The Colonels Corner Dark Alliance Part 9

1:31:44

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Transcript

0:00 Good afternoon, everyone. Good afternoon, Colonel. Oh, you're talking. Yep. I'm in the examining room already and should be out the door soon. Okay. She had a bad appointment, so I wasn't sure she was going to be able to be talking right away. All right. Just let me know when SR gets in. All right. We've got a lot to get to today. It's getting good.

0:30 All right. So we talked about free freeway Ricky Ross yesterday and how he fit into the whole picture and basically contaminating all of inner Los Angeles with cocaine and crack. OK, so within a year, Ricky Ross of crack making its first appearance.

1:04 He was selling over a million to a million and a quarter doses of crack every month. That's crazy. So during 82 to 83, Blandon said that he and Menendez brought three or four plain loads of cocaine from Miami to Los Angeles, according to the Torres brothers.

1:35 Each one of those loads from Miami ranged from 200 to 400 kilos. These regular flights continued until at least 1984. They were not sure whether all of that was sold directly to Ross, but a huge chunk of it was because he didn't really have too much competition. Blandon and Harry's cocaine deals with Ross began frightening the novice dealer. He was selling him so much.

2:07 that he was getting a little paranoid, Blandon said. Somebody from his organization was in jail. And he basically said, now, just remind you, Henry is the original go-between. He was the wholesaler. So it was Blandon, Henry, and then Ricky. And he was getting very nervous. He wanted to take his money and run. So basically...

2:39 He wanted to go literally out of the country, someplace with a low cost of living. He felt like the $200,000 or $300,000 that he accumulated would go a long way. So Henry was not turning over his customer base for free, though. He wanted Blandon to continue giving him commissions when he sold to Freeway Ricky.

3:14 And that didn't go over very well. So basically, Blandon tried to kind of edge him out. And in the middle of this was a woman by the name of Mary Monroe. She was a friend and an employee of Ross. And so they basically are going to try to just do a direct on deal.

3:42 And when Henry leaves, they're just going to basically cut him out. So Ross, recalling the meeting, we had a place, one of the ladies in our neighborhood, we used to hang out in her backyard and play pool with Danielle, meaning Blandon, met him in the backyard. And there's a lot of talking back and forth. And basically, they're just trying to set up.

4:13 And so basically it said everybody else was paying $3,000 for an ounce of cocaine. And we wanted to deal directly with Daniello and get it for $1,800 an ounce. So Blandon goes on a trip to South America. And it was then that he knew why Henry was nervous. It was where he was.

4:43 where Blandon went was a very rough area of town where firearms was everywhere. And Henry didn't like the corresponding violence that was starting to go along. Because remember, when they first started doing this whole cocaine thing, it was very upper class people. The entire dynamics of the cocaine trade changed during this.

5:13 transition to focus on inner cities. And along with that came gangs and violence and stuff like that. So while Blandon was testifying under oath, he kept changing the dates of when things were supposedly happening.

5:41 He basically said, oh, that happened in 82. No, it happened in 83. No, it happened in 84. Because he's realizing as he's talking that he's lying and it may have conflicted with something else he said. So Gary Webb says, Harry's retirement also seems to improve the quality of the cocaine Ross is getting. Because obviously Henry was cutting it.

6:09 When he took it to the dealers and his customers, they began raving about it. It was much more pure. And Ricky had decided that he was going to innovate a little bit. And it said if the neighborhoods were the dealers, if there was a neighborhood where the dealers were not pushing his supply, Ross said, he would find the hood's top dealer.

6:40 Pay him a friendly visit, bringing with him a couple of kilos of the finest heroin. And he would give it to him free. Take it out and see what you think. And just I'm not giving you guys a lot of the details, but understand this. Ricky, for being a high school dropout, is a business genius in a very evil industry.

7:10 the whole, he had a whole factory of cooking the crack cocaine. He had like a manufacturing line. He didn't leave anything out. And you can tell by the book and the way Gary Webb writes about him that he grudgingly respected his business dealings, even though he was in a very bad industry. Ross said that his first deal with Blanton was for around eight,

7:43 Landon, however, said it was more than that, at least a kilo. But anyway, in one reference, it says that Ricky had become the Walmart of cocaine and South Central L.A. had become a boomtown of sorts because of how rich all of the dealers were getting.

8:15 In a 1983 story began appearing in the Los Angeles Sentinel that the South Central Area Black-oriented news weeklies, the news weekly was called Los Angeles Sentinel, about crack houses that were springing up here and there. I would say things got worse when cocaine hit the streets in 83 because prior to that, all the brothers that were

8:43 selling angel dust, PCP, or whatever. And that was fairly hard to get. So this open floodgate of cocaine basically made everybody much more prosperous if you were on the distribution side of it. Right when I was starting to sell drugs, Scarface came out, Ross said, referring to a remake of

9:17 Pacino's Cocaine Kingpin. And isn't it interesting how we see so many times these movies kind of go along with real life? That's not an accident.

9:29 Barely a year had passed since the CIA had taken over the financing of the Contras and already a covert war was no longer a secret. The week before the 1982 elections, Newsweek magazine published the first detailed account of the Reagan administration's support of the Contras. It was called America's Secret War, Target Nicaragua. The cover story portrayed the Contras whose forces had built up.

9:57 around a 4,000-man army as being positioned to overthrow the Sandinistas. There was full-color photographs, and basically they made it sound as if the invasion was imminent. But that was a gross exaggeration of reality. The Contras, in truth, had just started receiving American weapons and supplies from the Reagan administration.

10:25 According to one account, the main source for Newsweek's story was none other than CIA Director William Casey, who wanted to ensure that the Contra project didn't get shelved. Now that it was public knowledge that the administration was helping the Contras, Casey's reasoning was that he would look like a sellout if he didn't continue. The reporting incensed some members of Congress, particularly those who

10:55 had been told by the CIA officials that the Contras were merely border guards keeping the Sandinistas from getting into El Salvador. The Contras' first major act of war, in fact, had nothing to do with El Salvador. Under CIA direction, two bridges linking Honduras and Nicaragua were blown up in March of 1982, and Operation Contra Commanders considered to be the opening shots of the war.

11:24 In response to the Newsweek report, Congressman Tom Harkins proposed a complete cutoff of the funding of all paramilitary activities in Nicaragua. The fact that the war was illegal, Harkins argued, was nothing compared to the U.S. government cozying up to perhaps some of the most hated groups of Nicaraguans that existed outside Nicaraguan borders.

11:52 meaning the Samosans. Harkins called them vicious cutthroat murderers and urged Congress to end any involvement. When Reagan administration heard about Harkins' proposed amendment to the annual budget, Oliver North later wrote, they hit the roof. The president let it be known to Congress that if they approved the Harkin Amendment, which was unlikely anyway, that he would promptly veto it.

12:20 Instead, Congress passed the first Bolin Amendment, named after Massachusetts Democrat Edward Bolin, who authored it. He was a member of the House Intel Committee, and it was drafted by Bolin. Now, keep in mind, we're in a Republican administration. It was drafted by Bolin without a single ability to mean anything.

12:46 It left glaring big loopholes. And while on the surface it was said, yeah, you're not supposed to be doing that. There was literally huge, like garage door size loopholes in it. He knew full well that the CIA had been funding the Contras because he's being briefed on it. And he was not opposed to it.

13:12 But Harkin's move, making a public issue out of a secret CIA project, had put Boland on the hot seat, supposedly. Another one of those kabuki dances. Boland told Harkin's that Congress had no business passing laws like the one that he was proposing. Yeah, he was attacking Harkin's bill because Harkin's bill was much more rigorous. That's why there was an intelligence committee, Boland said.

13:39 Yeah, like we know they're doing it. Shut up. Boland went on to say that there was an intelligence committee to keep the nation's secrets and exercise sensible and prudent oversight. What a joke. The intelligence committee, a body generally protective of the CIA, had been one of the few committees told about the secret Contra project.

