"The first casualty when war comes is the truth." - Sen. Hiram Johnson, 1917
Well, here it is, the completion of this (particular) series. I hope it will be read and enjoyed as much as the last one was.
While the last diary focused on Central and South America during the late Cold War (IMO, the Cold War was over - it was people like Rumsfeld going on about WMDs that continued it,) this diary will focus on the Middle East - namely Afghanistan and Pakistan - two very relevant topics today. I will also tie up some loose ends from Part II, and once again mention Negroponte.
I thought this wouldn't be quite as sensational as the CIA effectively being responsible for the crack epidemic of the 80s, but after writing it, it is. Taking a close look at Afghanistan, Bush/Cheney drug ties, the neocons, and narco-dollars leaves one rather speechless by the time it is over.
As before, I am going to try very hard to give you a diary to be proud of. I apologize for the whining about not being read, and that certainly is no longer an issue.
I hope the lack of readily available relevant information in this ongoing saga won't hurt this diary too much. I will happily update it with anything you have to share for me - and I thank those who have already shared some sources with me.
This is the final part of a 3 part series, and is a continuation of the two prior diaries. If you are going to comment on something not being mentioned, please read the other two diaries first and foremost. I am sure most of you have read the second, as I was honored to have been frontpaged. (It also made a screenshot on CNN - during the "Gannon" Interview by Anderson Cooper - apparently prompting many readers!)
Part I - WWII through the 70s (including Vietnam and the secret war in Laos)
Part II - The Contras and crack/cocaine (the 80s)
This is a huge topic - the complicity of the government in the "War on Drugs" - and while this particular series is over with this diary, I will revisit the topic and write what will likely be several follow-ups, as there is just that much journalistic gold out there. I will mention one diary in the works specifically when we reach the topic. As I got close to finishing this diary, the information just kept coming and coming, and I decided to drop everything new and just finish what I have started. If there is a topic I haven't touched upon, or an angle I didn't investigate, don't worry - I will.
Once again, this is definitely the stuff that conspiracy theories are made of (not like it's even necessary.) I will try to refrain from any outright speculation, but considering this is an ongoing saga, it might be difficult in some instances. Nonetheless, I will not speculate without making it clear I am doing so.
I will leave out the list of resources and plugs one last time, as my ego has gotten a little big and if this winds up on the frontpage it really isn't that appropriate. You can find them all, as well as a list of all my other diaries on this topic (drug prohibition), in Part I
I never expected to get frontpaged, and in Part 2 I never made the point clear that I am a former heroin addict in buprenorphine maintenance, and that I am fully against the "War on Drugs".
Before I get into the down and dirty, I want to make a point I should have made a long time ago.
War on [X] & The Military-Industrial Complex. (and some important background information.)
In September 1989, 3 months before he went after Noriega and 9 months after he was inaugurated, in his first televised speech to the nation, George H.W. Bush held up a baggie of cocaine, claiming that it was bought in front of the White House (later to be discovered this was only because the DEA lured someone there using their undercover ties.) This was his escalation of the "War on Drugs." It would seem to be a rather strong coincidence that the War on Drugs seemed to coincide with the end of the Cold War (and defense spending faced massive cuts) - and it represents a pattern. Notice, now, that we have our War on Terrorism, the War on Drugs is no longer even mentioned by politicians (yet it is continued at full force - at home, at least.)
The Cold War, the War on Drugs, and the War on Terrorism all present the possibility for an endless threat, constant fear, and an ever-escalating military-industrial apparatus. The warning of Eisenhower about the Military-Industrial Complex has come to fruition, likely beyond his wildest dreams. EX-DEA agent (undercover specialist of 25 years) Michael Levine has commented, "with the fade of communism [the Pentagon and CIA] are building a pretext for maintaining their budgets" (March 1991.) Believe it or not, after Iraq invaded Kuwait (August 1990) the rhetoric of the war on drugs suddenly changed, with the Bush (41) Administration declaring victory in the War on Drugs a few months later. Could this possible be some sort of coincidence, a development we don't know about, or had the Bush Administration now found a more convenient vehicle for the military-industrial complex in the "Madman" Saddam Hussein? With current events adding more meaning to this, things look quite a bit suspicious.
The Cold War and the War on Drugs (while ongoing) have both been widely considered to have been a waste of time, money, and most importantly lives. The War on Terrorism seems to be even worse - it is clearly inflaming terrorism, yet we continue with blind ignorance. When will we stop this nonsense and go after root causes instead of symptoms?
