Operation PBSUCCESS operation
also: Project Success, PB Success, Operation Success, PB's success, overthrown, regime changes in ... Guatemala, PB-6S, PB6S, PBSUCCESS, Project PB, Lansdale's Philippine project, success
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Related entities (most co-mentioned)
CIAintelligence service · 21Guatemalacountry · 20Allen Dullesperson · 14Frank Wisnerperson · 12Tracy Barnesperson · 8Jacobo Árbenzperson · 8United Fruit Companyorganization · 6E. Howard Huntperson · 5United Statescountry · 5Dwight D. Eisenhowerperson · 4Irancountry · 4Albert Haneyperson · 4J.C. Kingperson · 4Richard M. Bissell Jr.person · 4David Atlee Phillipsperson · 3Carlos Castillo Armasperson · 31954 Guatemalan coup d'étatevent · 3Operation 40operation · 3Cubacountry · 2Jacob Esterlinperson · 2Che Guevaraperson · 2Charles Cabellperson · 2Richard Helmsperson · 2Eddie P. Haneyperson · 2
Claims (25)
CIA carried_out_attack
Operation PBSUCCESS book_quoted
“anti-Arbenz sabotage teams. Frank Wisner also approved the final timetable for the attack, plus a fresh psychological warfare plan to help justify the operation. The CIA would configure a phony Soviet bloc arms shipment to Guatemala and con…”
▶ The Colonel’s Corner Safe for Democracy Part 10 @ 25:48
CIA funded
Operation PBSUCCESS book_quoted
“We're on page 112 in Bitter Fruits. We were talking about PB's success when we left off on Monday. And the concert, by the way, was awesome. Okay, so PB's success moves forward, though not without developments portending an outcome differen…”
▶ The Colonel’s Corner Safe for Democracy Part 10 @ 2:49
United Fruit Company funded
Operation PBSUCCESS host_asserted
“They all do. This time, it wasn't Standard Oil. It was United Fruit, who also was a Sullivan and Cromwell Dulles Brothers customer. It too had used Sullivan and Cromwell. United Fruit was the largest landowner in Guatemala. They owned 550,0…”
▶ The Colonel’s Corner safe for Democracy Part 9 @ 42:54
Thomas Corcoran funded
Operation PBSUCCESS host_asserted
“United Fruit didn't want it. They just picked up the phone and called the Dulles brothers. The lawyer, Thomas Corcoran, had been a lobbyist for Civil Air Transport and also for United Fruit. Just as a reminder, Civil Air Transport is a CIA …”
▶ The Colonel’s Corner safe for Democracy Part 9 @ 44:37
Allen Dulles carried_out_attack
Operation PBSUCCESS host_asserted
“A key difference would be that United Fruit, a principal purveyor of the charge that Arbenz constituted a communist threat to the Americas and a participant in early plots, this time wanted nothing to do with the action itself because Arben…”
▶ The Colonel’s Corner safe for Democracy Part 9 @ 45:40
Albert Haney carried_out_attack
Operation PBSUCCESS host_asserted
“He proceeded to Opelika, Florida to begin setting up a forward base codenamed Lincoln. Haney exercised general supervision over the CIA chiefs in the nations surrounding Guatemala so that they could control all of the forces to be used in P…”
▶ The Colonel’s Corner safe for Democracy Part 9 @ 54:26
Dwight D. Eisenhower funded
Operation PBSUCCESS documented
“Wisners recommended that Dulles approve PB6S for execution, and Dulles did exactly that. Eisenhower completed the circle on November 11th, approving the money for the CIA operation. Allen Dulles had the agency senior leadership in his offic…”
▶ The Colonel’s Corner safe for Democracy Part 9 @ 1:03:55
Dwight D. Eisenhower ordered_assassination_of
Operation PBSUCCESS documented
“that the Russians were indeed penetrating Latin America. President Eisenhower initiated Operation Hard Rock Baker, a naval blockade of Guatemala. The blockade was illegal under international law, but no one had standing to oppose it. This b…”
▶ The Colonel’s Corner Safe for Democracy Part 10 @ 36:58
Psychological Strategy Board funded
Operation PBSUCCESS documented
“The Psychological Strategy Board, in its capacity as arbiter of America's secret war, approved the concept on August 12th, 1953. And two weeks later, PSB, the Psychological Board, gathered together to give Guatemala the next highest priorit…”
▶ The Colonel’s Corner safe for Democracy Part 9 @ 35:34
Frank Wisner carried_out_attack
Operation PBSUCCESS host_asserted
“Weird! The first key meeting on Guatemala's project took place in Frank Wisner's office around Labor Day of 1953. Barnes and J.C. King of the Western Hemisphere Division went over all of the existing networks and operations in Central Ameri…”
▶ The Colonel’s Corner safe for Democracy Part 9 @ 41:16
