Peter Dale Scott's brilliantly researched tour de force illuminates the underlying forces that drive U.S. global policy from Vietnam to Colombia and now to Afghanistan and Iraq. He brings to light the intertwined patterns of drugs, oil politics, and intelligence networks that have been so central to the larger workings of U.S. intervention and escalation in Third World countries through al liances with drug-trafficking proxies. The result has been a staggering increase in global drug traffic. Thus, the author argues, the exercise of power by cover t means, or parapolitics, often metastasizes into deep politics - the interplay of unacknowledged forces that spin out of the control of the original policy ini tiators. Scott contends that we must recognize that U.S. influence is grounded n ot just in military and economic superiority but also in so-called soft power. W e need a soft politics of persuasion and nonviolence, especially as America is e mbroiled in yet another disastrous intervention, this time in Iraq.
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Scott, a former Canadian diplomat and current English professor, analyzes an important aspect of U.S. foreign policy. Scott does point to sources and relationships that are often ignored by works relying on standard archival materials. CHOICE Praise for the work of Peter Dale Scott: The War Conspiracy A powerful analysis of the United States' persistent drive toward war... -- Franz Schurmann Praise for the work of Peter Dale Scott: Cocaine Politics For the evidence that narcotics ... have been instruments of U.S. foreign policy, you simply have to read Cocaine Politics. This, one of the most enlightening books of the year, will redefine your usage of the silly term 'drug war." -- Christopher Hitchens The Nation Praise for the work of Peter Dale Scott: The War Conspiracy A meticulous and fascinating analysis... The great importance of this book extends well beyond the new understanding it provides with regards to past escapades. Scott exposes an element in the American system of global power that poses an increasing threat to the victims of this system... -- Noam Chomsky Praise for the work of Peter Dale Scott: Deep Politics and the Death of JFK Staggeringly well-researched and intelligent overview not only of the JFK assassination but also of the rise of forces undermining American democracy-of which the assassination, Scott says, is symptomatic... Kirkus Reviews Praise for the work of Peter Dale Scott: The War Conspiracy A meticulous and fascinating analysis... The great importance of this book extends well beyond the new understanding it provides with regards to past escapades. Scott exposes an element in the American system of global power that poses an increasing threat to the victims of this system. -- Noam Chomsky Praise for the work of Peter Dale Scott: The War Conspiracy A powerful analysis of the United States' persistent drive toward war. -- Franz Schurmann Praise for the work of Peter Dale Scott: Cocaine Politics For the evidence that narcotics ... have been instruments of U.S. foreign policy, you simply have to read Cocaine Politics. This, one of the most enlightening books of the year, will redefine your usage of the silly term 'drug war.' -- Christopher Hitchens The Nation Praise for the work of Peter Dale Scott: Deep Politics and the Death of JFK Staggeringly well-researched and intelligent overview not only of the JFK assassination but also of the rise of forces undermining American democracy-of which the assassination, Scott says, is symptomatic. Kirkus Reviews No student of political science or political thinker dares overlook this thirty-year tour de force of the dark side of history and the para and deep politics that control so much of our daily lives. -- Michael C. Ruppert, publisher/editor of From the Wilderness Peter Dale Scott takes us for a controversial tour along the dark side of American foreign policy. The book builds a powerful case that Washington's War on Drugs is at best futile and at worst criminal. The overall target is the militarization of our foreign policy. The facts and conclusions are chilling. -- Ambassador Robert White, president of the Center for International Policy Praise for the work of Peter Dale Scott: Coming to Jakarta Coming to Jakarta is the most important political poem to appear in the English language in a very long time. -- Robert Hass This is a brilliant, compelling, and startlingly original expose of American foreign policy as oil policy with an addiction to drug trafficking as its adjunct. It makes most academic and journalistic explanations of the dreadful paradoxes of our past and current interventions read like government propaganda written for children. -- Daniel Ellsberg, author of Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers
About the Author
Peter Dale Scott was born in 1929 in Montreal, Canada. A former Canadian diplomat and professor of English at the University of California, Berkeley, he is both a poet and an author of political analysis. His chief prose books include Deep Politics and the Death of JFK, The War Conspiracy, Cocaine Politics, and The Iran-Contra Connection (the last two in collaboration). His most recent book of poetry is Minding the Darkness, completing his trilogy Seculum. In 2002 he was awarded the Lannan Poetry Award. He is married to Ronna Kabatznick, and has three children by his former wife, Maylie Marshall.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is an outstanding and revelatory book, a brilliant account of a drug-trafficking empire. He shows how US protection for their drug-runner allies has led to the huge increase in drug trafficking in the last 50 years.
