[27] Some examples of political action programs were the prevention of the Italian Communist Party (PCI) from winning elections between 1948 and the late 1960s; overthrowing the governments of Iran in 1953 and Guatemala in 1954; arming rebels in Indonesia in 1957; and providing funds and support to the trade union federation Solidarity following the imposition of martial law in Poland after 1981.

This order defined covert action as "special activities," both political and military, that the U.S. government would deny, and granted the exclusive authority to conduct such operations to the CIA.

These officers often operate in remote locations behind enemy lines to carry out direct action (including raids and sabotage), counter-intelligence, guerrilla/unconventional warfare, counter-terrorism, and hostage rescue missions, in addition to being able to conduct espionage via HUMINT assets.

Its Secret Intelligence Division was responsible for espionage, while the Jedburgh teams, a U.S.-U.K.-French collaboration, were forerunners of groups that create guerrilla units, such as the U.S. Army Special Forces and the CIA.

OSS also helped arm, train and supply resistance movements, including Mao Zedong's People's Liberation Army in China and the Viet Minh in French Indochina, in areas occupied by the Axis powers.

[67] The original OSS mission in Vietnam under Major Archimedes Patti was to work with Ho Chi Minh in order to prepare his forces to assist the United States and their Allies in fighting the Japanese.

In 1970, for example, communist officials near Da Nang in northern South Vietnam instructed their agents to "kill 400 persons" deemed to be government "tyrant[s]" and to "annihilate" anyone involved with the "pacification" program.

[80] Also, in the 1970s, the U.S. Navy, the National Security Agency (NSA) and SAD[81] conducted Operation Ivy Bells and a series of other missions to place wiretaps on Soviet underwater communications cables.

Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, leader of the Islamic Courts, called for a jihad, or holy war, against Ethiopia and encouraged foreign Muslim fighters to come to Somalia.

The CIA teams provided the Northern Alliance with resources including millions of dollars in cash to buy weapons and pay local fighters and prepared for the arrival of USSOCOM forces.

[116] In September 2009, the CIA planned on "deploying teams of spies, analysts and paramilitary operatives to Afghanistan, part of a broad intelligence 'surge' ordered by President Obama.

[130] According to existing and former intelligence officials, General McChrystal had his own preferred candidate for the Chief of Station (COS) job, a good friend and decorated CIA paramilitary officer.

[142] In January 2013, a CIA drone strike killed Mullah Nazir, a senior Taliban commander in the South Waziristan area of Pakistan believed responsible for carrying out the insurgent effort against the U.S. military in Afghanistan.

[145] The Trump administration doubled down on the covert war in Afghanistan by increasing the number of paramilitary officers from SAD fighting alongside and leading the Afghan CTPT's, supported by Omega Teams from JSOC.

Many existing and former officials believed finding a way for the CIA and its paramilitary forces to continue to work with a new Afghan government was critical to the long-term survival of the deal and the counter-terrorism efforts in the region.

[155] A major target of these operations was Imam Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen with ties to both Nidal Hasan, the convicted Fort Hood attacker, and Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Christmas 2009 attempted bomber of Northwest Airline flight 253.

They had come from a wide variety of Middle Eastern and North African countries, including Yemen, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, Tunisia, Morocco, and Iran.

[188] According to the documentary film Drone, by Tonje Schei, since 2002 the U.S. Air Force 17th Reconnaissance Squadron has been working for the CIA as "customer", carrying out at least some of the armed missions in Pakistan.

1 guy in Pakistan," adds Mahmood Shah, a retired Pakistani Army brigadier and a former chief of the Federally Administered Tribal Area, or FATA, Mehsud's base.

[215] On May 1, 2011, President Barack Obama announced that Osama bin Laden had been killed earlier that day in Abbottabad, Pakistan by "a small team of Americans" acting under his direct orders during a CIA operation under Director Leon Panetta.

[249][250] There was speculation that President Obama issued a covert action finding in March 2011 that authorized the CIA to carry out a clandestine effort to provide arms and support to the Libyan opposition.

Launched after midnight local time, the eight helicopters carrying the teams along with support aircraft crossed hundreds of miles of airspace controlled by Iraq, Turkey and Russia.

These include: Abu Zubaydah,[274] the chief of operations for al-Qaeda; Ramzi bin al-Shibh,[275] the so-called "20th hijacker";[276] Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York City and Washington, D.C.;[277] Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, alleged to be the mastermind of the USS Cole bombing and leader of al Qaeda operations in the Persian Gulf prior to his capture in November 2002;[278] Abu Faraj al-Libi, al Qaeda's "field general" believed to have taken the role of No.

[282] SAC/SOG teams have been dispatched to the country of Georgia, where dozens of al Qaeda fugitives from Afghanistan are believed to have taken refuge with Chechen separatists and thousands of refugees in the Pankisi Gorge.

[149] The SAC/SOG teams have also been active in the Philippines, where 1,200 U.S. military advisers helped to train local soldiers in "counter-terrorist operations" against Abu Sayyaf, a radical Islamist group suspected of ties with al Qaeda.

[284][285] According to many experts, the Obama administration has relied on the CIA and their paramilitary capabilities, even more than they have on U.S. military forces, to maintain the fight against terrorists in the Afghanistan and Pakistan region, as well as places like Yemen, Somalia and North Africa.

[289] SAC officers have operated covertly since 1947 in places such as North Korea, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Lebanon, Iran, Syria, Libya, Iraq, El Salvador, Guatemala, Colombia, Mexico, Nicaragua, Honduras, Chile, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Somalia, Kosovo, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

[citation needed] In the Trump administration, SAC has begun deploying small units of paramilitary officers worldwide to track down terrorists, and they have been given the primary lead for CT operations in Afghanistan.

[290] In 2019, Pulitzer Prize finalist Annie Jacobsen's book, "Surprise, Kill, Vanish: The Secret History of CIA Paramilitary Armies, Operators, and Assassins" was released.

Waugh also led the last combat special reconnaissance parachute insertion into enemy territory occupied by communist North Vietnamese Army (NVA) troops on June 22, 1971.