#Superpower_influence),[2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_activities_in_Italy)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- In 1947, in [Greek civil war](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Civil_War) and ensuing [right wing military junta of 1967-74](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_military_junta_of_1967%E2%80%9374), Truman and the CIA provided money and support to anti-communist Greek dictators with deplorable human rights records.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_military_junta_of_1967%E2%80%9374)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- During the invasion of Sicily in July 1943, eight unarmed Italian civilians, including an eleven year old girl, were killed by U.S. troops. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canicatt%C3%AC_massacre)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- US soldiers killed 73 unarmed Italian and German prisoners of war in Santo Pietro, Italy on July 1943. The survivors were then shot at close range, directly through the heart. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biscari_massacre)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- The [Rheinwiesenlager](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rheinwiesenlager) (Rhine meadow camps) were a group of 19 US prison camps built in the Allied-occupied part of Germany to hold captured German soldiers at the close of the Second World War, holding between one and almost two million surrendered Wehrmacht personnel. Prisoners held in the camps were designated Disarmed Enemy Forces and not POWs, to avoid international treaty regulations. Between 3,000 to 10,000 died from starvation, dehydration and exposure to the weather elements because no structures were built inside the prison compounds. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rheinwiesenlager)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- A study by Robert J. Lilly estimates that a total of 14,000 civilian women in England, France and Germany were raped by American GIs during World War II.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_war_crimes#cite_note-66)</sup>. It is estimated that there were around 3,500 rapes by American servicemen in France between June 1944 and the end of the war and one historian has claimed that sexual violence against women in liberated France was common.<sup>[2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_war_crimes#cite_note-bbcNormandy-68)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- In July, 1945, the predecessor to the CIA, the US Office of Strategic Services (OSS), under the name [Operation Paperclip](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip), rescued and recruited 1,500 Nazi scientists, engineers, and spies. These included [Reinhard Gehlen](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinhard_Gehlen), Hitler’s master spy who had built up an intelligence network in the Soviet Union, SS intelligence officers Alfred Six and Emil Augsburg (who massacred Jews in the Holocaust), [Klaus Barbie](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaus_Barbie#US_intelligence_and_Bolivia) (the "Butcher of Lyon", who was used by the US to further anti-communist efforts in europe), [Otto von Bolschwing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_von_Bolschwing) (the Holocaust mastermind who worked with Eichmann) and SS Colonel [Otto Skorzeny](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Skorzeny) (a personal friend of Hitler’s). The policy of collaboration with nazi spies was deemed necessary to counter the threat from the USSR. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip)</sup>
|
||
|
||
### Asia
|
||
|
||
- Between 1996-2006, The US has given money and weapons to royalist forces against the nepalese communists in the [Nepalese civil war](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nepalese_Civil_War). ~18,000 people have died in the conflict. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nepalese_Civil_War)</sup>
|
||
- In [1975 Australian Constitutional Crisis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1975_Australian_constitutional_crisis), the CIA helps topple the democratically elected, left-leaning government of Prime Minister [Gough Whitlam](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gough_Whitlam). The CIA does this by giving an ultimatum to its Governor-General, [John Kerr](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Kerr_(governor-general)), a longtime CIA collaborator, to dissolve the Whitlam government.
|
||
- Between 1963 and 1973, The US dropped ~388,000 tons of [napalm bombs](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napalm#Military_use) in vietnam, compared to 32,357 tons used over three years in the Korean War, and 16,500 tons dropped on Japan in 1945. US also sprayed over 5 million acres with herbicide, in [Operation Ranch Hand](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ranch_Hand), in a 10 year campaign to deprive the vietnamese of food and vegetation cover. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napalm#Military_use),[2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ranch_Hand)</sup>
|
||
- In 1971 in Pakistan, an authoritarian state supported by the U.S., brutally invaded East Pakistan in the Indo-Pakistani war of 1971. The war ended after India, whose economy was staggering after admitting about 10 million refugees, invaded East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) and defeated the West Pakistani forces. The US gave W. pakistan 411 million provided to establish its armed forces which spent 80% of its budget on its military. 15 million in arms flowed into W. Pakistan during the war. Between 300,000 to 3 million civilians were killed, with 8-10 million refugees fleeing to India. <sup>1</sup>
|
||
- In 1899, after a [popular revolution](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippine_Revolution) in the Philippines to oust the Spanish imperialists, the US invaded and began the [Phillipine-American war](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippine–American_War). The US military committed countless atrocities, leaving 200,000 Filipinos dead.
|
||
|
||
|
||
- In 1970, In Cambodia, The CIA overthrows [Prince Sihanouk](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norodom_Sihanouk), who is highly popular among Cambodians for keeping them out of the Vietnam War. He is replaced by CIA puppet [Lon Nol](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lon_Nol), whose forces suppressed the large-scale popular demonstrations in favour of Sihanouk, resulting in several hundred deaths.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lon_Nol#cite_note-kiernan302-17)</sup> This unpopular move strengthens once minor opposition parties like the Khmer Rouge(another CIA supported group), who achieve power in 1975 and massacres ~2.5 million people. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khmer_Rouge)</sup>
|
||
- In 1969, The US initiated a secret carpet bombing campaign in eastern Cambodia, called, [Operation Menu](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Menu), and [Operation Freedom Deal](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Freedom_Deal) in 1970. An estimated 40,000 - 150,000 civilians were killed. Nixon lied about this campaign, but was later exposed, and one of the things that lead to his impeachment. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Freedom_Deal)</sup>
|
||
- US dropped large amounts of [Agent Orange](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agent_Orange#Vietnamese_victims_class_action_lawsuit_in_U.S._courts), an herbicide developed by monsanto and dow chemical for the department of defense, in vietnam. Its use, in particular the contaminant dioxin, causes multiple health problems, including cleft palate, mental disabilities, hernias, still births, poisoned breast milk, and extra fingers and toes, as well as destroying local species of plants and animals. The Red Cross of Vietnam estimates that up to 1 million people are disabled or have health problems due to Agent Orange.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agent_Orange#cite_note-56)</sup>
|
||
- US Troops killed between 347 and 504 unarmed civilians, including women, children, and infants, in South Vietnam on March, 1968, in the [My Lai Massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Lai_Massacre). Some of the women were gang-raped and their bodies mutilated. Soldiers set fire to huts, waiting for civilians to come out so they could shoot them. For 30 years, the three US servicemen who tried to halt the massacre and rescue the hiding civilians were shunned and denounced as traitors, even by congressmen. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Lai_Massacre)</sup>
|
||
- In 1967, the CIA helped South Vietnamese agents identify and then murder alleged Viet Cong leaders operating in villages, in the [Phoenix Program](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Program). By 1972, Phoenix operatives had executed between 26,000 and 41,000 suspected NLF operatives, informants and supporters.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Program)</sup>
|
||
- In 1965, The [CIA overthrew](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_activities_in_Indonesia) the democratically elected Indonesian leader [Sukarno](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sukarno) with a military coup. The CIA had been trying to eliminate Sukarno since 1957, using everything from attempted assassination to sexual intrigue, for nothing more than his declaring neutrality in the Cold War. His successor, [General Suharto](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suharto), aided by the CIA, massacred between 500,000 to 1 million civilians accused of being communist, in the [Indonesian mass killings of 1965-66](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_mass_killings_of_1965%E2%80%931966#Foreign_involvement). The US continued to support Suharto throughout the 70s, supplying weapons and planes.