It may come as a surprise to some, but perhaps not to most, that we spend more on our military than any other country by astounding numbers. I am not sure of the exact current numbers, but I do believe it's more than the next 10 top military spending countries combined, and is almost as much as the rest of the world's, once again, combined. It has, after a very small decline under Clinton, gone up 41% under George W. Bush, if you include the special Iraq packages. We have become a Military Nation. With Negroponte's nomination as Intelligence Czar (which, sad to say, he is sure to be confirmed to,) this is even more scary. Our military is out of control. Why should the CIA need to do things like sell drugs and arms to support a war? Shouldn't that be the Pentagon's Job (it should be NO ONE's job)? We don't need someone to coordinate intelligence between some 10 different agencies - we need to combine those agencies. But those agencies have become entities that are beyond American political control.
And then we have black America, the part that is chained to poverty in the slums. While cocaine would lose popularity by the end of the 80s, crack would explode. Many a conspiracy theorist has commented that the CIA specifically used crack as a method to keep down Black America. I am not making that charge (it were the gangs, specifically the infamous Bloods and Crips, that made and sold the crack - any CIA involvement was only in raw cocaine - at least as far as the evidence, that I am aware of at least, shows,) but I have made the charge that they were at least indirectly responsible, it would appear, for this development, and ambivalent about it.
And what would they do for the black community? Instead of helping them or ignoring them, as they have done for the white drug users (the majority of drug users,) they would throw them in prison by the boatload. Police would specifically target them. Crack is a drug that has the stiffest penalties for possessing, yet a drug that has not changed in popularity or availability in any significant degree over the years since it exploded during the Contra affair.
What exactly the government did, let happen, etc., in regards to crack and the black community is an unknown, and it will likely remain as such. What isn't an unknown, however, is that the politicians have been completely ambivalent to the plight of the blacks in poverty and prison - two things that are clearly not mutually exclusive. Is it possible, perhaps, that the Democrats are happy with the situation - as by having poor black people you are more assured their vote?...I truly hope no one is that heinous.
To wrap this up, I deeply fear that the "defense" department of our country has grown out of any sort of control, and will take over the country if it hasn't already. Keep in mind that the neo-cons, writers of PNAC, are now the ones in control of this country. And being "soft on defense" is political suicide.
Tying up Loose Ends (The Contras and Central/South America)
"The Latin American drug cartels have stretched their tentacles much
deeper into our lives than most people believe. It's possible they are
calling the shots at all levels of government."
- William Colby, former CIA Director, 1995
There was a myriad of comments in Part II, and I would like to tie up some loose ends as well as address, and incorporate, some of the excellent comments that were made. If I mention your name, and you did not want me to, let me know and I will immediately remove it. Call me paranoid, but I am truly afraid of CIA reprisals. Such a reprisal would be a badge of honor, however.
I want to mention some other figures involved in Iran-Contra, including George H.W. Bush (41). He was certainly a key figure in all of this, and it was quite a mistake to leave him out. He was CIA director from Nov. 1975- Jan. 1977, and while that predates the Contra Scandal, it clearly shows where he was coming from. He then went on to be Vice President to Reagan from 1980-1988, when he then became President himself. He sat as Vice President through the entire debacle, and to claim he knew nothing of it would be to go out on quite a limb indeed. Congressional testimony by George H.W. Bush's NSC advisor Donald Gregg would state that Bush himself met with Noriega in 1976 - which was after he was outed by the DEA as a drug lord. (FYI, Carter (who's hands are far from clean - don't get the wrong idea) stopped the checks to Noriega, and Reagan (Bush VP) resumed them.) NSC memos that the shredder missed revealed that Donald Gregg was aware early on of Contra involvement in the drug trade. Even many conservatives would shockingly all of a sudden urge for drug decriminalization, including Reagan's then-Secretary of State George Schultz, then-UN Ambassador Jeanne Kirkpatrick, economist Milton Friedman, and editor of the National Review William F. Buckley, Jr. Now what would cause them to do such a radical thing?
The first two years of George H.W. Bush's Presidency would see William Bennett, his first Drug Czar, criticized by members of Congress for his indifference to loopholes permitting U.S. companies to export unusual volumes of cocaine processing chemicals to Latin American countries. As he left office, Bush 41 pardoned six members convinced in the Iran-Contra(-Crack) scandal, including Elliott Abrams, and we will now explore some other names involved in Iran-Contra(-Crack.)
Someone I should definitely not have left out was John Poindexter. John Poindexter was convicted of conspiracy, lying to Congress, defrauding the government, and destroying evidence - one of the few to see criminal charges from Iran-Contra - after serving as National Security Advisor under Reagan (and losing his job.) His charges were overturned on appeals, like Oliver North. He, unlike Negroponte, has been personally implicated in the cocaine scandal (a Costa Rican Government Commission accused him personally, for instance.) He was another character from Iran-Contra to be given a position in the Bush Administration - a very scary position. He ran the now defunct, on paper, "Total Information Awareness" program at DARPA (2), an Orwellian Big Brother-esque program. Apparently, he still slips and refers to "TIA" in the present tense.
