http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB2/nsaebb2.htm
The Contras, Cocaine, and Covert Operations

National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 2
For more information contact:
202/994-7000 or nsarchiv@gwu.edu



Washington, D.C. – An August, 1996, series in the San Jose Mercury News by reporter Gary Webb linked the origins of crack cocaine in California to the contras, a guerrilla force backed by the Reagan administration that attacked Nicaragua's Sandinista government during the 1980s. Webb's series, "The Dark Alliance," has been the subject of intense media debate, and has focused attention on a foreign policy drug scandal that leaves many questions unanswered.

This electronic briefing book is compiled from declassified documents obtained by the National Security Archive, including the notebooks kept by NSC aide and Iran-contra figure Oliver North, electronic mail messages written by high-ranking Reagan administration officials, memos detailing the contra war effort, and FBI and DEA reports. The documents demonstrate official knowledge of drug operations, and collaboration with and protection of known drug traffickers. Court and hearing transcripts are also included.
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as well as so many other issues that don't fit the "there is no such thing as a government conspiracy" narrative.

is dominated by hardcore fuss-budgets who only want to talk about the same general topics that they deem as current politics. Therefore, a whole range of interesting discussion is confined to the backwoods forums under "Offbeat" and under that subgroup "Creative Speculation".

I know why so many people in the Lounge purposely avoid GD like the plague. There are some of the most close-minded people on that forum that you could ever find. For the most part, they simply obsess over one thing, that being the political headlines of the day.

This is not to say that there aren't plenty of people dying to talk about subjects like the Kennedy Assassination, Iran Contra, or various other topics of great interest. But they are restrained by the hosts and their moderators, along with their narrow-minded clients who support them.