US/Bombing campaigns since 1945

Countries the US has bombed since 1945 is in fact only the most memorable part of the listings that show violent interference by the United States of America in the affairs of other countries. In practice, US led assassinations, overthrows of legitimate government and interference with elections may be just as damaging, these are also listed here.

This article is intended as an adjunct to two Wikipedia articles, being the Timeline of United States military operations and US Regime-change actions (formerly entitled "Covert US foreign regime change actions"). There is a great deal of bias in many parts of the Wikipedia articles, and the detail overwhelms the picture. There are no useful "summaries" or totals of the interventions and articles confusingly put the earlier interventions (going right back to 1776) at the top of the page. This article aims to be even-handed, clearer and more relevant.

Countries the US has bombed since the end of World War 2

The US is said to have carried out 32 distinct and separate bombing campaigns on 24 different countries between 1945 and 1999. However, the listing below includes later operations as well. In most cases, bombings with aircraft cannot be denied, though in some cases this has been attempted.

Date	Country	Details	Disputed?
2011	Libya	Early US attacks under UNSC 1973 are followed by NATO attacks leading to regime change and death of Ghadaffi.	No
2003 - 2011	Iraq	Regime change against Saddam Hussein, an ally who had gone rogue. By all accounts, US Ambassador in Baghdad, April Glaspie, gave Saddam the green light to invade Kuwait in August 1990. She was totally silent on everything until her retirement in 2002 and has not spoken since.	No
2001 - present	Afghanistan	Regime change under the guise of trying to catch Osama Bin Laden.	No
1999	Yugoslavia - Serbia	Allegedly to stop an ethnic cleansing that had begun or might begin. Targetted television stations and bombed the Chinese Embassy.	No
1998	Afghanistan	Cruise missiles on Osama Bin Ladens compounds.	No
1998	Sudan	Cruise missile attack on an antibiotic factory wrongly alleged to be producing WMD.	No
1998	Iran		????
1995	Bosnia	Serbian forces bombed. Generally accepted as a "good war".	No
1992-94	Somalia	Known to the West chiefly for "Black Hawk Down"	????
1991	Kuwait	See bombing of Iraq, below. Some of the attack took place within Kuwait, leaving quantities of Depleted Uranium, and causing much subsequent concern about cancers.	No
1991	Iraq	Bombing for 40 days and nights devastated the ancient and modern capital city of one of the most advanced nations in the Middle East. 177 million pounds of bombs fell in the most concentrated aerial onslaught in the history of the world. Genuine multi-national effort and seen by most as a "good war".	No
1989-90	Panama	December 1989, a large tenement barrio in Panama City wiped out, 15,000 people left homeless. Casualties disputed.	No
1989	Libya	Attempt to kill Ghaddafi, Tripoli bombed.
1987-88	Iran		????
1981-90	Nicaragua	US taken to the World Court and condemned for terrorism.	Denied by some
1981-92	El Salvadore	Officially, the U.S. military presence in El Salvador was limited to an advisory capacity. About 20 Americans were killed or wounded in helicopter and plane crashes while flying reconnaissance or other missions over combat areas, and considerable evidence surfaced of a U.S. role in the ground fighting as well. The war came to an official end in 1992; 75,000 civilian deaths at a cost of six billion dollars. Meaningful social change still largely thwarted by 1999. A handful of the wealthy still owned the country, the poor remained as ever, and dissidents still suffered from death squads.	Disputed by some
1986	Libya	One of more than 50 attempts to assassinate foreign leaders (no listing in Pilger's "The World War on Democracy").	No
1983-84	Grenada	Was air-power used?
1982-84	Lebanon	Shelled villages from war-ship.
1969-70	Cambodia	More bombs than the whole of WW2.
1961-73	Vietnam	South Vietnam devastated.
1964-73	Laos
1965	Peru		Disputed by some
1965-66	Dominican Republic		????
1964	Guatemala		????
1964	Belgian Congo		Disputed by some
1960	Guatemala		Disputed by some
1959-60	Cuba	40 years of terrorist attacks, bombings, full-scale military invasion, sanctions, embargoes, isolation, assassinations.
1958	Indonesia	Large scale killings	????
1954	Guatemala	A CIA-organized coup overthrew the democratically-elected and progressive government of Jacobo Arbenz, initiating 40 years of death-squads, torture, disappearances, mass executions, and unimaginable cruelty (peaking 1967-69) totaling well over 100,000 victims - one of the most inhuman chapters of the 20th century. Arbenz had nationalized the U.S. firm, United Fruit Company. The Russians had so little interest in the country that it didn't even maintain diplomatic relations.	Disputed by some
1950-53	China		Denied by some
1950-53	Korea	At least 20% and perhaps up to 1/3rd of the population killed in order to prevent re-unification.	No
1945-46	China		Denied by some

Countries where the US has attempted to assassinate a movement leader

The US has made more than 50 attempts to assassinate political party leaders according to William Blum in "Killing Hope: U.S. Military and C.I.A. Interventions since World War II", 2003. Noam Chomsky called this book "Far and away the best book on the topic.". Former CIA officer John Stockwell called the same book "The single most useful summary of CIA history."

All such operations are illegal and almost all such killings are aimed at geo-political objectives. In almost no cases can any clear humanitarian benefit be identified, even if the target is/was indeed tyrranical.

While bombings with aircraft leave evidence in most cases, covert operations may be difficult to prove.

