It's one of the most common lefty talking points I see around but I was wondering what the best historical knowledge we have on the topic is. Any cool videos or articles you'd recommend?
There's a decent movie about Gary Webb that came out in 2014 called Kill the Messenger that gives a general overview of what he was able to uncover.
Webb's book is called Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion, and is supposed to be pretty good. I haven't read it myself, but it's on my list.
Another one on my list is Whiteout: CIA, Drugs and the Press which covers the CIA's history with drugs (with the exception of opium in Afghanistan since the book came out in 1998).
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93Contra_affair
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscar_Danilo_Bland%C3%B3n
Nicaraguan born drug trafficker who is best known as one of the main subjects of the 1996 newspaper series "Dark Alliance" by reporter Gary Webb.
markets in Nicaragua during the government of Anastasio Somoza. When the Somoza regime was overthrown in 1979, Blandón fled to the United States,[2] and then raised money for the Nicaraguan Democratic Force (FDN), a Contra group. As part of his fundraising activities Blandón began selling cocaine. Eventually Blandón became a major cocaine trafficker in the Los Angeles area.[3]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%22Freeway%22_Rick_Ross
A Nicaraguan exile and cocaine distributor named Danilo Blandón was acquainted with Arguellas and Corrales, and although he did not know him personally, was impressed with the amount of cocaine that Ross was moving. Blandón offered to supply cocaine to Corrales to sell to Ross, for a fifty-fifty split of the profit.[18] Eventually, Corrales lost his appetite for the cocaine business and retired, at which point Ross became a direct customer of Blandón.[19]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Webb
Webb was found dead in his Carmichael home on December 10, 2004, with two gunshot wounds to the head. His death was ruled a suicide
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_involvement_in_Contra_cocaine_trafficking
Edit: that's for south america and coke, for SEA and smack check out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_America_(airline)
Air America was an American passenger and cargo airline established in 1946 and covertly owned and operated by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from 1950 to 1976. It supplied and supported covert operations in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War, including providing support for drug smuggling in Laos.[1][2][3]
If you want a highly editorialized version, the show Snowfall is pretty good. Kinda interesting to see a big HBO show where the us government is the bad guys and literally selling drugs to black communities to arm fascists in south America.
It features the Black Panthers pretty prominently too, the story is fictional, but it's based on the real story. They focus mainly on the son of a Black Panther who fell off the wagon after Fred Hampton died. The son becomes the main distributor for CIA cocaine in LA and they do really good showing the contrast between him and his father
https://youtu.be/OYZTNQ62aCI
https://www.c-span.org/video/?10353-1/secret-wars-cia
The podcast Death is just around the corner did a nice series on Iran Contra that goes over it. Episodes 79-81.