The US strategy of opposing national self-determination involves alliances with drug-traffickers like the Sicilian Mafia, the Triads in South-East Asia, the Contras in Nicaragua, the Kosovo Liberation Army in Europe, the death squads in Colombia and the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan. As President Johnson's Secretary of State Dean Rusk said, the USA "should employ whatever means ... arms here, opium there."
From the 1870s to the 1960s, the British rulers of Malaya farmed the opium franchise to the Triads. The US state first copied this strategy in 1949, when it armed the defeated Kuomintang's drug networks in Burma and Laos, after the victorious Chinese revolution began to eliminate Chinese opium, then the source of 85% of the world's heroin.
The US state encouraged its allies to enrich themselves through drugs, while it blamed the communist enemy for the evils that its allies were committing. From 1949 until at least 1964, the US told the UN Narcotics Commission that China was responsible for drug imports into the USA. In fact, the drugs were trafficked from Burma and Thailand, under the protection of the Kuomintang troops backed by the CIA. The Hong Kong authorities stated that they "were not aware of a traffic in narcotics from the mainland of China through Hong Kong" but "quantities of narcotics reached Hong Kong via Thailand."
The US state assaulted the whole region of South East Asia between 1950 and 1975, just as it is attacking the Middle East today. An earlier effort at regime change in Laos in 1959-60 was a disaster, putting drug traffickers in power. Opium production soared during the years of US intervention, the 1950s and 1960s, and plummeted in 1975 after the Vietnamese people kicked US forces out of the region.
US military interventions lead to bigger drug flows into the USA. After the US intervention in Afghanistan in 1979, the Afghani-produced proportion of heroin consumed in the USA went from zero in 1979 to 52% in 1984.
Later, the Taliban government cut opium production from 3,656 tons in 2000 (90% of Europe's heroin supply) to 74 tons in 2001 (US State Department figures), wiping out 70% of the world's illicit opium production. US forces, in alliance with a drug trafficking network, the Northern Alliance, defeated Al Qa'ida, another drug trafficking network. The US funded the Northern Alliance warlord and terrorist Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, making him the world's biggest heroin trafficker.
Under US occupation, Afghan opium production has risen from 3,700 tons in 2002, to 3,400 tons in 2003, to 4,200 tons last year. The Financial Times wrote, "The U.S. and UN have ignored repeated calls by the international antidrugs community to address the increasing menace of Afghanistan's opium cultivation." It is now the world's leading producer of illicit drugs, producing 90% of the heroin sold in Britain and Europe. President Karzai of Afghanistan has made Rashid Dostum, a warlord, drug runner and terrorist, his military chief of staff.
According to the Colombian government, the antigovernment guerrillas of FARC (the supposed target of the 'war on drugs') had 2.5% of Colombia's cocaine trade; the government's allies, the paramilitary death squads, had 40%. Drug production in Colombia and its drug imports to the USA have now doubled to a new record.
6 of 10 people found the following review helpful
By Bert Ruiz
Format:Paperback
Peter Dale Scott is a highly regarded author with a long history of outstanding work. To this end, I bought this book because of my strong interest in Colombia and was attracted by the title of the book, "Drugs, Oil, and War: The United States in Afghanistan, Colombia, and Indochina." I would have never bothered to buy this book if I knew that nearly half of it is a rehash of Scott's 1972 publication, "The War Conspiracy: The Secret Road to the Second Indochina War."
Part I, "Afghanistan, Heroin, and Oil (2002) and Part II, "Colombia, Cocaine, and Oil (2001) is good. Scott makes some excellent observations about paramilitary relationships. Moreover, he carefully explains how paramilitary forces in Afghanistan and Colombia are heavily involved in drug trafficking. Nevertheless, the narrative of this book is coated in left of center rhetoric...and as a political moderate I found some theories lacked intellectual merit. To his credit, Scott's provides professionally prepared footnotes and bibliography.
Bert Ruiz
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
4.5 out of 5 stars
11 reviews
46 of 49 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Superb study of US state's use of mercenary drug-runners
21 Mar 2005
By William Podmore
- Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback
This is an outstanding and revelatory book, a brilliant account of a drug-trafficking empire. He shows how US protection for their drug-runner allies has led to the huge increase in drug trafficking in the last 50 years.
