When I saw mention of Bush's renewed pledge to "assist" Colombia in their "war on cocaine," I found it unsettling, considering the United States's historical involvement and profiteering in the drug trade.
Bush calls drug war `vital'By Ron Hutcheson
CARTAGENA, Colombia - President Bush traveled to the heart of the international cocaine trade Monday to pledge America's help in the fight against smugglers and guerrillas that live off the industry.
Stopping in Colombia on his way back from a 21-nation Pacific Rim summit in Chile, Bush said drug trafficking threatened the stability of the entire Western Hemisphere. He promised more U.S. aid to help Colombia fight an alliance of drug traffickers and guerrillas.
''The drug traffickers who practice violence and intimidation in this country send their addictive and deadly products to the United States. Defeating them is vital to the safety of our peoples and to the stability of this hemisphere,'' Bush said during a joint appearance with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe.
The United States has invested more than $3 billion in Colombia's antidrug campaign since 2002, but the funding package, known as Plan Colombia, expires next year. Bush didn't say how much more he would seek from Congress next year. [Continue reading here]
I found the below article to be a pretty adequate reflection of my thoughts. Aside from the history which reveals so much about our interest and motivation in toting a "global war on drugs," I find it hard to believe that George Bush would have such great concern for this matter that he would choose to spend many billions of American tax dollars on it for no other reason than to be a "do gooder." Our government has so long been involved in the drug trade and it has been so lucrative, that it's odd that they would want to eradicate it. Perhaps they'd just like to "redirect" it as has been done in the past.
George W. Bush and President Alvaro Uribe’s close ties to the Medellin CartelBy Clifton Ross
While Mr. George W. Bush promised more money to the Colombian government to fight presumably "bad narcoterrorists" his administration was sending "good narcoterrorists" to help develop its plans for Haiti.
As USAID states at their website: OTI [Office of Transition Initiatives, of USAID] continues to work closely with the US Embassy and IOM to develop options for a reintegration program for former combatants. Training and management specialists of the Kosovo Protection Corps, a civilian response unit consisting primarily of former Kosovo Liberation Army members, have been brought to Haiti to assess how the Kosovo model might be applied there.
The "Kosovo model" is code that would require an understanding of the KLA to interpret.
After kidnapping President Aristide and bringing into power a narco-government "of transition" by means of drug dealers and murderers it should be no surprise that the Bush administration would want to coordinate this newly imposed narco-government with its drug-dealing buddies in the KLA. See Anthony Fenton’s article.
Up to 80% of the heroin that enters Europe passes through the KLA, the elephant in the living room of narco-terrorism. The heroin the KLA helps smuggle into Europe has its origins in US-controlled Afghanistan ... the nation recently "liberated" from the Taliban, that Islamic grouping that had nearly eliminated opium production.
Now, under the aegis of the US and puppet Hamid Karzai Unocal, opium production is back up to record levels. The Afghan warlords, our "good narcoterrorists" are quite happy, as are, presumably, our "good narcoterrorists" in Kosovo, who skim the cream off the top of the drug money.
It is increasingly clear that what holds up the Bush administration in Washington is not only oil, but drugs and that’s nothing new (see Whiteout:The CIA, Drugs and the Press by Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair for an extensive and well-documented history).
During the Contra War, Papa Doc Bush used Colombian cocaine money to pay for arms for the terrorist Contra war in Nicaragua where 30,000 died, and the Vietnam War was financed by heroin from the Golden Triangle. The drugs are brought into the US on CIA planes and distributed in our poor urban communities as a way of keeping the largely African American community and other disenfranchised communities, sedated, neutralized and/or imprisoned.Posted by Maria at November 23, 2004 08:36 PMNow Baby Doc Bush appears to be stemming the flow of cocaine in South America while opening the taps of heroin in the Mideast. That would be a logical conclusion, since the US tends to fund its terrorist wars with drug money and at present the war in Iraq appears to require all the heroin the US can get its hands on for alternative, regional funding sources.
But not everything is as it appears to be. What is being viewed as "stopping the flow" of cocaine is a mere redirection through other channels.
In planning for future assaults on Latin America, we can expect Haiti to once again be a critical transshipment but the US must also get control of "product" and establish relations with the "wholesalers." That is to say, in order for the US to set up "good narcoterrorists" they must first dispense with the "bad narcoterrorists" so the leftist FARC, which taxes cocaine in areas under its control, must first be crushed in order for the "good narcoterrorists" to come into power.
And who might they be?
