Greg - I'm not sure anyone should bother to respond.. the main allegation is not that the CIA is involved in drug trafficking but that it turned a blind eye to the involvement of others in it.. um, its the CIA not the Drug Enforcement Agency or the FBI.. its not a police agency as such and has no police powers (forget the fiction, look at what it does).. then the article leaps from that into saying its core business is in drug smuggling and gun smuggling.. sorry, what?

You then drag in Nugan Hand, which collapsed in 1980 (more than 30 years ago). There were allegations of CIA involvement in Nugan Hand and it certainly hired a former official or two but its difficult to see just how the organisation could have been seriously involved with that bunch of nuts - if the CIA had been involved at least it would have been better funded.

My recollection of that publicity when the journalist you mentioned committed suicide was that even his fellow journalists had written him off as a nut. So should you.

Given the revelations of Edward Snowden, the whole world knows that America cannot be trusted to tell the truth or has any understanding of the meaning of words like: integrity, honesty, ethics, peace, fair-go, turn the other cheek, etc.

Instead of telling people to forget about America's misdeeds, the whole of the U.S. should be put under the microscope and its constant, nefarious, sadistic, barbaric, imperialist behaviour roundly condemned!

Let's shine a bright light on America, show just what an evil, barbaric nation it is rather than listen to its torrents of duplicitous propaganda.

Agree with a very well informed Curmedgeon.
Apart from that and in reference to drugs.
How's the 80 year old war on drugs going?
Are we winning?
How many billions or trillions have been spent thus far?
Could this money have been spent more wisely, combating the very reasons that drugs are so seductive?
Or that for some communities, few if any other choices to escape enduring generational poverty are on offer!
How many hundreds of thousands of lives have been sacrificed thus far fighting it?
And is that how anyone in their right mind measures success?
Are addicts using less?
Or have they switched to much more harmful drugs, when the authorities have briefly, successfully created a heroin drought?
And or, are or prison populations going down?
Are law enforcement agencies freer now to concentrate their often overwhelmed/overworked or modest resources on capital crime?
What is the evidence saying with regard to some of the less harmful drugs being legalized or decriminalized, in other more sanely lead places; or where addiction is treated as a medical problem, rather than a crime?
Are there more or less crimes and or brutal assaults, break and enter and the like?
And what has a legalized market done to the cash flows of illegal drug barons, and the power and "official" influence that allegedly buys/bought?
Well?
Rhrosty.

Greg, a very important article. I was particularly glad that you referred to Alfred McCoy and Peter Dale Scott. McCoy's book has been reprinted umpteen times with updates that make it as relevant today as when it was first published.

Scott has also been a pioneer in showing the linkages between drug trafficking and the CIA, in Colombia, Mexico, Vietnam, the so-called golden Triangle in SE Asia and Afghanistan where they resurrected the heroin traffic after it had been all but closed down by the Taliban.

Afghan heroin is shipped out to Camp Bond Steel in Kosovo where it is then distributed through Europe. This was noted in a Council of Europe report that stated, inter alia, that the Kosovo government was essentially a criminal enterprise. You would be surprised how few times Camp Bond Steel, the largest military facility in Europe, is even mentioned in the Australian media.

Unsurprisingly a couple of the commenters on this site, and no doubt their fellow travellers in due course, want to dismiss this as all ancient history. They need to wake up to the reality of the world we live in. As the UN Drug Agency noted only two years ago, most of the US's major banks survived the recession because of the huge profits they made from laundering drug money. The Bank of Wachovia was a rare example of a prosecution, although the fine, measured against the profits, was derisory.

James - you are in a fantasy world.. an entertaining one and good one in which to write thrillers, but a fantasy one none the less.. there have been allegations from the 1960s-1970s that the CIA turned a blind eye to aspects of the heroin trade due to the politics of the time, but actively involved? But who am I to spoil these fantasies..

