CIA transnational anti-crime and anti-drug activities,
This article deals with activities of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency related to transnational crime, including the illicit drug trade.
See also: CIA drug trafficking
Two offices of the CIA Directorate of Intelligence have analytical responsibilities in this area. The Office of Transnational Issues applies unique functional expertise to assess existing and emerging threats to US national security and provides the most senior US policymakers, military planners, and law enforcement with analysis, warning, and crisis support.
The CIA Crime and Narcotics Center researches information on international narcotics trafficking and organized crime for policymakers and the law enforcement community. Since the CIA has no domestic police authority, it sends its analytic information to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and other law enforcement organizations, such as the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the United States Department of the Treasury (OFAC).
Another part of the CIA, the National Clandestine Service, collects human intelligence (HUMINT) in these areas.
Drug trade
According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODOC),
Drug cultivation thrives on instability, corruption and poor governance. The world's biggest drug producing centres are in regions beyond the control of the central government, like South Afghanistan, South-West Colombia and East Myanmar. Until government control, democracy and the rule of law are restored, these regions will remain nests of insurgency and drug production—and represent the biggest challenge to containment.
Especially in developing countries in conflict, there have been allegations that the CIA assisted the illicit drug activities of local leaders who saw that as a payment for their assistance.
Counternarcotics mission
Ironically, given the numerous allegations of the CIA's involvement in drug trafficking operations, the CIA has a mandate to give support to counter-narcotics efforts.
CIA publishes reference materials in this area, such as "Heroin Movement Worldwide".
CIA supported a reevaluation of US antidrug priorities by the President's Office of National Drug Control Policy by publishing a paper that addressed the strategic vulnerabilities of the global drug trade. The paper addressed the exploitable operational, logistical, financial, and geographic weakness of the many criminal enterprises that supply narcotics to the United States and other markets. The paper was well received by the Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, and he instructed the law enforcement community to use it as a template to craft a companion product addressing the vulnerabilities of the US domestic drug trade.
CIA analysts wrote the first-ever analysis of drug flows and consumption in Brazil, the world's second-largest consumer of cocaine after the United States. The study entailed open-source field collection and an innovative methodology for calculating the prevalence of drug use.
Latin America
Main article: CIA and Contra's cocaine trafficking in the US
There have been allegations that CIA was involved in the Latin American drug trade, possibly to finance operations in Nicaragua and other areas where Congress had denied funding, such as Afghanistan during the Soviet invasion, and in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War. According to a personal account by Everett Ellis Briggs, former U.S. Ambassador to Panama and Honduras, CIA undermined efforts to put a stop to the drug smuggling activities of Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega prior to the December, 1989 U.S. invasion of Panama.
Iran-Contra related
Released on April 13, 1989, the Kerry Committee report found that the U.S. State Department had assisted drug traffickers:
"who provided support for the Contras were involved in drug trafficking […] and elements of the Contras themselves knowingly received financial and material assistance from drug traffickers."
Some of these payments were after the traffickers had been indicted by federal law enforcement agencies on drug charges or while traffickers were under active investigation by these same agencies. The report declared, "It is clear that individuals who provided support for the Contras were involved in drug trafficking […] and elements of the Contras themselves knowingly received financial and material assistance from drug traffickers."
Representative Maxine Waters testified to Congress:
“ Senator Kerry and his Senate investigation found drug traffickers had used the Contra war and tie to the Contra leadership to help this trade. Among their findings, the Kerry committee investigators found that traffickers used the Contra supply networks and the traffickers provided support for Contras in return. The CIA created, trained, supported, and directed the Contras and were involved in every level of their war. ”
In 1996, investigative journalist Gary Webb wrote a series of articles for the San Jose Mercury News entitled, "Dark Alliance", in which he reported evidence that CIA aircraft, which had ferried arms to the Nicaraguan Contras, had been used to ship cocaine to the United States on their return flights. In 1998 the new DCI, George Tenet, declared that he was releasing the report.[8] The report of CIA Inspector General Frederick Hitz and Hitz's testimony showed that the "CIA did not 'expeditiously' cut off relations with alleged drug traffickers" and "the CIA was aware of allegations that 'dozens of people and a number of companies connected in some fashion to the contra program' were involved in drug trafficking" Hitz also said that under an agreement in 1982 between Ronald Reagan's Attorney General William French Smith and the CIA, agency officers were not required to report allegations of drug trafficking involving non-employees, which was defined as meaning paid and non-paid "assets [meaning agents], pilots who ferried supplies to the contras, as well as contra officials and others. This agreement was revealed,at a time when there were allegations that the CIA was using drug dealers in its covert operation to bring down the leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua. Only after Congressional funds were restored in 1986 was the agreement modified to require the CIA to stop paying agents whom it believed were involved in the drug trade.
Webb also alleged that Central American narcotics traffickers could distribute cocaine in U.S. cities in the 1980s without the interference of normal law enforcement agencies, and that the CIA intervened to prevent the prosecution of drug dealers who were helping to fund the Contras. The Mercury News ultimately retracted Webb's conclusions, and Webb was not authorized to conduct any further investigative reporting. Webb was transferred to cover non-controversial suburban stories and subsequently gave up journalism and committed suicide.
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