14:10 To keep Harkins quiet and other liberals, Boland agreed to an amendment to prohibit the use of taxpayer funds, quote, for the purpose of overthrowing the government of Nicaragua. OK, so all they did was say they weren't trying to overthrow the government and they just kept right on going. No doubt the lawmakers were eager to get home for the holidays. But the reason the Boland Amendment received unanimous support is because it accomplished absolutely nothing.

14:41 It was a fraud designed to make it look like Congress was doing something and didn't do anything. Internal government memos show that the CIA, White House, Defense Department, and the Contra congressional supporters knew that the Contras had no hope of defeating the Sandinistas. Since there was no way in hell the Contras was ever going to overthrow the Nicaraguan government, their supporters reasoned they could continue spending CIA funds despite the bowling amendment.

15:10 If the Contras were given money for one purpose, arms interdiction, and decided to use it in another way, well, that wasn't the CIA's fault, was it? The money hadn't been given for that purpose of overthrowing the government. Indeed, by early 1983, CIA dollars were pouring into Honduras and Costa Rica in torrents. Best of all, the Contras no longer had to ask Argentine advisors for permission to spend it.

15:38 Most of them had been called home by 1982 after their country's disastrous civil war with the Balkan Islands. Enrique Bermudez and other top-ranking FDN officials started living like real generals. They bought houses with balconies overlooking beautiful hillside country in exclusive neighborhoods, all on our taxpayer dollars.

16:09 Bermudez and his staff spent their evenings dining, smoking cigars, drinking tequila, and carousing at the best restaurants. Bermudez had also developed a taste for young teenage girls, and his men were recruiting them out of Nicaragua. That was written about by journalist Sam Dillon in his 1991 book called Commandos.

16:37 Bermudez was inviting them from the base camps and he would call them his secretaries. Dillon wrote that the CIA was sending tens of thousands of dollars a month to Bermudez's general staff to pay the family salaries of his field commanders and other sums to buy food for thousands of the fighters. But much of that aid never reached the fighters because the commanders.

17:06 were using it. The Southern Front commanders located in Costa Rica, Idan Pastora and Chamorro, constantly complained that Bermudez and his CIA friends were stifling them on supplies, raking off the best weapons and food and sending them the garbage. Because remember,

17:29 The guys that are in Honduras are the old National Guard generals that the CIA wants to deal with. And Pastora is the other group that's in Costa Rica that they don't really like. Bermuda's staff officers were pocketing a lot of the money, Dillon wrote. They were also stealing half of the CIA's food budget.

17:53 They were only shipping things like beans and rice to the base camps, but they were billing the CIA full rations. Several accounts, including Dillon's, paint a picture of a massive corruption inside of the FDN perpetuated by Bermudez and his closest associates, death squad leaders, Ricardo Lau, a millionaire land baron, Aristide Sanchez.

18:24 At one point, dozens of mid-level FDN held commander positions petitioned to have Bermudez fired for stealing money and squandering the supplies. Some CIA officers were pushing for his removal as well. That didn't happen. But Bermudez had friends at Langley, which is why it didn't happen. After he contacted them about a mutiny, the complainers, one by one, were

18:55 expelled. The CIA brass felt they couldn't dump the obedient asset who had constructed their entire project. Congressional discomfort over the CIA's army was growing. By May, the House Intelligence Committee issued a special report suggesting the operation was illegal and that the administration knew plainly that the Contras were trying to overthrow the Nicaraguan government.

19:23 By July of 1983, the House passed a resolution to stop all aid to the Contras. Opposition in the House to aiding the Nicaraguan rebels seemed almost insurmountable, and it would be easy for the House Democrats to block passage of a new aid authorization in 1984 than it had been to cut it off in 1983, according to Robert Kagan.

19:54 Same guy, same guy in the State Department. Yet it was somewhere along this time, according to Blanton, that he stopped sending the profits from his L.A. cocaine sales to the Contras. At other times, he had said that it was late 1982. Blanton said that the reason was is because they had plenty of money now. He didn't need to donate his money.

20:23 In 1983, according to him, this is what he's saying, the Contras gets a lot of money from the U.S., he told a federal grand jury in 1994. And they were, when Reagan got into power, Mr. Reagan got into power, we start receiving a lot of money. And the people that was in charge, it was the CIA. So they didn't want to raise any money because they have, they had the money that they wanted.

20:52 He speaks some broken English. That's not me. End of quote. The U.S. attorney asked him, was they getting the money from the government? He said, yes, for the Contra Revolution. Okay. So we started, you know, the ambitious person. We started doing business ourselves, Blanton said. To make money for yourself? Yes. There's a lot of money to be made. Yes, Blanton said.

21:21 Blanton told the CIA inspectors that the FDN commander, Bermudez, came to California sometime in 83 and told him personally that it wasn't necessary for the L.A. group to raise any more money. The FDN needed people, not money, because the CIA was providing the money now. But Blanton's mentor, Norwin Menendez, said Blanton remained a loyal financial supporter to the Contras for the duration of the war.

21:50 Asked when Blanton stopped giving money to the Contras, Menendez replied, never as far as I know. Blanton said that he was working for Menendez at the time the Contras cocaine kickbacks ended. I continued to work for a period of time, about six months, and then I changed because Menendez was, it was the same thing. I wasn't making any money. Blah, blah, blah.

22:19 Blandon said he owed Menendez around $100,000 and couldn't seem to reduce the debt because I didn't make any money. We're going to hear this story a few more times. Poor Blandon. The Colombians were happy to help in supplying cocaine. Blandon said, and he was encouraged to strike out on his own.

22:45 When I fight with Norwin, the Colombian people started, you know, pushing me along, trying to cross Norwin. And they go with me and talk to me that I can make it myself. Asking Colombians for cocaine on credit was not difficult. They were used to working cocaine deals that way. They would give you the cocaine and a few days later you sell it, then you pay them what you owe.

23:12 It was a clever way for the cartels to expand their customer base in the U.S. The Colombians advanced Blanton 15 kilos worth about a million dollars, and they were off to the races. He started out getting 15 kilos a month, and within a few months, he had progressed to 30 a month. He left Menendez and the Contras behind and concentrated on making money for himself.

23:40 But several parts of Blanton's story doesn't add up. He testified that when he was supplying Henry Corrales in 1983, Ross was already selling up to seven kilos a day. So where is he getting all the crack? Blanton said that he had other customers as well. So in Blanton's testimony about the size of the initial dealings with the Columbians is true. He wouldn't even have had enough to supply Ross for a week, much less a month.

24:09 Before his purported split from Menendez, he had been selling far larger quantities of cocaine than what he admitted. So Blanton was asked, do you remember if you were getting large amounts or small amounts from Menendez? His reply was, at the end, it was large. And what's a large amount? 40 to 50 kilos at a time, he testified.

24:37 During his federal grand jury appearance in 94, Blanton was asked to estimate how much total you would have gotten from Norwin during the time he was receiving cocaine from him. How many I received from Norwin, he asked? Yes. Well, it was I received from him. OK, not for me, because it was I was only the administrator at the time. I received in L.A. about 200 or 300.

25:07 But Blanton didn't make his first sell until the spring of 1982 and spent a year to 18 months dealing only in small amounts, according to previous testimony. In fact, evidence turned up by the FBI and DEA in later years showed that Blanton and Menendez were still working together as late as 1991. The guy literally lies about everything. In August of 86, Blanton and Menendez had...

25:38 intelligence files, computerized profiles maintained by the federal government on suspected drug traffickers. It showed both men as current associates. It also said that if Blanton had double-crossed Menendez in 82 or 83 by stealing his sources and his LA customers, it's doubtful the men would have remained friends and business partners.

26:07 which they were because they owned joint property in Latin America. What appears to have happened is that Blanton acquired additional sources of supply sometime in 84 and became his own boss in L.A. when Menendez remained in charge of the San Francisco drug operation. They continued working with each other and with the Contras for years, but more as equals.