|
||
- From the 1960s onward, the US supported Filipino dictator [Ferdinand Marcos](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferdinand_Marcos). The US provided hundreds of millions of dollars in aid, which was crucial in buttressing Marcos's rule over the years. The estimated number of persons that were executed and disappeared under President Fernando Marcos was over 100,000. After fleeing to hawaii, marco was suceeded by the widow of an opponent he assasinated, [Corazon aquino](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corazon_Aquino). <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferdinand_Marcos)</sup>
|
||
- Starting in 1957, in the wake of the US-backed [First Indochina War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Indochina_War), The CIA carries out approximately one coup per year trying to nullify Laos’ democratic elections, specifically targeting the [Pathet Lao](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pathet_Lao), a leftist group with enough popular support to be a member of any coalition government, and perpetuating the [20 year Laotian civil war](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laotian_Civil_War). In the late 50s, the CIA even creates an "Armee Clandestine" of Asian mercenaries to attack the Pathet Lao. After the CIA’s army suffers numerous defeats, the U.S. drops more bombs on Laos than all the U.S. bombs dropped in World War II. A quarter of all Laotians will eventually become refugees, many living in caves. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laotian_Civil_War)</sup>
|
||
- From 1955-1975, the US supported French colonialist interests in Vietnam, set up a puppet regime in Saigon to serve US interests, and later took part as a belligerent against North Vietnam in the [Vietnam War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War). U.S. involvement escalated further following the 1964 [Gulf of Tonkin incident](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Tonkin_incident), which was later found to be staged by Lyndon Johnson. The war exacted a huge human cost in terms of fatalities (see [Vietnam War casualties](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War_casualties)). Estimates of the number of Vietnamese soldiers and civilians killed vary from 966,000[[29\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War#cite_note-Hirschman-30) to 3.8 million.[[50\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War#cite_note-Obermeyer_2008-52) Some 240,000–300,000 [Cambodians](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khmer_people),[[51\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War#cite_note-Heuveline.2C_Patrick_2001-53)[[52\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War#cite_note-Banister.2C_Judith_1993-54)[[53\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War#cite_note-Sliwinski_1995_42.2C48.2Bcomment-55) 20,000–62,000 [Laotians](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lao_people),[[50\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War#cite_note-Obermeyer_2008-52) and 58,220 U.S. service members also died in the conflict, with a further 1,626 missing in action. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War)</sup>
|
||
- In the beginning of the Korean war, US Troops killed ~300 South Korean civilians in the [No Gun Ri massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Gun_Ri_massacre), revealing a theater-wide policy of firing on approaching refugee groups. Trapped refugees began piling up bodies as barricades and tried to dig into the ground to hide. Some managed to escape the first night, while U.S. troops turned searchlights on the tunnels and continued firing, said Chung Koo-ho, whose mother died shielding him and his sister. No apology has yet been issued. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Gun_Ri_massacre#Killings)</sup>
|
||
- The U.S. installed [Syngman Rhee](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syngman_Rhee),a conservative Korean exile, as President of South Korea in 1948. Rhee became a dictator on an anti-communist crusade, arresting and torturing suspected communists, brutally putting down rebellions, killing 100,000 people and vowing to take over North Korea. Rhee precipitated the outbreak of the [Korean War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_War) and for the allied decision to invade North Korea once South Korea had been recaptured. He was finally forced to resign by mass student protests in 1960.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syngman_Rhee)</sup>
|
||
- US Troops committed a [number of rapes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_during_the_occupation_of_Japan) during the battle of Okinawa, and the subsequent occupation of Japan. There were 1,336 reported rapes during the first 10 days of the occupation of Kanagawa prefecture alone.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_during_the_occupation_of_Japan)</sup> American Occupation authorities imposed wide-ranging censorship on the Japanese media, including bans on covering many sensitive social issues and serious crimes such as rape committed by members of the Occupation forces.<sup>[2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_during_the_occupation_of_Japan#cite_note-FOOTNOTEDower1999412-32)</sup>
|
||
- In 1918, the US took part in the [allied intervention in the Russian civil war](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allied_intervention_in_the_Russian_Civil_War), sending 11,000 troops to the in the Arkhangelsk and Vladivostok regions. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allied_intervention_in_the_Russian_Civil_War)</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
## Internal Repression
|
||
|
||
### Native Americans
|
||
|
||
- In 2016, the US army corp of engineers approved a [Energy Transfer Partners](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Transfer_Partners)' proposal to build an oil pipeline near the [Standing Rock Indian Reservation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standing_Rock_Indian_Reservation), sparking the [Dakota Access Pipeline Protests](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dakota_Access_Pipeline_protests), evoking a brutal response from North Dakota police aided by the [National Guard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Guard_of_the_United_States), private security firms, and other law enforcement agencies from surrounding states. The Standing Rock Sioux tribe believes that the pipeline would put the Missouri River, the water source for the reservation, at risk, pointing out two recent spills, [a 2010 pipeline spill into the Kalamazoo River](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalamazoo_River_oil_spill) in Michigan, which cost over billion to clean up with significant contamination remaining, and a 2015 [Bakken crude oil spill into the Yellowstone River](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_Yellowstone_River_oil_spill) in Montana. Police repression has included dogs attacking protesters, spraying water cannons on protesters in sub-freezing temperatures, >700 arrests of native americans and ~200 injuries, a highly militarized police force using armored personnel carriers, concussion grenades, mace, Tasers, batons, rubber bullets, and tear gas. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dakota_Access_Pipeline_protests)</sup>
|
||
- In 1975, FBI agents attacked AIM activists on the [Pine Ridge Reservation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_Ridge_Indian_Reservation#The_Pine_Ridge_Shootout), in the 'Pine Ridge Shootout'.[[37\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_Ridge_Indian_Reservation#cite_note-TimeShootout-37) Two FBI agents, and an AIM activist were killed. In two separate trials, the U.S. prosecuted participants in the firefight for the deaths of the agents. AIM members [Robert Robideau](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Robideau) and Dino Butler were acquitted after asserting that they had acted in self–defense. [Leonard Peltier](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Peltier) was extradited from Canada and tried separately because of the delay. He was convicted on two counts of first–degree murder for the deaths of the FBI agents[[38\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_Ridge_Indian_Reservation#cite_note-LeonardPeltierTrial-38) and sentenced to two consecutive terms of life in prison, after a trial which is still contentious. He remains in prison.
