Nexus - 0403 - New Times Magazine-pages

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s-Nicaragua border... A common feature of all infiltrate any country and that "foreign powers" would kill to future Pegasus missions was the transport "of large white coolers know how it is done), and landing at Bluefields Air Base with in and out of the Contra camps". deliveries for placement aboard civilian C-123s and C-130s.* On 26 February 1985, Tatum and his crew were instructed to This mission was followed by a brief stint in Colombia, where he fly two individuals to one of the larger Contra camps on the was assigned to assist the Drug Enforcement Administration's Honduran border. His flight log lists the names of the two indi- "War on Drugs", only to discover the DEA was heavily engaged viduals as Bill Cooper and Buzz Sawyer, both of whom worked in narcotics trafficking. for Corporate Air Services. Following a meeting between the CIA agents and Contra leaders, Tatum was given a sealed cooler, | THE "BOSS HOG" LIST marked "Vaccine", weighing approximately 200 pounds, and One of the most flamboyant individuals involved in the cocaine instructed to deliver it to a USAF C-130 transport plane at La trail from Columbia through Honduras to Panama and on into the Mesa Airport, Honduras. Two crew members offloading the United States, was Barry Seal. Seal flew an assortment of air- cooler accidentally dropped it, breaking the seal. Inside were over craft, offloading shipments of weapons in South America and 100 bags of cocaine. Tatum resealed the cooler and later watched _ picking up deliveries of cocaine for his return flight to the US on as it was transferred aboard the C- behalf of Col. North's Enterprise. 130, outward bound for Panama. nr i His primary base of operations On his return to Palmerola Air BOSS HOGS" — UNITED STATES was Mena Airport, Arkansas. Base, Honduras, Tatum phoned Col. A CIA "asset", Seal was later North to advise him of his discovery. arrested and became a DEA North replied that it was "a trophy of informer. Prior to his killing in war" and that the "Sandinistas are 1986—allegedly by a Medellin manufacturing cocaine and selling it cartel assassination squad in to fund the military". North closed revenge for informing on them— cocaine was bound forthe world_| National Security Adviser) mation that implicated hish eve seen ees eae ee Haig (General Alexander Haig, former Secretary of pacaequgneve courts as evidence" against the State) government officials, including Santinistas. incident struck T: - Greg (Donald Gregg, former National Security phen Vice President Busi tn ine e whole incident struck Tatum | p qvigar to VP Bush, Ambassador to Korea and alleged nterprise's narcotics-trafficking as va and reminded a ete joint "Controller" of Panama's Manuel Noriega, along PuSINess. lds i" : earlier missions dating bac! 0 - with William Casey) atum WOU. soon get to mee 84 when he was stationed at Fort F " , Barry Seal and become close ‘ . . + Clairage (Duane "Dewey" Clarradge, CIA) 2 arry he han Campbell, Kentucky, as a Special | 5 Fernandez (Joseph Fernandez, CIA Costa Rica Station friends. Tatum recalls being pre- = Casey (William Casey, Director Central Intelligence) = Clair-George (Clair Elroy George, Head of CIA's Central American Task Force) - Bush (Vice President George Bush) Kissinger (Dr Henry Kissinger, Chairman, Kissinger Associates; former US Secretary of State; former Operations pilot. Regularly he would Chief) sent during a meeting between trans-ship white coolers, marked as | 2 North (Lt Col. Oliver North, National Security Oliver North, Felix Rodriguez, Medical Supplies", to Little Rock Council aide) Amiram Nir and General Alvarez Air Force Base, Arkansas. On two occasions he carried similar coolers to Mena Airport, Arkansas. Deliveries of med- ical coolers to Little Rock AFB were picked up by Dr Dan Lasater—a close confidant of the then Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton. By now, almost two years later, Tatum had decided to doc- ument his discovery to safe- guard his "retirement". Thereafter, he documented all Pegasus flights on the reverse of three respective "handlers" his flight logs. were knee-deep in the This was a difficult time for Tatum, since he had three balls to cocaine venture and making fistloads of money. juggle at the same time. On the one hand he was flying classified Unknown to all those present, Seal had earlier provided Tatum active-duty missions for the US Army; on the other, he was flying with a list of names of those high-level government officials CIA missions arranged through Mil. Group A (CIA), located at deeply involved with or responsible for controlling the narcotics the embassy in Tegucigalpa, Honduras; and thirdly, he was flying business. Seal called them the "Boss Hogs". Tatum has kept this Pegasus missions under the control of William Colby, Oliver list a tightly-held secret until recent weeks. The list cites the sur- North and George Bush following his recruitment into Pegasus by names only, and is reproduced above, as I received it, complete from Honduras, when North stated that Vice President Bush was going to have his son Jeb arrange "something out of Columbia". This conver- sation focused on Barry Seal's increasingly notorious activities. When Tatum later heard Seal had died, he immediately understood who was behind the killing. The discussion also made it clear that VP Bush, Governor Clinton and his © Singlaub (John Singlaub, CIA covert operator) - Colby (William Colby, Director Central Intelligence, 1973-76) © Secord (Richard V. Secord, regarded as a "brilliant" CIA black operative) 2 Weld (William Weld, head of Criminal Division, US Department of Justice; instrumental in "blocking" Senate investigations into narcotics, according to testi- mony of former Senate special investigator, Jack Blum) - Rodriguez (Felix Rodriguez, CIA officer with close connection to VP Bush) = Peroot (General Peroot, Defense Intelligence Agency) Colby in 1986. with misspellings as written. I have appended their full names Tatum completed numerous missions during his rotation out of _ and titles in brackets. Honduras. Picking up and trans-shipping coolers containing Most, if not all of these names are readily familiar to cocaine was a regular event. Extraordinarily, this included infil- Contragate investigators and journalists covering this story. trating Nicaraguan airspace (Tatum says it was not difficult to Allegations regarding the involvement of former President infiltrate any country and that "foreign powers" would kill to know how it is done), and landing at Bluefields Air Base with deliveries for placement aboard civilian C-123s and C-130s.* This mission was followed by a brief stint in Colombia, where he was assigned to assist the Drug Enforcement Administration's "War on Drugs", only to discover the DEA was heavily engaged in narcotics trafficking. 28 = NEXUS APRIL - MAY 1997 "BOSS HOGS" — UNITED STATES