In fact, Bush (43) seems quite fond of Iran-Contra conspirators, and has nominated John Negroponte (UN Ambassador, nominated Intel Czar), Elliott Abrams (director of the office for democracy, human rights, and international operations for the National Security Council - pleaded guilty two 2 counts of withholding evidence related to Iran-Contra, pardoned by Bush 41,) and Otto Riech (assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs.) Richard Armitage is another obvious one, and was mentioned in Part 2. Finally, we come to Dick Cheney. Cheney was an ardent supporter of Oliver North, and even supported his run in 1994!
War crimes? What war crimes? The war criminals (and drug dealers) of Iran-Contra(-Crack) weren't put in jail - they were promoted! It should be stressed that the whole neocon movement is very closely tied to the Iran-Contra debacle. Why is George W. so complicit in all this? Is it a coincidence; he just likes these guys? Fatherly influences? What?..
History consistently proves these people can't see any farther than the hand in front of their face.
[It's interesting to note, but there are (COMPLETELY unsubstantiated, AFAIK,) allegations that George W. Bush both used and sold cocaine]
I just want to quickly say that while I provided many links to sources for what I said in Part 2, there are plenty more for those who are interested, many given to me in comments. Please read through those comments! They are great, great stuff!
I want to share with you a post by ben masel, as it's just amazing. Posting it here, however, does not mean I am authenticating it.
In the Spring of 1987, I was field organizer for the Grassroots Impeachment Campaign, seeking to remove Reagan, Meese, and Vice President Bush from office for their Obstruction of Justice in the Contra/cocaine operation. We quickly developed a cluster of local organizations in the usual radical hotspots of the midwest.
In those pre-paypal days, fundraising meant working the streets. We soon raised the cost of a fullpage ad in the Sunday New York Times, I drove to all the organizers and picked up cash, arriving in New York with $37,590, just shy of the $39,000 pricetag, with a promise from Bill Kunstler for the balance.
As I walked up to the Overthrow Magazine office, where I was going to typeset the ad, I was grabbed by 1 DEA and 5 New York State cops, searched, arrested for a reputed 1.4 grams of marijuana, and the ad money siezed.
The State guys were a brand new unit. Previously only City cops worked narcotics in New York, but regular reports of corruption led to the State dispatching a crew. I was their 3d arrest.
While holding me, they read off a boilerplate query: "Can you tell us anything about drug trafficking in New York or anywhere else?"
Me: "Yes, but the guys I know about are too big for you to take down."
This of course got them interested. I proceeded with a half hour discourse on the many tendrils of the Contra Coke operation, touching on such locations as Baton Rouge, Homestead Airforce Base, Mena, Costa Rica, Haiti, Langley, the White house basement, and the Office of the Vice President. After 1/2 hour of rapt attention, one of the officers interjected "You're right. They are too big for us to take down. We're going to release you on a citation, your court date is....."
To the credit of the State boys, every dollar showed up on the receipt, unprecedented for a drug bust in New York.
The possession case fell away when the State Crime lab lost the evidence. Contesting the forfeiture took nearly 3 years. First came a ruling that the search had been illegal. The Govt, by then US Attorney Rudi Giuliani, attested that they had independently derived evidence that the money was tainted. When they failed to produce any evidence at trial, we obtained a ruling that Giuliani had acted in bad faith in his earlier statement to the Court. Because of this bad faith ruling, I was the 1st claimant ever in a Federal Civil Forfeiture to be awarded Attorneys Fees as well as return of property.
Gary Webb, the guy who likely made this entire story possible for me to tell today, is dead at the age of 49. He died on Dec. 10th, 2004. The official cause of death is suicide (stipulating otherwise would be that "conspiracy theory" stuff I am avoiding.) He was the one who published all those stories about the CIA funding the Contras with cocaine at the San Jose Mercury News, and then went on to publish a book, (which I, unfortunately, have not yet read,) Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras and the Crack Cocaine Explosion, but only after his career was thoroughly destroyed despite no factual errors in his reporting. The so-called mainstream media wouldn't jump on this story - they would attack it - and it would seem apparent that they, which included the "liberal" New York Times, had as much to hide and protect as the CIA. Gary Webb deserves a salute from all of us, and is exactly the type of person that our media so desperately needs. We will miss you, Gary.
There is one final country I should discuss before moving on, and that is Haiti. The CIA had alliances in Haiti, and in the 1980s into the early 90s, the CIA worked to keep the Haitian leadership in power. But wait - what a suprize - the leadership they were supporting were drug traffickers. In 1986 the CIA would create a new Haitian organization, the National Intelligence Service (SIN). SIN was created on paper to fight the cocaine trade, but SIN officers themselves engaged in the trafficking!
