Showing posts with label Air America. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Air America. Show all posts

Friday, September 29, 2017

Glenn Greenwald: Yet Another "Major" Russia Story Falls Apart...

Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,


The biggest purveyors of “fake news” and irresponsible journalism are the news media outlets complaining most about it.


MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow is at the forefront of the latest fake news on Russia.


Maddow’s Rant






The story went viral of course.










Another Story Falls Apart


Today, Glen Greenwald reports Yet Another Major Russia Story Falls Apart. Is Skepticism Permissible Yet?



LAST FRIDAY, most major media outlets touted a major story about Russian attempts to hack into U.S. voting systems, based exclusively on claims made by the Department of Homeland Security. “Russians attempted to hack elections systems in 21 states in the run-up to last year’s presidential election, officials said Friday,” began the USA Today story, similar to how most other outlets presented this extraordinary claim.


 


MSNBC’s Paul Revere for all matters relating to the Kremlin take-over, Rachel Maddow, was indignant that this wasn’t told to us earlier and that we still aren’t getting all the details. “What we have now figured out,” Maddow gravely intoned as she showed the multi-colored maps she made, is that “Homeland Security knew at least by June that 21 states had been targeted by Russian hackers during the election. . .targeting their election infrastructure.”


 


So what was wrong with this story? Just one small thing: it was false. The story began to fall apart yesterday when the Associated Press reported that Wisconsin – one of the states included in the original report that, for obvious reasons, caused the most excitement – did not, in fact, have its election systems targeted by Russian hackers.


 



 


The spokesman for Homeland Security then tried to walk back that reversal, insisting that there was still evidence that some computer networks had been targeted, but could not say that they had anything to do with elections or voting.


 


Then the story collapsed completely last night. The Secretary of State for another one of the named states, California, issued a scathing statement repudiating the claimed report:


 



 


This has happened over and over and over again. Inflammatory claims about Russia get mindlessly hyped by media outlets, almost always based on nothing more than evidence-free claims from government officials, only to collapse under the slightest scrutiny, because they are entirely lacking in evidence.


 


The examples of such debacles when it comes to claims about Russia are too numerous to comprehensively chronicle. I wrote about this phenomenon many times and listed many of the examples, the last time in June when 3 CNN journalists “resigned” over a completely false story linking Trump adviser Anthony Scaramucci to investigations into a Russian investment fund which the network was forced to retract.


 


Remember that time the Washington Post claimed that Russia had hacked the U.S. electricity grid, causing politicians to denounce Putin for trying to deny heat to Americans in winter, only to have to issue multiple retractions because none of that ever happened?


 


Or the time that the Post had to publish a massive editor’s note after its reporters made claims about Russian infiltration of the internet and spreading of “Fake News” based on an anonymous group’s McCarthyite blacklist that counted sites like the Drudge Report and various left-wing outlets as Kremlin agents?


 


Or that time when Slate claimed that Trump had created a secret server with a Russian bank, all based on evidence that every other media outlet which looked at it were too embarrassed to get near?


 


Or the time the Guardian was forced to retract its report by Ben Jacobs – which went viral – that casually asserted that WikiLeaks has a long relationship with the Kremlin? Or the time that Fortune retracted suggestions that RT had hacked into and taken over C-SPAN’s network?


 


And then there’s the huge market that was created – led by leading Democrats – that blindly ingested every conspiratorial, unhinged claim about Russia churned out by an army of crazed conspiracists such as Louise Mensch and Claude “TrueFactsStated” Taylor?


 


And now we have the Russia-hacked-the-voting-systems-of-21-states to add to this trash heap.


 


Each time the stories go viral; each time they further shape the narrative; each time those who spread them say little to nothing when it is debunked.


 


Regardless of your views on Russia, Trump and the rest, nobody can possibly regard this climate as healthy. Just look at how many major, incredibly inflammatory stories, from major media outlets, have collapsed. Is it not clear that there is something very wrong with how we are discussing and reporting on relations between these two nuclear-armed powers?



Hello Rachel Maddow!


