|
||
- In 1973, 200 [Oglala Lakota](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oglala_Lakota) and AIM activists occupied the town of Wounded Knee, South Dakota, on the Pine Ridge Reservation, called the [Wounded knee incident](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wounded_Knee_incident). They were protesting the reservation's corrupt US-backed tribal chairman, [Dick Wilson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Wilson_(tribal_chairman)), who controlled a private militia, called [Guardians of the Oglala Nation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guardians_of_the_Oglala_Nation) (GOONs), funded by the government. FBI, US marshals, and other law enforcement cordoned off the area and attacked the activists with armored vehicles, automatic rifles, machine guns, grenade launchers, and gas shells, resulting in two killed and 13 wounded. [Ray Robinson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perry_Ray_Robinson), a [civil rights](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_rights) activist who joined the protesters, disappeared during the events and is believed to have been murdered. As food supplies became short, three planes dropped 1,200 pounds of food, but as people scrambled to gather it up, a government helicopter appeared overhead and fired down on them while groundfire came from all sides. After the siege ended in a truce, 120 occupiers were arrested. Wilson stayed in office and in 1974 was re-elected amid charges of intimidation, [voter fraud](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_fraud), and other abuses. The rate of violence climbed on the reservation as conflict opened between political factions in the following three years; residents accused Wilson's private militia of much of it. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wounded_Knee_incident)</sup>
|
||
- In Nov. 1969, a group of 89 native americans occupied [Alcatraz Island](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupation_of_Alcatraz) for 15 months, to gauge the US's commitment to the [Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Fort_Laramie_%281868%29), which stated that all abandoned federal land must be returned to native people. Eventually the government cut off all electrical power and all telephone service to the island. In June, a fire of disputed origin destroyed numerous buildings on the island.[[7\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupation_of_Alcatraz#cite_note-occupation-7) Left without power, fresh water, and in the face of diminishing public support and sympathy, the number of occupiers began to dwindle. On June 11, 1971, a large force of government officers removed the remaining 15 people from the island.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupation_of_Alcatraz)</sup>
|
||
- From its creation in 1968, The **American Indian Movement** (**AIM**) has been a target of repression from law enforcement agencies, and surveillance as one of the FBI's COINTELPRO targets. This includes the wounded knee incident and the pine ridge shootout. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Indian_Movement)</sup>
|
||
- In 1942 the federal government [took](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution#Takings_clause) privately held Pine Ridge Indian Reservation land owned by tribal members in order to establish the [Badlands Bombing Range](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Badlands_Bombing_Range) of 341,725 acres, evicting 125 families. Among the families evicted was that of Pat Cuny, an [Oglala Sioux](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oglala_Sioux). He fought in World War II in the [Battle of the Bulge](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Bulge) after surviving torpedoing of his transport in the [English Channel](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Channel).[[24\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_Ridge_Indian_Reservation#cite_note-24) [Dewey Beard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dewey_Beard), a [Miniconjou](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miniconjou) Sioux survivor of the Wounded Knee Massacre, who supported himself by raising horses on his 908-acre allotment received in 1907 was also evicted. The small federal payments were insufficient to enable such persons to buy new properties. In 1955 the 97-year-old Beard testified of earlier mistreatment at Congressional hearings about this project.[[25\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_Ridge_Indian_Reservation#cite_note-25) He said, for "fifty years I have been kicked around. Today there is a hard winter coming. ...I might starve to death." <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_Ridge_Indian_Reservation#Taking_of_Badlands_Bombing_Range)</sup>
|
||
- In 1887, the [Dawes Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dawes_Act), and [Curtis Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Act_of_1898), resulted in the loss of 90 million acres of native-alloted land, and the abolition of many native governments. During the ensuing decades, the Five Civilized Tribes lost 90 million acres of former communal lands, which were sold to non-Natives. In addition, many individuals, unfamiliar with land ownership, became the target of speculators and criminals, were stuck with allotments that were too small for profitable farming, and lost their household lands. Tribe members also suffered from the breakdown of the social structure of the tribes. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dawes_Act)</sup>
|
||
|
||
### Black people
|
||
|
||
- In May, 2010, [Kalief Browder](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalief_Browder), a 16 year old black teen, was arrested while walking home in the Bronx, on suspicion of robbery. He was held for 3 years on [Riker Island](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rikers_Island), a New York jail notorious for its horrible treatment of inmates, without trial or conviction, refusing to accept the state's plea deal and staunchly defending his innocence, until the case was finally dismissed. Kalief was held for 2 of his 3 years in solitary confinement, and his deteriorating mental health lead him to attempt suicide multiple times. After his release, Kalief Browder committed suicide by hanging himself, in June, 2015. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalief_Browder), [2](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/10/18/kalief-browder-hanged-himself-after-jail-destroyed-him-then-a-broken-heart-killed-his-mother/)</sup>
|
||
- On April 12, 2015, [Freddie Carlos Gray, Jr.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Freddie_Gray), a 25-year-old [Black man](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_American), was [arrested](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrested) by the [Baltimore Police Department](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baltimore_Police_Department) for possessing what the police alleged was an illegal [switchblade](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Switchblade) under Baltimore law. While being transported in a [police van](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_van), several cops held him down, putting pressure on his spinal cord, after which he fell into a [coma](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coma) and died on April 19, 2015. This sparked a series of [protests in Baltimore](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_Baltimore_protests); riot police responded violently, and called in the national guard to aid against the "thugs", as they were labeled by [Obama in a press conference](https://youtu.be/ml1LzRenH_Q). After the protests were put down, the police officers were given separate trials, and all of them were found innocent. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Freddie_Gray)</sup>
|
||
- The [shooting of Walter Scott](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Walter_Scott) occurred on April 4, 2015, in [North Charleston, South Carolina](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Charleston,_South_Carolina), following a daytime [traffic stop](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traffic_stop) for a non-functioning brake light. Scott, an unarmed black man, was murdered by Michael Slager, a white North Charleston police officer. Slager was only charged with murder after an eyewitness video surfaced which showed him shooting Scott from behind while Scott was fleeing, and which contradicted his police report. Without the video, the shooting would've likely been deemed justified, as nearly all murders by police result in no charges. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Walter_Scott)</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
- On November 22, 2014, in [Cleveland](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland), [Ohio](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohio), two police officers killed 12 year old [Tamir Rice](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Tamir_Rice), after receiving a call that he had a weapon. It turned out to be a toy. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Tamir_Rice)</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
- The [shooting of Michael Brown](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Michael_Brown) occurred on August 9, 2014, in [Ferguson, Missouri](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferguson,_Missouri), a northern [suburb](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suburb) of [St. Louis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Louis). Brown, an unarmed 18-year-old black man was fatally shot by Darren Wilson, 28, a white Ferguson police officer, after robbing a convenience store. [Protests in Ferguson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferguson_unrest) erupted after the murderer was found innocent, evoking a militarized crackdown on black protestors by the predominantly white police force. This systemic pattern of murder of unarmed black civilians spawned the [Black Lives Matter(BLM)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_lives_matter) movement. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Michael_Brown)</sup>
|
||
- The [shooting of John Crawford III](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_crawford_III) occurred on August 5, 2014. Crawford was a 22-year-old [African-American](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African-American) man shot to death by Beavercreek police officer Sean Williams, in a [Walmart](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walmart) store in [Beavercreek](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beavercreek,_Ohio), [Ohio](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohio), near [Dayton](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dayton), while holding a toy [BB gun](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BB_gun).<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_crawford_III)</sup>
|
||
- On July 17, 2014, [Eric Garner](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Eric_Garner) died in [Staten Island](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Staten_Island), [New York City](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City), after a [New York City Police Department](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_Police_Department) (NYPD) officer put him in what has been described as a [chokehold](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chokehold) for about 15 to 19 seconds while arresting him. A grand jury found the officer Pantaleo innocent, sparking a series of nation-wide demonstrations against police brutality of blacks.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Eric_Garner)</sup>