"We had problems in Haiti, where friends of ours -- that is, intelligence sources in the Haitian military -- had turned their facilities, their ranches and their farms over to drug traffickers. Instead of putting pressure on that rotten leadership of the Haitian military, we defended them. We held our noses, we looked the other way, and they and their criminal friends distributed, through a variety of networks, cocaine in the United States -- in Miami, in Philadelphia, New York and parts of Pennsylvania." - (Jack Blum in testimony before Congress)
Alright, time to move on to the heart of Part III. But we are going to take a detour to the Middle East along the heroin trail.
Kosovo - Yet another example.
Unfortunately, this one hits the Dems - namely Clinton and Wesley Clark. But there is no partisanship in truth - what I peddle in. See Part 1 for more on this. Neither Clinton nor Carter have no blood on their hands. In fact, I know of at least one book about Clinton's ties to drug traffic alone - many freepers charge that Clinton was the leader in the world of government drug kingpins. Fortunate for us, but unfortunate for him, much of this is just right-wing noise, and unfortunate for everyone but the Bushes, nothing can compare to the crimes of the Bush Family. While surely Clinton had his fair share, it was nothing in comparison to the Republican Administrations of the period - namely Reagan and Bush (41 & 43). Regardless, corruption must be unacceptable in politics, and we must make it clear that we will not tolerate anything of the sort in our party.
So we come to another known example, Kosovo. There were essentially two wars in Kosovo (here in the US we call them 'police actions'.) The first ('96-99) was the conflict between Albanian separatists and Serbian and Yugoslav security forces. The Albanians characterized it as a struggle for liberation and the Serbs called it terrorism. The second ('99) was the war between Yugoslavia and NATO, in which we and NATO participated in many bombing campaigns mostly against Yugoslav targets (we, clearly, supported the Albanians. Or, better said, we were against the Yugoslavians/Serbs.) Slobodan Milosevic, former President of Yugoslavia, is currently on trial for war crimes - including genocide. Worthy of note is that Wesley Clark was the general in charge of this "war." It wasn't really a war - on our end - more of a bomb dropping campaign - a Clinton favorite. Going into the details of the Kosovo Conflict is beyond the scope of this diary, and I don't know nearly as much about it as I really should. Essentially, you have the usual battle between ethnic groups for a country/autonomy, although the causes of strife run far deeper than simple ethnic division.
Anyway, many Albanians became radicalized, and a group of them would decide that armed resistance was necessary. On April 22, 1996, long before the bombings of NATO began, four simultaneous attacks on Serbian civilians and security personnel were carried out in Kosovo. A new organization, which called itself the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), claimed responsibility. While Milosevic would be demonized to no end, and I am not defending Milosevic, the KLA would be deemed "freedom fighters." It turned out this group was trying to entice Serbian Reprisals and thus NATO involvement. The KLA also had ties to Bin Laden.
Alas, once again, it would seem that the U.S. was secretly supporting not only a criminal drug smuggling group - but terrorists (I define 'terrorist' as anyone who kills civilians for political purposes) - and it just may have helped get all of NATO involved. Very well documented, the links of the KLA to criminal syndicates in Albania, Turkey, and the EU have been known to intelligence agencies and Western Governments since the early 90s. The truth of the matter, as consistent with the pattern, is that the KLA was sustained by organized crime with the stamp of approval by the United States - and it's allies. In fact, the KLA was one of the largest groups of heroin traffickers in the entire region.
Essentially, The West was using it's KLA puppets to rubber stamp an agreement that would have transformed Kosovo into an occupied territory under Western Administration. By supporting the criminal and terrorist KLA, the U.S. and NATO would also appear intent in bypassing the civilian Kosovo Democratic League, who's leader Ibrahim Rugova had called for an end to the bombings and expressed his desire for a peaceful settlement with Yugoslavia.
The KLA was nearly fully funded by drug money, drug money which was earned with full CIA complicity. The CIA even laundered the money, and we will get into that, and the huge BCCI scandal, shortly.
A full investigation here, as in every other case, is an order. Unfortunately the CIA will not let any such investigation take place, and I wouldn't hold your breath on a change of heart or political climate. Take note of what happened here, there will be many parallels in Afghanistan.
Heroin in the 80s and 90s - a change in dynamics
It's important to note that Southeast Asia - Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iran - was the second largest producer of Opium. While there was the infamous "Golden Triangle" described in Part 1, the above three countries were known as the "Golden Crescent." And notice, quite coincidentally, that the latter three are fronts in the current war - the War on Terrorism - whereas the previous three were part of the Cold War. Also, notice now, we have heroin availability growing. When we supported the Heroin Kingpins in Southeast Asia (namely Laos,) heroin exploded. When we supported cocaine smuggling in the Contra scandal, crack exploded. Now we are supporting warlords in Afghanistan, and heroin is back again - especially in Europe, where most of the Afghan bumper-crop will wind up, where a huge epidemic will soon be announced (without a doubt - especially in France which was dry on heroin and still has harsh(er) drug laws.) It is too much to be a coincidence.
