Nexus - 0502 - New Times Magazine-pages

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equivalent of the CIA, confirmed this during a remarkably frank Allied victory in Korea—as explained by Colonel Philip Corso, interview with historian Professor Alfred McCoy. Belleux told former Head of Special Projects Branch, Intelligence Division, McCoy that "French military intelligence had all their covert Far East Command, in testimony to Congress in 1996. Upon operations from the control of the Indo-China drug trade". This returning from Korea, Corso was assigned to the Operations covered the French Colonial War from 1946 through to 1954. Coordinating Board of the White House National Security Belleux revealed how this worked. French paratroopers fight- Council, where he discovered the "no win" policy. He was ing with hill tribes scattered throughout the region collected raw appalled by it.* opium and transported it aboard French military aircraft to Saigon But if winning militarily was not a US objective, securing con- where it was handed over to the Sino-Vietnamese Mafia for distri- trol of the region's opium production most certainly was. Little bution. Also heavily engaged in the opium traffic were the time passed before the CIA had a stranglehold on the opium trade. Corsican crime syndicates that shipped opium to Marseille, This resulted in a massive increase in opium production followed France, for refining into heroin. From there it was distributed to by a surge in heroin addiction in North America and Western Europe and the United States, the network becoming known as Europe. Paralleling this was an enormous growth in heroin "the French Connection". It was a case of the underworld work- addicts amongst US combat troops in Vietnam. Fully one-third of ing hand-in-glove with the French Government—with both bene- all combat forces were hooked on "China white"—courtesy of the fiting financially from the joint arrangement. The shared profits men from Spooksville, Virginia.’ were channelled through central bank accounts under French mili- Drug dealing was rampant amongst South Vietnamese military tary-intelligence control. The commanders. One of the principal SDECE master-spy closed his inter- figures was General Dang Van view by stating that he believed the . oe spe a Quang, the Military and Security CIA "had taken over all French assets But if winning militarily [in Assistant to President Nguyen Van and were pursuing something of the Vietnam] was nota US objective Thieu. Quang developed a network same policy".* . ae ; of dope trafficking via Vietnamese The term "Vietnam War" is some- securing control of the region s Special Forces operating in Laos. thing of a misnomer. More correctly, opium production most certainly Laos, a CIA fiefdom, was a princi- the US involvement in the entire pal opium producer under the nomi- region should be called the "South- was. Little time passed before the nal control of General Vang Pao, East Asia War". While the fighting in CIA had a stranglehold on the leader of the Meo tribesman fighting Vietnam reached the media on a daily . the CIA's secret war. Vang Pao basis, the secret war in Cambodia, opium trade. would collect raw opium grown Laos and Thailand remained secret throughout northern Laos and trans- and continued right through the port it aboard the CIA's "Air 1980s. This was the CIA's own hot America" helicopters to Long Thien. little war, fought with the assistance of local tribesmen and 'off- A massive, sprawling US-built complex, Long Thien was known the-books' American soldiers and airmen—who, once captured, as "Spook Heaven" by some and "Alternate 20" by others. It was were abandoned by a chillingly ungrateful and cynical secret gov- here that General Pao's raw opium was processed into top-grade ernment.* No. 4 China white heroin. At this point, direct CIA involvement The US military strategy in Vietnam was unique. Although the _ in the 'product' ceased. Americans had military superiority, with the ability to win the war Meanwhile, the CIA provided Vang Pao with his own airline— in approximately one year, they were expressly forbidden from known to insiders as "Air Opium'"—that would transport the drugs doing so by US foreign policy makers. This doctrine was spelled to Saigon, landing at the giant US military Ton Sohn Nut Air out in National Security Council Memorandum 68, which was the Base. Thereafter, part of the bulk was divvied up among Quang's template for the Cold War. This was the same policy that forbade network for sale to US servicemen hooked on the drug. The rest was shipped to the Corsican syndicate in Marseille for delivery to Cuba—a trans-shipment point controlled by Florida Mafia boss Santos Trafficante—and thence to the United States. A regular variation of the delivery route occurred when sealed bags of heroin were stitched inside the dead bodies of GIs returning home for military burial. Back at home, US policy-makers didn't give a flying damn about the growing drug problem among US ser- vicemen. This view of disregard was best stated by Secretary of State Henry Kissinger who told Washington Post reporters Woodward and Bernstein that "military men are dumb, stupid animals to be used as pawns for foreign policy".° CIA had a stranglehold on the opium trade. hea we wee tte 28 - NEXUS FEBRUARY - MARCH 1998