|
||
- On April 30, 2014, a police officer, Christopher Manney, [shot and killed Dontre Hamilton](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Dontre_Hamilton), a black man with a history or mental illness, at Red Arrow Park in [Milwaukee](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milwaukee), [Wisconsin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wisconsin). After the shooting, Manney applied for duty disability, saying the shooting and its aftermath caused him to experience severe [post-traumatic stress disorder](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-traumatic_stress_disorder), after being fired. No charges were brought against him.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Dontre_Hamilton)</sup>
|
||
- In 2004, during a protest at the republican national convention, over 1,800 people were arrested. They were held at [Hudson Pier Depot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_depots_of_the_New_York_City_Transit_Authority#Hudson_Pier_Depot) at [Pier 57](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pier_57) on the [Hudson River](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_River_%28Hudson_River%29), a three-story, block-long pier that has been converted into a temporary prison, described as overcrowded, dirty, and contaminated with [oil](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petroleum) and [asbestos](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asbestos). People reported having suffered from smell, bad ventilation, and even chemical burns and rashes. In 2014, the city was forced to pay $ 6.4 million to 430 individual plaintiffs. $6.6 million was paid to settle a class-action lawsuit filed by 1,200 additional people. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Republican_National_Convention_protest_activity),[2](https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/peter-gelderloos-how-nonviolence-protects-the-state)</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
- On May 13, 1985, the police again attempted to evict [MOVE](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOVE), [and bombed an entire city block](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOVE#1985_bombing), killing 11 people(including 5 children), and leaving 250 homeless. Police initially lobbed [tear gas](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tear_gas) canisters at the building, and a gunfight with [semi-automatic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semi-automatic_firearm) and [automatic firearms](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_firearm) ensued. Commissioner Sambor then ordered a bombing from a Pennsylvania State Police helicopter, and [Philadelphia Police Department](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philadelphia_Police_Department) Lt. Frank Powell proceeded to drop two one-pound bombs made of C4 explosive (which the police referred to as "entry devices") made of FBI-supplied [water gel explosive](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_gel_explosive), a [dynamite](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamite) substitute, targeting a fortified, bunker-like cubicle on the roof of the house. The resulting explosions ignited a fire from fuel for a gasoline-powered generator in rooftop bunker that eventually destroyed approximately 65 nearby houses. The firefighters, who had earlier [deluge-hosed](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_cannon#Riot_control) the MOVE members in a failed attempt to evict them from the building, stood by as the fire caused by the bomb engulfed the first house and spread to others, having been given orders to let the fire burn. Despite the earlier drenching of the building by firefighters, officials said that they feared that MOVE would shoot at the firefighters. Eleven people (John Africa, five other adults and five children aged 7 to 13) died in the resulting fire and more than 250 people were left homeless. Ramona Africa, one of the two survivors, stated that police fired at those trying to escape. No one from the city government was charged criminally. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOVE#1985_bombing)</sup>
|
||
- In 1979, a [communist-led march](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_Workers%27_Party_(United_States)) to oust the [Ku Klux Klan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ku_Klux_Klan) and the [American Nazi Party](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Nazi_Party) lead to the [Greensboro Massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greensboro_massacre), where local police helped the KKK stop the march and kill 5 protesters. Edward Dawson, a Klansman-turned FBI informant as part of the agency's [COINTELPRO](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO) program and was among the founders of the North Carolina Knights of the Ku Klux Klan when the North Carolina chapter of the [United Klans of America](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Klans_of_America) split. By 1979 he was working as an informant for the Greensboro Police Department. He was given a copy of the march route from the police and informed them of the potential for violence. Absent the police, the attackers escaped with relative ease. The city lost a civil lawsuit in 1980, being one of the few times in US history when "a jury held local police liable for cooperating with the KKK in a wrongful death." <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greensboro_massacre)</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
- In 1978, the police were involved in shootout with [MOVE](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOVE), a black power commune in Philadelphia, after attempting to evict them. The 9 surviving members(called the MOVE 9) were given 100 year long sentences, 7 of which are still currently in prison.
|
||
- Between 1932 and 1972, the US public health service secretly infected ~200 black men with syphilis, under the guise of receiving free health care, in the [Tuskegee syphilis experiment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_syphilis_experiment). None of the men infected were ever told they had the disease(told instead they had "bad blood"), and none were treated with [penicillin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penicillin) even after the antibiotic became proven for the treatment of syphilis in 1947. By the end of the study in 1972, only 74 of the test subjects were alive. Of the original 399 men, 28 had died of syphilis, 100 were dead of related complications, 40 of their wives had been infected, and 19 of their children were born with [congenital syphilis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congenital_syphilis). <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_syphilis_experiment)</sup>
|
||
- In 1969, the FBI in collaboration with chicago police, murdered an influential black panther organizer, [Fred Hampton](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Hampton#1969_raid_and_assassination), when he was 21 years old. An FBI informant drugged him in the evening, then agents broke into the apartment, killing another, and firing into the room where Hampton and his pregnant girlfriend slept. The FBI targeted him as being a potential "Black Messiah", as Hampton was organizing poor blacks, whites, latinos, and native americans in Chicago with the [Rainbow Coalition](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_Coalition_(Fred_Hampton)), to fight the repressive police brutality under mayor Daley. After a break-in at an FBI office in Pennsylvania, the existence of [COINTELPRO](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO), an illegal counter-intelligence program, was brought to light. One of the documents that was released after the break-in was a floor plan of Hampton's apartment. Another document outlined a deal the FBI brokered with the deputy attorney general to conceal the FBI's role in the assassination of Hampton and the existence of COINTELPRO. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Hampton#1969_raid_and_assassination)</sup>
|
||
- Starting in 1967, The [Black Panther Party](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Panther_Party), a revolutionary black socialist group, became the [target of FBI's COINTELPRO](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Panther_Party#COINTELPRO). Hoover deemed the Panther's free breakfast program(which served food for 10,000 children daily at its height), and its free medical care programs, as a dangerous threat to the US. Local police forces, aided by the FBI, were involved with multiple break-ins of panther headquarters, shoot-outs, the arrests, imprisonment, or murder of nearly every high-ranking member, and achieved its systematic destruction by 1980. A faithful account of its history is in founder Huey P. Newtons [Revolutionary Suicide](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutionary_Suicide), and the history [Black against Empire](https://www.amazon.com/Black-against-Empire-Politics-Foundation/dp/0520293282/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1485890722&sr=8-1&keywords=black+against+empire). <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Panther_Party)</sup>
|
||
- In 1967, a nationwide series of riots broke out in the black ghettos of the US, involving young blacks revolting against the white-supremacist power structure. In the [1967 Detroit Riot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_Detroit_riot), Lyndon Johnson brought in the Michigan National guard to put down the revolt. The result was 43 dead, 1,189 injured, over 7,200 arrests, and more than 2,000 buildings destroyed. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_Detroit_riot)</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
- From December 1963 until his death in 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was the target of an intensive campaign by the FBI to 'neutralize' him as an effective civil rights leader. This included wiretapping his phones, blackmail letters threatening to expose his extramarital affairs, a [letter encouraging him to commit suicide](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FBI%E2%80%93King_suicide_letter), as well as watching King [during his assassination](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_King_Jr.#Allegations_of_conspiracy), leading many to believe the FBI were either complicit, or accomplices. The FBI are similarly accused of being complicit or accomplices to the [nation of Islam's murder of Malcolm X.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_X#Allegations_of_conspiracy) <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_King_Jr.#FBI_and_King.27s_personal_life)</sup>
|
||
- In such cities as Birmingham, Alabama, [police ruthlessly enforced segregation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birmingham_campaign#Conflict_escalation), and white supremacist terrorism. In 1963, the police assisted the KKK in bombing the black leaders of the [Birmingham Campaign for desegregation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birmingham_campaign), leading to the [Birmingham Riot of 1963](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birmingham_riot_of_1963), as well as the [16th st. Baptist Church Bombing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/16th_Street_Baptist_Church_bombing), where 4 black girls were killed. The US government sent in troops to quell the revolting black populace. In the [1963 Children's Crusade](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children%27s_Crusade_(1963)), police mass arrested black children who had walked out of school protesting segregation, using fire hoses and attack dogs against them. Over 1,000 people were arrested throughout the campaign.
