Central Intelligence Agency and Its Purpose Essay

Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was founded in1947 out of the Office of Strategic Services, or OSS, and its purpose was to act as a civilian foreign intelligence agency that dealt with threats to American interests abroad. While initially born at the onset of the Cold War era in which espionage and the threat of nuclear war was high, the CIA has developed over the years to be something more than its initial mandate set out. By participating in various black operations geared towards effecting regime change, the CIA quickly became known as a cloak and dagger agency very much in the tradition of the OSS.

The organizational structure of the CIA is situated in five directorates, all of which help to coordinate intelligence: the Directorate of Digital Innovation, of Analysis, of Operations, of Support, and of Science and Technology. The Director of the CIA oversees all of these directorates and reports to the Director of National Intelligence, the President and to Congress. The CIA works closely with military intelligence as well so that the Executive branch can coordinate with the agency devoted to foreign intelligence (that also has a significant amount of experience in off the books operations, such as Operation Mongoose, a covert operation by the CIA to overthrow Castro in Cuba). The exposure of Operation Mongoose and the failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion in particular raised the ire of President Kennedy and Alan Dulles resigned as Director of the CIA after the Cuban Project failed and became an embarrassment of foreign policy for the White House. Throughout its history, the CIA's covert ops have from time to time been a black eye for the Executive Office: the Iran-Contra Affair is another example (Weiner 463).

Nonetheless, the CIA often used the bottomless pockets of the Marshall Plan to finance front operations like Radio Free Europe and to finance opposition parties in foreign elections as well as opposition movements in countries like Iran where the Agency supported the rise of the Shah (Tyler 26).

Today, the CIA faces a number of new challenges, especially in the Digital Age. The Directorate of Science and Technology, for example, is tasked with research and development in the new technology sphere, a task that facilitates the military as well. Prior to the advent of the Digital Age, the CIA helped develop the U-2 spy plane, and today it is involved with cyber…