E. Howard Hunt member_of
Operation PBSUCCESS documented
“Less than one year after the Iranian coup, the CIA director and his team had won a second opportunity to boast about their successful coup machine. PB's success would forge deep, lifelong bonds among Dulles and his Guatemala crew, which inc…”
▶ The Colonel's Corner The Devil's Chessboard Part 12 @ 43:10
David Atlee Phillips member_of
Operation PBSUCCESS documented
“Less than one year after the Iranian coup, the CIA director and his team had won a second opportunity to boast about their successful coup machine. PB's success would forge deep, lifelong bonds among Dulles and his Guatemala crew, which inc…”
▶ The Colonel's Corner The Devil's Chessboard Part 12 @ 43:10
David Morales member_of
Operation PBSUCCESS documented
“Less than one year after the Iranian coup, the CIA director and his team had won a second opportunity to boast about their successful coup machine. PB's success would forge deep, lifelong bonds among Dulles and his Guatemala crew, which inc…”
▶ The Colonel's Corner The Devil's Chessboard Part 12 @ 43:10
CIA covered_up
Operation PBSUCCESS book_quoted
“and his senior covert planners into a formal briefing of the operation. Collather's account reveals that the agency lied to the president, telling him that, oh, only one rebel was actually killed. Incredible, the president said, and thus, a…”
▶ The Colonel's Corner The Devil's Chessboard Part 12 @ 59:14
Allen Dulles headed
Operation PBSUCCESS host_asserted
“In this case, the CIA saw no possibility of foreign intervention, yet there were definite advantages to be had in cooperating with United Fruit, which, of course, has already pulled off several coups on their own before the CIA was even set…”
▶ The Colonels Corner President’s Secret Wars chapter 6 @ 32:31
United Fruit Company financed_via
Operation PBSUCCESS documented
“Wisner and Allen Dulles, however, backed Haney and gave him a free hand. In the end, United Fruit itself decided not to go in on Operation Success. If the operation failed, they didn't want to have anything to do with it. And that, by the w…”
▶ The Colonels Corner President’s Secret Wars chapter 6 @ 37:59
Dwight D. Eisenhower covered_up
Operation PBSUCCESS book_quoted
“NCIA camps in Nicaragua, and where? The Panama Canal Zone. You know that army base down there where School of Americas was located that they trained assassins and paramilitary people? Yeah, there. Later, Guatemala police made arrests based …”
▶ The Colonels Corner President’s Secret Wars chapter 6 @ 49:21
United Fruit Company funded
Operation PBSUCCESS host_asserted
“One would have to go back in time to the 17th or 18th century when the Dutch East India Company ruled a far-flung empire with the power to make war, negotiate treaties, hang convicts, and mint their own money to find another corporation tha…”
▶ The Colonel's Corner The Devil's Chessboard Part 12 @ 36:13
Allen Dulles headed
Operation PBSUCCESS documented
“As he signed off, Arbenz declared with certainty that despite his personal downfall, the cause of progress in Guatemala would triumph. The social accomplishments of the past few years, he insisted, could not be undone. History would prove h…”
▶ The Colonel's Corner The Devil's Chessboard Part 12 @ 42:38
Richard M. Bissell Jr. member_of
Operation PBSUCCESS documented
“Less than one year after the Iranian coup, the CIA director and his team had won a second opportunity to boast about their successful coup machine. PB's success would forge deep, lifelong bonds among Dulles and his Guatemala crew, which inc…”
▶ The Colonel's Corner The Devil's Chessboard Part 12 @ 43:10
Tracy Barnes member_of
Operation PBSUCCESS documented
“Less than one year after the Iranian coup, the CIA director and his team had won a second opportunity to boast about their successful coup machine. PB's success would forge deep, lifelong bonds among Dulles and his Guatemala crew, which inc…”
▶ The Colonel's Corner The Devil's Chessboard Part 12 @ 43:10
Operation PBSUCCESS targeted_for_regime_change
Guatemala guest_asserted
“They planned PB's success, which was the name of the operation to overthrow the Guatemalan president. And that was General Eisenhower.…”
▶ 'Operation Gladio is Alive and Well' NATO_s secret terrorist army EXPOSED @ 31:21
National Security Council funded
Operation PBSUCCESS host_asserted
“He met with the Undersecretary of State at the time, which was Walter Bedell Smith. Yes, he was also CIA. And although one account of the Guatemala operation alleges that it was approved by the National Security Council Special Group Review…”