26:37 who were present at the time, confirmed this is in fact true. The principal group is controlled by Blanton and is the local focal point for drug supplies and money laundering for others, per a 1986 DEA report. The other group is ran by Menendez and located in San Francisco, per a confidential informant. Cocaine is often transported to Blanton's association.

27:05 and then from Blanton to Menendez in San Francisco. That was according to a DEA report. In a 1992 interview with the FBI, Blanton's associate, Josito Torres, one of the two Torres brothers, told agents that Blanton continued receiving cocaine from Menendez for at least two years longer than Blanton admitted.

27:30 As of approximately 84, Blanton was involved in cocaine sales in the Glendale, California area. Blanton's supplier as of 84 continued to be Menendez, Torres said. But in 84, things expanded drastically and Menendez was flying plane loads of dope in from Miami to keep up with the demand.

27:56 Nor when Menendez, Blanton's supplier in 83 and 84, routinely flew in 200 to 400 kilos from Miami weekly. A 1990 DEA report requesting the formation of a multi-agency task force targeting Blanton and Menendez shows that DEA agents believe that the two who were supposedly disassociated with each other

28:30 were actually still working together. And this is a quote. They had reunited to head, quote, a criminal organization that operates internationally from Colombia and Bolivia through the Bahamas, Costa Rica, Nicaragua to the United States, unquote. The report claimed the drug ring was getting its cocaine from the politically connected Suarez family in Bolivia.

29:00 and the Alka family in Colombia. The founders, of course, and then in the DEA report, they blamed it on the Medellin cartel, when we know for a fact that they were dealing directly with the Cali cartel. The Bolivian cocaine was coming into Miami, the report said. The DEA reported that Menendez had given Blandon his start in Los Angeles.

29:32 In the 80s, Blandin had operated directly for Menendez, according to the report. Blandin continued dealing with Menendez through 84. And this was confirmed in a Los Angeles Times news article that was written in 1996 that attempted to demonstrate that Blandin and Menendez had split in 82. The Times, because they're trying to keep the story straight.

30:01 The Times claimed to have interviewed an unnamed cocaine trafficking associate of Blandon's who said that he was present at Menendez's house in the Bay Area a day when Menendez and Blandon were celebrating the consummation of a big drug deal. Danilo and Norwin had done some business, the Times quoted. The deal involved 40 or 50 kilos. The money was divvied up.

30:27 There was cash all over the place. They were cooking steaks on the grill. It was a big party. The phone rang and Menendez's girlfriend, Blanca Margarita Castano, answered it and shrieked. Herrero has been arrested. Well, everyone cleared out in a heartbeat. They grabbed the money and ran. Records show that his arrest happened in 1984, not 1982.

30:57 which was two years after Blanton had testified that he had stopped working with them. So even when they try to report the difference, if you check the facts, they're lying. Okay, during a visit, there's one of their cohorts.

31:24 said Blanton starts telling me he'd been doing a lot of things with the black people down in Los Angeles. And I said, yeah, so? And he wanted to see if I was interested in doing something up here. His last name is Corneo. He said, why? And he asked if I would like to get into what he referred to as the black thing. No one cares about them, he told him.

31:52 When they start killing themselves, no one cares. That's what Blanton said to the guy who was trying to get into the business. The guy he's talking to says, don't play me with that race thing. Business is business, but don't play me with the race thing. The difference between him and me was I grew up in San Francisco and it didn't mean as much to us.

32:20 But they grew up in Nicaragua with rich, powerful people. And that's the way he thought. Blandon's own experience had taught him that no one cared about cocaine pouring into primarily black South Central L.A. By then, he had received no interference from the police whatsoever. Only the media in L.A. that seemed alarmed at the spread of the crack in black neighborhoods.

32:50 every once in a while, would write an article on it. In 1983, for instance, former L.A. Dodger legend Maury Willis was arrested for driving a stolen car. The Los Angeles Herald-Examiner noted that the arresting officer also found a small vial on the front seat containing rock-like substance believed to be cocaine. Police said a clear glass pipe was found next to the vial.

33:20 The L.A. officer refused to speculate if it was drug paraphernalia or had anything to do with the cocaine. The story said Willis was booked on grand theft auto allegations pending further identification of the white substance. Starting in 1984, unlike what had been seen for the last two years, street cops like Steve Pollack were arresting low-level dealers in South Central.

33:50 with more cocaine than they had ever seen before. And keep in mind, this is around the exact same time Joe Biden implemented that law that was going to send all of these people to prison for decades. And tell me this is not an attack on the Black community. They've destroyed the Black family already in the 60s, and now they're going after the young Black men.

34:19 to basically start these gang wars in the inner cities. So anyway, the LAPD is like going crazy because there's just like literally drugs everywhere, everywhere they turn. The patrolmen were reporting their fines to the major violations unit, but was getting nowhere, Pollack said, who was one of the LAPD's crack experts.

34:49 and lectured police departments around the country on what it was. A lot of detectives, a lot of cops were saying to them, hey, these blacks no longer are we just seeing gram dealers. These guys are doing ounces. They're doing kilos. The major violations unit, which dealt primarily with Colombian and South Americans, found such reports hard to swallow.

35:18 They were saying basically, ah, South Central, how much could they be dealing? Pollack laughed. The money's not there. We're not going to bring in millions of dollars in seizures or large quantities of coke down there. As a result, the crack dealers of South Central virtually went untouched for a very long period of time. They enjoyed quite a run with no one looking.

35:44 And again, that's because the perception of most of the other cops was that cocaine was a rich man's job, not a poor man's job. The same could not be said for the Menendez's organization in San Francisco. Since 1981, it had been under constant investigation by the DEA, the FBI, and the California Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement.

36:13 But aside from a couple of nickel and dime busts of Norwin's nephews, nothing had happened to Norwin. Norwin was a target of ours. This is a quote. And his organization was one that we had worked on, said Jerry Smith, a former San Francisco bureau chief of the California Drug Task Force. But Smith said Menendez Network was so tight.

36:41 that it was impossible to get anyone inside. The Menendez's organization, one federal prosecutor wrote in 93, had been the target of unsuccessful investigation attempts for many years. Menendez, on the other hand, seemed to have much better luck at infiltrating the police. There were some things that happened, this is according to him, and I'm really kind of reluctant to go into it, Smith said.

37:08 It had nothing to do with the CIA or the FBI. It had to do with one of my guys who subsequently was fired. I think he was brokering some information to somebody for money. We got onto it very quickly, so he was no longer around. I don't think anything ever came to fruition, but it was something that bothered us for a long time. So in other words, Menendez had moles in the police.

37:38 Menendez, in an interview, boasted that he had a DEA agent on his payroll and he was feeding him information about anything the government was investigating. And I don't doubt that for a minute. Even if that's true, it doesn't go the full length to understanding why he was never actually prosecuted. It's hard to imagine.

38:06 That one or two corrupt narcotic officers in the DEA could hold off the entire U.S. law enforcement community. What about the FBI? What about the CIA? They all know the drugs are coming in. So according to Dennis Ainsworth, this is a quote. Oh, he, Menendez, was totally protected by the U.S. government. Dennis.

38:37 Ainsworth is a former San Francisco area economics professor. He was protected by everyone under the sun, Ainsworth said. He had came to that conclusion in a very difficult and painful way. Ainsworth, you see, was a conservative Republican Party big wig in California and nationally.

39:02 He was a very staunch supporter of the Contras. He threw himself into the cause wholeheartedly as far back as 1983. He had posted, found jobs for, taken care of, donated money to all of the Nicaraguans that flocked to San Francisco. He said,

39:27 that he was very supportive of all of the refugees. He worked with liberal churches in the San Francisco area, trying to help them all. In February 1984, Ainsworth said he saw an announcement in the San Francisco Chronicle for a seminar at the Drake Hotel concerning Central America and the Contras. So he attended. He met Julio Vanella.

39:56 a Nicaraguan who had been a local coordinator for the FDN. The men chatted briefly, exchanged phone numbers, and according to at least one source, the entire meeting was paid for by Menendez. About three weeks later, Ainsworth said Benalla called him and invited him to an informal meeting.