My Quick Take










 









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Saturday, July 8, 2017

Rachel Maddow Caught In Latest Fake News Scandal; Proof Her "Forged NSA Document" Segment Was A Hoax

She thought she had it.  The smoking gun that would prove someone in Trump"s campaign colluded with the Russians to steal the 2016 election.  But, when a forged NSA document sent to Rachel Maddow turned out to be just more bad information from more anonymous sources, it left the crusading MSNBC host feeling a bit "triggered."  As such, she opened her show last night with the following segment:





“Somebody, for some reason, appears to be shopping a fairly convincing fake NSA document that purports to directly implicate somebody from the Trump campaign in working with the Russians in their attack in the election."



“This is news, because: why is someone shopping a forged document of this kind to news organizations covering the Trump-Russia affair?”





Not surprisingly, Maddow uses the discovery to imply that someone within the Trump administration is intentionally planting fake information in an attempt to discredit her show.  She goes on to imply that similar efforts may have caused the recent firing of 3 "journalists" at CNN who simply couldn"t be bothered with verifying the anonymous tip they received.


Here are more details of Maddow"s show from the Daily Caller:





On June 7, an unidentified person sent documents to an online tip line for Maddow’s show, she said.



That was two days after The Intercept published legitimate NSA documents that were stolen by Reality Winner, a contractor for the agency.



And that"s where Maddow"s faux-outrage breaks down. 


You see, if it"s clear that Maddow received her forgery after the intercept published their documents then there"s really no "there" there.  Pretty much anyone with an internet connection could have simply taken the Reality Winner documents from The Intercept website and used them create a forgery to send to Maddow. 


Of course, Maddow knew that her whole story was bullshit unless she could convince her viewers that the forgery she received was created before The Intercept published it for the world to see.  If she could prove that, then she could insist the forged document must have come from someone on the "inside."


So, she decided to get "technical" and take a look at the "metadata" on the document she received.  As it turns out, the "creation date" on the document she received was roughly 3.5 hours before The Intercept published their Reality Winner story.  See, it"s all laid out right here on this lovely timeline graphic.  Checkmate, Mr. Trump!




Except, not.  Ironically, by stretching the truth in an attempt to prove that her story was in any way relevant, Maddow unwittingly proved exactly the opposite. 


As The Intercept has subsequently pointed out, the "creation date" on the document received by Maddow (see the timeline above) perfectly matches, to the exact second, the "creation date" on The Intercept"s Reality Winner document. 


Why?  Because that is the exact time in which The Intercept created their document and published it to their cloud server. 


All of which simply proves that Maddow"s source didn"t have a sneak peak at the Reality Winner documents...they actually used The Intercept document as their source for creating their forgery. 


Now, we could be wrong here...but, if the Trump administration wanted to dupe Rachel Maddow we suspect they could have gotten their hands on clean copies of the Reality Winner docs without having to lift them from The Intercept"s website.




So, what seems more likely to have happened here is that Maddow"s staff could easily tell the "NSA document" was a forgery from the start and simply ignored it at first. Afterall, she received the document on June 7th and is just now deciding to talk about it a month later?  Unlikely. 


But, when 3 journalists from CNN lost their jobs for publishing fake news, Maddow saw an opportunity to launch a whole new narrative attacking the Trump administration by alleging that they"re planting fake intelligence reports with the media.  Never let a good crisis go to waste...as they say.


Edward Snowden summarized the situation the best in a series of tweets:





Maddow"s lawyerly defense of why her implication was wrong is disappointing. Such caution should come prior to raising alarm on national TV.



When the media"s credibility is under attack, rushing stories out before checking facts and contacting the subject is hard to comprehend.



That said, journalism is hard and mistakes happen. When they do, as in this Maddow case, apologies should be frank and unequivocal.



When we start getting economical with facts, we lose. This important story was mangled by needlessly injected an unsupportable conspiracy.



Each time the media gets a prominent story wrong right now, I wince. More than egg on a famous face, it risks a generation"s trust in news.



If our most famous journalists are so proud they can"t admit to what is now an obvious error, how can they hope to hold the public trust?



Most folks can"t read three different papers every day. If we don"t set the highest standard, many give up and say the truth is unknowable.



That is the twilight of an age.