▶ The Colonels Corner President’s Secret Wars chapter 6 @ 31:04
World Anti-Communist League funded
Operation PBSUCCESS host_asserted
“Same guy, same people, just using them in Latin America because they're all part of the World Anti-Communist League, which was used more as a command in order to execute these operations than it ever was just a normal anti-communist NGO. So…”
▶ The Colonels Corner President’s Secret Wars chapter 6 @ 45:55
Dwight D. Eisenhower proposed
Operation PBSUCCESS guest_asserted
“They planned PB's success, which was the name of the operation to overthrow the Guatemalan president. And that was General Eisenhower.…”
▶ 'Operation Gladio is Alive and Well' NATO_s secret terrorist army EXPOSED @ 31:21
Mentions (51)
▶ 31:21
They planned PB's success, which was the name of the operation to overthrow the Guatemalan president. And that was General Eisenhower. Also, one of the very last things he did was issue a findings, which is what it's called when you order t…
▶ 32:01
gleam in John Foster Dulles' eyes at the White House briefing and surmise that something similar was going on elsewhere. Even the code word people seem to allude to Iran when they designated the Guatemala effort was Operation Success. So th…
▶ 32:31
In this case, the CIA saw no possibility of foreign intervention, yet there were definite advantages to be had in cooperating with United Fruit, which, of course, has already pulled off several coups on their own before the CIA was even set…
▶ 36:56
They still had formal control over the stations Haney was supposed to use. King, who was less affectionate, less affectionately known as his nickname, Jesus Christ. Not kidding. Because he was very, like, in charge of everything. He private…
▶ 37:59
Wisner and Allen Dulles, however, backed Haney and gave him a free hand. In the end, United Fruit itself decided not to go in on Operation Success. If the operation failed, they didn't want to have anything to do with it. And that, by the w…
▶ 45:55
Same guy, same people, just using them in Latin America because they're all part of the World Anti-Communist League, which was used more as a command in order to execute these operations than it ever was just a normal anti-communist NGO. So…
▶ 52:02
Diction was like a scandal. And it basically led to the first military action of Operation Success. CIA paramilitary man William Rip Robertson wanted to go to the port city with frogmen and sink the Swedish ship with explosives. Yes, that's…
▶ 54:43
Later, it was decided that no more ships were going to be boarded because that's literally a violation of international law. Not that we care about that kind of stuff, you know, because we're doing assassinations and overthrowing government…
▶ 2:49
We're on page 112 in Bitter Fruits. We were talking about PB's success when we left off on Monday. And the concert, by the way, was awesome. Okay, so PB's success moves forward, though not without developments portending an outcome differen…
▶ 6:42
The troops that were at Apalaca under Al Haney covered several walls of his operation center with a complex flow chart tracking the many distinct parts of PB's success, showing current status and what needed doing before other portions of t…
▶ 10:33
Project PB Success became the first real CIA covert operation for David Atlee Phillips, brought in after a brush with Florida police who had arrested him for trying to spend an alleged bogus check that almost broke his CIA cover and ended h…
▶ 18:45
posed a communist threat. Communication traffic brought another headache. PB6S had resulted in a five-fold increase in proprietary messaging from the U.S. to American missions in Central and South America. Anyone with a competent radio watc…
▶ 19:44
but the CIA at large. Two of the cables had been from CIA headquarters, the rest from Haney. Fortunately for the secret warriors, the leak did not reach the ears of the Guatemalan government. It was hushed up almost immediately. The big att…
▶ 21:44
On March 16th, Frank Wisner met with Richard Helms, Tracy Barnes, and J.C. King and others for a high-level review. Haney warned that delaying D-Day would cause morale problems and weather difficulties. Wisner saw no need to change the ops …
▶ 25:48
anti-Arbenz sabotage teams. Frank Wisner also approved the final timetable for the attack, plus a fresh psychological warfare plan to help justify the operation. The CIA would configure a phony Soviet bloc arms shipment to Guatemala and con…