President Alvaro Uribe, of course.
Uribe’s close ties to the Medellin Cartel will enable the top narcoterrorists of the world (the US government) to finance their wars in Latin America (as they did through the second half of the twentieth century) while also carrying out drug and terror operations in the Middle East.
"Deep throat," the anonymous agent who blew the whistle on Nixon and Watergate, said "follow the money." Perhaps today he might say, "Follow the drug and oil pipelines." Bush’s pledge of aid to oil-rich and drug-plagued Colombia, a nation which is already the largest recipient of US aid in the hemisphere, is another step toward future US intervention in Latin America as it seeks to control the world through oil, drugs and guns.
Our government has so long been involved in the drug trade and it has been so lucrative
Say what?
Oh wait - is this one of those CIA-created-crack-to-make-money-off-crack-heads-in-Loa Angeles??
Posted by: Mad Mikey at November 23, 2004 08:44 PMOh wait is this another one of those "Maria Please educate me because I'm incapable of educating myself" moments?
Yes. The United States has long been involved in drug trafficking. Do you have something that refutes that statement?
Posted by: Maria at November 23, 2004 09:01 PMNo.
Do you have something that proves it?
Otherwise it's another Tin-Foil Hat Brigade campfire story....
Posted by: Mad Mikey at November 23, 2004 10:36 PMYou just keep telling yourself that Mikey. I have plenty of sources to back up these claims. But you have none to back up yours. Just like you had nothing to dispute that Katherine Harris committed voter suppression, you just talk but you have no basis for your denials. What a pity. Just because you choose to ignore the truth doesn't mean I'm going to.
Posted by: Maria at November 23, 2004 10:46 PM
I have plenty of sources to back up these claims.
Then site them.
But you have none to back up yours.
You're right - I don't. It's practically impossible to prove a negative.
Just like you had nothing to dispute that Katherine Harris committed voter suppression, you just talk but you have no basis for your denials.
Standard Democratic Tactic #14: Change the subject.
Just because you choose to ignore the truth doesn't mean I'm going to.
What truth? Please enlighten me as to what the 'truth' is.
I'm honestly curious about your assertions....and to me and most others, they are assertions until otherwise cooberated.
Posted by: Mad Mikey at November 24, 2004 02:15 PMBelieve me, if I didn't already know how pointless it is, I would debate with you. But debating you is like banging my head against a brick wall, and I've done enough of that in the past few days. Debating this with you would be a huge waste of my time, just like all the other debates I've had with you where you demand that I back up my claims, which I do, and then you never back up yours. I don't know what your point is Mikey. If you want to know about U.S. involvement in drug running, do the fucking research. If you don't want to know, enjoy your ignorance. We've had this conversation before and I'd prefer not to have it again, especially in the cranky ass mood that I'm in today.
Posted by: Maria at November 24, 2004 02:19 PMOkay. I reasearched it and found no evidence of systematic use of government assets to sell drugs.
What about you? Or are you gonna take the you're too stupid to understand my reasoning Mikey approach?
Posted by: Mad Mikey at November 24, 2004 04:20 PMI find it hard to believe that George Bush would have such great concern for this matter that he would choose to spend many billions of American tax dollars on it for no other reason than to be a "do gooder."
It's not as if he hasn't spent money on cocaine before...
Oh, and Mikey, would William French Smith and William Casey do?
"In 1982, the Attorney General and the Director of Central Intelligence entered into an agreement that excluded the reporting of narcotics and drug crimes by the CIA to the Justice Department."
Posted by: Phoenician in a time of Romans at November 25, 2004 11:42 PMgoogle
Air America + Laos + heroin + US
Contras + Nicaragua + cocaine + US
Freedom Fighters + Afghanistan + opium + US
There is no US Dept of Drug Imports, no Bureau of Narcotics Finance, no Central Opium, Heroin & Cocaine Agency. Those US officials involved in the drug trade don't send out media kits. They don't give press conferences. They don't exist, officially. What they're doing is illegal. The perpetrators would be scorned, and indicted, if they ever admitted these acts, of which they must be ashamed. Even years after the fact, all they can do is issue non-denial denials. But that's sufficient for those who choose to remain blind to the obvious facts.
How would tons of illicit drugs get from distant 3rd-World war zones, controlled by the US, or its' surrogates, all the way to the streets of US cities, without our knowledge and involvement?
How would the money get back to those surrogates, and into support for the war, without our knowledge or involvement?
How could we support these surrogates and not know of, and approve of their drug trading activities, at least tacitly?