Year	Country	Details	Disputed?
2011	Pakistan	Osama Bin Laden. Killing of a captured man.	Maybe
2003	Iraq	Saddam Hussein and his two sons. Two killings and a semi-judicial execution.	Maybe
2002	Afghanistan	Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Islamic leader and warlord	Maybe
1998, 2001-2	Afghanistan	Osama bin Laden, leading Islamic militant. Cruise missiles followed by a full-scale invasion.	Maybe
1993	Somalia	Mohamed Farah Aideed, prominent clan leader. Failed attempt but he died later.	Maybe
1991	Iraq	Saddam Hussein, leader. Attempt to kill him?	Maybe
1985	Lebanon	Sheikh Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, Shiite leader (80 people killed in the attempt)	Maybe
1984	Nicaragua	The nine comandantes of the Sandinista National Directorate	Maybe
1983	Nicaragua	Miguel d'Escoto, Foreign Minister	Maybe
1983	Moroccan	Gen. Ahmed Dlimi, Army commander	Maybe
1982	Iran	Ayatollah Khomeini, leader	Maybe
1980-1986	Libya	Muammar Qaddafi, leader, several plots and attempts upon his life	Maybe
1976	Jamaica	Michael Manley, Prime Minister	Maybe
1975	Zaire	Mobutu Sese Seko, President	Maybe
1972	Panama	General Manuel Noriega, Chief of Intelligence. Captured alive and been imprisoned ever since.	Maybe
1970s, 1981	Panama	General Omar Torrijos, leader	Maybe
1970	Chile	Gen. Rene Schneider, Commander-in-Chief of Army	Maybe
1970	Chile	Salvador Allende, President	No
1967	Cuba	Che Guevara, revolutionary leader.	Maybe
1965-6	France	Charles de Gaulle, President	Maybe
1965	Dominican Republic	Francisco Caamaño, opposition leader	Maybe
1960s	Cuba	Raúl Castro, high official in government	Maybe
1960s-70s	Cuba	Fidel Castro, President, many attempts on his life including poisoned cigars.	Maybe
1963	South Vietnam	Ngo Dinh Diem, President. Successful attempt to replace one puppet leader with another.	Maybe
1961	Dominican Republic	Gen. Rafael Trujillo, leader	Maybe
1961	Congo (Zaire)	Patrice Lumumba, Prime Minister	Maybe
1961	Haiti	Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier, leader	Maybe
1950s-70s	Costa Rica	José Figueres, President, two attempts on his life	Maybe
1960	Iraq	Brig. Gen. Abdul Karim Kassem, leader	Maybe
1959, 1963, 1969	Cambodia	Norodom Sihanouk, leader	Maybe
1957	Egypt	Gamal Abdul Nasser, President	Maybe
1955	India	Jawaharlal Nehru, Prime Minister	Maybe
1951	Iran	Mohammed Mossadegh, Prime Minister	Maybe
1951	North Korea	Kim Il Sung, Premier	Maybe
1950s (mid)	Philippines	Claro M. Recto, opposition leader	Maybe
1950s, 1962	Indonesia	Sukarno, President	Maybe
1950s	China	Prime minister Chou En-lai, several attempts on his life	Maybe
1950s	Germany	CIA/Neo-Nazi hit list of more than 200 political figures in West Germany to be "put out of the way" in the event of a Soviet invasion	Maybe
1949	Korea	Kim Koo, opposition leader	No

Increasingly, attacks are being made on individuals or leaders of quite small groups designated "terrorists". In 2011/2012 there are killings of nuclear technicians in Iran.

Countries where the US has attempted to overthrow a democratic government

The US has attempted to overthrow more than 50 national governments, most of them being popular/democratic rather than tyrannical.

While bombings with aircraft leave evidence in most cases, covert operations may be difficult to prove.

Year	Country	Details	Disputed?
1973	Chile	1970 attempts to kill Salvador Allende, President and Gen. Rene Schneider, Commander-in-Chief of Army.	Maybe
1964	Brazil	Democratic government overthrown and replaced with a military dictator, and with American support military dictators dominated Brazil until the late 1970s.	Maybe
1953	Iran	In 1951 the Iranian parliament voted to nationalize the Iran's petroleum industry, threatening the profits of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. Declassified CIA documents show that Britain was fearful of Iran's plans to nationalize its oil industry and pressed the U.S. to mount a joint operation to depose the prime minister and install a puppet regime. Elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh and his government were replaced by the Shah (overthrown 26 years later).	No

Countries where the US has attempted to suppress a populist or national movement

The US has has attempted to suppress a populist or national movement in 20 countries. Covert operations may be difficult or impossible to prove.

Countries where the US has seriously interfered in democratic elections

The US has seriously interfered in democratic elections in at least 30 countries. Covert operations may be difficult or impossible to prove.

Reliability of this information

The shortage of material in the MSM means that some of this Wikispooks article has used sources which, while they are better than blogs, are not really subject to the kind of "editorial control" exerted by responsible publishers. In many cases, this comes down to the reliability of individual authors. While some of the authors used here may be opinionated, prone to using flowery language and (inevitably) accused of errors, none of them are known to deliberately distort the facts.

Wikpedia bias

Substantial bias can be seen in many parts of the Wikipedia articles (eg no mention of the successful World Court action by Nicaragua against the US). Partly this is simply concealment of the overall picture in the mass of detail.

However, there are other clues which betray the impossible editing conditions which are tolerated and indeed imposed at the Wikipedia, whereby good editors are driven off by bad editors.