Another coincidence was that the heroin explosion in Pakistan and Afghanistan would signal a marked increase in heroin potency - to the heroin we know today that is easily sniffed or smoked - the finest "No. 4" heroin around.
Opium cultivation in Afghanistan is nothing new. It's been going on since the end of India's (British) Monopoly, and Afghanistan was the prime supplier of opium to the #1 consuming nation for a long time - Iran. This opium was not leaving the region. By the mid-90s, however, Afghanistan would grow to become the #1 opium producer in the world. By 2003, it would be cultivating the equivalent of 3/4ths of the world's opium supply, and the opium coming out of Burma/Myanmar and Laos (the Golden Triangle - where we were no longer entangled) would decline to become a second and distant third respectively, and consistently fall over the years. This year, it produced the largest opium crop ever recorded.
Columbia, however, would start heroin production and traffic (to supplement their now booming cocaine production and traffic,) and would eventually establish itself as the #1 heroin producer for the United States, using the networks they set up and the ties to the local gangs that were created by the CIA during the Contra Scandal. Their stranglehold over the narcotics trade, while it would often get into local conflicts such as with Mexico (which supplies the "black tar" low grade heroin prevalent on the West Coast,) would remain to this day. The Sicilian Mob Connection created by the CIA during World War II would largely end, and drug trafficking and dealing would fall out of the hands of the infamous Italian mafia figures and into the hands of Columbian Drug Lords.
"Who can compete with the government?", indeed. (John Gotti, Jr.)
Do I need to remind you again that the government itself is responsible for the arrangement creating the heroin and crack boom of the late 80s and 90s (into today), and the shift of power from the mafia to even more nefarious characters, notably militants?
The situation in Europe, and briefly here at home (until Columbia entered the picture,) would be different as with the resurgence of Mid-East Heroin, which you will soon read about, the French Connection would be re-opened for business for the first time in years.
Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Beyond
We are currently involved in massive military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as elsewhere in the Middle East (with Iran and Syria being possible future targets), as you well know. What exactly is the background to all of this and where is it going? Obviously, I can't write here the entire background and future of the situation, but I can, and will, tell you what is relevant to the so-called "War on Drugs." Well, not everything - you could fill several books with this stuff (and some people have.) Some history is an order, however, and the focus here will be Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The operations in question, in Afghanistan, were some of the final of the Cold War, and they largely paralleled the operations in South America with the Contras. What was going on there was that the Soviets tried to take the country by force, for decades (largely unsuccessfully.) We fought back. It turned into a major Cold War battleground.
As America and allies dispatched cover operatives, secret arms shipments, and military aid to fight this covert war in Afghanistan, opium production soared and heroin poured out of the region. The correspondence between our covert operations and the rising opium and heroin exports was unmistakable. In the beginning, much of that opium from Afghanistan would go to Iran, as the Iranian Revolution put into place a leader - Ayatollah Khomeini - who did not denounce opium as his predecessor did (although he certainly denounced alcohol, which is expressly forbidden by the Koran.) With the bans on things such as entertainment, opium would be a very tempting choice among those in oppressive Islamic regimes, especially the young, and the country would find itself with 2 million addicts - an all-time high. Pakistan, too, would see a huge opium problem, but unlike Iran, it didn't start with one. It would find itself with 1.2 million opium addicts by 1985, from virtually zero in 1979.
Iran itself started to grow more opium domestically, as well - and this would free up the growing amount of Afghan and Pakistani opium for trade to the West (this would not continue forever, however, and today cultivation of opium in Iran is negligible - though use and traffic through the country is high.) Pakistan, also, would start to grow far more opium domestically, and some of it would wind up in the West. In twists in the War on Drugs I won't describe, a practice of Afghan grown opium, processed into heroin in Pakistan, and moving into Europe and the U.S., would become an engrained practice that is still practiced today. This is all centered around the highlands on the Afghan-Pakistan border - a major front in the current war, continuing on into today. A coincidence?
Let's get back to Afghanistan in the Cold War. In 1979, the Soviets would invade. We of course responded - in the form of another covert war. So whom did we choose to support in Afghanistan's battle against the Soviets? One of the first groups we supported were the Mujahedeen rebels, part of what became the "Northern Alliance," who were big time opium cultivators, and they used opium to largely fund their efforts. We covertly supported these guys - very heavily - and essentially created this Afghan-Pakistan heroin pathway. As they gained territory in Afghanistan, they would force cultivation of opium, as a "revolutionary tax." Across the border in Pakistan, there would be hundreds of heroin labs operating under the protection of the Pakistani Government.
