On This Day — Able Archer 1983 : The Brink of Apocalypse (November 7-11, 1983) [UPDATE : “NATO is a leftover Cold War relic doing more harm than good.”]

Posted on November 7, 2025 by L

“The US intelligence had failed to grasp the true extent of their anxiety.”

Robert Gates
CIA Deputy Director
for Intelligence
during Able Archer 83

November 7 2025 — Able Archer 83 is the codename for a command post exercise carried out in November 1983 by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Coordinated from the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) in Casteau, Belgium, it involved NATO forces throughout Western Europe. This exercise began on November 7, 1983 and ended on November 11, 1983. Today, many historians believe that the world almost came to a nuclear war on that week. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

Continue reading →
Posted in Nuclear False Alarm, Nuke | Tagged , | Leave a comment

On This Day — Robert Gates Becomes 15th CIA Director (November 6 1991) [Test your “Spy Knowledge” with our CIA Directors Quiz!]

Posted on November 6, 2025 by L

“If Iraq and Afghanistan have taught us anything in recent history, it is the unpredictability of war and that these things are easier to get into than to get out of.”

Robert Gates
Former CIA Director

cia-logo-floor
“A people always ends by resembling its shadow.” – Rudyard Kipling

November 6 2025 — Robert Gates was nominated to become the Director of Central Intelligence (head of the CIA) in early 1987. He withdrew his name after it became clear the Senate would reject the nomination due to controversy about his role in the Iran-Contra affair. Gates was nominated again for the position by President George H. W. Bush on May 14, 1991. This time, he was confirmed by the Senate on November 5, and sworn in on November 6 1991. How much do you know about spy agencies? Take this quiz to find out your knowledge of the CIA Directors. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today

Continue reading →
Posted in CIA, CIA Director, QUIZ | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

On This Day — The Iran-Contra Scandal Revealed (November 3, 1986)

Posted on November 4, 2025 by L

“My purpose was… to send a signal that the United States was prepared to replace the animosity between [the U.S. and Iran] with a new relationship… At the same time we undertook this initiative, we made clear that Iran must oppose all forms of international terrorism as a condition of progress in our relationship. The most significant step which Iran could take, we indicated, would be to use its influence in Lebanon to secure the release of all hostages held there.”

US President Ronald Reagan
(November 13 1986)

 

libya_bombing_reagan_meeting_14_march_1986

November 3 2025 — On November 3 1986, the Lebanese magazine Ash-Shiraa exposed the Iran–Contra scandal. Senior administration officials secretly facilitated the sale of arms to Iran, which was the subject of an arms embargo. They hoped, thereby, to fund the Contras in Nicaragua while at the same time negotiating the release of several U.S. hostages. Under the Boland Amendment, further funding of the Contras by the government had been prohibited by Congress. This affair is usually regarded as one of the most important scandals in US modern history. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

Continue reading →
Posted in IranContra | Tagged | Leave a comment

On This Day — KRYPTOS Sculpture Dedication Ceremony at the CIA (November 3 1990) [UPDATE : And Then Came a ‘Gigantic Mistake’… As Always!]

Posted on November 3, 2025 by L

“Maybe you’re mistaken–maybe this first part of the Kryptos code is really not a polyalphabetic Vigenere Tableau after all — maybe it’s a different type of code entirely. Or maybe it is a Vigenere code, but it’s been double or triple encoded — or maybe it was encoded backwards.”

David Stein
CIA analyst
Directorate of Intelligence

 

November 3 2025 — Kryptos, the sculpture by American artist Jim Sanborn on the grounds of the CIA in Langley, Virginia, has revealed a major surprise. Of its four encrypted sections, the first three had long been solved. The final section, one of the world’s most famous unsolved codes, has now been uncovered — thanks to an unexpected “gigantic mistake.” Always expect the unexpected! Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

Continue reading →
Posted in CIA, Cryptography, KRYPTOS | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

From Wikipedia to Grokipedia, From Chomsky to Sarkozy… [Is Wikipedia left-leaning?]

