On September 4, 1961, President John F. Kennedy signed the Foreign Assistance Act into law “which reorganized the U.S. foreign assistance programs including separating military and non-military aid. …The Act mandated the creation of an agency to administer economic assistance programs” On November 3, 1961, by Executive Order, President JFK established the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) [1]
USAID’s history dates back to post WWI. It stems from the Truman’s 1948 Economic Cooperation Act, known as the Marshall Plan named after Secretary of State Marshall who in 1947 voiced U.S. interest in rebuilding European economies after World War II, and then Truman’s 1949 Act for International Development (Point IV) Program, as well as the 1961 establishment of the JFK inspired US volunteer Peace Corps. [5]
USAID is “an independent federal government agency that receives overall foreign policy guidance from the Secretary of State.” It’s “primary emphasis was on long-range economic and social development assistance efforts…Freed from political and military functions that plagued its predecessor organizations, USAID was able to offer direct support to the developing nations of the world.”
President Lyndon Johnson administration, who backed population control, earmarked funds from USAID to be dovoted to population control (health) programs to be implemented abroad. An Office of Population was set up within USAID in 1965 and first headed by Reimert Ravenholt who as somone who thought of “pregnacy as a diseases” helped create “a global empire of interlocking population control organizations operating with billion-dollar budgets to suppress the existence of people considered undesirable by the U.S. Department of State”. [3, 4]
From 1968-1972 Ravenholt’s population control funding had grown from $36 to $120 million per year, taking funds away from disease prevention and other health care initiatives, so that the “U.S. non-military foreign aid program was transformed from a mission of mercy to an agency for human elimination.”