Everyone worthy of knowing knew these guys had heavy ties to heroin, and Dr. Musto (White House appointee to the strategy Council on Drug Abuse) would protest to his council "Shouldn't we try to avoid what we had done in Laos? Shouldn't we try to pay the growers if they will eradicate their opium production?", he was responded to with resounding silence. He went on to co-write an op-ed in the NY Times with a similar theme. Heroin from Afghanistan and Pakistan poured into America, and it's use would grow dramatically. The DEA and other anti-drug bureaucracies would grow increasingly concerned, but concede that due to the influence of the military and CIA, they were powerless.
All of this would continue through the 1980s. Once again, the CIA was mounting a major covert war - on par with Laos - in the Asian opium zone. They would use bases adjacent to Afghanistan in Pakistan's North-West Frontier province. This was a tribal area with no rule of law. And now Reagan would enter office and things would escalate greatly. He offered a huge deal to Pakistan for their support, and that they got. The CIA would then, using Pakistan support, put most of their money behind Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, leader of the Hezb-i Islami guerrilla group. It was a terrible decision. It turned out his force was just a creature inside the Pakistan Military. After the CIA built Hezb-i Islami into the largest Afghan guerrilla force, Hekmatyar would prove to be brutal, incompetent, and - of course - corrupt. Hekmatyar would use his guerrilla army - with no objections from the CIA - to become one of Afghanistan's (and thus Pakistan's) leading drug lords. The group has previously had operations in Iran, and is now said to have allied with the post-9/11 Taliban. It is currently estimated that Hezb-I Islami and the Taliban have a comparable army in size. Hekmatyar fled to Iran in 1996, where he continued to lead Hezb-i Islami.
Our support of Pakistan continued, and they our one of our key allies today. Unfortunately, their government (that came into power through a military coup) is one of the most corrupt around. Their intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), is as corrupt as it gets. They were instrumental in our covert war during the 80s, and our hot war after 9/11 - acting as the instrumental go-between. Needless to say, they have full CIA support, as does Pakistan. Alas, they are neck deep in drugs and other illicit trades and activities - including terrorism. They received so much support, and grow so powerful, that they would be deemed "a state within a state." Pakistan's illegal heroin economy (one that didn't exist until we entered the picture) has kept its legitimate State economy sustained since 1990 (it would have otherwise collapsed.) It has also enabled it to maintain it's military, and it's military government, and sustain it's - what is essentially - terrorism. Indeed, it seems quite likely a verifiable fact, that the ISI began using heroin to fund covert operations at the insistence of the CIA. I intended to return to this topic, but for those that are inclined, you need not go any further than the Center for Cooperative Research's Pakistan ISI and/or Drug Connections search in it's complete 9/11 timeline project.
The Soviets grossly underestimated the huge cost of their attempted grab at Afghanistan (and it has even been described as the Soviet Union's Vietnam.) The peak of the fighting was in 1985-1986. The Soviet forces would launch their largest assaults on the Mujahedeen supply lines along the border with Pakistan. At the same time, increased support for the Mujahedeen by the U.S. and Saudi Arabia allowed it to regain it's guerilla war edge. By August 1986, effective ground-to-air missles were used, and would deny the Soviet's puppet regime the effective use of the air. These shifts in the momentum of the war would cause the new Gorbachev government to view futher escalation of the war as a misuse of Soviet political and military capital. By the beginning of 1997, the Soviets would essentially give up on Afghanistan - but not pull out just yet. In February 1989 the Soviets would finally fully withdraw, under the Geneva Accords. Their regime they installed in Kabul, however, did not go peacefully, and a three year civil war ensued. The Mujahedeen would split into factions, and no longer exist as we once knew it.
Many, many developments would happen, and they are ones which do not fall into the scope here. Opium production continued to rise quite steadily. Eventually, around 1992, the Taliban would emerge, and we would support them - and Bin Laden, who was a supporter of the Taliban. In 1996 the Taliban would take Kabul, and in 1998 it would control 90% of the country. During this time opium production would also see a very marked climb even higher, and the Taliban would support it's cultivation.
I want to quote something from Michael C. Ruppert, as it's just too great to paraphrase. He writes some excellent stuff on all of this, by the way.
The governments of the United States and Britain - along with a lap-dog mainstream media all too willing to regurgitate falsehoods - are feeding us a line of demonstrably inaccurate lies about the Taliban and opium. We are being warned of a "new flood" of al-Q'aeda opium as the war expands. As British Prime Minister Tony Blair boasts, "We will bomb their poppy fields," he neglects to mention that there aren't any poppy fields in Taliban controlled areas to bomb. This outrageous deception of the public, in an effort to stir up support for the war effort, is further evidence that most of the rest of the government's line following the attacks of September 11, is simply not credible.