Are we complete fools, or just corrupt? Believe what you want to believe. But the truth is obvious. The United States Government and its' surrogates around the world have been involved in narcotics for many years. These drugs have financed operations in many countries of interest to the US. These drugs have found their way on to our streets, where they have wreaked havoc.
Responsibility must rest somewhere, but owning up would mean disgrace, and imprisonment. Like the Mafia, the CIA never admits its' crimes. And, like the Mafia, it's hard to get inside the CIA, and emerge with any information. Still, there's plenty out there. Unless you choose not to see it.
So, pick one: The US Government is totally incompetent at keeping drugs from "friendly" countries out of our sovereign territory, and cash from going back. Or, the US Government is guilty of drug-trafficking, itself.
google
crazy + liberal + conspiracy + theories
Google
willfully + ignorant + conservatives
Well, that settles it then.
You should immediately leave the United States cause we're "bad".....
Posted by: Mad Mikey at November 26, 2004 02:40 PMAnd thanks for the Google searches - they were insightful.
Now - can any of you provide further proof other than some profs personal page with his opinions or the steering for a Google search? I didn't think so.
I'm really curious about Maria's sources....
Posted by: Mad Mikey at November 26, 2004 02:48 PMMy sources are ex-CIA agents. Many books have been written which cover this subject Mikey.
I won't have a back and forth with you about it because I've already banged my head against that brick wall as much as I can stand. Regardless of the information that's available to you, you will believe what you CHOOSE to believe, and nothing I say or present you with is ever going to change that. If there's one thing I've learned from my exchanges with you, it is that this is true.
Posted by: Maria at November 27, 2004 11:53 AM.
The moonbat nazi-wannabees all think that if they pitch in their pathetic efforts to the ongoing campaign of denial, they'll get a Junior G-man badge, some day. Sad.
But they can't deny the truth: The drugs were there, under our surrogates' control. Then they were here, under our noses (so to speak). The money was here, readily traceable, then it was in our surrogates' hands, and used to buy weapons, from us.
Try getting anything in, out, or through places like Laos, Central America, or Afghanistan, in massive quantities. Logistical nightmare; even worse in wartime, without big-time help. Yet, it happened.
So, are our military, Customs and police incompetent? Willfully blind? Or complicit? Let's see some links on that, moonbat nazi-wannabees.
Sorry, I don't have any toy badges for you Repukes. How about an authentic Hitler-youth secret decoder-ring replica? Already got one? BWA-HA-HAH!
.
Regardless of the information that's available to you, you will believe what you CHOOSE to believe, and nothing I say or present you with is ever going to change that.
It's all what you CHOOSE to believe. For every claim brought forward, there is another which denies it. For every book written with "facts", there is another written that has opposing "facts". The only people that know are the ones that were, or weren't, involved. Beyond that you pick a side to believe. You prefer to believe one group, I choose to believe another. There just haven't been enough facts beyone "he said she said" to convince me otherwise.
Posted by: Geoffrey at November 27, 2004 06:52 PMFor every book written with "facts", there is another written that has opposing "facts".
No there isn't. Please refer me to one book or individual which credibly debunks and disputes the claim that the U.S. has been heavily involved in drug running. I'll be right here waiting.
Posted by: Maria at November 27, 2004 07:44 PMHas anyone actually decicated enough time to write a book refutting such a ludicris claim?
I'd actually be surprised if there was....
And if you don't want to 'go back and forth', that's okay - I win by default.
Posted by: Mad Mikey at November 27, 2004 09:40 PMNo there isn't. Please refer me to one book or individual which credibly debunks and disputes the claim that the U.S. has been heavily involved in drug running. I'll be right here waiting.
William Leary, prof U of GA, Joseph Westermeyer, author of "Poppies, Pipes, and People".
How about providing a few of those sources you earlier "couldn't be bothered to provide" and I'll toss up someone else disputing them, too.
By denying that there is even another side to the story, you give further evidence that you'll just drink the kool aid. You don't even CARE if the information you believe is false. You don't even believe contradictory information may be out there. You're content to sit in your world of spoon fed information. At least I've taken the time to get both sides before forming an opinion.
I'd actually be surprised if there was..
Be surprised.
Posted by: Geoffrey at November 28, 2004 09:41 AMYou're mistaken. I have just had the discussion with Mikey enough times to know that anything I provide him with will simply be ignored in favor of the well known strategy of denial. I have also previously posted on this subject and had this discussion before and am not keen on having it again with those who refuse to acknowledge this side of the story.