▶ 28:51
Within days, the CIA was told to report on the impact of the postponement or cancellation of PB's success. Wisner's defense combined elements that would be employed once again when the identical question arose during a CIA operation against…
▶ 30:19
Them saying they don't want to do it because they don't want to stop PB's success. They're going to abandon the people eventually. They're key people. They relocate to the United States. We know that for further use. But they always abandon…
▶ 31:51
would join the rebels. None. At this point, the State Department backed off. So if you want to get your operation approved, just lie at will. A few days later, a full headquarters delegation visited Opelika in triumph. Frank Wisner, Tracy B…
▶ 34:31
Once they were back in Washington, Richard Bissell spoke of a different paper, one that might show how much time had been wasted as a result of the fight with State Department. Blame somebody else. The CIA's big psychological war victory ca…
▶ 36:03
Cabell. Barnes described the status of the various PB success elements. The CIA project seemed to be moving along smoothly. One action by the Arbenz government did play into the preparation for the success. The Guatemalans turned to Czechos…
▶ 43:58
The Dutch government lodged an official protest after a Dutch ship was boarded in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Later, it was decided that no more ships would be boarded without specific State Department authorization. James Haggerty, Eisenhower's…
▶ 44:24
As a matter of fact, we were at war with the British in 1812 for the exact same reason. Project PB's success was already in its final stages. E. Howard Hunt's propaganda featured cartoons, posters, pamphlets, and more than 200 articles base…
▶ 44:53
The military plan had to be changed at the last minute when Salvadorian officials refused to allow the invasion to be mounted from their country. At the beginning of June, Tracy Barnes argued that the paramilitary plan, as originally concei…
▶ 48:18
The CIA operation could have been exposed right there. As it was, an American national, William Bell, was taken into custody. You know, there was not supposed to be any Americans flying any of these airplanes. But the agency managed to get …
▶ 54:10
Arbenz received an ultimatum and resigned before the day was out, taking refuge at the Mexican embassy and asking for political asylum. PB's success had achieved its goal. Despite the success of this unintended strike, that incident had a m…
▶ 55:36
In a 1966 interview with New York Times reporter Richard Bissell conceded that the action went well beyond the established limits of policy. Frank Wisner and Tracy Barnes celebrated. Barnes would be rewarded with stewardship of the station …
▶ 56:34
Iran and Guatemala as models of successful covert operations. The inner stories reveal that both Project Ajax and PB's success was filled with failures. At some point in each case, the CIA came close to canceling their operation. The projec…
▶ 8:17
be operators. They also didn't personally get along very well. You know, that's the best thing you want to do when you're putting a team together, have people that don't get along. Droehler held the title as the WH-4 political action chief,…
▶ 11:32
dissent from the conquistadors, and spoke fluent Spanish. He could trade on war stories from Korea, where Sanchez had started out with the agency in 1951, and he had been a deputy station chief in Guatemala City during Project Success, whic…
▶ 45:40
A key difference would be that United Fruit, a principal purveyor of the charge that Arbenz constituted a communist threat to the Americas and a participant in early plots, this time wanted nothing to do with the action itself because Arben…
▶ 46:11
He kept in close touch with the planning through his personal assistants. Jim Hunt was Dulles' man for field operations. Tom Braden had been working as the international organizations area, which this would encompass. And by the fall, defin…
▶ 46:41
The plan for success embodied a September 11th paper that went to Dulles. Based on the premise that the Guatemalan army was poorly trained, indifferently equipped, and consisted of less than 7,000 troops, would function as an arbiter of the…
▶ 48:16
of major proportions. The Director of Operations estimated the money necessary to be about $3 million. Dulles read the paper, as did the Deputy Director, Air Force General Charles Cabell. On September 15th, he asked Wisner for a brief memor…