40:25 had a house in San Francisco to meet some other Nicaraguans that maybe could help. Ainsworth found the group Pleasant consisting of middle-aged husbands and wives, most of them Nicaraguan immigrants, one of which was Anastasio Simoes, the president, the former president of Nicaragua's dentist. Their leader,

40:55 was a pharmaceutical salesman by the name of Don Sinoccio, known to others in the trade as Mr. Malox, because he sold popular antacid prescriptions to local hospitals. Sinoccio was not Nicaraguan. He had been born in Italy and had moved to Nicaraguan in the 30s.

41:25 and married a local Nicaraguan woman by the name of Nydia Gonzalez. She was the daughter of General Gonzalez, part of the National Guard. As the covert war in Nicaragua escalated, stories about the conflict began popping up in San Francisco newspapers, and Sinico read them avidly, but not happily.

41:52 He believed the press was cheerleading for the Sandinistas, and he fired off letter after letter after letter. In late 1983, Sinico said he had gotten a phone call from a man named Aldolfo Calero, head of the political wing of the FDN. Sinico said that Calero had called him about his letter-writing campaign and flattered him and said, we need your help.

42:21 We need you to be part of our PR group. Sinico formed a small organization called United Support Against Communism in the Americas. He and his friends held local meetings to publicize the plight of the Contras. Sinico said he had never met Calero before, but his wife and Calero's wife were old friends from Managua.

42:53 They, Calero had been part of the Chamber of Commerce down there. He also is the guy, remember a long time ago, we talked about this in a former chapter. He's the guy that was the distributorship for Coca-Cola down there. He also, while he had the distributorship for Coca-Cola, not unlike the story we learned about in Chile with Pepsi, he was a CIA asset.

43:21 He was someone the U.S. government had hoped would replace Somoza as president before the Sandinista takeover. According to former FDN director Edgar Chamorro, Calero had been working with the CIA in Nicaragua for a very long time. He served, among other things, as a conduit for funds for the U.S. embassy.

43:48 to various student and labor organizations under Somoza's government in Nicaragua, something we see in all of these stories. Pay the labor people to not be labor people. In early 1983, the CIA had brought Calera out of Nicaragua and installed him as the political director of the FDN.

44:17 was a familiar face of Nicaraguan rebels in the United States. Calero spoke perfect English. He was a graduate of Notre Dame. Calero and Bermudez were our main links with the CIA, Chamorro declared. They met constantly with the CIA station chief.

44:43 In 1984, Calero began visiting San Francisco frequently. Ainsworth and Sinico said and would usually stay in their house while he was there doing business. Ainsworth was dismayed at the lack of political sophistication displayed by these groups. The Nicaraguans were eager and committed to the Contra cause, Ainsworth recalled, but there wasn't a soul.

45:13 in America's political system that was helping. So he decided to take it upon himself to help because he had political connections everywhere. He wanted to draw attention to their cause. Why not sponsor a speaking tour and have some contra officials, such as Adolfo Calero, do the speaking? Bring him to town, show him around, get some good press coverage. Sinoka, who was the president of their little local chapter,

45:45 was very impressed with Ainsworth's ideas and his political connections, and they voted to make him the director of their new group. As far as I knew, he was presumably very active in Republican politics. He knew senators, representatives, both at the state level and the federal level. He knew chairmen of the political parties. He was very influential. He also had been very...

46:12 active in international, quote unquote, anti-communist efforts. Ainsworth began opening doors all over San Francisco and appeared to be able to get us booked anywhere to include the Olympic Club, the Commonwealth Club, all the ritzy places. On June 4th, 1984, Ainsworth arranged a private reception for Calero at an exclusive yacht club in San Francisco.

46:43 with several influential business leaders and statewide Republicans. It wasn't really a fundraiser. It was more of a meal and a cocktail party. Afterwards, Calero, Ainsworth, and Sinico, and about 20 others, drove over to an Italian restaurant near Fisherman's Wharf.

47:11 When the bill came, Ainsworth said that it had already been paid. Do you know who paid it? Menendez. Yeah, same guy. At the end of the dinner, they introduced Adolfo Calero and everyone. They had scheduled the next event, which was going to be a cocktail party. And Adolfo Calero was going to be the guest or the.

47:50 main event. And Norwin Menendez came in with a crowd dressed in a very expensive suit. And they're kind of milling around. Well, one of the guys, Soneko, who's kind of wanting to get pictures to put out for promotion of the cause, starts taking pictures. And Menendez gets totally pissed off at him.

48:20 They say that there was a picture taken of him and he turns his head. He doesn't want to be seen in these pictures. So and Sinico says that he suddenly realized that he's the guy that had paid the bill at the previous dinner. So he goes over to thank him. And when Menendez realized he knows that he's the one that paid the bill, he left.

48:51 He was like, yeah, you're not supposed to know that. After that, Menendez began attending meetings, but he always stayed in the back. He was always arriving like after the meeting started, kind of like he wants to be a shadow on the wall. And it says that Sinico recalled usually arriving with the Mendoza brothers who had run the Cuban.

49:23 anti-communist groups, that was an off-branch of the Miami ones. That's weird. Ainsworth said that he did not believe that there was a connection between Menendez and the Cubans other than a political one and a drug one. A former FDN mercenary from Florida, Jack Terrell, said Menendez

49:49 was plugged tightly into the Cuban exile community in Miami. He assisted the Cuban Legion in their radio propaganda shows coming from Miami, Terrell said, adding that Menendez was an associate of several members of the 2506 Brigade that made up the Bay of Pigs, because of course they're working in Honduras and El Salvador, and that's where Felix Rodriguez is. Of course they're connected. Hello.

50:21 So it says documents he provided was a handwritten note that he said were his talking points for one of the early meetings. Our first time meeting was highly successful, Sinoco had written down. He listed seven successes. The first was that Adolfo was brought over.

50:48 Success number six was we are receiving some attention from the Cuban people that appear eager to help. Success number seven was Mr. Menendez contribution. Menendez had dropped off a contribution on the little group at their first meeting and then obviously picked up their dinner tab. According to Sunoco's files, another founding member.

51:17 of their group was a man called Father Thomas Dowling. He was a San Francisco, a San Franciscan whom Sunilco had thought was some kind of priest, though he sometimes passed himself off as a Roman Catholic priest. Dowling was an ordained member of a tiny splinter church.

51:46 called North American Old Roman Catholic Church of the Euclid Succession. That's quite a name. The church whose legitimacy is a matter of some debate. While working for this group and the Contras, Dowling appeared before Congress in 1985, sporting a clerical collar and identifying himself as a Catholic church priest, which he was not.

52:17 to testify as a witness to Sandinista atrocities. His appearance had been arranged by the State Department, Office of Public Diplomacy for Latin America. It was later described, this particular office, as a CIA-ran domestic propaganda machine embedded in the State Department. Not that any of us are surprised by that.

52:44 Senior CIA officials with backgrounds in covert operations, as well as military intelligence and psychological operations specialists from the Department of Defense, were deeply involved in establishing and participating in domestic and political propaganda operation through this obscure bureau and the State Department. That was all revealed in a 1992 House Committee staff report, which concluded.

53:12 Almost all of these activities were hidden from the public view, and many of the individuals involved were never questioned or interviewed by the Iran-Contra committee. Of course they were not. It's a CIA front. They weren't going to talk to anybody about that. And what's interesting about this is we've seen this happen many times. They dress him up as a Catholic priest and pretend like he has some authority to talk on the Contra's atrocities.

53:41 He lived in San Francisco. He didn't go to Nicaragua. Dowling later admitted that he had received $73,000 in cash and traveler's checks from Oliver North, CIA agent Adolfo Calero, and other members of North's operation between 1986 and 87 to affect public opinion favorably for Ronald Reagan's position on Central America.