Still, we do feel badly for the liberal "journalists" of the world...all the embarrassing fake news stories of late means that they may have to actually start doing their jobs rather than just blindly running stories from "anonymous sources."

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Monday, July 3, 2017

Legendary Author of “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” Admits He Was Recruited by CIA to Run Drugs

cia


Best-selling author Robert Kiyosaki, best known for his book “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” recently revealed that he was offered to smuggle drugs for the US government while he was working for the military during the Vietnam war. Kiyosaki mentioned this fact during a recent conference in Bozeman, Montana, and then later clarified his statements in an interview with Millie Weaver.


In the years since the war ended, it has been thoroughly documented that large shipments of heroin were coming from the region in and around Vietnam, and that those shipments were either protected or smuggled directly by individuals working with the US military. During the Vietnam War, the area surrounding Vietnam and Laos was known as “The Golden Triangle,” a hotbed for heroin production.


As The Free Thought Project has reported, drugs were transported on military aircraft and brought back to America, where they were eventually sold to the mafia and distributed on the streets. Now the Golden Triangle has taken a back seat to the “Golden Crescent,” which refers to the area in and around Afghanistan, a region that the US military is currently occupying.


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In his youth, Kiyosaki was fighting in Vietnam with the US Marines and was offered to fly airplanes for the CIA front company “Air America,” which was used to import and export drugs. Kiyosaki was informed by other marines that Air America was used to smuggle drugs, and that it could be an opportunity for him to make a lot of money. However, he resisted the temptation and declined the offer because he did not feel comfortable being a drug runner.



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“In 1973 I was a Marine lieutenant, I was a pilot flying helicopter gunships in Vietnam and I was about to rotate home and an organization called ‘Air America’ approached me and wanted to know if I would fly for them,” Kiyosaki said. “The offer was pretty good, it was a long time ago but I think it was about $80,000 per year which was a lot of money back then for a 25-year-old kid. I didn’t know what Air America was, and then I just got the ‘nod nod wink wink’ that you could make a lot more money if you ran special packages. I didn’t know what they were talking about but my friends were just hitting me saying ‘you idiot, don’t you know what they are talking about?’ Later on, I discovered it was to run intoxicants out of Laos and the Golden Triangle.”


“I don’t do drugs, I have tried marijuana and I’ve tried cocaine but I don’t do drugs, and I don’t care how much money I make, I won’t run drugs, so I’m glad I didn’t take up the offer,” he added.




Years later, the corruption at Air America was exposed by former Laos CIA paramilitary Anthony Poshepny and other Air America pilots who eventually came forward.



Air America was dissolved on June 30, 1976, but then was subsequently renamed “Air Asia” and purchased by Evergreen International Airlines. Over $20 million in profits from the sale were quietly transferred to the US Treasury.


However, government-sponsored drug trafficking did not stop with Air America, as there have been multiple incidences proving that these operations are still taking place.



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In September 2007, a CIA jet crashed in Mexico with 3.2 tons of cocaine onboard. The jet was on its way from Bolivia when it was spotted by Mexican helicopters that followed in pursuit. The chase resulted in the crash of the jet and the seizure of the cocaine. Upon inspecting the wreckage site, the Mexican authorities found no body or survivors but did find several thousand pounds of cocaine. The serial numbers on the plane were eventually traced back to a company that transported terrorists for the US government.


This story is not uncommon, there have been many cases where government planes have crashed in South and Central America with tons of illegal drugs onboard. On April 10, 2006, Mexican police seized a DC-9 aircraft that was carrying 5.5 tons of cocaine, flight records showed this aircraft to be another CIA “terrorist transport” plane that was used to transport drugs. The pilot of the DC-9 aircraft also managed to escape from Mexican authorities.

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Monday, June 19, 2017

Real Life Air America: CIA Exposed Running a Covert Drug Smuggling Airline

america


When you hear “Air America,” there is a good chance the 1990 movie starring Mel Gibson and Robert Downey Jr. is the first thing that comes to mind. The plot revolves around two men who find themselves in the middle of the CIA’s private airline, which is used to deliver food, supplies, and even opium, to a small kingdom during the Vietnam War.


But what if it was more than just a movie plot?  