The Taliban turned out to be not exactly what we had hoped - in so many ways. In 2000, the Taliban would do something drastic - they would ban opium cultivation, as per Islamic Law. The ban would be extremely effective, and Afghanistan's Opium Production would plummet to 185 tons in 2001, from 3,300 in 2000. Of course, then came 9/11 and the end (for now) of the Taliban - and the very next harvest would jump back up to 3,400 tons in 2002. John Kerry oftentimes charged during the 2004 campaign that Bush outsourced the job in Afghanistan to warlords. While this is a very often used strategy by America, and it does save American lives (and I am growing sick and tired of American lives counting 50 fold more than any others to be quite honest - although at least in this case it wasn't some secret power-grab - I hope,) it is not without it's repercussions. Right now, in Afghanistan, we have one of, if not the, biggest opium crop in history. And who's supporting it? Those very same warlords (whom are supported even today by the CIA). Does anyone else find it a bit shocking that John Kerry, whom likely supports the "War on Drugs" like every other politician, didn't mention this critical fact even once?
In Iraq, things wouldn't be quite as interesting on the drug front. But there are a few things worthy of mention. For one, Iraq was relatively drug-free under Saddam's rule. You can expect that to change, likely quite drastically, very soon, and there is already evidence of an increase in both consumption and traffic. And then we have this gem: Syrian traffickers are now trafficking through Iraq's poorly guarded borders a niche drug, fenethylline, a synthetic drug more commonly known as Captagon (similar to the amphetamines.) The drug is a favorite among the wealthy party crowd in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states.
Anything for our friends in Saudi Arabia, right?
It's the Economy, Stupid.
Remember that picture of then-NYSE Richard Grasso embracing a FARC commander? It's such a good shot, I will give it to you again.
This visit occurred in June 1999, and the purpose of his trip was to get the drug money from Columbia flowing through the NYSE. FARC wasn't interested, and the war on FARC was intensified via Plan Columbia. FARC was bringing their money back into local development without the assistance of the American banking system. The audacity!
This is all pretty eerie when we start to think, well what about Afghanistan? Did we want their drug money? We are talking multibillions of dollars, here. Things must have been really bad for the NYSE chairman to make a trip to visit "Narco-Terrorists" - a trip that was reported on by the AP among others. The Taliban cut off the flow of Afghanistan drug money from the cartels we supported. I honestly do not know what the situation was in the "Golden Triangle." But if things were grim in the Golden Triangle, taken along with the issues in Columbia, things are going to be very grim for the NYSE.
As is largely reported, the Bush Crime Family wanted to build an oil pipeline through Afghanistan (which is now back on track.) The Taliban gave them trouble in this regard, as well - and now the plan is back on schedule. Could one of the reasons we targeted Afghanistan be the lack of drug money (as opposed to, say, Saudi Arabia - who has consistently kept the money flowing)? Surely, restoring the CIA sponsored drug trade to it's historic highs was an objective that couldn't be simply ignored. Immediately following the invasion in October 2001, the opium markets were restored - to levels nearly 10 times higher than in 2000. One of the most recent developments in this ongoing saga was the U.S. offer to spray opium crops in Afghanistan. Our puppet regime declined.
It should be noted just how vital the operations in Kosovo have been to creating a shorter and more direct flow of drugs from Asia to the West, in reference to the economy, especially when taken it context with the re-emergence of the "Golden Crescent."
For further reading on our drug-based economy, I strongly urge you to read Jerome a Paris' diary, The US - a finance based economy on crack, and Catherine Fitts' series, Narco Dollars for Beginners
If the 1920s plus the 1990s teaches one thing it is this: "It's not the drugs stupid, its the prohibition." If the 2000s teach us nothing else, they will teach us: "It's not the drugs stupid, its the money." -
M. Simon, a Republican Anti-Prohibitionist (who shares my values in this regard, albeit probably only in this regard.)
Bush and Cheney both have notable ties to drug trafficking, as shocking (or not) that may be to some. I am not going to go into depth on this topic, as this diary is extremely large as it is. I will devote an entire diary to the subject - Bush, Cheney, Bin Laden, and Drug Money - coming soon! (But not until after I finish my history diaries, which are up next.) The whole BCCI scandal closely ties into this, as well. What I will give you is a little tease, quotes from an excellent article entitled "The Bush-Cheney Drug Empire" by Michael C. Ruppert, written way back in October of 2000.