▶ 49:14
The T-O-F-T-E. He had returned from Korea to become Barnes' chief of operations. Allen Dulles told the group that the basic plan sounded good and he already had discussed it with several of the people present individually. Colonel Keene off…
▶ 49:49
and what would need to happen. Commenting on CIA station in Central America, action needed to build up networks, the psychological warfare requirements, and the personnel needed to carry it all out. King advised that diplomatic measures cou…
▶ 52:19
had long been in touch with Nicaraguan leaders. General Cabell advised Dulles to double the skimpy $300,000 programmed for unexpected developments or contingencies. Dulles was fine with that too. They just rounded up the cost to a full $3 m…
▶ 55:25
Joseph Codwell King's division had formal control over the stations Haney needed to use. King privately thought Project Success was daffy and didn't want some task force poaching on his turf. Haney's deputy, Jacob Esterlin, proved more amen…
▶ 58:50
So, plausible deniability? Despite United Fruit's preferences, in at least one respect, the agency carried on with its program. That is, there had already been one CIA effort aimed at Guatemala, and that one had involved United Fruit. Under…
▶ 1:00:27
it had changed the name to Success. So Success was just a continuation of the former operation that was being conducted on United Fruit's own area that Arbenz basically wanted to take back from them, and obviously for good reason. By early …
▶ 1:03:24
and the CIA-backed paramilitary force they were training up would be ready. Stage five would be go time. The plan enumerated a sixth stage, but that was to be the initial actions by the CIA-installed successor regime. Reviewing the plans, F…
▶ 1:03:55
Wisners recommended that Dulles approve PB6S for execution, and Dulles did exactly that. Eisenhower completed the circle on November 11th, approving the money for the CIA operation. Allen Dulles had the agency senior leadership in his offic…
▶ 42:38
As he signed off, Arbenz declared with certainty that despite his personal downfall, the cause of progress in Guatemala would triumph. The social accomplishments of the past few years, he insisted, could not be undone. History would prove h…
▶ 43:10
Less than one year after the Iranian coup, the CIA director and his team had won a second opportunity to boast about their successful coup machine. PB's success would forge deep, lifelong bonds among Dulles and his Guatemala crew, which inc…
▶ 43:40
Many of the team members would be reunited for the Bay of Pigs. In later years, some of the Guatemala veterans would again pop into the spotlight under different notorious circumstances. But when they filed into the East Wing Theater for th…
▶ 57:15
that you were talking about. Yeah, I've read it. I also want to read, because one of them came from, part of it came from the NSA archive. And Operation PB Success, okay? This is just a brief little thing, but it proves, it drives home a re…
▶ 59:14
and his senior covert planners into a formal briefing of the operation. Collather's account reveals that the agency lied to the president, telling him that, oh, only one rebel was actually killed. Incredible, the president said, and thus, a…
▶ 59:45
explains and became the model for future CIA activities in Latin America. In Guatemala, last couple sentences, of course, Operation Success had deadly aftermath. After a small insurgency developed in the wake of the coup, the Guatemalan mil…
▶ 1:03:14
There was one other item, and thank you, Bridget, for all that concerning PB success. There was a previous attempt called PB Fortune on Armas. So this was not just all about a Benz. They got Armas sort of under control, and then we went wit…
▶ 43:35
were considered out of bounds for scholarly and journalistic exploration, including the bloody regime changes in Iran and Guatemala and the bloody, the boiling cauldron of injustice at home. The grants, literary prizes, journalism awards, a…
▶ 57:43
His dream of national liberation was backed up with guns. Castro and his equally charismatic comrade, Che Cavera, made it clear from the start that they would not share the fate of Arbenz in Guatemala. They would fight fire with fire. Che w…
▶ 58:14
and went up against United Fruit and the CIA. Shea would let her write, I am not Christ or a philanthropist. He wrote that in a letter to his mother when basically she was asking what the heck he was doing. I fight for the things I believe …