Dark alliance
Gary Webb draws from thousands of pages of once-secret files from the CIA, DEA, and FBI, the L.A. Sheriff's Department, and recently declassified papers from the Iran-Contra investigation. Together with Nicaraguan journalist Georg Hodel, Webb interviewed former members of the Contra drug ring, as well as former federal prosecutors, CIA and DEA agents, and former Central American police officials. This book shows how the L.A. crack market flourished through a breathtaking combination of government negligence, greed, and criminal conduct. It also demonstrates that the U.S. goverment agencies, including the CIA, the DEA, and the FBI, were aware of the activities of this well-connected drug network throughout its long existence and did little or nothing to stop it. Indeed, in several instances documented here, the Justice Department, the CIA, and the secret National Security Council unit run by Oliver North, took extraordinary steps to protect the ring from public exposure.
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- If anyone is interested in the logistics of the cocaine trade I recommend the Dark Alliance book [1]. The book argues that when cocaine first appeared in the US it was not considered so dangerous or addictive and the authorities did not respond to it as a serious threat (at the time it was PCP that was being demonised).
[1] http://www.amazon.com/Dark-Alliance-Contras-Cocaine-Explosio...
- For interesting reads on the politics of cocaine, in addition to the mentioned story in Freakonomics, take a look at:
Dark Alliance by Gary Webb: http://www.amazon.com/Dark-Alliance-Contras-Cocaine-Explosio...
Snowblind: http://www.amazon.com/Snowblind-Brief-Career-Cocaine-Trade/d...
- Not just a drug dealer, but Freeway Ricky Ross, who arguably helped invent crack whose cocaine supplier was the Nicarguan Contras, the CIA-funded army of Iran-Contra fame. I love Planet Money, but I wish they'd gone a little deeper into his involvement with the contras. If you want to know more look into Gary Webb's series, Dark Alliance. The restored site is here: http://www.narconews.com/darkalliance/drugs/start.htm
- Thanks, that's actually valuable feedback.
You missed, for instance, this link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wormwood_%28miniseries%29
It's (perhaps surprisingly) based on true events and might give some idea of the difficulties with even discussing the topic.
There are also various links like this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missing_scientists_conspiracy_...
If you dig there, you'll sooner or later hit upon the weird discrepancies from reality that Wikipedia article has. It mixes unrelated cases with genuinely disturbing ones like McCasland. Who wasn't demented at all.
"Housecleaning" refers to the practice of killing prospective leaks. It doesn't make much sense to kill them once they've talked.
Killing is a last resort, mundane leaks are retaliated against by revoking clearances and destroying careers that way.
Note that the Espionage Act of 1917(!) allows to treat whistleblowers like foreign spies and deprives them of arguing, their leak would serve the common interest.
Actual cases are usually ruled "suicides" or "accidents", but obviously aren't:
Danny Casolaro (1991): "The Octopus" Investigation
Gary Webb (2004): The "Dark Alliance" Expose
Dr. David Kelly (2003): Iraq War WMD Leaker
John P. Wheeler III (2010): Pentagon Insider
... there are many others. You only find what you look for.
- The US state uses drug money to fund covert operations, so we're never "winning" the war. See reporting by Gary Webb in the 1980s (Dark Alliance, later admitted by the CIA years after his suicide) or the amazing conversion of Afghanistan into the #1 opium hub under U.S. occupation (with pretty photos of U.S. soldiers guarding poppy fields).
- Isn't the worlds most successful drug lord ever the CIA. They sold cocaine and the journalist Gary Webb who uncovered it was attacked by the CIA mouthpieces of corporate journalists and corporate media and "suicideded" himself. He shot himself in the head twice to succeed in the "suicide".
Afghanistan after first overturning the Taliban had the biggest increase ever in drug production ever when the CIA was running the country.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Webb
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Alliance_(book)
https://theintercept.com/2014/09/25/managing-nightmare-cia-m...