A closer look at available research, including an August 2, 2000 report by the Center for Public Integrity (CPI) at www.public-i.org, suggests that drug money has played a role in the successes achieved by Halliburton under Cheney's tenure as CEO from 1995 to 2000. This is especially true for Halliburton's most famous subsidiary, heavy construction and oil giant, Brown and Root. A deeper look into history reveals that Brown and Root's past as well as the past of Dick Cheney himself, connect to the international drug trade on more than one occasion and in more than one way.
This June the lead Washington, D.C. attorney for a major Russian oil company connected in law enforcement reports to heroin smuggling and also a beneficiary of US backed loans to pay for Brown and Root contracts in Russia, held a $2.2 million fund raiser to fill the already bulging coffers of presidential candidate George W. Bush. This is not the first time that Brown and Root has been connected to drugs and the fact is that this "poster child" of American industry may also be a key player in Wall Street's efforts to maintain domination of the half trillion dollar a year global drug trade and its profits. And Dick Cheney, who has also come closer to drugs than most suspect, and who is also Halliburton's largest individual shareholder ($45.5 million), has a vested interest in seeing to it that Brown and Root's successes continue.
(Note: This was likely before the exact nature of Cheney's shareholdings came to light)
And, the dark light of drugs may shine on Iraq yet...
In March of 1991, tens of thousands of Kurdish refugees, long-time assets of the CIA, were being massacred by Saddam Hussein in the wake of the Gulf War. Saddam, seeking to destroy any hopes of a successful Kurdish revolt, found it easy to kill thousands of the unwanted Kurds who had fled to the Turkish border seeking sanctuary. There, Turkish security forces, trained in part by the Vinnell, Brown and Root partnership, turned thousands of Kurds back into certain death. Today, the Vinnell Corporation (a TRW Company) is, along with the firms MPRI and DynCorp (FTW June, 00) one of the three pre-eminent private mercenary corporations in the world. It is also the dominant entity for the training of security forces throughout the Middle East. Not surprisingly the Turkish border regions in question were the primary transhipment points for heroin, grown in Afghanistan and Pakistan and destined for the markets of Europe.
A confidential source with intelligence experience in the region subsequently told me that the Kurds "got some payback against the folks that used to help them move their drugs." He openly acknowledged that Brown and Root and Vinnell both routinely provided NOC or non-official cover for CIA officers. But I already knew that.
I was going to write about the banking scandals tied with CIA money laundering (other than the Nugan Hand Bank, which was covered in Part 1), namely the BCCI (the Bank of Credit and Commerce International.) This diary is too long to do so, however, in the way that I originally intended, and it all ties in nicely to the Bush Crime Family, and the diary I intend to write on the topic. Nonetheless, I will at least summarize this topic, one that books could (and have) been devoted to. In another twist of irony (or not?), it would be yet again John Kerry who would investigate BCCI, and you can read his report here. Findings concluded that "avoid centralized regulatory review... [with the objective] to keep their affairs secret, to commit fraud on a massive scale, and to avoid detection". It was yet another CIA money laundering front, and the BCCI was closely tied to American and Pakistan intelligence. The tip off that led Kerry on it's trail was the discovery that Manuel Noriega was using it to launder money. It had many notorious clients, including the Afghan rebels we supported, and Osama Bin Laden's brother, Salem (who named investment broker James R. Bath as his business representative in Texas, coincidentally right after Bush's father became CIA director in 1976.) Bath proceeded to invest $50,000 into George W. Bush's first business, Arbusto Energy. Most of this story is common knowledge to us Kossacs - but not the part about BCCI. The BCCI would become a key model for international terrorist financing.
The Justice Department would eventually launch a very questionable investigation into BCCI, and investigation led by Robert Mueller. Yes, that Robert Mueller - the one that was promoted to FBI Director.
Here's a link on this topic to wet your whistle: Follow the Money: How John Kerry Busted the Terrorist's Favorite Bank by David Sorota and Jonathan Baskin.
The Future of Covert Wars
So where does all of this lead? Are we going to use drug money to fund operations in other Middle Eastern countries, such as Iran? I, for one, am pretty freaking scared. We simply do not have the manpower for an operation in Iran - nor the public support, for that matter. This makes covert funds necessary. And how do they get covert funds? Drugs and guns. What a combo.
Iran remains the largest consumer of opium today - numbers which clearly indicate external forces at work (such as during China's Opium Wars - remember that Iran is no longer producing opium domestically.) Iran also is seemingly taking steps to combat the opium problem. According to the International Narcotics Control Strategy Report: Iran, "There is overwhelming evidence of Iran's strong commitment to keep drugs moving out of Afghanistan from reaching its citizens. As Iran strives to achieve this goal, it certainly also prevents drugs from reaching markets in the West." It also notes that " Iran has been in the forefront of efforts by the international community to combat the Afghan drug trade." I believe that history will prove this to be more than a footnote.