|
||
- In 1921, a white mob started the [Tulsa race riot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_riot), attacking black residents in [Tulsa](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa), [Oklahoma](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oklahoma), in what is considered one of the worst incidents of racial violence in US History. Thousands of whites rampaged through the black community for two days, killing men and women, burning and looting stores and homes, and using private planes to drop burning balls of turpentine on rooftops. ~300 blacks were killed, and ~10,000 blacks were left homeless. More than 800 people were admitted to hospitals and more than 6,000 black residents were arrested and detained. In 2001 it was revealed that the police and national guard assisted the whites. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_riot)</sup>
|
||
- In the 18th and 19th centuries, US plantation owners benefitted from [African Slavery](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_United_States), which eventually became the dominant mode of production in the south. Words cannot do justice to the inhumanity of slavery as practiced by the US, but specific examples above will attempt to highlight its brutality. The total slave population in the South eventually reached 4 million before liberation. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_United_States)</sup>
|
||
|
||
### LGBTQ People
|
||
|
||
- In 1969, LGBT activists began the [Stonewall riots](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonewall_riots) in response to a police raid in Greenwich Village, which highlighted a pattern of discrimination against gay people in the legal system. The Stonewall Inn It catered to an assortment of patrons and was known to be popular among the poorest and most marginalized people in the gay community: [drag queens](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drag_queen), [transgender](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender) people, effeminate young men, [butch lesbians](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butch_and_femme), [male prostitutes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Male_prostitution), and homeless youth. Police raids on gay bars were routine in the 1960s. The riot began an extended confrontation with the [New York City police](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_Police_Department), and within weeks, Village residents quickly organized into activist groups to concentrate efforts on establishing places for gays and lesbians to be open about their [sexual orientation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_orientation) without fear of being arrested. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonewall_riots)</sup>
|
||
|
||
### Women
|
||
|
||
- In the period following WWII, the US capitalist-controlled media, advertising, and consumer products industries propagandized and glorified the ideal of the housewife-consumer, in order to sell products, make labor space for returning soldiers, take advantage of women's unpaid labor in the home, and to help build a new workforce and potential army to combat the soviet union. This sparked an era of regression with respect to the feminist victories of the previous 50 years, and caused psychological damage and demoralization to an uncountable number of women. Women who remained in the labor force were primarily only allowed in subordinate positions such as secretaries, cleaning women, elementary school teachers, saleswomen, waitresses, and nurses. This is chronicled in the [Feminine Mystique](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Feminine_Mystique).
|
||
- From the 1880s onward, many US states(27 + puerto rico in 1956) operated a system of [forced sterilization](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compulsory_sterilization#United_States) of women, rooted in white supremacy. The principle targets were the mentally ill, native americans, and blacks. For example, in [Sunflower County Mississippi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunflower_County,_Mississippi), 60% of black women living there were sterilized without their permission. An estimated 3,406 Indian women were sterilized.[[63\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenics_in_the_United_States#cite_note-Lawrence-63) California eugenicists in 1933 began sending their literature overseas to german scientists and medical workers, sparking the beginnings of Nazi Eugenics. In the end, over 65,000 individuals were sterilized in 33 states, in all likelihood without the perspectives of ethnic minorities. 148 female prisoners in two California institutions were sterilized between 2006 and 2010 in a supposedly voluntary program, but it was determined that the prisoners did not give consent to the procedures. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compulsory_sterilization#United_States),[2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compulsory_sterilization#cite_note-71)</sup>
|
||
|
||
### Latinos
|
||
|
||
- In early 2017, ICE began a [campaign of arrests and deportation](https://theintercept.com/2017/02/14/ice-arrested-nearly-700-people-last-week-advocates-are-bracing-for-more-to-come/) of undocumented immigrants. 700 People have been arrested so far. <sup>[1](https://theintercept.com/2017/02/14/ice-arrested-nearly-700-people-last-week-advocates-are-bracing-for-more-to-come/)</sup>
|
||
- In the present day, [ICE(U.S._Immigration_and_Customs_Enforcement)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Immigration_and_Customs_Enforcement#Case_samples), the police tasked with immigration enforcement, operates over 200 prison camps, housing over 31,000 undocumented people deemed "aliens", 20,000 of which have no criminal convictions, in the US [system of immigration detention](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_detention_in_the_United_States#Criticisms). [The camps](http://www.cnn.com/2015/07/23/opinions/reyes-immigration-detention/) include forced labor(often with [contracts from private companies](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Immigration_and_Customs_Enforcement#Corporate_contracts)), poor conditions, lack of rights(since the undocumented aren't considered citizens), and forced deportations, often splitting up families. Detainees are often held for a year without trial, with antiquated court procedures pushing back court dates for months, encouraging many to accept immediate deportation in the hopes of being able to return faster than the court can reach a decision, but forfeiting legal status, in a cruel system of coercion. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_detention_in_the_United_States#Criticisms), [2](http://www.cnn.com/2015/07/23/opinions/reyes-immigration-detention/)</sup>
|
||
- In 1996, in response to increased immigration from countries such as El Salvador and Guatemala ravaged by US imperialism and authoritarian dictatorships, the US passed the [Anti-Terrorism and effective Death Penalty Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antiterrorism_and_Effective_Death_Penalty_Act_of_1996), allowing deportation of any immigrant ever convicted of a crime, no matter how long ago or how serious. Lawful permanent residents who had married Americans and now had children were not exempt. The *New York Times* reported in July that "hundreds of long-term legal residents have been arrested since the law passed." <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antiterrorism_and_Effective_Death_Penalty_Act_of_1996)</sup>
|
||
- By 1984, during the Reagan-era of social services and welfare cutbacks, 42% of all Latino children and one-fourth of the families lived below the poverty line.
