> we knew the cold war was coming This takes our agency (no pun intended) out of the equation a little bit, don't you think? To have a cold war was a decision

> we knew the cold war was coming This takes our agency (no pun intended) out of the equation a little bit, don't you think? To have a cold war was a decision we made (we and the Soviets, of course). Whether one agrees with it or not is another thing, but "was coming" ascribes a sort of inevitability to your argument that I don't think is merited. Making assertions by going "the fact of the matter is ____" is a nice flourish but it's lipstick on a pig in this case: your take is just as interpretive as the other poster's. Re: nuance, well, yes and no. There's a lot of nuance to a murder case in most instances, but in the end we have to consult some fairly un-nuanced principles to help us make a decision about it: is homicide wrong or not? Saying "yes, it's wrong" isn't painting a killer as cartoonishly evil or not nuanced enough; it's just saying murder is wrong. The killer may have had reasons and circumstance - nuanced ones, even. But he's still a killer. Same goes with the US government and the CIA, etc.: all the reasons in the world aren't gonna excuse you from accusations of "cartoonish evil" if your track record - your real behavior out there in the world - is one of cartoonish evil. The CIA didn't invent couching sociopathy in virtue or reason, but if you look at their track record you'll see they've gotten pretty good at it. They deserve only abolition and prosecution, but until that day, in my interpretation, they deserve every shred of scorn they get, nuanced or not.