MEDIA IS SNOWBLIND NO MORE

Spooked In Peru

A good litmus test for the integrity of any news organization is the
aggressiveness of its reporting on the CIA. And the test has never been
more relevant than in the two weeks since April 20, when CIA operatives
helped shoot down a missionary plane in Peru. While many journalists
concentrated on reconstructing events behind the "tragic" death of an
American mother and child, others rejected the U.S. government's spin and
turned to unauthorized sources to piece together the more important back story.

Here's an example of government spin: The CIA has been putting out the word
that it's OK for its contract employees to help Peruvian drug warriors spot
suspicious civilian aircraft and shoot 'em down, as long as the Peruvians
take the proper steps to ID the plane and warn its pilot before opening
fire. But the truth is that shooting at civilian aircraft is a violation of
international law no matter what, and decision makers in the Clinton
administration knew they were subverting the law when they cemented the
current partnership with Peru in 1994.

While this revelation has been reported by The Washington Post, the AP, and
other outlets, it has been glossed over by the CIA-friendly New York Times.
Even as The Washington Post reported on April 26 that the Senate
intelligence committee had decided to investigate the U.S. role in the drug
partnership with Peru, the Times was still pushing the government's
suggestion that the missionary scandal was an "isolated incident" caused by
reckless Peruvians, and for which the U.S. government bears no responsibility.

The 1994 debate over Peru's shoot-down policy is outlined in documents
obtained by the National Security Archive, a research group in Washington,
D.C. According to the documents, government lawyers warned that "intense
criticism" might result if the CIA began helping Peru shoot down suspected
drug planes.

The critics even foresaw last month's disaster, warning that "a shoot-down
leading to the death of innocent persons would likely be a serious
diplomatic embarrassment for the United States."

Instead of being cautious, the Clinton administration cavalierly created
what it called an "exception" to international law, authorizing such
shoot-downs in the name of the drug war and giving everyone involved
immunity from criminal prosecution. The NSA's Michael Evans dubs this a
classic case of the Clintonites using semantics to dodge responsibility for
a legal violation.

According to Evans, "The significance of these documents is that the
Clinton administration made a really bad decision back then and it doesn't
seem like they're getting much heat for it. The details of [the missionary
shoot-down] need to be clarified, but very little has been written about
the policy itself."

Another example of government spin is the CIA's refusal to provide
information on the three "contract employees" who spotted the missionaries
from a surveillance plane and then helped a Peruvian pilot shoot them down.
After the dead-missionary story broke, Illinois congresswoman Janice
Schakowsky called the CIA, asking for the names of their three employees.
But the agency stonewalled, in response to which she introduced a bill that
would bar the U.S. government from using private contractors in the Andean
region. Her move was first reported by In These Times on April 27; on April
29, Schakowsky told the St. Petersburg Times, "These private military
contractors are not held accountable for their actions."

The identities of the CIA operatives remain a secret.

ABC and CBS reported that they were employees of DynCorp, a Virginia-based
company, while on April 27, In These Times and The Miami Herald correctly
linked them with Aviation Development Corp., a military contractor
apparently operating in secret out of the Maxwell Air Force base in
Montgomery, Alabama. The Times piggybacked on the Aviation Development
story the next day.

On April 29, The Washington Post published a front-pager that blew the
cover off the CIA's clandestine role in Peru. These were among the Post's
findings: Contrary to its own PR, the U.S. is a major player in Peru's drug
war, providing ample staff for U.S.-funded radar stations in the Amazon and
Peruvian military bases.

The partnership to shoot down suspected drug flights was "negotiated
directly" with Vladimiro Montesinos, Peru's former head of intelligenceNwho
is now a fugitive wanted on charges ranging from arms dealing to accepting
bribes from drug traffickers. An $8 million drug-war complex in Pucallpa is
home to U.S. and Peruvian drug police, Huey helicopters, and half a dozen
DynCorp employees, not to mention an untold number of Aviation Development
pilots who man the CIA surveillance planes. And then there are the Peruvian
pilots, some of whom appear to be on the take (as if the U.S. drug warriors
cared about that).

It seems a good bet that the Times will never publish a scoop on the U.S.
mercenaries in Colombia and Peru. But on April 29, The Week in Review
published a much needed reality check by Tim Weiner. Weiner pointed out
what the Times has been missing: that the killing of the missionary is just
the tip of the iceberg of the CIA's historical presence in Latin America.
"What is America doing down there, and with whom?" he asked rhetorically.
"Who are its friends, and what happens when it befriends them?"

The answers are not pretty.

Instead of promoting democracy in Latin America, the CIA has forged
alliances with a tiny elite comprised of "businessmen, bankers, dynastic
families and generals." The partnership has been good for the region's
military and political leaders, who typically get arms deals and "gentle
treatment" when they stand accused of corruption and torture. And it's been
good for American military contractors and businessmen. But the CIA and
U.S. embassies have done little to save the lives of hundred of thousands
of civilians who continue to be tortured and killed by rogue gunmen allied
with corrupt military leaders.

With friends like that, who needs enemies?

As a final test of credibility, watch how the media covers the subject of
the CIA's relationship with Montesinos. By 1994, when Clinton approved the
plan to shoot down drug planes, Montesinos was already notorious in Peru.
The L.A. Times reported that, before becoming intelligence chief, he was a
lawyer representing drug traffickers, a "reptilian" guy who collected
diamond watches, Italian shoes, and flashy young girlfriends. According to
The New Yorker, Montesinos kept his top military officers happy by sharing
the profits he made from arms sales and from "drug traffickers, who relied
on the cooperation of the armed forces to stay in business."

Last September, shortly after a tape surfaced showing Montesinos bribing a
local congressman, he went on the lam, and the U.S. has done little to help
track him down. Given that the reptile-in-exile personally launched a U.S.
drug initiative now under scrutiny by Congress, an expose addressing his
relationships with the CIA and U.S. diplomats is long overdue.