The Rising Clamor
The American Press, the Central Intelligence Agency, and the Cold War
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4154954 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Greg Barnhisel (Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2020 |
| Volume | 107 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 538-539 |
| Publication date | 2020-09-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of American History (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0021-8723 • E-ISSN: 1945-2314 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/jahist/jaaa259 |
| OpenAlex | W3089112925 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 3 |
For a secret organization, the Central Intelligence Agency (Cia) has garnered more media coverage than any American governmental institution, apart from the presidency. But as David P. Hadley shows in The Rising Clamor, the press has covered the Cia so much because the agency cultivated and romanced select reporters at major news outlets who would cover stories the way it wanted and would help create a mythology for it. But that strategy worked for only a short period. Frank Wisner, one of the Cia's founding officers, bragged that the agency used the press as a “mighty Wurlitzer” to amplify the messages to targeted populations (p. 3). Hadley focuses not on the Cia's operations but rather on how the American media covered the agency until the mid-1970s; he makes clear that Wisner's confidence in his ability to shape the message would prove misplaced. Press opinion was initially divided about the need for an independent intelligence organization, but the division was not where one might think. On the one hand, centrist papers such as the New York Times and even left-leaning journals such as the New Republic supported the creation of the agency and cheered such early “successes” as the overthrow of Mohammad Mossadegh of Iran in 1953 and the 1954 deposal of Jacobo Árbenz in Guatemala. Conservative voices such as the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune, on the other hand, attacked the Cia as a waste of money, particularly when it failed to predict world events
Agency (philosophy · Economic history · Media studies · Mythology · Political science · Politics · Presidency · Social science · Sociology · Classics · History · Intelligence, Security, War Strategy · Law · Public Administration
| Citations per year | 1.5 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2024 - 2025 (2) |
| Highly cited | No |