Your sources are bunk Geoffrey. Both of the names you provided are those of people who are toted by the CIA as their defenders, but unfortunately, the evidence outweighs their lies. I believe one of the most credible ex CIA agents on the subject was John Stockwell, the highest ranking CIA official ever to come forward about the CIA's nefarious covert operations. While Joseph Westermeyer and William Leary were "researching," John Stockwell was witnessing. Who do I believe? The guy who was sitting at a desk concocting ways to fight off these allegations and "conspiracy theories" or the guy who worked for the CIA, headed up the war in Angola and wrote several heavily censored books on the subject of the CIA's secret wars, including the transport and trade of guns and drugs in CIA planes? Hmmm. You guess.
Posted by: Maria at November 28, 2004 10:38 AMYou've obviously never read Joseph Westermeyer. He was witnessing as much as anyone else.
I believe
That should be "I CHOOSE to believe", which is the entire point I was making. You have one guy who chose to make a very good living telling stories with no evidence to back him up or any supporting compatriots, and a bunch of people saying he's full of crap.
First you say:
No there isn't. Please refer me to one book or individual which credibly debunks and disputes the claim that the U.S. has been heavily involved in drug running. I'll be right here waiting.
Then I do, and you change that to:
Your sources are bunk Geoffrey.
Keep your head in the sand. Like I said, there are two sides to this story. Just because you want to badly believe there aren't, doesn't make it so. At least I read multiple sources before I made up my mind. You didn't even think they existed.
Posted by: Geoffrey at November 28, 2004 12:55 PM"He was witnessing as much as anyone else."
Not as much as John Stockwell.
I didn't say there weren't two sides to the story. I said that there wasn't anyone who could credibly dispute the allegations of drug running. I stand by that statement. Even William Leary doesn't deny that the drug running took place, he just absolves the CIA of any blame and naively asserts that they were unaware of the heroin onboard their planes. I choose to believe that THAT is watered down, if not patently false based on the writings of those whose credentials, access to inside details and personal experience are more credible than Mr. Leary's.
We can agree to disagree on this one. I've done plenty of reading on the CIA and I know exactly what Joseph Westermeyer's position is and as far as I'm concerned, it's one of ignorance, no matter how much humanitarian work he did in Laos or how much research he did on the CIA. The same goes for William Leary.
It's to be expected that the CIA would try to discredit John Stockwell, but his is the position of someone who at one time believed in the work he was doing for the CIA, became involved with the CIA in the first place because he believed it was an honorable organization, only to be confronted by an ugly truth which concerned him so deeply that he wrote books about it and gave lectures wherein he devulged much of his own knowledge and experience. He did his duty to America by not staying silent about what he knew. I have no doubt he's been called a liar and a traitor. That's the only tactic our government and its die hard defenders knows to battle the truth. Smear. So be it. I'm not telling you what to believe. I'm only telling you who I believe and that I do not agree that there is anyone who can credibly diffuse these allegations, as I've yet to read or hear of one that has more than obvious bias on his side.
Feel free to write up a post discrediting critics of our government and CIA and I will keep posting the facts and opinions of those who you choose to ignore and discredit, (despite the integrity that they've exhibited). If there's one thing we've learned about eachother, Geoffrey, it's that we are rarely going to agree, so I'm not going to agonize over it.
Now g'head, have the last word, since I know you have to have it or you will implode.
Posted by: Maria at November 28, 2004 01:27 PMI imagine Mike Ruppert is off the table as a credible source about CIA drug involvement.
Posted by: 403 at November 28, 2004 01:44 PMYeah 403, he's just another yeller-assed traitor lying through his teeth for shits and giggles.
Posted by: Maria at November 28, 2004 01:55 PM"And if you don't want to 'go back and forth', that's okay - I win by default."
What did you win Mikey? And how? You haven't done a damn thing except sit on your ass and ask half wit questions. You haven't presented a single credible source to refute the heavily backed claims in this post. At least Geoffrey made an attempt. You just deny, deny, deny. And then you think you won something. HAHAHAA! Whadja win Mikey?
Posted by: Maria at November 28, 2004 02:52 PMThat's assuming there is a competition with clear cut winners and losers. That's how they frame the debate never realizing a lot of us are perfectly happy to let them hold their opinions near and dear. You already told him that. I guess we could all chip in to buy MM a reading comprehension class or two. No child left behind you know.
Posted by: 403 at November 28, 2004 04:19 PM