There is a lot of controversy about the CIA right now about whether or not they tell anybody outside the agency what they are doing. Obviously some people are in the loop. The question is who.
When FDR set the organization up as the OSS at the start of WWII, he chose William Donovan to head it up. Bill was a WWI war hero, a very smart guy, and highly unorthodox in his general outlook. He built an organization that was very secretive and to a large extent, self supporting, as far as covert ops went. In countries that we needed information about what was going on and where perhaps we wanted to manipulate political outcomes, he found that the best people to work with were the local criminal elements. They were men of action, who already had access to valuable sources of information and used to working in a covert manner. Obviously the profit motive is the correct way to motivate these kinds of people. The CIA, from the very beginning actively engaged in very lucrative criminal activities, all over the World. A lot of smuggling. Drug production. Arms deals. counterfeiting. Whatever worked in the situation they found themselves in.
Since the CIA made a lot of profit and was able to keep these funds off shore, they didn't have to ask for money from anybody for everything they did. There was no accountability. They didn't have to tell anybody.
They also weren't particularly concerned about working for whatever partisan party was currently in power. As time went by they pretty much worked for whatever they thought was best for the national interest.
This is just the way the CIA is. It's never going to change, even if the agency is removed as a part of the American government. It wouldn't destroy the organization, it would go along pretty much as always, as a criminal and political enterprise. I don't think the US government is going to do that. Better a vicious dog protecting your yard than outside your gate. Woof!
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