Most people may think conspiracy theories are not true but only rumors. Nobody can blame them for this. Moreover, there have been such disturbing and horrible incidents that it is normal to consider them as just a theory. But, as time passes by, some theories turn out to be actually true thanks to the evidence from whistleblowers, responsible politicians, and investigative journalists. Although most conspiracy theories are still unproven, some of them have been proven with documents and testimonials. Here we have documented ten conspiracy theories that turned out to be true.

1 The Business Plot, aka The White House Coup

In 1933, a group of America’s wealthiest businessmen and powerbrokers including the grandfather of George W. Bush, Prescott Bush, planned to stage a coup against then-president Franklin Roosevelt to change the regime. One year later, a retired Marine Corps Major General, Smedley Butler, revealed the plot. 

The Business Plot, aka The White House Coup, was a political conspiracy in 1933 in the US. The purpose of the alleged conspiracy was to replace the Roosevelt administration with a fascist dictatorship. A coalition of many influential billionaires and power brokers led by Prescott Bush, the grandfather of the former president George W. Bush, planned the coup. The reason behind this attempt was the policies of the Roosevelt administration towards the business world. The owners of some big corporations like General Motors, Goodyear, Chase Bank, and Heinz thought the government would destroy private enterprise. Thus, they wanted to bring a business-friendly regime so that they could preserve their power.

However, the coup plan came to light when Smedley Butler, a retired Marine Corps Major General, alerted the authorities in Washington D.C. of the conspiracy. According to his statement, some mysterious bankers and businessmen approached him and asked him to command an army of veterans who fought in WWI in order to stage a coup and overthrow the democratically-elected president, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Butler was a popular military figure then, and he also had influence over the veterans. That’s why they chose him. A committee investigated the allegations and declared that some Wall Street elites were involved in the conspiracy, but, nobody was charged.(1,2,3)

2 20 July Plot

In 1944, a group of German officers tried to kill Adolf Hitler in order to take the control of the armed forces and Germany in order to finish the war and make peace with Allies and other countries. Although they executed the plan, they couldn’t achieve their goal. 

On 20 July 1944, Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg and some other high-ranking German officers, like Generals Friedrich Olbricht and Henning von Tresckow, attempted to kill Adolf Hitler. They were going to take control of Germany, disarm the SS soldiers, and arrest all Nazi leaders. The goal of the plot was to eliminate Nazis and make peace with Allied Forces as soon as possible. The German officers who were involved in this plot wanted to show the world that not all Germans were like Nazis.

Stauffenberg joined a military conference with Adolf Hitler on 20 July with a bomb in his briefcase. He put the briefcase under the table and left the room after making an excuse. After he left the room, the bomb exploded, but Hitler managed to survive. As a result of the failed assassination attempt and the intended coup, the Gestapo, the secret police of Nazi Germany, arrested about 7,000 people and executed 4,980 of them. (1,2,3)

3 Operation Mockingbird

The CIA tried to manipulate the media in the US. Starting from the 1950s, the CIA implemented an operation with the aim of controlling major news media like Time, NBC, etc., and well-known journalists for propaganda purposes during the Cold War. The documents about the operation were declassified in 2007.

The CIA executed a covert operation in order to manipulate, control, and use the domestic media during the Cold War. The name of the operation was Operation Mockingbird, and it included lots of major media corporations and celebrated journalists. The operation was created by the Office of Policy Coordination, a unit for covert operations, and its first director Frank Wisner, a Wall Street lawyer. According to Deborah Davis who wrote about the operation in 1979, Operation Mockingbird was a response to the International Organization of Journalists which was a communist organization and funded by the Russians. The usual method followed in the operation was to place reports from the CIA-provided intelligence with cooperating reporters. Then, those reports would be promoted by the recipient reporters, and thus, they would be mentioned throughout the media.

Frank Wisner recruited Phillip Graham from the Washington Post to help the CIA run the operation within the industry. Graham also recruited lots of people then. According to Deborah Davis, “By the early 1950s, Wisner ‘owned’ respected members of The New York Times, Newsweek, CBS, and other communications vehicles.” As well as the New York Times and CBS, the CIA had influence over ABC, NBC, Reuters, the Associated Press, United Press International, and many others. Also, the CIA had relationships with many respected journalists such as Joseph Alsop and Ben Bradlee. The operation was revealed in 2007 when the documents about it were made public. (1,2)

4 Big Brother Conspiracy

The US government tracked and spied on people through their electronic devices. This fact came to light when Edward Snowden, a former NSA contractor, leaked the proof in 2013.

The Big Brother conspiracy was a mass surveillance of people by the National Security Agency (NSA) and the US government. A former NSA/CIA contractor, Edward Snowden, made all documents public about the global surveillance. According to those documents, the NSA conducted a global surveillance program named Prism starting from 2007. Within this project, the agency tracked the internet traffic of major internet corporations like Google, Apple, Facebook, Yahoo, Microsoft, etc. Also, the documents showed that the NSA made Verizon hand over all its telephone records on a daily basis.

After going to Hong Kong, Snowden stated that the NSA had conducted 61,000 hacking operations throughout the world. Germany, Brazil, the UK, Mexico, and Colombia were some of those countries. Apart from the US and other countries, the NSA also spied on the embassies of 38 countries like Japan, India, France, and Italy. After leaking the documents, Snowden was accused of treason, but he couldn’t be captured as he had fled the country previously. (1,2)

5 Nayirah False Testimony

Nayirah said that she had witnessed Iraqi soldiers killing Kuwaiti babies after Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait. The purpose of the testimony was to justify the support of the US for Kuwait during the Gulf War in 1990. Two years later, when her last name was revealed, it was understood that she was the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador to the US.

On 10 October 1990, a 15-year-old Kuwaiti girl named Nayirah gave a testimony before the Congressional Human Rights Caucus. At that time, Nayirah only told her first name, and her last name was kept a secret. She stated that she had seen Iraqi soldiers killing babies in a hospital after the invasion of Kuwait. The media gave wide publicity to her statement then. Furthermore, most senators and the president of the time, George H. W. Bush, cited Nayirah’s testimony many times while explaining their reason why they supported Kuwait in the Gulf War.

Two years later, the last name of Nayirah was revealed. It was al-Sabah, and she was the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador to the US, Saud al-Sabah. Although cited numerous times by the president, her testimony had never been verified. Then, it was understood that it was false and arranged by a US public relations firm, Hill & Knowlton. The firm had organized Nayirah’s testimony as part of the public relations campaign of the Citizens for a Free Kuwait Project supported by the Kuwaiti government. (1,2)