|
||
- In 1983, a mostly latino workforce lead the 3-year long [Arizona Copper Mine Strike of 1983](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arizona_copper_mine_strike_of_1983), in which the police, national guard, and Arizona governor assisted in one of the largest strikebreaking incidents of the 1980s, ending with the [Phelps Dodge Corporation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phelps_Dodge_Corporation) replacing most of the workers and decertifying the unions. Miners were subject to [undercover surveillance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surveillance) by the Arizona Criminal Intelligence Systems Agency, to identify strikers engaged in violence, with the governor sending 325 National Guard soldiers to Morenci, and increasing the number of state policemen there to 425. Meanwhile, the local government passed [injunctions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Injunction) limiting both picketing and demonstrations at the mine. The Arizona copper mine strike would later become a symbol of defeat for American unions. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arizona_copper_mine_strike_of_1983)</sup>
|
||
|
||
### Asians
|
||
|
||
### Workers
|
||
|
||
- In 1983, a mostly latino workforce lead the 3-year long [Arizona Copper Mine Strike of 1983](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arizona_copper_mine_strike_of_1983), in which the police, national guard, and Arizona governor assisted in one of the largest strikebreaking incidents of the 1980s, ending with the [Phelps Dodge Corporation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phelps_Dodge_Corporation) replacing most of the workers and decertifying the unions. Miners were subject to [undercover surveillance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surveillance) by the Arizona Criminal Intelligence Systems Agency, to identify strikers engaged in violence, with the governor sending 325 National Guard soldiers to Morenci, and increasing the number of state policemen there to 425. Meanwhile, the local government passed [injunctions](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Injunction) limiting both picketing and demonstrations at the mine. The Arizona copper mine strike would later become a symbol of defeat for American unions. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arizona_copper_mine_strike_of_1983)</sup>
|
||
- In 1979, a [communist-led march](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_Workers%27_Party_(United_States)) to oust the [Ku Klux Klan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ku_Klux_Klan) and the [American Nazi Party](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Nazi_Party) lead to the [Greensboro Massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greensboro_massacre), where local police helped the KKK stop the march and kill 5 protesters. Edward Dawson, a Klansman-turned FBI informant as part of the agency's [COINTELPRO](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO) program and was among the founders of the North Carolina Knights of the Ku Klux Klan when the North Carolina chapter of the [United Klans of America](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Klans_of_America) split. By 1979 he was working as an informant for the Greensboro Police Department. He was given a copy of the march route from the police and informed them of the potential for violence. Absent the police, the attackers escaped with relative ease. The city lost a civil lawsuit in 1980, being one of the few times in US history when "a jury held local police liable for cooperating with the KKK in a wrongful death." <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greensboro_massacre)</sup>
|
||
|
||
### Poor people
|
||
|
||
- In 1996, Congress signed into law the deceptively titled [Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_Responsibility_and_Work_Opportunity_Act), which capitalized on a demonization of the poor as being lazy(in reality there was a lack of jobs, and low-wage work proved unable to sustain most families), in order to dismantle welfare benefits. Its aim was to force poor families receiving federal cash benefits (many of them single mothers with children) to go to work, by cutting off their benefits after two years, limiting lifetime benefits to five years, and allowing people without children to get food stamps for only three months in any three-year period. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_Responsibility_and_Work_Opportunity_Act)</sup>
|
||
|
||
### Prisoners
|
||
|
||
- Ramping up since the 1980s, the term [prison–industrial complex](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison%E2%80%93industrial_complex) is used to attribute the [rapid expansion of the US inmate population](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_incarceration_rate#Growth) to the political influence of [private prison](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_prison) companies and businesses that supply goods and services to government prison agencies. Such groups include corporations that contract [prison labor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison_labor), construction companies, [surveillance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surveillance) technology vendors, companies that operate prison food services and medical facilities, [private probation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_probation) companies, lawyers, and [lobby groups](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lobby_groups) that represent them. Activist groups such as the [National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Organization_for_the_Reform_of_Marijuana_Laws) (NORML) have argued that the prison-industrial complex is perpetuating a flawed belief that imprisonment is an effective solution to social problems such as [homelessness](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homelessness), [unemployment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unemployment), [drug addiction](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_addiction), [mental illness](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_illness), and [illiteracy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illiteracy). <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prison%E2%80%93industrial_complex)</sup>
|
||
- The [War On Drugs](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Drugs), a policy of arrest and imprisonment targeting minorities, first initiated by Nixon, has over the years created a monstrous system of mass incarceration, resulting in the imprisonment of 1.5 million people each year, with the US having the most prisoners per capita of any nation. One in five black Americans will spend time behind bars due to drug laws. The war has created a permanent underclass of impoverished people who have few educational or job opportunities as a result of being punished for drug offenses, in a vicious cycle of oppression. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Drugs#cite_note-59), [2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_Drugs)</sup>
|
||
- Over 90% of criminal trials in the US are settled not by a judge or jury, but with [plea bargaining](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plea_bargain), a system where the defendant agrees to plead guilty in return for a concession from the prosecutor. It has been statistically shown to benefit prosecutors, who "throw the book" at defendants by presenting a slew of charges, manipulating their fear, who in turn accept a lesser charge, regardless of their innocence, in order to avoid a worst outcome. The number of potentially innocent prisoners coerced into accepting a guilty plea is impossible to calculate. Plea bargaining can present a dilemma to [defense attorneys](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_attorney), in that they must choose between vigorously seeking a good deal for their present client, or maintaining a good relationship with the prosecutor for the sake of helping future clients. Plea bargaining is forbidden in most European countries. John Langbein has equated plea bargaining to medieval torture: "There is, of course, a difference between having your limbs crushed if you refuse to confess, or suffering some extra years of imprisonment if you refuse to confess, but the difference is of degree, not kind. Plea bargaining, like torture, is coercive. Like the medieval Europeans, the Americans are now operating a procedural system that engages in condemnation without adjudication." <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plea_bargain#Controversy)></sup>
|
||
- The US [system of bail](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bail_in_the_United_States#Criticisms_of_bail) (the practice of releasing suspects before their hearing for money paid to the court) has been criticized as monetizing justice, favoring rich, white collar suspects, over poorer people unable to pay for their release. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bail_in_the_United_States#Criticisms_of_bail)</sup>
|
||
- The [Crime bill of 1994](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violent_Crime_Control_and_Law_Enforcement_Act), signed into law by Bill Clinton, increased the size of the US prison industry, and dealt with the problem of crime by emphasizing punishment, not prevention. It extended the death penalty to a whole range of criminal offenses, and provided $30 billion for the building of new prisons, to crack down on "super predators", a term used by Hillary Clinton to refer to remorseless juvenile criminals. <sup>[1](http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-36020717)</sup>
|
||
- In the 1978 case [Houchins v. KQED, Inc.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houchins_v._KQED,_Inc.) the supreme court ruled that the news media do not have guaranteed rights of access to jails and prisons. It ruled also that prison authorities could forbid inmates to speak to one another, assemble, or spread literature about the formation of a prisoners' union.<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houchins_v._KQED,_Inc.)</sup>
|
||
- In September, 1971, prison guards [killed George Jackson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Jackson_(activist)#Death), a black Marxist and member of the black panthers in San quentin prison(who had served 10 years of an indeterminate prison sentence for a $70 robbery), after he attempted to free himself and other inmates. Outrage over this, terrible prison conditions, and mistreatment by white prison guards, caused the [Attica Prison Riot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attica_Prison_riot), in which 33 inmates and 10 prison guards were killed, and sparked dozens of prison riots across the country. In Attica, 100 percent of the guards were white, prisoners spent fourteen to sixteen hours a day in their cells, their mail was read, their reading material restricted, their visits from families conducted through a mesh screen, their medical care disgraceful, 75% were there as a result of plea bargaining, and their parole system inequitable.