The US strategy of opposing national self-determination involves alliances with drug-traffickers like the Sicilian Mafia, the Triads in South-East Asia, the Contras in Nicaragua, the Kosovo Liberation Army in Europe, the death squads in Colombia and the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan. As President Johnson's Secretary of State Dean Rusk said, the USA "should employ whatever means ... arms here, opium there."
From the 1870s to the 1960s, the British rulers of Malaya farmed the opium franchise to the Triads. The US state first copied this strategy in 1949, when it armed the defeated Kuomintang's drug networks in Burma and Laos, after the victorious Chinese revolution began to eliminate Chinese opium, then the source of 85% of the world's heroin.
The US state encouraged its allies to enrich themselves through drugs, while it blamed the communist enemy for the evils that its allies were committing. From 1949 until at least 1964, the US told the UN Narcotics Commission that China was responsible for drug imports into the USA. In fact, the drugs were trafficked from Burma and Thailand, under the protection of the Kuomintang troops backed by the CIA. The Hong Kong authorities stated that they "were not aware of a traffic in narcotics from the mainland of China through Hong Kong" but "quantities of narcotics reached Hong Kong via Thailand."
The US state assaulted the whole region of South East Asia between 1950 and 1975, just as it is attacking the Middle East today. An earlier effort at regime change in Laos in 1959-60 was a disaster, putting drug traffickers in power. Opium production soared during the years of US intervention, the 1950s and 1960s, and plummeted in 1975 after the Vietnamese people kicked US forces out of the region.
US military interventions lead to bigger drug flows into the USA. After the US intervention in Afghanistan in 1979, the Afghani-produced proportion of heroin consumed in the USA went from zero in 1979 to 52% in 1984.
Later, the Taliban government cut opium production from 3,656 tons in 2000 (90% of Europe's heroin supply) to 74 tons in 2001 (US State Department figures), wiping out 70% of the world's illicit opium production. US forces, in alliance with a drug trafficking network, the Northern Alliance, defeated Al Qa'ida, another drug trafficking network. The US funded the Northern Alliance warlord and terrorist Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, making him the world's biggest heroin trafficker.
Under US occupation, Afghan opium production has risen from 3,700 tons in 2002, to 3,400 tons in 2003, to 4,200 tons last year. The Financial Times wrote, "The U.S. and UN have ignored repeated calls by the international antidrugs community to address the increasing menace of Afghanistan's opium cultivation." It is now the world's leading producer of illicit drugs, producing 90% of the heroin sold in Britain and Europe. President Karzai of Afghanistan has made Rashid Dostum, a warlord, drug runner and terrorist, his military chief of staff.
According to the Colombian government, the antigovernment guerrillas of FARC (the supposed target of the `war on drugs') had 2.5% of Colombia's cocaine trade; the government's allies, the paramilitary death squads, had 40%. Drug production in Colombia and its drug imports to the USA have now doubled to a new record.
The US strategy of opposing national self-determination involves alliances with drug-traffickers like the Sicilian Mafia, the Triads in South-East Asia, the Contras in Nicaragua, the Kosovo Liberation Army in Europe, the death squads in Colombia and the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan. As President Johnson's Secretary of State Dean Rusk said, the USA "should employ whatever means ... arms here, opium there."
From the 1870s to the 1960s, the British rulers of Malaya farmed the opium franchise to the Triads. The US state first copied this strategy in 1949, when it armed the defeated Kuomintang's drug networks in Burma and Laos, after the victorious Chinese revolution began to eliminate Chinese opium, then the source of 85% of the world's heroin.
The US state encouraged its allies to enrich themselves through drugs, while it blamed the communist enemy for the evils that its allies were committing. From 1949 until at least 1964, the US told the UN Narcotics Commission that China was responsible for drug imports into the USA. In fact, the drugs were trafficked from Burma and Thailand, under the protection of the Kuomintang troops backed by the CIA. The Hong Kong authorities stated that they "were not aware of a traffic in narcotics from the mainland of China through Hong Kong" but "quantities of narcotics reached Hong Kong via Thailand."
The US state assaulted the whole region of South East Asia between 1950 and 1975, just as it is attacking the Middle East today. An earlier effort at regime change in Laos in 1959-60 was a disaster, putting drug traffickers in power. Opium production soared during the years of US intervention, the 1950s and 1960s, and plummeted in 1975 after the Vietnamese people kicked US forces out of the region.