In South America the largest US military presence is in Columbia. Columbia also happens to be one of the major sources of South American marijuana and cocaine, much of which makes its way up to the US.
In the Middle East the largest US military presence in is Afghanistan. Afghanistan also happens to be one of the major sources of Middle Eastern heroine, much of which makes its way into Europe and, especially, Russia.
Historically the connection between the US military and heroine coming out of the Golden Triangle during the Viet War is too well known to be allowed any credible denial.
Finally, movie critic David Carr writing in the NT Times has endorsed the movie Kill the Messenger which tells the story of how reporter Gary Webb was hounded unto suicide by a vengeful MSM for daring to suggest that Ronald "The Gripper" Regan's presidency was a time of cocaine dealing by the "President's Army", the CIA. It is a day late and a dollar short for Gary Webb, but the truth does eventually come out - something the current crop of mendacious spooks operating within the Beltway and protected by a compliant MSM might do well to remember.

The interesting thing about most conspiracy theories is that they often involve an assumption of a supreme level of competence and organization together with the assumption of a level of incompetence that allows the conspiracy theorist to "figure it out".

Conspiracy theorists often seem to be uneducated but suffer from the illusory superiority effect. This is supported by evidence that many people who believe in conspiracy theories, believe in multiple conspiracies, even when one conspiracy contradicts the other.

James O'Neill

Interesting comment.

So by what criterion do you distinguish governments that are "essentially a criminal enterprise" from those that are not?

'So by what criterion do you distinguish governments that are "essentially a criminal enterprise" from those that are not?'
That's the trick you can't. From Albert Einstein's theory, for every force there is an equal and opposite force. This is a basic theory of the physical world. It relates to everything, nothing is exempt. Were ever there are people(s) who want more at there acceptable cost, there will be corruption. As a famous gangster once said, you can't have organised crime without law and order (aside: which is why he owned so many judges in the rawing twenties). Human nature is the same from the slums to heights. What you see at the street level is what you get at the heights. The heights are smarter about it. That's all (university degrees).
Don't be a sheeple, it maybe you the wolves will use as food.

@JKJ Interesting point. As you see from my comment, I was quoting the Council of Europe who formed that view on a number of bases including trafficking in human body parts and its role in drug distribution. I suppose one could mount an argument that in respect of all governments it is only a matter of degree. The squeaky clean would be a short list.

I should note in the light of some of the above responses that Gary Webb exposed the CIA crack cocaine link in a series of articles for the San Jose Mercury. He was widely ridiculed at the time. It leads to his alleged suicide (2 gunshot wounds to the head). A report by the CIA's own Inspector General ultimately confirmed what Webb had written. The New York Times has belatedly semi-apologised for its earlier treatment of Webb in the context of a review of a film made based on Webb's book.

Here, as elsewhere, such discussions invariably attract comments from the terminally stupid that what is being propounded is a "conspiracy theory". Ironically, the term was developed as a pejorative by the CIA itself, using its friendly media outlets (Operation Mockingbird) because the CIA was alarmed at the coverage being received from those who argue that the CIA was the prime mover in the Kennedy assassination.

Professor Lance de Haven Smith has written a fascinating study on conspiracy theory in America. It probably won't appeal to those commenters on this site who prefer the comfort of their ignorance to the reality of the world we live in.

Thanks to all those folks who saw fit to respond. Clearly as always some posters are more informed and articulate than others. I am always fascinated by those who have an opinion - however ill-informed and clumsily proffered - and yet still aren't afraid to use it, especially under cover of a convenient pseudonym. You know who you are (even if I don't), although I suspect it would take an enforced overdose of sodium pentothal avec a polygraph to extract any truthful admission to that effect, at least in any public forum. As I have opined before - and do so again for the record - when the immovable object of ignorance meets the irresistible object of arrogance, sometimes it is best to just get out of the way. Happy trails to all. And keep those cards and letters rolling right in.