Meanwhile, the addicted in America populate homeless shelters and jails.
AlterNet
Perhaps the reason why the CIA’s well-documented role in the global drug trade is never really acknowledged is because it never really ended.
Other Western countries like Great Britain are quite honest about their history of drug trading, but we still engage in self-censorship, even amongst the Left, when it comes to acknowledging that similar activities have been carried out by the CIA in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War and Latin America during the Iran-Contra Affair. Perhaps the reason why the CIA’s well-documented role in the global drug trade is never really acknowledged is because it never really ended.
Remember this story? The video to your right is an update into the specifics:
A Gulfstream II jet that crash landed in Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula in late September bearing a load of nearly four tons of cocaine. This particular Gulfstream II (tail number N987SA), was used between 2003 and 2005 by the CIA for at least three trips between the U.S. east coast and Guantanamo Bay — home to the infamous “terrorist†prison camp — according to a number of press reports.
Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Gary Webb uncovered that the CIA was responsible for distributing cocaine into poor Los Angeles neighborhoods. Shortly after Webb exposed the CIA, he was killed (the official story is that he committed suicide by shooting himself twice in the head).
War is profitable, and the so-called “War on Drugs†is no different. Government agencies make money in every part of the process: from sale, to seizure, to incarceration. America has 25% of the world’s incarcerated population, and a higher percentage of its black population in prison than South Africa did at the height of apartheid.
Sometimes there is a price to pay for telling the truth.
PrisonPlanet.com
Credible sources who were close to Gary Webb have stated that he was receiving death threats, being regularly followed, and that he was concerned about strange individuals who were seen on multiple occasions breaking into and leaving his house before his apparent 'suicide' on Friday morning.
Webb, a Pullitzer prize winning journalist, exposed CIA drug trafficking operations in a series of books and reports for the San Jose Mercury News. He was found dead on Friday morning in what the police said was an apparent suicide.
[..]Original Associated Press reports stated that Webb had died of gunshot wounds (plural) to the face. This was later changed to 'single gunshot wound' when people began to question how or why a man would shoot himself in the face twice. This represents a concentrated effort to cover up the nature of Webb's death. There have also been reports that the coroner on the scene had originally reported 'multiple gunshot wounds' but later changed his story.
Newspapers also reported the fact that Webb's body was found by removal men without questioning why a man who was about to commit suicide would plan a house move.
The Miami Herald and LA Times continue to attack Webb even after his death in their obituariues published yesterday. Both claimed that his work was discredited despite the fact that Webb was vindicated by congressional investigations.
Former DEA agent Cele Castillo concurs that Webb was murdered and that in such a 'revenge hit' situation it was common in his experience that the murderers would have likely talked to Webb at length about how and why they were about to kill him.
If the Taliban really controlled drug profits, wouldn't they be flying modern aircraft against us?
JWHarrison
Afghanistan’s heroin share dwindled to 6 percent for much of the 1990’s. After the fundamentalist Taliban government was overthrown in 2001, opium production escalated. The production of Afghan opium used to produce heroin reached its highest level ever this year, accounting for 90% of the world’s supply of illicit opium.
With Afghanistan accounting for nearly the entire product in a multibillion dollar trade, it’s obvious that the benefactors are not the Afghans growing the poppies. Afghanistan still remains one of the poorest countries in the world. Though official US sources will claim that Afghan warlords and the Taliban are collecting this revenue, the surge in opium cultivation actually coincides with the US-led military operation which toppled that regime. In 2001, Taliban prohibition had caused the beginning of a worldwide heroin shortage for powerful interests. This fact is compounded when consider that the CIA was previously engaged in drug trafficking out of Afghanistan in the 1980’s as it supported the Mujahideen against the Soviets.
The connection between the CIA and the drug trade is well documented. The agency was accused by various US soldiers in Vietnam of smuggling opium into the United States to fund covert operations defending American corporate interests. It was also reported by Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Gary Webb that the CIA was responsible for distributing cocaine into poor Los Angeles neighborhoods. Shortly after Webb exposed the CIA, he committed “suicide†by shooting himself in the head… twice.
During the Iran-Contra Affair, it was also concluded that members of the US State Department were involved in cocaine trafficking from Latin America. In fact, the Deputy Director of Central Intelligence in the CIA during the Iran-Contra Affair was Robert Gates. Yes, the same Gates who is now Secretary of Defense and heads military matters worldwide, including Afghanistan of course. With drug trafficking constituting the third biggest global commodity after oil and arms trades, do we truly believe that the Taliban is the benefactor, or the powerful business and financial interests sustained by US foreign policy?
No comments:
Post a Comment