|
||
|
||
### Homeless people
|
||
|
||
- Since January, 2013, over 21 US cities have enacted legislation to restrict giving food to the homeless, such as requiring expensive permits to discourage food donations in public spaces, or direct police intervention. In Tampa FL, on January 9th, 2017, police arrested 7 volunteers of Food Not Bombs and 1 homeless person to prevent them from distributing food. <sup>[1](http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/In-Tampa-If-You-Share-Food-with-Homeless-Cops-Will-Raid-You-20170110-0003.html)</sup>
|
||
|
||
- In 1988, a founder of [Food Not Bombs](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_Not_Bombs), [Keith McHenry](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_McHenry), was one of nine volunteers arrested for sharing food and literature at Golden Gate Park on August 15, 1988.[[1\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_McHenry#cite_note-1) In the following years, Keith was arrested over 100 times for serving free food in city parks and spent over 500 nights in jail. He faced 25 years to life in prison under the California Three Strikes Law but in 1995, Amnesty International and the United Nations Human Rights Commission brought about his release.[[2\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_McHenry#cite_note-2) <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_McHenry)</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
### Religious minorities
|
||
|
||
- From February to April of 1994, ATF(Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms) and FBI forces besieged a religious [compound in Waco, Texas,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waco_siege) after a botched raid and arrest attempt of the leader of the branch davidians, David Koresh, for sexual abuse and weapons charges. After a failed negotiation, tanks were used to rip apart the building, while highly flammable tear gas was shot into the building. 76 people, including pregnant women and children, were burned alive in the firestorm. The event is chronicled in the documentary, [Waco: Rules of Engagement](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waco:_The_Rules_of_Engagement).<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waco_siege)</sup>
|
||
|
||
### Pervasive
|
||
|
||
- Police repression against minorities and the poor have been increasing in the last few years, leading to the establishing of several online databases, such as [this one by the washington post documenting shooting-deaths by police](https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/national/police-shootings-2016/), and [killedbypolice.net](http://www.killedbypolice.net/). US police shot and killed 963 people in 2016, and 991 in 2015.
|
||
- In 2013, [Edward Snowden](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden#Global_surveillance_disclosures), an NSA contractor, leaked secret NSA documents exposing a world-wide network of surveillance lead by the US, in the [Global surveillance disclosures](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_(2013%E2%80%93present)). Some NSA programs revealed were [PRISM](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_%28surveillance_program%29) (which collects the e-mail, voice, text and video chats of foreigners and an unknown number of Americans from Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Yahoo, Apple and other tech giants),[[95\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_%282013%E2%80%93present%29#cite_note-WaPo1-95)[[96\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_%282013%E2%80%93present%29#cite_note-Greenwald1-96)[[97\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_%282013%E2%80%93present%29#cite_note-97)[[98\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_%282013%E2%80%93present%29#cite_note-98), [UPSTREAM](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#Related_U.S._government_surveillance_programs), in which the NSA made deals with fiberoptic undersea cable companies to spy on emails, web pages, and phone calls across continents, GENIE, in which smartphone manufacturers of iphone and android bundled spying programs, and [XKeyScore](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XKeyscore#Scope_and_functioning), which allowed NSA agents to help build a "fingerprint" of a target by watching their emails, traffic to and from website, and track associations. *The Washington Post* revealed that the NSA has been tracking the locations of mobile phones from all over the world by tapping into the cables that connect mobile networks globally and that serve U.S. cellphones as well as foreign ones. In the process of doing so, the NSA collects more than five billion records of phone locations on a daily basis. This enables NSA analysts to map cellphone owners' relationships by correlating their patterns of movement over time with thousands or millions of other phoneusers who cross their paths.[[275\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_%282013%E2%80%93present%29#cite_note-wapo52013-275)[[276\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_%282013%E2%80%93present%29#cite_note-276)[[277\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_%282013%E2%80%93present%29#cite_note-277)[[278\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_%282013%E2%80%93present%29#cite_note-278)[[279\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_%282013%E2%80%93present%29#cite_note-279)[[280\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_%282013%E2%80%93present%29#cite_note-280)[[281\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_%282013%E2%80%93present%29#cite_note-281)[[282\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_%282013%E2%80%93present%29#cite_note-282) Australia ([ASD](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Signals_Directorate)), Britain ([GCHQ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_Communications_Headquarters)), Canada ([CSEC](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_Security_Establishment_Canada)), Denmark ([PET](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politiets_Efterretningstjeneste)), France ([DGSE](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directorate-General_for_External_Security)), Germany ([BND](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bundesnachrichtendienst)), Italy ([AISE](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agenzia_Informazioni_e_Sicurezza_Esterna)), the Netherlands ([AIVD](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algemene_Inlichtingen_en_Veiligheidsdienst)), Norway ([NIS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norwegian_Intelligence_Service)), Spain ([CNI](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centro_Nacional_de_Inteligencia)), Switzerland ([NDB](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_intelligence_agencies)), Singapore ([SID](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_and_Intelligence_division)) as well as Israel ([ISNU](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_8200)), were found to be spying on their own citizens, and sharing that data with countries and businesses <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosures_(2013%E2%80%93present))</sup>
|
||
- The 2010 [US diplomatic cables leak](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_diplomatic_cables_leak) by Chelsea Manning revealed a pervasive policy of using US ambassadors as spies, supporting dictatorships, spying on the UN, strong-arming for US companies abroad, and disrupting nuclear disarmament talks. The scope of these leaks touches every country the US has a relationship with, and they are better detailed [here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contents_of_the_United_States_diplomatic_cables_leak). <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contents_of_the_United_States_diplomatic_cables_leak), [2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_diplomatic_cables_leak)</sup>
|
||
- In 2010, [Chelsea Manning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelsea_Manning) was imprisoned under the espionage act for a series of leaks which embarrassed the US government, including the [July 12, 2007 Baghdad airstrike](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_12,_2007_Baghdad_airstrike), [Afghan War documents](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghan_War_documents_leak), [Iraq War documents leak](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_War_documents_leak), [US diplomatic cables leak](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_diplomatic_cables_leak), and the [Guantanamo Bay files leak](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_Bay_files_leak). The leak was, in Manning's Words: "possibly one of the most significant documents of our time, removing the fog of war and revealing the true nature of 21st century asymmetric warfare". <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelsea_Manning)</sup>
|
||
|
||
|
||
- Between 1850 and 2011, according to the World Resources Institute, the United States was the source of [27 percent of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions causing global warming](http://www.wri.org/blog/2014/11/6-graphs-explain-world%E2%80%99s-top-10-emitters); the European Union, 25 percent; China, 11 percent; Russia, 8 percent; and Japan, 4 percent. These emissions have led to the emergence of large-scale [environmental hazards to human health](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_global_warming_on_humans), such as extreme weather, ozone depletion, increased danger of wildland fires, loss of biodiversity, stresses to food-producing systems and the global spread of infectious diseases. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 160,000 deaths, since 1950, are directly attributable to climate change. Many believe this to be a conservative estimate. To date, much less research has been conducted on the impacts of climate change on health, food supply, economic growth, migration, security, societal change, and public goods, such as drinking water, than on the geophysical changes related to global warming.<sup>[1](https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/america-is-the-worst-polluter-in-the-history-of-the-world-we-should-let-climate-change-refugees-resettle-here/2015/06/25/28a55238-1a9c-11e5-ab92-c75ae6ab94b5_story.html),[2](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_global_warming_on_humans)</sup>
|
||
- The [Espionage Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Espionage_Act_of_1917), a federal law that allows imprisonment of anyone who *interferes with [military operations](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_operation) or [recruitment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_recruitment)*, was used to imprison socialists and dissidents for speaking out against WWI, and involuntary conscription, as well as modern activists speaking out against the US police state. In 1919, [Eugene V. Debs](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_V._Debs), a popular socialist candidate for president was imprisoned for his anti-war speeches. Among those charged with offences under the Act are German-American socialist congressman and newspaper editor [Victor L. Berger](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_L._Berger), labor leader and four time [Socialist Party of America](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_Party_of_America) candidate, [Eugene V. Debs](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_V._Debs), anarchists [Emma Goldman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emma_Goldman) and [Alexander Berkman](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Berkman), former [Watch Tower Bible & Tract Society](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watch_Tower_Bible_and_Tract_Society_of_Pennsylvania) president [Joseph Franklin Rutherford](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Franklin_Rutherford), communists [Julius and Ethel Rosenberg](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_and_Ethel_Rosenberg), [Pentagon Papers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentagon_Papers) [whistleblower](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower) [Daniel Ellsberg](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Ellsberg), [Cablegate](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_diplomatic_cables_leak) whistleblower [Chelsea Manning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelsea_Manning), and [National Security Agency](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Security_Agency) (NSA) contractor and whistleblower [Edward Snowden](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden).
