Taking Back Our Stolen History
COINTELPRO
COINTELPRO

COINTELPRO

COINTELPRO (COunter INTELligence PROgrams) was a series of clandestine, illegal FBI projects that infiltrated domestic political organizations to discredit and smear them. This included critics of the Vietnam War, civil rights leaders like Dr. Martin Luther King and a wide variety of activists and journalists. The acts committed against them included psychological warfare, slander using forged documents and false reports in the media, harassment, wrongful imprisonment and, according to some, intimidation and possibly violence and assassination.  The program began in 1956 and was successfully kept secret until 1971, when the Citizens’ Commission to Investigate the FBI burgled an FBI field office in Media, PA, took several dossiers, and exposed the program by passing this material to news agencies. The FBI claims the program ended then, but evidence proves it continues today with sophisticated tactics, including NSA monitoring and the controlled mockingbird media to do the smearing.

What was originally deemed as a justifiable effort to protect the US during the Cold War from Soviet and Communist threats and infiltration, soon devolved into a program for suppressing domestic dissent and spying on American citizens. Approximately 20,000 people were investigated by the FBI based only on their political views and beliefs. Most were never suspected of having committed any crime.

The reasoning behind the program, as detailed in a 1976 Senate report, was that the FBI had “the duty to do whatever is necessary to combat perceived threats to the existing social and political order.” The fact that the “perceived threats” were usually American citizens engaging in constitutionally protected behavior was apparently overlooked. The stated goal of COINTELPRO was to “expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, or otherwise neutralize” any individual or group deemed to be subversive or a threat to the established power structure.

The FBI’s techniques were often extreme, with the agency being complicit in the murder and assassination of political dissidents, or having people sent away to prison for life. Some of the more “moderate” actions that were used were blackmail, spreading false rumors, intimidation and harassment. It has been argued that the US is unique in that it is the only Western industrialized democracy to have engaged in such a wide spread and well organized domestic surveillance program. It finally came to an end in 1971 when it was threatened with public exposure.

In a stunning revelation from the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund (PCJF), it appears that COINTELPRO is alive and well today. Through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, PCJF was able to obtain documents showing how the FBI was treating the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement, from its inception, as a potential criminal and domestic terrorist threat. This despite the FBI’s own acknowledgement that the OWS organizers themselves planned on engaging in peaceful and popular protest and did not “condone the use of violence.”

The documents, while heavily redacted, give a clear picture of how the FBI was using its offices and agents across the country as early as August 2011 to engage in a massive surveillance scheme against OWS. This was almost a month before any actual protests took place or encampments were set up (the most famous being the one in New York City’s Zuccotti Park).

The FBI’s documents show a government agency at its most paranoid. It considered all planned protests, and the individuals involved, as potential threats. Most disturbing of all, there was talk (p. 61) of the government being ready to “engage in sniper attacks against protesters in Houston, Texas, if deemed necessary” and perhaps needing to formulate a plan “to kill the leadership [of the protest groups] via suppressed sniper rifles.” (Infowars)

Related History

A Document Originating from Halliburton subsidiary KBR Provides Details on a Push to Outfit FEMA and U.S. Army Camps around the United States.

A Document Originating from Halliburton subsidiary KBR Provides Details on a Push to Outfit FEMA and U.S. Army Camps around the United States.

Infowars.com received a document originating from Halliburton subsidiary KBR that provides details on a push to outfit FEMA and U.S. Army camps around the United States. Entitled “Project Overview and Anticipated Project Requirements,” the document describes services KBR is looking to farm out to subcontractors. The document was passed on to us by a state government employee who wishes to remain anonymous for obvious reasons. Services ...
Wikileaks: INDECT to Build Automatic Dossiers on Individuals and Organizations from Web, Mobile, & Social Networking Data

Wikileaks: INDECT to Build Automatic Dossiers on Individuals and Organizations from Web, Mobile, & Social Networking Data

Wikileaks published a document by the INDECT , the Intelligence Information System Supporting Observation, Searching and Detection for Security of Citizens in Urban Environments of Europe. According to Wikileaks, INDECT's "Work package 4" is designed "to comb web blogs, chat sites, news reports, and social-networking sites in order to build up automatic dossiers on individuals, organizations and their relationships." Mind Your Tweets: The CIA Social Networking ...
According to Memphis Jury Verdict, Martin Luther King, Jr. was Assassinated by Government Conspiracy, Not by James Earl Ray

According to Memphis Jury Verdict, Martin Luther King, Jr. was Assassinated by Government Conspiracy, Not by James Earl Ray

The King family launched a civil suit to expose the facts surrounding the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., and they discovered that government agents, not James Earl Ray, were responsible for King’s death. - “According to a Memphis jury’s verdict, in the wrongful death lawsuit of the King family versus Lloyd Jowers [a Memphis restaurant owner] ‘and other unknown co-conspirators,’ Dr. Martin Luther King Jr ...
Rapper 2pac Killed: Was it by the FBI?