54:12 Dowling testified that the money went to a nonprofit organization that he had set up in San Francisco called the Latin American Strategic Studies Institute. In addition to Dowling, the institute employed a recently retired CIA officer with extensive Latin American experience by the name of G. James Quesada. He was also a Nicaraguan who lived in San Francisco.

54:46 The supposed priest said, I met Cicada when I spoke before a retired group of intelligence officers a few years back. Now, this guy, you spell his name, Q-U-E-S-A-D-A. We've come across him in several of our stories. The CIA officer confirmed that he worked with Dowling, but said that he did so as a private citizen, not CIA.

55:17 Bullshit. Okay. And he even jokes, the CIA guy says, yeah, I know everybody thinks the CIA agent never retires, but trust me, I really retired. Quesada also met Menendez and Blanton at the FDN meeting and instantly said his antenna was up. I found out that Menendez was what he was pretty quickly, but he was not involved on our side of things.

55:49 He was involved on the political side of things. Again, bullshit. All right. In addition to his work with Oliver North and the San Francisco FDN, Father Dowling was also heavily involved in the San Francisco group with Ainsworth. And this is the best part of the whole day. It was a political organization.

56:18 That was part of Reverend Moon's Unification Church. What? I about died when I read that part. During the time of the CIA funding cutoff, Moon's organization. Keep in mind, Reverend Moon Unification Church is another CIA front. Moon's organization, which was linked to the 1970s Korean Central Intelligence Agency, WACL and everything else.

56:56 Operation Gladio, Operation Condor, stepped in and began funneling money and supplies to the Contras. Dowling was a member of this organization and was part of the National Advisory Board and a frequent speaker at their events. Among the documents, let's see.

57:26 that Sunoka had, it showed that the author of a August 1984 letter from the Moon Front president was none other than an Air Force general by the name of R.D. Wallner, W-O-E-L-L-N-E-R, thanking Sunoka's

57:56 organization for attending the annual Reverend Moon organization convention and suggesting groups to work closely together in the future. Though the combination of a fringe religion and the Contras may seem strange, partly declassified CIA records show that the agency had evidence as far back as 82 that there was a

58:22 unwholesome connection between Menendez's drug ring and the FDN and an unnamed religious organization in the United States, which would be the Unification Church. According to a 1998 CIA inspector general's report, the CIA's domestic collection division, domestic collection division, another one of those oxymorons, picked up word in October 1982.

58:53 that there is an indication of links between a U.S. religious organization and two Nicaraguan counter-revolutionary groups. The heavily redacted CIA cable said these links involve an exchange in the United States of narcotics for arms. You know, because the Unification Church is a CIA firm. The CIA's domestic spies, again, oxymoron.

59:23 reported that there was to be a meeting among the participants in Costa Rica regarding this exchange and that two law enforcement agencies were aware of it, though the agencies were not known and were not named in the CIA cable. The FBI had Menendez's organization under investigation at the time and had learned through wiretaps of Menendez's Costa Rican contra associate.

59:52 by the name of Horacio Parina, Toylo Sanchez, and his brother, Fernando Sanchez, and that they were shipping cocaine to San Francisco. CIA headquarters ordered its domestic agents, again, we're not supposed to have any, to get more information about the ongoing meeting in Costa Rica.

1:00:20 And a few days later, another cable arrived at Langley with additional details. The attendees at the meeting would include representatives from the FDN, the UDN, and several unidentified U.S. citizens. The CIA cable reported it identified Ronaldo Pena as one of the four people, along with three unidentified U.S. citizens.

1:00:47 who would represent the FDN at the Costa Rica meeting. Ronaldo Pena Cabrera was one of Norwin Menendez's San Francisco drug dealers and a friend of Dennis Ainsworth. Pena was dating Danielle Blanton's sister, Leza, and was a top official in San Francisco's FDN. Pena told CIA investigators that he met Menendez in 1982.

1:01:18 at an FDN meeting and served as an official representative to their political organization in California from 1982 to 84. After that, he said, he was appointed as a military representative of the FDN in San Francisco, in part because Menendez's close relationship with the commanding general down in Honduras, Bermudez. Pena and Norwin introduced him.

1:01:47 to his nephew, the guy that got arrested, Hario, who was in charge of the distribution of the family's cocaine to their dealer network. Soon, the young Contra found himself hauling cash and drugs up and down the freeway in California. Pena says that he made six to eight trips from San Francisco to L.A.

1:02:14 for Menendez drug trafficking organization, the CIA inspector general reported. Each time, he says, he carried anywhere approximately a million dollars to Los Angeles and returned to San Francisco with eight kilos of cocaine. Pena said that the Colombian associate of Menendez told Pena that, in general terms, that a portion of the proceeds were going to the Contras.

1:02:45 That amount of money was being taken from L.A. was far more than needed to verify the bullshit lies that was being told about the guys struggling in L.A. to sell kilos. They were selling a bunch. So we know that Bonilla was lying yet again.

1:03:13 When the information about Renato Pena's involvement in the upcoming Costa Rican meeting was relayed back to Langley, CIA headquarters immediately ordered the Domestic Collections Division to halt any further investigation, allegedly because of the apparent participation of a U.S. citizen. But the agency began having second thoughts about that. And on November 17th, 1982, Langley

1:03:43 worriedly cabled one of its stations in Latin America to tell its agents that while the headquarters didn't think the reports about the Contras and drugs were true, the information was surfaced by another U.S. agency and may return to haunt us. Phil, we must try to confirm or refute the information if possible.

1:04:08 Langley wanted to know if Contra leaders had scheduled any meeting in the next few weeks. If so, what information do you have and who's going? The response, several Contra officials had recently gone to the United States for a secret meeting, including a meeting with Contra supporters in San Francisco. The Central American CIA station reported back.

1:04:31 This was during October 1982 that the FDN leaders met with Menendez in LA and San Francisco. The CIA inspector general's report is silent about what, if anything, the agency did next. Pena told CIA inspectors that the unnamed U.S. religious organization mentioned in the CIA cables was a FDN political ally that provided

1:04:57 humanitarian support to Nicaraguan refugees and logistical support to the Contra rallies. When Renato Pena said Menendez's nephew was arrested on cocaine trafficking, Ainsworth began suspecting that the FDN was involved in drug trafficking. Renato wasn't a drug dealer, Ainsworth said. He was a Contra and he was duped.

1:05:23 When the Congress cut off the aid in 1983, these guys had nowhere else to go and they wanted to get the country back. Agents found a kilo of cocaine in the trunk of Pena's car at an apartment that belonged to Menendez's nephew, maintained in Oakland, and doubled as a cocaine storage house. DEA found half a kilo in the safe because the evidence against him was so overwhelming.

1:05:53 Hand-to-hand sales to DEA agents and kilos in his car, Pena pleaded guilty to one count of possession of cocaine with intent to sell in 1985. He also agreed to help the government prosecute the Menendez nephew and was given a two-year sentence in return. As part of his deal with the government, Pena was extensively debriefed by the DEA in his interview.

1:06:21 was nothing short of astonishing, which is probably why they remain sealed for the next 15 years. When debriefed by the DEA in early 1980s, Pena said that the CIA was allowing the Contras to fly drugs into the United States, sell them, and keep the proceeds. The Justice Department IG reported in 1997, Menendez

1:06:46 nephew had told him that the US was aware of these dealings and that it was highly unlikely I would even get in trouble. Both Norwin Menendez and Blanton told him that they were raising money for the Contras through drug dealing. Blanton had even claimed the Contras would not be able to operate without the drug proceeds.

1:07:08 He also said that FDN leader Enrique Bermudez was aware of the drug deals, and Pena described Bermudez as a CIA agent. When challenged by CIA questioner on that statement, Pena merely laughed. It's very obvious, he said, Bermudez had been Somoza's military attache in Washington, and it's common knowledge in Nicaragua that anyone who has that job working for Somoza

1:07:36 worked for the CIA, which means at least that he was a contract agency, if not a direct agent. As if Pena's testimony wasn't convincing enough, the DEA obtained independent cooperation in spring of 1986 from a longtime informant who'd known Menendez since childhood, described by the DEA as a reliable, extremely reliable source.