|
||
- In 2004, during a protest at the republican national convention, over 1,800 people were arrested. They were held at [Hudson Pier Depot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_depots_of_the_New_York_City_Transit_Authority#Hudson_Pier_Depot) at [Pier 57](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pier_57) on the [Hudson River](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_River_%28Hudson_River%29), a three-story, block-long pier that has been converted into a temporary prison, described as overcrowded, dirty, and contaminated with [oil](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petroleum) and [asbestos](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asbestos). People reported having suffered from smell, bad ventilation, and even chemical burns and rashes. In 2014, the city was forced to pay $ 6.4 million to 430 individual plaintiffs. $6.6 million was paid to settle a class-action lawsuit filed by 1,200 additional people. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Republican_National_Convention_protest_activity),[2](https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/peter-gelderloos-how-nonviolence-protects-the-state)</sup>
|
||
- In 1987, FBI agent [Jack Ryan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Ryan_(FBI_agent)) was arrested for refusing to investigate non-violent activists. He lost his job in September 1987 ten months short of retirement.[[1\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Ryan_%28FBI_agent%29#cite_note-MJ1988-1) He was thus ineligible for a full pension and had to live in a [homeless shelter](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeless_shelter).[[3\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Ryan_%28FBI_agent%29#cite_note-3) In a report by the *LA Times*, he stated his belief that the Bureau could reinstate him to a position which would not conflict with his personal beliefs that U.S. involvement in [Central America](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_America) is "violent, illegal and immoral."[[4\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Ryan_%28FBI_agent%29#cite_note-4)<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Ryan_(FBI_agent))</sup>
|
||
|
||
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- In 1968, the CIA implemented [Operation CHAOS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_CHAOS), a spying program targeting [Students for a Democratic Society(SDS)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Students_for_a_Democratic_Society), the [Black Panthers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Panther_Party), the [Young Lords](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Lords), Women Strike for Peace, and Ramparts Magazine, in an effort to tie vietnam anti-war protests to foreign intervention. CIA agents went undercover as student radicals to spy on and disrupt campus organizations protesting the Vietnam War. In total, Operation CHAOS contained files on 7,200 Americans, and a computer index totaling 300,000 civilians and approximately 1,000 groups, with no foreign interventionism found. The operation was halted after the watergate break-in, and exposed a few years later. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_CHAOS)</sup>
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- Beginning in August, 1956, **COINTELPRO** (a portmanteau derived from [**CO**unter **INTEL**ligence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterintelligence) **PRO**gram) was a series of [covert](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covert_operation), and often illegal, projects conducted by the United States [Federal Bureau of Investigation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Bureau_of_Investigation) (FBI) aimed at surveilling, infiltrating, discrediting and disrupting domestic [political organizations](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_organizations). COINTELPRO resources targeted groups and individuals that the FBI deemed [subversive](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subversive), including anti-[Vietnam War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War) organizers, activists of the [Civil Rights Movement](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Movement) or [Black Power movement](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Power_movement) (e.g., [Martin Luther King, Jr.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Luther_King,_Jr.) and the [Black Panther Party](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Panther_Party)), [feminist](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feminist) organizations, anti-colonial movements (such as [Puerto Rican independence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puerto_Rican_independence) groups like the [Young Lords](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Lords)), and a variety of organizations that were part of the broader [New Left](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Left). [FBI Director](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Director_of_the_Federal_Bureau_of_Investigation) [J. Edgar Hoover](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Edgar_Hoover) ordered FBI agents to "expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, neutralize or otherwise eliminate" the activities of these movements and especially their leaders.
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- In 1953, the CIA begins [Project MKUltra](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MKUltra), a human testing program. Experiments on humans were intended to identify and develop drugs and procedures to be used in interrogations and torture, in order to weaken the individual to force confessions through mind control. MKUltra used numerous methodologies to manipulate people's mental states and alter brain functions, including the surreptitious administration of drugs (especially LSD) and other chemicals, hypnosis, sensory deprivation, isolation, verbal and sexual abuse, as well as other forms of psychological torture. The scope was broad, with research undertaken at 80 institutions, including 44 colleges and universities, as well as hospitals, prisons, and pharmaceutical companies. Many subjects died under testing, or committed suicide. Others such as [Frank Olson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Olson) were murdered for threatening to expose the program. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MKUltra)</sup>
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- Prior to WWII, under the banner of "Fitter Families for the future", many US states practiced [eugenics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenics_in_the_United_States), in the form of [forced sterilizations](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compulsory_sterilization#United_States), [euthanasia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euthanasia_in_the_United_States), and better baby contests. After the eugenics movement was well established in the United States, it spread to Germany. [California eugenicists](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenics_in_California) began producing literature promoting eugenics and sterilization and sending it overseas to German scientists and medical professionals. By 1933, California had subjected more people to forceful sterilization than all other U.S. states combined. The forced sterilization program engineered by the Nazis was partly inspired by California's.[[8\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenics_in_the_United_States#cite_note-murphy-8) The [Rockefeller Foundation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rockefeller_Foundation) helped develop and fund various German eugenics programs,[[78\]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenics_in_the_United_States#cite_note-78) including the one that [Josef Mengele](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josef_Mengele) worked in before he went to [Auschwitz](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auschwitz).<sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenics_in_the_United_States)</sup>
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- The [Alien and Sedition Acts](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alien_and_Sedition_Acts), signed into law in 1798, originally made it harder for an immigrant to become a citizen, but was later used during WWII by [President Franklin Delano Roosevelt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_Franklin_Delano_Roosevelt) to imprison [Japanese](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_people), [German](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_people), and [Italian](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_people) aliens during [World War II](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II), with continued use after the war by Truman to imprison and deport people. <sup>[1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alien_and_Sedition_Acts)</sup>
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### Sources / Starting points
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- [ ] Skim through [peoples history of the US](http://www.historyisaweapon.com/zinnapeopleshistory.html)
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- [ ] Skim through untold history of the united states
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- [x] Wikipedia sources on FBI, CIA, COINTELPRO, MKULTRA, war crimes
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- [x] Wikipedia on war on terror
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- [ ] Capitalism death count, US death count
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- [x] Noam chomsky on presidents video
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- [ ] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Wars_involving_the_United_States
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- [x] http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/CIAtimeline.html
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- [x] http://www.salon.com/2014/03/08/35_countries_the_u_s_has_backed_international_crime_partner/
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- [x] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5rVD_TXrjo
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- [x] http://xpatnation.com/the-cia-operations-that-undermined-latin-american-democracy/
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- [x] http://endgenocide.org/learn/past-genocides/native-americans/
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- [x] http://www.globalresearch.ca/us-has-killed-more-than-20-million-people-in-37-victim-nations-since-world-war-ii/5492051
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- [ ] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Wars_involving_the_United_States
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### Backlog
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- Panama papers
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