Jesse Helms, former Senator from the North Carolina, who campaigned much of his long career to defund USAID, would be proud … So now we know that USAID wasn’t as great as people thought.
President Donald Trump, billionaire Elon Musk, and those in their inner orbit have dismantled USAID without even formally needing to.
“We spent the weekend feeding USAID into the wood chipper,” tweeted Musk, who heads the Department for Government Efficiency, or DOGE, on Monday.
There was a time, in my youth, when USAID struggled for congressional respect and support. It is as if “the ghost of Senator Jesse Helms, legendary USAID opponent and tobacco supporter, still haunts the halls at USAID.”
Graham Greene’s novel The Quiet American (1955), should now be on the required reading list of any potential Foreign Service Career Officers in order to better understand how development, however good sounding and well-intentioned, can go astray.
The work offers a profound critique of Western interventionism, particularly in the context of development and foreign policy. For students of international development studies, the novel is essential reading because it explores how well-intentioned but misguided foreign involvement can lead to unintended consequences, including conflict, instability, and harm to local populations.
USAID was actually CIA!
USAID (the United States Agency for International Development) was secretly functioning as a branch of the CIA. As today’s title implies, the closure of USAID’s closure is a victory for those who opposed its operations and its use by the deep state for insidious things—all things bad!
As former US Senator Ron Paul summarized so effectively and to the point:
“Behind every US foreign policy disaster you will find the fingerprints of USAID, from Ukraine to Georgia and far beyond USAID is meddling in the internal affairs of foreign countries, something that should infuriate Americans if it was happening to us.’”
Now it will be Permanently Abolished. Brilliant, Ethical, Moral Move, Mr. President!
Only those who don’t know think USAID was great. It will put lots of people out of work in the expat community and in these fake NGOs, and that is a good thing! They can go out and find real jobs and stop being dark agents of the deep state, peddling unproven vaccines, hybrid seeds and destroying once sustainable communities with those so-called modern methods that are unstainable and detrimental to the environment, not to mention the cancer of their new “Rainbow religion” that USAID pushes so hard, to the detriment of children worldwide.
Manana Dumbadze, who is a writer and development specialist, having worked in Afghanistan, and now a member of the Georgian government, with a focus on cultural affairs, and one of two daughters of the famous writer, the Mark Twain of the USSR, Nodar Dumbadze, wrote me this morning:
‘Now they need to appreciate your efforts over the years to expose corruption in USAID.’ Big Congrats Jeffrey, Your fight has borne fruit at last and the truth is coming out. Congratulations!
She is referring to my efforts, dating back more than 20 years, with the help of many others, to uncover massive corruption, malfeasance, fraud and incompetence in how international assistance has been delivered to Georgia so poorly in this region of the world, without doing anything to raise standards of living for ordinary people, it makes you doubt if that was even the intention in the first place.
I was able to get three American NGO directors terminated for corruption and mismanagement in the span of one year, and one BIG project in Afghanistan shut down (USAID and Asian Development Bank funded).
But not all are happy with such news, as one friend commented on an earlier draft:
You are not helping … a good friend of mine is locked out of her job and the good work she does is Africa…nothing is black and white, and you are not helping with [what you perceived] as critical yet fair representation!
For decades, USAID has presented itself as a humanitarian organization dedicated to development and aid. However, recent revelations confirm what many have long suspected—USAID has often served as a front for intelligence operations, funding extremist groups, including bona fide terrorists (the Chechens and ISIS, for example), and fuelling global instability under the guise of international assistance and development, however, according to the expert, Robert Chambers, development is defined as Good Change.
USAID: A Tool for Spy craft and Regime Change
Rather than fostering sustainable development, USAID has played a central role in covert activities, including:
- Backing political revolutions to install pro-U.S. governments.
- Funding terrorist organizations, such as Chechen militants in Georgia and Azerbaijan.
- Undermining local economies through questionable agricultural and medical programs, including unproven vaccines and hybrid seeds that disrupt traditional farming.
Even more concerning are allegations that USAID has helped finance bioweapons research, violating the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention. Recent reports—echoed by figures like Elon Musk—suggest USAID has been tied to controversial pathogen studies and gain-of-function research (EcoHealth Alliance).
The Supposed Shutdown: A Real Reform or Just Rebranding?
With the Trump administration reportedly shutting down USAID, questions arise:
- Is this a genuine effort to end USAID’s corruption, hidden agenda, or simply a PR move?
- Will USAID’s operations be transferred to the State Department or outsourced to private contractors?
One thing is clear: USAID’s global reach has been vast, but its actual impact remains questionable. Countries like Georgia—once dubbed an “NGO heaven”—are overrun with aid organizations, yet tangible progress remains elusive. Now the crowds protesting the democratically elected government are thinning out, and not hard to understand why, with their cash cow slaughtered.
Corruption in Aid: A Systemic Problem
USAID is not alone in its dismal failures. The broader international aid system is plagued by:
- Embezzlement and fraud, with funds funnelled into offshore accounts or mismanaged by local intermediaries.
- Lack of accountability, as donors focus on feel-good metrics rather than real impact.
- Political interference, where aid is more about geopolitics than genuine development.
Even when corruption is exposed, the response is weak—money is quietly recovered, but the system remains unchanged. Meanwhile, those who try to expose wrongdoing risk their careers, as seen when high-ranking USAID officials have threatened not only investigative journalists, but elected members of the US government.
Aid Should Help, Not Harm
Harvard economist Jeffrey Sachs once argued that foreign aid should be carefully designed, limited in duration, and be phased out. Instead, international NGOs now compete with local organizations, creating a dependency cycle that delays economic development, weakens government responsibility, and deepens divisions within societies.
Ironically, while aid agencies claim to promote democracy and stability, their actions often prolong conflict and reinforce political instability. By relieving governments of their basic responsibilities, aid organizations can do more harm than good.
The world doesn’t need more aid—it needs better aid. Until donors demand true transparency and stop funding hidden agendas, the cycle of corruption will continue. If USAID is truly shutting down, it must be replaced with a system that prioritizes real development over covert operations and political control.
Only then can foreign assistance truly serve the people it claims to help. The apparent closure of USAID will result in widespread job losses, particularly among those employed within the aid sector and affiliated NGOs. However, this shift presents an opportunity for individuals to transition into more sustainable and productive roles beyond reliance on foreign-funded programs.
With the “gravy train” of international aid coming to an end, former beneficiaries will need to seek employment in sectors that contribute directly to local economies, fostering greater self-reliance and long-term development.
But naturally, there will be causalities of any downsizing and many of those truly in need will fall through the cracks, if care is not taken by national governments to avert this risk.
Jeffrey K. Silverman is a freelance journalist and international development specialist, BSc, MSc, based for 30 years in Georgia and the former Soviet Union.