1:08:03 He told the DEA intelligence analyst that Menendez was indeed working for the FDN and had been using drug money to buy weapons for the Contra. He also vouched for Renata Pena's credibility. Renata Pena worked for the nephew Menendez and ran the San Francisco.

1:08:26 office for the FDN, the informant said. Pena was one of the major Contra fundraisers in San Francisco and was one responsible for sending Menendez's drug proceeds to the Contras. In an interview years later with inspectors from the CIA and the Justice Department, Pena defiantly stood his ground. Even though he was under threat of immediate deportation, he insisted.

1:08:52 that the CIA knows about all of these things. The money the Contra received from the Reagan administration was peanuts and was growing military organization needed arms, supplies, food, and money to support the families. And the CIA decided to recruit Menendez so that the drug sales could be supplemental income. Bermudez could not have recruited Menendez on his own. He was there just following orders.

1:09:20 Ainsworth said that Pena was so devastated by his arrest and confessed to him his role in the Contra network. Alarmed, Ainsworth began looking into the relationship between FDN and drugs. He made inquiries in the local San Francisco Nicaraguan community and wondered among his acquaintances what Adolfo Calero and other people in the FDN were doing.

1:09:46 And the word that he received back is that they were all cocaine smugglers. Ainsworth told this to the FBI. During one of Ainsworth's trips to Washington in 1985, I went to see some friends of mine and started asking some questions. One friend slipped Ainsworth a copy of a DEA intelligence report that was dated February 6, 1984. The DEA report prepared by Agent Saldalio.

1:10:15 Gonzalez from San Jose, Costa Rica, told of the results of a debriefing of a confidential informant. Ainsworth's heart sank as he read it. The informant related that Menendez Costasero, Edmundo's younger brother, was presently residing in San Jose, Costa Rica, and it is apparent

1:10:41 that they are the head of a criminal organization responsible for smuggling kilo quantities of cocaine into the United States. This is DEA telling them that. The discovery left Ainsworth reeling. I had gone through the looking glass. I had crossed over into the nether world of 99% of the population would never know existed.

1:11:08 In September of 85, Ainsworth was contacted by U.S. Customs officials who was investigating the Nicaraguan role in a large narcotic ring extending from Miami through Texas to California. The customs agent wanted to ask Ainsworth about the FDN. During the contact, name redacted, complained to Ainsworth that the national security interest kept him from making good narcotic cases.

1:11:36 and he acted frustrated at the claims of the events. Ainsworth would later tell the FBI, according to name redacted, two U.S. Customs Service officers who felt threatened and intimidated by the national security interference in legitimate narcotic smuggling investigations had resigned and had assumed false identities because of threats.

1:12:04 The FBI report went on to say that the customs agent told Ainsworth that Menendez would have been arrested in a major drug case in 1983, except that he had been warned that he was given a warning by a redacted officer not to arrest him. Other law enforcement agencies told Ainsworth that they had on file.

1:12:33 that the FBI's file on Menendez was two feet thick. I thought this bastard should have been arrested. I assumed there would have been an outstanding warrant on this guy. I was amazed. There wasn't a single outstanding warrant on Menendez anywhere. Not one. They had no interest in him whatsoever. Here you have a major cocaine trafficker who was deeply involved in the illegal Contra deals.

1:13:01 and apparently everyone but me knew about it. After I broke with Calero, I found out Calero and Menendez are very good friends. Calero had admitted meeting with Menendez on at least six occasions in San Francisco, but he had portrayed them as simple meetings during large public gatherings. He was repeatedly denied knowing Menendez as a drug trafficker.

1:13:26 Yet he admitted to a Costa Rican paper in 1986 that he knew Menendez was involved in something illegal. So that's crazy. Crazy, crazy, crazy. That's enough. Everybody knows and no one does anything about it. All right. Let me bring Bridget back up here. Did SR ever join us? No. Can you get up here, Bridget? There you go.

1:14:17 Always the Moonies. Oh, my God. They're like a cancer that shows up everywhere. And I forgot to put on the rumble. My internet thing is not working right today. My Starlink, so. I gotcha. We've been over there chatting. Yeah, I couldn't get it to work. It just shows as pending. Yeah, yeah. It's just showing the intro on a loop. Yeah. But we'll get that fixed later.

1:14:49 You know, I tell you what, the Moody's must have been like their favorite key card to throw through. Well, keep in mind, he had billions of dollars and he had a weapons manufacturing system there. Yeah, but I think it's more than that. I think it's also the religious aspect. Like, you won't suspect me because we are considered a...

1:15:20 you know, a religious organization. Why do you think they dress the guy up as a priest to send them in to talk about how bad this, uh, Sandinistas are? Right. Right. Right. That's true. Yeah. And you know, there was, I, I can never refine it, but there were an assassination attempt that we found monks dressed or people dressed up as monks or monks involved in. Yeah. So, you know, it's just,

1:15:50 Anything they touch. They dress up the Nazis as priests to get them out of Germany. They love using it. And, oh, by the way, throughout the Latin America area, they killed priest after priest after priest. They tortured them. So they don't give a shit about religion except to use it as a tool in their covert operations. Absolutely. Absolutely.

1:16:22 And for that, they will rot in the lower part of hell. Yeah, in the sub-basement of hell. There you go. In the hottest part of the furnace. Yes, absolutely. However, there was something that I saw today that I thought was pretty funny. And even though it's unrelated, it's sort of related. But it was talking about today, or the thing with Comey.

1:16:54 being an irony that the very institution that was so corrupted, which, as we know, I don't know if the FBI was as corrupted as the CIA, but we'll go with that, and that the FBI director was integral in taking down this previous FBI director. I don't know that we've ever seen that in the CIA. Oh, hell no.

1:17:28 But hopefully this is the beginning of a trend. Notice that the list that Cash had put out a long time ago, Comey was the number one on his list. And Flynn. Both. Yeah. Yeah. So, well, for Flynn, it's personal. Right. Right. Yeah. Because not only did he sick the FBI on him, then he laughed about it afterwards. Bastard.

1:18:02 Bragged about it. Bragged about it on, yeah, on the, how does he put the CIA? No. All along always says NBCIA or something like that. Yeah. Texas Annie, did you want to say something? I didn't realize I asked for a speaker and I wondered why it went quiet. It's been doing that to me lately. Whenever I get a speaker, I can't hear anything.

1:18:34 Except like it sounds a million miles away. So I'm going to pull my speaker away. Okay. Thank you. Sure. Well, I don't see any hands today. So, and I went a little long. There's so much in this book, you guys. There's so much in this book. And as you can tell, again, if I had read this book five years ago.

1:19:08 I would have read right over the fact that the Reverend Moon Unification Church was involved in this and never even blinked an eye because I don't really know. I would have not known what that was. I would have thought it was weird, but just kept right on reading. And you cannot read these books the same way now because every piece of this is important about.

1:19:37 How all of these, because all of these stories get woven together. And that's why at some point we definitely need to pull all of them together in some type of a timeline, because it's simply amazing how overlapped they all are. Stellar, go ahead.

1:20:00 Have you guys looked into the one pastor that met with Charlie Kirk, the pastor and his son got arrested in Korea? It's like son something. Pastor's son. Hold on. No, I have not. Okay. Yeah, he was recently arrested. And then I think yesterday his son was arrested, but they had recently met with Charlie Kirk.

1:20:28 I would say this past summer, I don't know how long ago, but I don't know what's going on there. My mom mentioned it. I looked into it and it was for real. So DM me his name. I'll look and see if he's attached to the unification church. That would be crazy. Okay. Yeah. I'll, I'll, I'll pull over real quick. All right. Yeah. You don't have to do it right now. No, you can do it later. Oh, okay. Yeah. His name is like doctor or a pastor.