According to the Central Intelligence Agency’s own website, Air America is in fact described as “an airline secretly owned by the CIA,” which was used as “a vital component in the Agency’s operations” in the small Southeast Asian Kingdom of Laos, from 1955 to 1974.



The version presented on the CIA’s website is authored by William M. Leary, a former history professor at the University of Georgia. He attempted to dispel the rumors by blaming Air America’s poor public image on the fact that the Blockbuster version featured “a cynical CIA officer who arranged for the airline to fly opium to the administrative capital of Vientiane for a corrupt Asian general—loosely modeled on Vang Pao, a military leader of the mountain-region-based Hmong ethnic group.”  


“The film depicts the CIA man as having the opium processed into heroin in a factory just down the street from the favorite bar of Air America’s pilots. The Asian general, in return, supplied men to fight the war, plus a financial kickback to the CIA,” Leary wrote. “Ultimately, we learn that the Communist versus anti-Communist war in Laos was merely a facade for the real war, which was fought for control of the area’s opium fields.”


 In an opinion piece for the New York Times in 1993, titled “The CIA Drug Connection is as Old as the Agency,” Larry Collins noted that the CIA has had its hand in the international drug trade since the Korean War in 1950, when they traded weapons and heroin, in exchange for intelligence.




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The practice continued as the Vietnam War started in 1955, and Collins noted that the CIA appeared to have one interest in mind—the cultivation of the opium poppy.


“During the Vietnam War, operations in Laos were largely a CIA responsibility,” Collins wrote. “The agency’s surrogate there was a Laotian general, Vang Pao, who commanded Military Region 2 in northern Laos. He enlisted 30,000 Hmong tribesmen in the service of the CIA.”


The operation was discussed on an episode of PBS’ Frontline, titled “Guns, Drugs and the CIA,” which aired in 1988. The documentary looked at the Meo Tribe, whose members served as “the foot soldiers of a secret CIA army” in Laos, just across the border from North Vietnam.


Ron Rickenbach, former official at the U.S. Agency for International Development, served in Laos during the 1960s. He told Frontline that for the soldiers involved, they initially believed that what they were doing was “in the best interests of America,” even if it meant being involved “in some not so desirable aspects of the drug traffic.”



“These people were willing to take up arms. We needed to stop the Red threat and people believed that in that vein we made, you know, certain compromises or certain trade-offs for a larger good,” Rickenbach said. “Growing opium was a natural agricultural enterprise for these people and they had been doing it for many years before the Americans ever got there. When we got there they continued to do so.”


Fred Platt, a former pilot in Laos, told Frontline about the incentives the Meo tribesman had to take part in the trade.



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“When a farmer raised a crop of opium, what he got for his year’s worth of work was the equivalent of 35 to 40 U.S. dollars,” Platt said. “That amount of opium, were it refined into morphine base, then into morphine, then into heroin and appeared on the streets of New York, that 35-dollar crop of opium would be worth 50, 60, a hundred thousand dollars in 1969—maybe a million dollars today.”


How does Air America come into play? According to PBS’ Frontline, the CIA’s secret airline played the role of both a transportation service for the Meo farmers’ cash crop, and the only lifeline between the tribespeople and the outside world—to the point where Meo children “came to believe that rice fell from the sky.”


While Air America reportedly only operated from 1950 to 1976, the CIA’s obsession with opium has continued to flourish over the years.


The CIA supported the Mujahideen rebels in Afghanistan—in the name of fighting the Soviet Army—in the 1980s. According to a 2009 report from the United States Institute of Peace, the CIA turned a blind eye to the group’s involvement in the opium trade.


The U.S. then encountered Afghanistan’s poppy-rich land again in 2001, when it invaded the country. In the years since the invasion, Afghanistan’s opium production, which is “an important source of funding for the Taliban,” has increased 35-fold.


As The Free Thought Project reported in April, the North Korean government is also a major opium producer, which provides some of the necessary context surrounding the U.S. government’s interest with, and the mainstream media’s obsessive and speculative coverage of every move made by the small nation.




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When looking at the CIA’s history of fueling proxy wars to overthrow foreign governments, and using drugs like opium as a means of control, it makes Hollywood’s version of “Air America” sound much less like a fictional movie, and much more like a documentary.

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