========
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.conspiracy,alt.drugs
Subject: Re: CIA and drugs
From: stefanl@direct.ca (stefan lemieszewski)
Date: 9 Oct 1996 00:19:17 GMT

In article <53eciv$3if@nntp1.best.com>, snopes@best.com says...
>
>                                 Sacramento Bee                              
>                                October 4, 1996 
>
>                                 RUMOR HAS IT 
>
>By: Fahizah Alim 
>
>   Did the CIA pour drugs into Los Angeles' African American community to
>finance its war in Central America? 
>
>   African Americans have been telling Patricia Turner that for years. It was
>an enduring and pervasive rumor -- and it may be true. 
>                                                                              
  

The problem of crack cocaine in LA, has moved well beyond a rumour to a 
"who-dun-it" stage. The court documents revealed by Gary Webb's article in the 
San Jose Mercury News is no longer a "rumour". While much of media hype is 
focusing on the CIA, there is evidence indicating this will be be a dead end 
intentionally because of the way the CIA covers its tracks. The evidence points 
to a secret operation being run by the Reagan/Bush White House. see below:

__________________________________________________________________

In August , 1996 the San Jose Mercury News, in an expose by reporter Gary Webb 
and based on court records, described the role of the Reagan-Bush 
administration-backed Nicaraguan Contras in flooding the streets of Los Angeles 
with crack cocaine during 1983-87 using gangs such as the Crips and Bloods. The 
Executive Intelligence Review (EIR) reported on September 20, 1996 that this 
was done while George Bush was vice-president of the U.S., overseeing the 
entire operation, along with Oliver North (of Iran-Contra fame/infamy) and as a 
result, there are 100,000 to 200,000 people in American prisons on drug 
charges.

Gary Webb posted his series of three articles on the internet over Aug. 18-20, 
1996,  has received over 100,000 hits a day, and has triggered calls for 
Congressional investigations, and other probes, into the role of the CIA in the 
Contras' crack trafficking. 

However, whereas, there were many ex-CIA agents involved in the drug-smuggling 
operation, focusing solely on the CIA may miss the mark, according to the 
article "CIA Genl. Counsel: Contra Drug Records May Not Exist" published in The 
New Federalist on September 30, 1996. Here it was reported that Jeff Smith the 
General Counsel of the CIA has "acknowledged --for the first time--  that 
records of such activities may not exist, for the reason that U.S. government 
officials may have been involved in privatized, 'off-line' secret operations." 
The article goes on to say that the activities of Oliver North, Richard Secord, 
Felix Rodriguez, and others, were all supervized by George Bush and that the 
operation was actually run outside the "official" CIA through private networks 
and contractors. (It's a CYA). Apparently, these covert operations are 
permitted under the 1981 Executive Order 12333, and under National Security 
Decision Directives 2, 3, and others.

Meanwhile, according to the Sept. 27, 1996 EIR,  "At a crowded Washington, D.C. 
press conference on Sept. 19,1996, EIR Washington bureau chief Bill Jones, Law 
Editor Edward Spannuas, Counterintelligence Editor Jeffery Steinberg, and EIR 
analyst Gail Billington, released a 120-page special multi-client report, 
'Would a President Bob Dole Prosecute Drug Super-Kingpin George Bush?'  which 
documents the role of the former Vice President and President, in overseeing 
the biggest cocaine-smuggling operations of the 1980s.

"At the press conference, Steinberg began with a warning, that anyone who 
focuses solely on the CIA involvement in the Contra cocaine-smuggling operation 
of the 1980s, is walking into a trap that will likely lead to a cover-up of the 
truth. Already, CIA director John Deutch has written to Congress-woman Maxine 
Waters (D-Calif.), explaining that a thorough search of CIA files occurred in 
1988, and no evidence linking the Agency to the accused Contra cocaine dealers, 
Norwin Meneses and Danilo Blandon, was turned up. Deutch, however, told Waters 
that he had ordered CIA Inspector General Frederick Hites to conduct a thorough 
probe of the allegations, and report the results to him by early November.

"Steinberg reviewed a string of Reagan Presidential Executive Orders and 
National Security Decision Directives, many of them now declassified, that 
placed Vice President Bush  ---not the CIA---  directly in charge of the Contra 
operation. Although active and former CIA personnel were involved in the Contra 
supply operations, Steinberg documented that it was senior Bush aides, 
including ex-CIA official Donald Gregg, ex-CIA officer Felix Rodriguez, and 
Marine Lt. Col. Oliver North, who administered the secret program from one day 
to the next, and had first-hand knowledge of the illegal drug trafficking by 
Contra pilots and "humanitarian aid" assets.

" 'The evidence is overwhelming,' Steinberg concluded, 'that the Contras were 
flooding the United States with illegal drugs, to finance the war in Central 
America; and that Vice President George Bush sat on top of a command structure 
that supervised and protected this effort.' 
...

"By Sept. 20, the story of the release of the EIR Special Report had broken 
internationally, and George Bush was already being contacted by reporters and 
asked to comment on the charges that he was the biggest crack cocaine kingpin 
of the 1980s.

"In Venezuela, Mexico, and Columbia, a number of prominent newspapers and 
television news shows aired the EIR allegations. Reuters, which sent a reporter 
to the Washington press conference, issued a Spanish-language wire story. The 
story was published in El Impulso, in Barquisimeto, Venezuela, under the 
headline, 'Bush Supercapo del Crack?'  The article began, 'George Bush, the 
aristocratic ex-President of the U.S. a super-capo of drug trafficking?  For 
the editors of the controversial weekly magazine, Executive Intelligence Review 
(EIR), Bush should already be serving a life sentence in jail for promoting the 
epidemic of cocaine that hit the Uniterd States during the last decade.'  
Reuters contacted Bush about the allegations, which he denied. The Reuters 
story cited the model indictment and quoted Spannaus that 'the majority of drug 
traffickers now imprisoned in the United States were convicted on the basis of 
less evidence than that which we have accumulated' against Bush.

"NBC filmed the entire news conference, and released a news item on its 
Spanish-language all-news broadcast. The NBC segment featured an interview with 
EIR reporter Carlos Mendez, which aired in Mexico. The Mexican wire service 
Notimex, and Agence France Presse, both released lengthy wires on the report, 
which also found their way into several Ibero-American daily newspapers.

"Not surprisingly, there are reports already coming to light of pressure on 
African-American newspaper editors and radio and TV news directors to black out 
the Bush dimension of the Contra-crack story, and focus exclusively on the 
'CIA' allegations. Several Washington area news shows that had scheduled 
coverage of the Bush charges, abruptly cancelled the stories. In short, a 
behind-the-scenes war has broken out."