1Operation Ajax
In 1953 CIA launched Operation Ajax which was a plot to overthrow Iran's democratically elected government. As part of the mission, CIA agents bombed the house of a prominent Muslim while posing as pro-government supporters. Iran’s democratically elected leader was successfully overthrown and about 200-300 people were killed.
2. Winston Churchill had a plan called "Operation Unthinkable" to invade the Soviet Union in a surprise attack immediately after the end of World War 2. His plan was finally shot down when it was learned that the Soviet troops remaining outnumbered allied troops 3:1.
3. In 2003, the U.S. military planned to attach caged chickens to the top of their Hum-Vees as they entered Iraq, to act as an early warning system to any dangerous chemicals or nerve agents. The operation was dubbed Operation Kuwaiti Field Chicken (KFC).
4. Operation INFEKTION was a disinformation campaign run by the KGB in the 1980s to spread information that the United States invented HIV/AIDS as part of a biological weapons research project at Fort Detrick, Maryland.
5. Operation Cherry Blossoms at Night was a 1945 plan developed by Japanese army medical officer Shirō Ishii to wage biological warfare upon civilian population centers in Southern California in the United States during the final months of World War 2, using plague fleas from unit 731.
Latest FactRepublic Video:
15 Most Controversial & Costly Blunders in History
6Operation Northwoods
In 1962 the US Government proposed Operation Northwoods, a plan to commit acts of 'false flag' terrorism on American soil, for which Cuba would be blamed, in an effort to gain public support for a US invasion of Cuba. The plan was rejected by the Kennedy Administration.
7. British intelligence once executed "Operation Cupcake" to hack an online al-Qaeda magazine, replacing bomb-making instructions with a recipe for cupcakes.
8. Operation Christmas Drop is an air force training exercise where the US Air Force drops presents and supplies in Micronesia. This is the longest running humanitarian airlift in the world. Supplies and presents have been dropped every Christmas since 1952.
9. Operation Wetback was a 1954 operation by the United States Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) to remove illegal immigrants, mostly Mexican nationals from the southwestern United States.
10. At the start of Operation Good Hope, US forces were supposed to land on the beaches of Mogadishu, Somalia under the cover of darkness. Instead, they were met by CNN who was covering the landing live on television.
11Operation Cornflakes
Operation Cornflakes was a US operation during World War 2 which involved tricking the German postal service into distributing anti-Nazi propaganda by dropping false letters next to bombed mail trains. When recovering the mail, the postal service would confuse the false mail for the real thing.
12. Operation London Bridge has been a codename which refers to the plan for what would happen in the days after the death of Queen Elizabeth II. This plan has been extensively prepared by most British government and media organizations since the 1960s.
13. During Operation Cottage over 300 allied casualties were reported during the invasion of an undefended island named Kiska. Some of these were due to friendly fire, as Canadian and U.S. troops mistook each other from the absent Japanese garrison.
14. As part of Operation Meetinghouse, the firebombing of Tokyo was the single deadliest air raid of World War 2, which was greater than Dresden, Hamburg, Hiroshima, or Nagasaki as single events. The bombing resulted in over 100,000 deaths.
15. After the fall of France in 1940 Churchill launched Operation Catapult, in which he ordered the Royal Navy to seize or destroy the French Navy to prevent Hitler from using it. In one British attack, 1,297 French sailors were killed. This proved to the United States that Britain would resist Nazi Germany whatever the cost.
16Operation Claymore
During Operation Claymore in World War 2, a British soldier sent a telegram to Adolf Hitler, which read “Herr Hitler. Reference your last speech, I thought you said that whenever British troops land on the continent of Europe, German soldiers will face them. Well, where are they?”
17. Operation Paul Bunyan included 60 US troops, 64 South Korean Special Forces troops, 7 attack helicopters, an array of attack jets, nuclear ready B-52 bombers, and 12,00 troops on standby to finish cutting down a tree after North Korean soldiers killed 2 US soldiers who were cutting a tree.
18. During Cold War, CIA launched Operation Kitty in which cats were surgically implanted with bugging devices to eavesdrop on Soviet conversations after all who would suspect a cat of wearing a wire. The 1st mission failed after the cat was run over and the $15 million operation was dropped.
19. The CIA in Vietnam, in a program called "Operation Phoenix," secretly, without trial, executed at least 20,000 civilians in South Vietnam who were suspected of being members of the Communist underground.
20. As part of Operation Flex, which took place in California, an FBI informant named Craig Monteilh pretended to be a radical Muslim. The members of the mosque quickly got a restraining order on him and reported him to the FBI.
21Operation Flagship
Operation Flagship was a sting operation that sent out free Redskins tickets to wanted fugitives. The operation was success, which resulted in more than 100 arrests with Marshalls wearing Redskins and Chicken costumes.
22. The Nazis during World War 2 formed a plan called 'Operation Bernhard' in which they planned to crash England’s economy by counterfeiting 132 million Great Britain Pound and dropping it over England by planes. This would equivalent to £8.3 billion today.
23. Operation Tracer was a top-secret WW2 mission in which a British team consisting of 6 men were to be sealed in a cave inside the Rock of Gibraltar, incase Nazi's captured Gibraltar. They were to monitor enemy movements after the Rock’s capture. They would have supplies with them for several years as there was no way out and anyone who died within the chamber would have to be embalmed and cemented into the floor. After decades of rumors and searching, the cave was rediscovered in 1997.
24. Operation Berkshire is the name of a secret program started in the 1970s by seven of the world’s largest tobacco companies which was aimed at promoting “controversy” over the link between smoking and disease.
25. Operation Pastorius was a German World War 2 mission of sabotage inside the United States. It failed primarily due to defections but was in danger of being compromised right from the start as one of the agents, when drunk, announced to patrons at a bar in Paris that he was a secret agent.