Here's a telling excerpt from a detailed article on the CIA and it's victims:
The numbers don't lie! At the end of a detailed statistical study, the CIA will be found, like a spider in its web, at the bump on a bell curve, at the very nexus of murder, mayhem and heinous acts of terrorism that it has exported across the globe. It is an indictment that will include the deaths of US citizens in America.
CIA atrocities may be categorized:
Secret Wars
Assassinations
Subversions of targeted regimes
Overt terrorism
Support of other terrorist organizations
Exploitation and/or creation of terrorist organizations like 'al Qaeda'.
Drug sales, primarily cocaine and its derivative --crack.
Domestic Assassinations and acts of terrorism
The US government, especially under the GOP regimes of Ronald Reagan, Bush Sr, and now the shrub, have given up the dream of peace. The result is an Orwellian nightmare, a state of perpetual war put into effect by the CIA, the Praetorian Guard to America's privileged elite. The nightmares --domestic and foreign --are of our own making. Worse than "mutually assured destruction", this thug government within a government may very well spell the end of humankind, at least the end of those dreams that make life worth living. It was an avoidable choice forced upon us by incompetent, cowardly and corrupt right wing inspired 'leadership'
Since World War II, the peace achieved with this strategy has been illusory. "Peace" has become an Orwellian term for a series of crimes against humanity. The secret wars waged by the CIA hardly penetrates the American consciousness, numbed as we are by a compromised mainstream media. Largely owned by the likes of Rupert Murdoch and other extreme right wing corporations, media, at the highest levels of ownership and management, are complicit. Many conflicts escape the glare of publicity --by design or by incompetence. Some are low-intensity conflicts designed to slip under the radar.
At the very heart of the CIA modus operandi is the network of proxy governments, by nature, oligarchical, naturally allied with America's privileged classes. The CIA has little trouble convincing this class that its work abroad is 'patriotic'.
By now, the CIA has become expert in waging wars by proxy, encouraging domestic terrorism, subverting elected governments.
CIA operations follow the same recurring script. First, American business interests abroad are threatened by a popular or democratically elected leader. The people support their leader because he intends to conduct land reform, strengthen unions, redistribute wealth, nationalize foreign-owned industry, and regulate business to protect workers, consumers and the environment. So, on behalf of American business, and often with their help, the CIA mobilizes the opposition. First it identifies right-wing groups within the country (usually the military), and offers them a deal: "We'll put you in power if you maintain a favorable business climate for us." The Agency then hires, trains and works with them to overthrow the existing government (usually a democracy). --Steve Kangas, A Timeline of CIA Atrocities
Pakistan is a case in point.
Since 9/11, the Bush administration has been propping up Musharraf's military regime with $3.6 billion in economic aid from the US and a US-sponsored consortium, not to mention $900 million in military aid and the postponement of overdue debt repayments totaling $13.5 billion. But now the administration is debating whether Musharraf has become too dependent on Islamic extremist political parties in Pakistan to further US interests, and whether he should be pressured to permit the return of two exiled former prime ministers, Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif, who have formed an electoral alliance to challenge him in presidential elections scheduled for next year. --Pakistan: Friend or Foe? The US shouldn't prop up President Musharraf's military regime, Selig S. Harrison
The late Benazir Bhutto revealed the truth before she was brutally gunned down in the streets of Karachi: US policy causes world terrorism. She died before she could tell the rest of the story. See also: Terrorism is worse under GOP regimes.
When the United States aligns with dictatorships and totalitarian regimes, it compromises the basic democratic principles of its foundation -- namely, life, liberty and justice for all. Dictatorships such as Musharraf's suppress individual rights and freedoms and empower the most extreme elements of society. Oppressed citizens, unable to represent themselves through other means, often turn to extremism and religious fundamentalism.