Title: The CIA, Contras, Gangs, and Crack - Institute for Policy Studies
Headings: The CIA, Contras, Gangs, and Crack
The CIA, Contras, Gangs, and Crack
History of CIA Involvement in Drug Trafficking
1947 to 1951, France
Early 1950s, Southeast Asia
1950s to early 1970s, Indochina
1973 to 1980, Australia
1970s and 1980s, Panama
1980s, Central America
Mid-1980s to early 1990s, Haiti
1980s to early 1990s, Afghanistan

Content: There was substantial evidence of drug smuggling through the war zones on the part of individual contras, contra suppliers, contra pilots, mercenaries who worked with the contras, and contra supporters throughout the region. . . . U.S. officials involved in Central America failed to address the drug issue for fear of jeopardizing the war efforts against Nicaragua. . . . In each case, one or another agency of the U.S. government had information regarding the involvement either while it was occurring, or immediately thereafter. . . . Senior U.S. policy makers were not immune to the idea that drug money was a perfect solution to the contras’ funding problems.” In Costa Rica, which served as the “Southern Front” for the contras (Honduras being the Northern Front), there were several CIA-contra networks involved in drug trafficking. In addition to those servicing the Meneses-Blandon operation (detailed by the Mercury News) and Noriega’s operation, there was CIA operative John Hull, whose farms along Costa Rica’s border with Nicaragua were the main staging area for the contras. Hull and other CIA-connected contra supporters and pilots teamed up with George Morales, a major Miami-based Colombian drug trafficker who later admitted to giving $3 million in cash and several planes to contra leaders. In 1989, after the Costa Rica government indicted Hull for drug trafficking, a DEA-hired plane clandestinely and illegally flew the CIA operative to Miami, via Haiti. The U.S. repeatedly thwarted Costa Rican efforts to extradite Hull to Costa Rica to stand trial. Another Costa Rican-based drug ring involved a group of Cuban Americans whom the CIA had hired as military trainers for the contras.