Rapper 2pac Killed: Was it by the FBI?

Hear my presentation at the very first Hip Hop Summit before Hip Hop got sold out and taken over: If you think COINTELPRO is over, think again. It's on steroids now!! Here's John Potash on the assassination of Tupac Shakur. I had already found evidence of his surveillance, Potash found more! All to keep Hip Hop artists from becoming political and to degenerate into what we ...
The 'Church Committee' is Formed by the Senate to Investigate Corruption and Criminal Activity by the Intelligence Community

The ‘Church Committee’ is Formed by the Senate to Investigate Corruption and Criminal Activity by the Intelligence Community

The Church Committee was formed following one of the most controversial events in American history. Watergate had revived American feelings of distrust in their government. Also, Seymour Hersh, of the New York Times, ran an article on December 22, 1974, concerning alleged intelligence abuses by the CIA and other intelligence agencies; American suspicions grew. In an attempt to respond and alleviate American distrust, the Ford Administration ...
American Indian Movement members Begin a Protest for Injustices Against their Tribe Resulting in the Unlawful Use of Military Force and Framing of Leonard Peltier

American Indian Movement members Begin a Protest for Injustices Against their Tribe Resulting in the Unlawful Use of Military Force and Framing of Leonard Peltier

"Amnesty International considers Leonard Peltier to be a political prisoner whose avenues of redress have long been exhausted.... Amnesty International recognizes that a retrial is no longer a feasible option and believes that Leonard Peltier should be immediately and unconditionally released." - Amnesty International, April 6, 1999 "I have been reading in Leonard Peltier's book, and about an hour ago I spoke with him .... He ...
The Burglary: Eight Ordinary People Break into Pennsylvania FBI Office to Discover Evidence of FBI Spying and Suppression of Activists

The Burglary: Eight Ordinary People Break into Pennsylvania FBI Office to Discover Evidence of FBI Spying and Suppression of Activists

Eight seemingly ordinary people showed extraordinary courage and carried out one of the most powerful acts of non-violent resistance in American history. In a search for evidence of whether the FBI was spying on Americans in order to suppress dissent, they broke into an FBI office in Media, PA, a sleepy old town southwest of Philadelphia that once was a stop on the Underground Railroad, the ...
The Assassination of Fred Hampton: How the FBI and Chicago Police Murdered a Black Panther

The Assassination of Fred Hampton: How the FBI and Chicago Police Murdered a Black Panther

On December 4, 1969, 47 years ago today, a select unit of Chicago police officers executed a predawn raid that left Illinois Black Panther Party (BPP) leaders Fred Hampton and Mark Clark dead and several other young Panthers wounded. The seven survivors of the raid were arrested on fraudulent attempted murder charges. The officers who committed the execution were specially assigned to Cook County State’s Attorney ...
Operation CHAOS Begins: A CIA Program to Spy on Peace Activists & Civil Rights Groups

Operation CHAOS Begins: A CIA Program to Spy on Peace Activists & Civil Rights Groups

In August 1967, the CIA created the Special Operations Groups within the Counter-lntelligence Division. Richard Ober, chosen to head the new project known as Operation CHAOS, was uniquely suited to the job. In early 1967, Ramparts magazine had exposed CIA secret funding of the National Student Association, causing acute embarrassment to the agency. In response, Ober was assigned to investigate members of the staff of the ...
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is Founded... as a Covert Zionist Military Intelligence Spy Front?

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is Founded… as a Covert Zionist Military Intelligence Spy Front?

With the race riots of Springfield, IL (President Lincoln's hometown) as a catalyst, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was founded six months later. The public generally believes that the NAACP was founded by people like W.E.B. DuBois (who would later become a leader of the Communist Party), but the truth is that the organization had a heavy Jewish influence from its inception, founded by ...