Editing Plausible deniability (section)

===Church Committee===
The [[Church Committee]] of the [[U.S. Senate]] conducted an investigation of the intelligence agencies in 1974–1975. In the course of the investigation, it was revealed that the [[CIA]], going back to the [[Kennedy administration]], had plotted the assassination of a number of foreign leaders, including [[Cuba]]'s [[Fidel Castro]], but the president himself, who clearly supported such actions, was not to be directly involved so that he could deny knowledge of it. That was given the term "plausible denial."<ref>{{cite book | author=Zinn, Howard | title=Declarations of Independence: Cross Examining American Ideology | publisher=Perennial | year=1991 | isbn=0-06-092108-0|page=16}}</ref>

{{Quote|Non-attribution to the United States for covert operations was the original and principal purpose of the so-called doctrine of "plausible denial." Evidence before the Committee clearly demonstrates that this concept, designed to protect the United States and its operatives from the consequences of disclosures, has been expanded to mask decisions of the president and his senior staff members.|Church Committee<ref>[[Church Committee]] Reports United States Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities, Senate, Nov. 20, 1975, II. Section B Covert Action as a Vehicle for Foreign Policy Implementation. p.  11</ref>}}

Plausible denial involves the creation of power structures and chains of command loose and informal enough to be denied if necessary. The idea was that the CIA and later other bodies could be given controversial instructions by powerful figures, including the [[President of the United States|president]] himself, but that the existence and true source of those instructions could be denied if necessary if, for example, an operation went disastrously wrong and it was necessary for the administration to disclaim responsibility.