1:20:57 Son Hyung-do or something like that. And I don't know what, what, you know, I know nothing about him. You know, my mom mentioned it, that a lot of people in Korea are mad about that. So I just, I didn't know. It just sounds like there's a lot of boiling points going on. Yeah. When you get home, DM me the name. I'll find out. Okay. Renee, go ahead.

1:21:20 Hey, Colonel. Hey, everyone. Sorry for the noise. I'm in traffic next to a bus. But anyway, regarding this chapter, it made me kind of, well, I guess this whole book, I started reflecting on the timeline and like famous people in Hollywood and stuff. And remember, like Andy Gibb from the Bee Gees had another brother and he was a famous singer from Australia and he like OD'd on cocaine. And so I started digging in the whole

1:21:50 timeline in hollywood and this book definitely seems uh uh more in the 80s and the beginning of the crack culture and everything and the whole manipulation with hip-hop and rap and all that stuff yeah um but i was digging prior to that and it's really interesting i mean um it seems that

1:22:15 In 1914, there was something called the Harrison Act that was made domestically, which kind of started the control process of cocaine, opium, and whatever. And it seems like, I mean, not that it's the same, but not only, I guess it's just pulling my head in this direction.

1:22:40 They have to control everything. They got to control what comes in, all our medicine, our food. It started making me think about dairy because all dairy used to be raw and natural. Then they controlled that and pasteurized the hell out of it and homogenized it. It's all kind of in the direction. There was prohibition with alcohol.

1:23:07 And it was crazy. I mean, I didn't even know in the 1920s in Hollywood, apparently during the time of prohibition, there was people in the silent film era. There was an underground scene of people who would do the cocaine and the heroin and opium and stuff because they couldn't get alcohol.

1:23:34 And it's just constantly this ping pong game of how do we control to our advantage? And then there's little black markets here and little black markets there. And it's just crazy. But, yeah, there's even a book called, I don't know if you'll ever heard. Well, I know you all know who probably who Robert Evans was. He was the producer of Chinatown and The Godfather and Rosemary's Baby and all that stuff.

1:24:02 He had a book called The Kid Stays in the Picture. And he talks about in that book his issues with cocaine and its prevalence in Hollywood in the 70s was really huge and stuff. But anyway, yeah, I didn't. It just sucked me down all these little rabbit holes of learning more about it. And I thought I'd share. And that's pretty much it.

1:24:32 Thanks for all this. Yeah. That goes back to all of the Gilded Age robber barons. Most of them made their money on the open water and trafficking opium. And so when you fast forward to Prohibition and you do some research into that.

1:24:58 The Pritzkers. It was the Canadian cross-border control of illicit alcohol that made those people rich. And there's a whole series of families that was involved in that trade. And what did they all do? They bought hotels.

1:25:21 If you go back to the origins of the Pritzker family, it's crazy. There was a Pritzker and Pritzker law firm, very, very old. And all of these, the what's the name? The Canadian family that has the alcohol, the secret. Their family back in those days, they all bought hotels. That was a way of laundering money. And they.

1:25:50 they were prostitution places for a large part. They'd have entire sections of their hotel where was basically a prostitution network. And they were involved in all of the illicit type of activities and made their wealth. It's a crazy story to understand that a lot of the controllers behind the scene

1:26:19 gained their wealth through illicit means. And they didn't stop doing that. You know, like we found out more recently that that's all of the money that has been placed in these foundations that propagated the open borders and all of that stuff. It's just generation after generation of this type of activity. It's really crazy.

1:26:48 And again, it's not any history that you ever learn in school because you would grow up not trusting them and they can't have that. And so all of that history is buried. It's all out there. It's in real books, but you have to go looking for it.

1:27:08 Yeah, absolutely. And it even draws you back to the whole Arkansas thing because apparently, and I didn't know, there was this town called Hot Springs, Arkansas, and that was a hotbed for early mafia.

1:27:21 And prostitution and gambling. And guess what? That's only like an hour and a half from me to Arkansas. And then we got the Clintons. And then we got the Rockefellers in Arkansas. It's just crazy. Indeed, it's completely crazy. But it's like they rebrand the grift. And they rebrand the pirating of all the booty. Hot Springs in Arkansas was a mecca for the Chicago Mafia. Yeah.

1:27:51 That it's crazy. I don't know how you say your name. Radium. Did you come up? Did you want to say something? Go ahead. We can't hear you. Bridget, can you hear him? No. Hey, right. And I'm going to try and drop you down and bring you back up because we can't hear your microphone. Not working. All right, Miles, go ahead. Colonel, you ever been to Quantico? Yes. Many times.

1:28:35 Oh, okay. Do they have a big auditorium that you could have a big meeting? Uh-huh. Oh, okay. Quantico is a huge base. Yeah. Security good for continuity? Yes. All right. Thanks, Colonel. Yeah. They don't contract out. There's actual Marines on the front gate, at least the last time I was there, which was a couple of years ago. But I lived.

1:29:07 So I lived dead in the middle of Fort Belvoir and Quantico, where I lived in Virginia for six years. And so it was kind of a toss up every weekend when I would go to the commissary, which commissary I went to, because it was going to be a day long thing. You took the kids, you went to the BX. As a matter of fact, that's the story that I told about my middle daughter taking something from the BX and then getting home and driving her all the way back.

1:29:37 It happened at Quantico. We walked back into the Quantico BX and she had to give it to the manager. And she was just in tears, but she never stole another thing in her life. So, yeah, I used to go to Quantico all the time. A good mom. A mean mom. A good mean mom. Did we lose him? Must have. I assume you're talking about that. Yeah.

1:30:21 I don't know what happened to it. All right. Well, if we don't have any other hands, I'm going to bug out of here and go grab me something to eat. Thank you, Colonel Tanner. And I sent both you and Bridget the link and a screenshot of some of the stuff. I'll look it up and see if we can find out something about it. Okay.

1:30:46 It's Friday. You guys have a nice weekend. And we will be back on Monday at 4 o'clock to continue our book and find out what's going to happen this weekend. Things are so crazy right now. But anyway. But isn't it a great time to be alive? I can't imagine missing this. It is literally crazy.

1:31:19 But anyway. All right. I'll post pictures. We're going to have a football party at my house at one o'clock to watch the Bucs on Sunday. So anyway, it's going to be a lot of fun. You guys all have a nice weekend and I will see you Monday. Have a great weekend, everybody. See you, Renee.

Entities here

Danilo Blandon25 CIA25 San Francisco25 Norwin Menendez25 Contras24 Dennis Ainsworth23 Nicaragua23 FDN21 Los Angeles17 Don Sinoccio15 Adolfo Calero15 Enrique Bermudez12 Renato Pena12 Floyd "Freeway" Rick Ross11 United States10 Costa Rica9 Unification Church9 U.S. Congress9 Thomas Dowling9 Colombia7 Miami7 Henry Corrales7 Reagan administration6 Edward Boland6 Honduras5 Sun Myung Moon5 Boland Amendment5 Sam Dillon4 Sandinistas4 Tom Harkin4 Anastasio Somoza4 Quantico4 Daniel Blanton3 Oliver North3 G. James Quesada3 Jerry Smith3 House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence3 CIA Inspector General report3 Newsweek3 Iran-Contra affair2

Claims made here

Danilo Blandon supplied_arms_to Floyd "Freeway" Rick Ross host_asserted ▶ 1:35

“Each one of those loads from Miami ranged from 200 to 400 kilos. These regular flights continued until at least 1984. They were not sure whether all of that was sold directly to Ross, but a huge chunk…”

Henry Corrales member_of Floyd "Freeway" Rick Ross host_asserted ▶ 2:07

“that he was getting a little paranoid, Blandon said. Somebody from his organization was in jail. And he basically said, now, just remind you, Henry is the original go-between. He was the wholesaler. S…”

CIA funded Contras documented ▶ 9:29

“Barely a year had passed since the CIA had taken over the financing of the Contras and already a covert war was no longer a secret. The week before the 1982 elections, Newsweek magazine published the …”