Posted on November 2, 2025 by L

“The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum. That gives people the sense that there’s free thinking going on…”

Noam Chomsky
The Common Good, 1998

November 2, 2025 — On July 26, 2007, I published an article highlighting suspicious edits made to certain Wikipedia entries. The date was not chosen at random. Exactly sixty years earlier, on July 26, 1947, President Harry S. Truman had signed the National Security Act, which established the Central Intelligence Agency. Two decades later, the questions raised by that story remain just as urgent. In an era globally defined by disinformation, this moment marked an early warning. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

Continue reading →
Posted in Disinformation | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

On This Day — US Detonates First Thermonuclear Weapon (November 1, 1952)

Posted on November 1, 2025 by L

“The island of Elugelab is missing.”

Gordon Dean
Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission
summarizing the events to President Eisenhower

Ivy Mike (yield 10.4 mt) — an atmospheric nuclear test conducted by the U.S. at Enewetak Atoll on November 1st 1952 — was the world’s first successful hydrogen bomb.

November 1st 2025 — On November 1st 1952, the United States detonated  the first full-scale thermonuclear device on the island of Elugelab in Enewetak Atoll, in the Pacific Ocean, as part of Operation Ivy. It was the first full test of the Teller–Ulam design, a staged fusion device. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

Continue reading →
Posted in nuclear test, Nuke | Tagged , | Leave a comment

On This Day — Hemingway Wins Nobel Prize (October 28 1954) [Was Hemingway pushed to suicide by the FBI?]

Posted on October 28, 2025 by L

“Hemingway may have said ‘yes’ to the Soviet recruitment pitch, but unless there is some additional trove of material in the NKVD archives that argues otherwise, it is clear Hemingway was never a productive Soviet agent.”

CIA website
Intelligence in Literature and Media

American writer Ernest Hemingway (1899 – 1961) working at a portable table while on a big game hunt in Kenya, September 1952. (Photo by Earl Theisen/Getty Images)

October 28 2025 — On October 28 1954, the Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to Ernest Miller Hemingway “for his mastery of the art of narrative, most recently demonstrated in The Old Man and the Sea, and for the influence that he has exerted on contemporary style.” Hemingway was aware of his long surveillance by J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI, who were suspicious of his links with Cuba, and it has been argued that this surveillance may have pushed him to the brink. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

Continue reading →
Posted in Hemingway | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Revisiting Havana Syndrome: Moscow Death Ray vs. CIA Hoax [UPDATE — Full Circle in Langley: Brennan’s Judgment Day ]

Posted on October 27, 2025 by L

“Agency heads at the time created a politically charged environment that triggered an atypical analytic process around an issue essential to our democracy.”

CIA Director John Ratcliffe
(July 2, 2025)

July 6, 2025 — This week, the CIA concluded a critical internal review casting serious doubts on the integrity of past intelligence narratives—highlighting strong circumstantial evidence that former CIA Director John Brennan played a central role in shaping, and possibly fabricating, key political allegations. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

Continue reading →
Posted in Havana Syndrome, John Brennan, Russiagate, Trump-Russia Investigation | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

CIA Memorial Wall — Stars 82 & 83 : Christopher Glenn Mueller and William “Chief” Carlson (Afghanistan — October 25, 2003)

Posted on October 25, 2025 by L

“The bravery of these two men cannot be overstated. Chris and Chief put the lives of others ahead of their own. That is heroism defined.”

George J. Tenet
Director of Central Intelligence
(May 2004)

October 25 2025 — Mueller and Carlson were paramilitary contractors from Special Activities Division, killed in an ambush in Afghanistan on October 25, 2003. On May 21, 2004, these officers’ stars were dedicated at the CIA memorial ceremony. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

Continue reading →
Posted in CIA Book of Honor, CIA Memorial Wall | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

CIA Memorial Wall — STAR 28 : David Lee Konzelman (Texas – October 24, 1971)

Posted on October 24, 2025 by L

“I heard one day that one of our local operations had gone awry, that a helicopter had been forced to make an emergency landing, hurting someone in the process. It turned out to be much worse than that. Dave had been horribly burned by a white phosphorous grenade. It was a windy day, and the helicopter pilot had apparently requested that a smoke grenade be thrown to show him wind direction as he landed in a small area. A white phosphorous grenade had been used by mistake.”

A friend of Dave Lee Konzelman David

October 24, 2025 — David Lee Konzelman died on October 24, 1971, at Brooke Army Medical Center in Texas from injuries sustained on September 13, 1971. The injuries occurred when a phosphorus grenade exploded in his hand while he was serving in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

Continue reading →
Posted in CIA Book of Honor, CIA Memorial Wall | Tagged , , | Leave a comment