Trying to discern the true nature of the CIA and its secret operations is like going down the rabbit-hole. It's like Alice in Wonderland. Like sitting down at table with the evil Queen of Hearts -- the Mad Hatter, the Jack of Diamonds, the Cheshire Cat -- and the rest of her crazy court. Patriotically, we Americans want to think of this fraternity of spies as our White Knights -- champions for freedom, justice and the American way. But it's hard to square the country's ideals with agency's past and present practices. This is an organization that has been in bed (quite comfortably) with some of the modern era's worst dictators, rogues and tyrants. Always for a good cause of course. The same bunch who tried to kill Fidel Castro with an exploding cigar -- who delivered us the Bay of Pigs fiasco, who were caught totally off guard when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, who had no clue about the genocide in Bosnia/Herzegovina, and who -- following 9/11 -- water-boarded, tortured and killed Guantanamo prisoners (read the latest Congressional report) to extract under duress false confessions and other useless data that provided no reliable or actionable intelligence information, at least according to the committee that conducted the investigation. I hate to be the one to tell you -- but these aren't the good guys folks. No one in the upper echelon at Langly wears a white hat.
So, should we ask ourselves -- what is the CIA doing today in Syria and Iraq? Do we really want to know. The most troubled spot on the globe today -- at least in terms of the United State's national security interests -- is the Middle East, and most specifically Syria and Iraq. After the so-called "Liberation" -- we all remember George Bush's famous declaration of "Mission Accomplished" -- and Saddam's fall from power, the ill-advised dissolution of Iraq's civil society under Paul Bremer (Bush's "man-on-the-ground") and the Coalition Provisional Authority, and the later failure of the Malaki government to create a stable and unified Iraq. The disaffected Sunnis in Western Iraq have now joined with the ISIS insurgency in Syria, pitting ISIS (the Sunnis) against the Shias and Tehran in Southeastern Iraq in what constitutes a major civil war with the control of Iraqi oil being the prize. So where do you think the CIA is in all this?
Well, all we can do is speculate. Iran, however, is the major political power in the region, and the second largest oil producing state behind Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Emirates (Qatar, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates). Shia Iran is not going to let the Sunni based ISIS insurgency take over Iraq, particularly Baghdad and Southeastern Iraq where most of the oil is located. That's why right now Iran's Revolutionary Guard makes up most of the command structure of the Iraqi army fighting ISIS in the North around the cities of Mosul and Tikrit. Here's the irony, and here's where it all gets a little strange -- like going down the rabbit-hole.
Right now Iran -- who the Republicans call our "mortal" enemy -- is fighting our enemy ISIS. This helps us in our fight against ISIS. The Saudis who are Sunnis, and supposedly our strongest ally in the region, are helping ISIS (with money) in its battle against the Assad government in Syria (Assad is an Alawite, a minority Shia sect). Qatar, Kuwait and the United Emirates are also on board with the Saudis. So our ally Saudi Arabia and its Arab partners are helping our enemy ISIS, while our enemy Iran is fighting our enemy ISIS. Do you think the Queen could figure this all out? Makes it kind of hard to decide what uniform to put on doesn't it?
The oil sheikdoms (Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait and the United Emirates) all have substantial oil revenues, but where is ISIS getting the kind of real money it requires to buy arms and support the troops it needs to wage its insurgency in Syria and Iraq (wars are expensive -- just ask Napoleon)? Some of it no doubt comes from Saudi Arabia and the other oil sheikdoms (fellow Sunnis), but most of it comes from the sale of illegal drugs. Now, remember back to Manuel Noriega -- the President of Panama -- and his ties to the CIA. In the 1980's Noriega was a CIA operative in Central America and one of the biggest drug dealers in the Western Hemisphere. He was our go-to-guy in Latin America; that is, until the Reagan administration tried to get him to provide a protective sanctuary and staging area in Panama for the Contra rebels who were almost right next door fighting the Sandinistas in Nicaragua. Understandably, he declined to harbor a revolutionary army within the borders of his own country. This incurred the wrath of -- and put him seriously on the outs with -- the Reagan administration who was trying, with the help of the rebel Contras, to depose the popularly elected Sandinista government in El Salvador. The next administration of George H. W. (Poppy) Bush invaded Panama to arrest and unseat Noriega as a notorious drug dealer even though he was (and had been all along) on the payroll of the CIA. Life is a bitch! Sometimes even the best friends can fall-out.
So, I just ask the question -- is it possible that the CIA is supporting ISIS by helping it sell drugs to buy the arms and support the manpower that it needs to fight Syria and Iraq? I don't know. It's kind of counter-intuitive, but it's a good question. The arms and equipment purchases could be hidden, disguised first as sales to the Saudis or the other Arab sheikdoms. Remember, The CIA helped the Mujahideen (providing money and arms) fight the Soviets in Afghanistan -- Osama was even on the Company's payroll at the time. But that doesn't make any sense you say -- ISIS is our enemy. Well, Iran is our enemy. The neo-cons in our country's defense/intelligence establishment -- mostly hold-overs from the Bush administration -- have long wanted a regime change in Syria, and war with Iran. This is a good way to accomplish both goals. It could be a completely secret, rogue operation (good material for a novel) -- something totally outside the purview and authority of the current Obama administration. It's entirely possible for the President to have no knowledge of what the CIA might be doing in Syria and Iraq. Wouldn't that make for a juicy Washington scandal? In typical CIA, cloak-and-dagger fashion this might be code named: Operation Wonderland, or some such melodramatic, para-military name. Never underestimate the treachery, the temerity and the capacity for double-dealing -- or the rank stupidity of these guys. While the whole country now believes we're in a full-out war with ISIS (remember those ghastly and horrific beheading videos) fighting terrorism, the CIA might be on the other side of the fence, playing both ends against the middle. Let's all hope the guys (and gals) running this operation are more competent than the Watergate burglars.
I know this sounds fanciful, and some would say outrageous -- but it can not either be wholly dismissed. J.F.K. (when he first came into office) was surprised and ultimately humiliated by what the CIA was planning in Cuba (the Bay of Pigs), and later the agency (due to its poisoned relationship with the President) might have had a hand in his assassination. The Warren Report was most likely a cover-up, and we might never know the truth of what happened that day in Dallas. It's unlikely though that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. He probably had help from the CIA (who hated Kennedy), the Mafia and a clique of powerful oil industry executives who likewise hated Kennedy for his efforts to roll-back the industry's highly lucrative depletion allowance. Oswald himself was probably a CIA operative at the time, and -- while there more than likely was another shot fired from the "grassy-knoll" that actually killed the President -- just the fall-guy, the Company's convenient patsy for the whole operation. This might all sound far-fetched, like some half-baked conspiracy theory; but just remember, this is the rabbit-hole, Wonderland world of the CIA where anything can happen!
The Money Trader