Reagan administration supplied_arms_to Contras documented ▶ 9:57

“around a 4,000-man army as being positioned to overthrow the Sandinistas. There was full-color photographs, and basically they made it sound as if the invasion was imminent. But that was a gross exagg…”

William Casey headed CIA documented ▶ 10:25

“According to one account, the main source for Newsweek's story was none other than CIA Director William Casey, who wanted to ensure that the Contra project didn't get shelved. Now that it was public k…”

Contras carried_out_attack Nicaragua documented ▶ 10:55

“had been told by the CIA officials that the Contras were merely border guards keeping the Sandinistas from getting into El Salvador. The Contras' first major act of war, in fact, had nothing to do wit…”

Tom Harkin targeted_for_regime_change Contras documented ▶ 11:24

“In response to the Newsweek report, Congressman Tom Harkins proposed a complete cutoff of the funding of all paramilitary activities in Nicaragua. The fact that the war was illegal, Harkins argued, wa…”

Edward Boland founded Boland Amendment documented ▶ 12:20

“Instead, Congress passed the first Bolin Amendment, named after Massachusetts Democrat Edward Bolin, who authored it. He was a member of the House Intel Committee, and it was drafted by Bolin. Now, ke…”

CIA funded Enrique Bermudez book_quoted ▶ 16:37

“Bermudez was inviting them from the base camps and he would call them his secretaries. Dillon wrote that the CIA was sending tens of thousands of dollars a month to Bermudez's general staff to pay the…”

Enrique Bermudez overbilled_or_diverted CIA book_quoted ▶ 17:53

“They were only shipping things like beans and rice to the base camps, but they were billing the CIA full rations. Several accounts, including Dillon's, paint a picture of a massive corruption inside o…”

Danilo Blandon funded Contras host_asserted ▶ 19:54

“Same guy, same guy in the State Department. Yet it was somewhere along this time, according to Blanton, that he stopped sending the profits from his L.A. cocaine sales to the Contras. At other times, …”

Norwin Menendez funded Contras host_asserted ▶ 21:50

“Asked when Blanton stopped giving money to the Contras, Menendez replied, never as far as I know. Blanton said that he was working for Menendez at the time the Contras cocaine kickbacks ended. I conti…”

Colombia supplied_arms_to Danilo Blandon host_asserted ▶ 23:12

“It was a clever way for the cartels to expand their customer base in the U.S. The Colombians advanced Blanton 15 kilos worth about a million dollars, and they were off to the races. He started out get…”

Danilo Blandon member_of Norwin Menendez documented ▶ 25:38

“intelligence files, computerized profiles maintained by the federal government on suspected drug traffickers. It showed both men as current associates. It also said that if Blanton had double-crossed …”

Norwin Menendez funded United Support Against Communism in the Americas guest_asserted ▶ 39:56

“a Nicaraguan who had been a local coordinator for the FDN. The men chatted briefly, exchanged phone numbers, and according to at least one source, the entire meeting was paid for by Menendez. About th…”

CIA recruited Adolfo Calero documented ▶ 42:53

“They, Calero had been part of the Chamber of Commerce down there. He also is the guy, remember a long time ago, we talked about this in a former chapter. He's the guy that was the distributorship for …”

CIA installed Adolfo Calero documented ▶ 43:48

“to various student and labor organizations under Somoza's government in Nicaragua, something we see in all of these stories. Pay the labor people to not be labor people. In early 1983, the CIA had bro…”

Adolfo Calero member_of FDN documented ▶ 43:48

Norwin Menendez member_of Brigade 2506 guest_asserted ▶ 49:49

“was plugged tightly into the Cuban exile community in Miami. He assisted the Cuban Legion in their radio propaganda shows coming from Miami, Terrell said, adding that Menendez was an associate of seve…”

Norwin Menendez funded Cuban Legion guest_asserted ▶ 49:49

Norwin Menendez funded Don Sinoccio guest_asserted ▶ 50:48

“Success number six was we are receiving some attention from the Cuban people that appear eager to help. Success number seven was Mr. Menendez contribution. Menendez had dropped off a contribution on t…”

State Department Office of Public Diplomacy for Latin America front_for CIA documented ▶ 52:17

“to testify as a witness to Sandinista atrocities. His appearance had been arranged by the State Department, Office of Public Diplomacy for Latin America. It was later described, this particular office…”

Oliver North paid Thomas Dowling documented ▶ 53:41

“He lived in San Francisco. He didn't go to Nicaragua. Dowling later admitted that he had received $73,000 in cash and traveler's checks from Oliver North, CIA agent Adolfo Calero, and other members of…”

Thomas Dowling funded Institute for American Strategy documented ▶ 54:12

“Dowling testified that the money went to a nonprofit organization that he had set up in San Francisco called the Latin American Strategic Studies Institute. In addition to Dowling, the institute emplo…”

Thomas Dowling member_of Unification Church documented ▶ 56:56

“Operation Gladio, Operation Condor, stepped in and began funneling money and supplies to the Contras. Dowling was a member of this organization and was part of the National Advisory Board and a freque…”

Unification Church funded FDN documented ▶ 56:56

Renato Pena member_of FDN documented ▶ 1:01:18

“at an FDN meeting and served as an official representative to their political organization in California from 1982 to 84. After that, he said, he was appointed as a military representative of the FDN …”

CIA covered_up Norwin Menendez documented ▶ 1:03:13

“When the information about Renato Pena's involvement in the upcoming Costa Rican meeting was relayed back to Langley, CIA headquarters immediately ordered the Domestic Collections Division to halt any…”

Norwin Menendez funded FDN documented ▶ 1:06:46

“nephew had told him that the US was aware of these dealings and that it was highly unlikely I would even get in trouble. Both Norwin Menendez and Blanton told him that they were raising money for the …”

Daniel Blanton member_of FDN documented ▶ 1:06:46

Enrique Bermudez member_of FDN documented ▶ 1:07:08

“He also said that FDN leader Enrique Bermudez was aware of the drug deals, and Pena described Bermudez as a CIA agent. When challenged by CIA questioner on that statement, Pena merely laughed. It's ve…”

Enrique Bermudez spied_on Nicaragua guest_asserted ▶ 1:07:08

Norwin Menendez supplied_arms_to FDN documented ▶ 1:08:03

“He told the DEA intelligence analyst that Menendez was indeed working for the FDN and had been using drug money to buy weapons for the Contra. He also vouched for Renata Pena's credibility. Renata Pen…”

Al Pena funded Contras book_quoted ▶ 1:08:26

“office for the FDN, the informant said. Pena was one of the major Contra fundraisers in San Francisco and was one responsible for sending Menendez's drug proceeds to the Contras. In an interview years…”

Enrique Bermudez recruited Norwin Menendez book_quoted ▶ 1:08:52

“that the CIA knows about all of these things. The money the Contra received from the Reagan administration was peanuts and was growing military organization needed arms, supplies, food, and money to s…”

Norwin Menendez trafficked United States book_quoted ▶ 1:10:15

“Gonzalez from San Jose, Costa Rica, told of the results of a debriefing of a confidential informant. Ainsworth's heart sank as he read it. The informant related that Menendez Costasero, Edmundo's youn…”

U.S. Customs Service covered_up Norwin Menendez book_quoted ▶ 1:12:04

“The FBI report went on to say that the customs agent told Ainsworth that Menendez would have been arrested in a major drug case in 1983, except that he had been warned that he was given a warning by a…”

Norwin Menendez trafficked Contras book_quoted ▶ 1:12:33

“that the FBI's file on Menendez was two feet thick. I thought this bastard should have been arrested. I assumed there would have been an outstanding warrant on this guy. I was amazed. There wasn't a s…”

Chicago Outfit trafficked Hot Springs, Arkansas host_asserted ▶ 1:27:21

“And prostitution and gambling. And guess what? That's only like an hour and a half from me to Arkansas. And then we got the Clintons. And then we got the Rockefellers in Arkansas. It's just crazy. Ind…”