US military interventions lead to bigger drug flows into the USA. After the US intervention in Afghanistan in 1979, the Afghani-produced proportion of heroin consumed in the USA went from zero in 1979 to 52% in 1984.
Later, the Taliban government cut opium production from 3,656 tons in 2000 (90% of Europe's heroin supply) to 74 tons in 2001 (US State Department figures), wiping out 70% of the world's illicit opium production. US forces, in alliance with a drug trafficking network, the Northern Alliance, defeated Al Qa'ida, another drug trafficking network. The US funded the Northern Alliance warlord and terrorist Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, making him the world's biggest heroin trafficker.
Under US occupation, Afghan opium production has risen from 3,700 tons in 2002, to 3,400 tons in 2003, to 4,200 tons last year. The Financial Times wrote, "The U.S. and UN have ignored repeated calls by the international antidrugs community to address the increasing menace of Afghanistan's opium cultivation." It is now the world's leading producer of illicit drugs, producing 90% of the heroin sold in Britain and Europe. President Karzai of Afghanistan has made Rashid Dostum, a warlord, drug runner and terrorist, his military chief of staff.
According to the Colombian government, the antigovernment guerrillas of FARC (the supposed target of the `war on drugs') had 2.5% of Colombia's cocaine trade; the government's allies, the paramilitary death squads, had 40%. Drug production in Colombia and its drug imports to the USA have now doubled to a new record.
26 of 26 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Shocking material in a chewy read
15 Oct 2006
By Paul Vitols
- Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback
A hard-to-follow structure and a dry, academic writing style make this powerful and much-needed book less accessible than it should be.
Spurred in part by the near-unanimous 5-star acclaim among the Amazon reviewers, I bought this book. I was a bit disappointed. Not because of the content: Scott's authority comes through strongly as a concerned, longtime, and deep observer of the deliberately hidden dimension of U.S. foreign policy operating in Afghanistan, Colombia, and Indochina. Writing since the time of the Vietnam War, he has dug and dug into these things, and we are the beneficiaries of his spadework.
My issue is more with the structure and presentation of the book. As other reviewers have noted, the book is in fact mostly a reprinting of some of Scott's earlier writings, with some new, brief introductions. This means the book is not really unified, but more a collection of essays with some overlap and repetition which I found sometimes confusing. Counterintuitively, it moves backward in time, starting with a discussion of Afghanistan in 2002 and progressing to Colombia in 2001 and Indochina from 1950 to 1970. The book is not a single narrative or a single argument, and its unity suffers for this.
Scott delivers what should be the most sensational pieces of information--such as that presidents Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon all had strikingly intimate ties to organized-crime figures--in a dry, unemphatic way that makes for a strangely subdued, scholarly tone (with copious end-notes), and thus a less engaging read than it should be.
Also: if you are not thoroughly familiar with things like the progression of political and military events in Indochina leading up to the Vietnam War, you will find the book heavy going, since Scott assumes this knowledge on the part of the reader.
All of that being said, this book is very important, and Scott has done a huge service to us all in writing it. In the nature of things, he can't create a seamless narrative of American skulduggery in its wars since World War Two, since this has been kept secret. But he presents a host of suggestive and damning evidence of systematic, covert wrongdoing by American intelligence and military operatives working opportunistically with drug traffickers and organized-crime figures, often without the knowledge of the administration they are ostensibly serving. These people have taken the adage "the ends justify the means" to the extreme--although what the desired "ends" actually might be is often far from clear.
So: five stars for content and its importance; three stars for presentation. We need more Peter Dale Scotts--a lot more of them. His ideas need to be popularized, but it seems that Scott himself is not the guy to do that.
Spurred in part by the near-unanimous 5-star acclaim among the Amazon reviewers, I bought this book. I was a bit disappointed. Not because of the content: Scott's authority comes through strongly as a concerned, longtime, and deep observer of the deliberately hidden dimension of U.S. foreign policy operating in Afghanistan, Colombia, and Indochina. Writing since the time of the Vietnam War, he has dug and dug into these things, and we are the beneficiaries of his spadework.
My issue is more with the structure and presentation of the book. As other reviewers have noted, the book is in fact mostly a reprinting of some of Scott's earlier writings, with some new, brief introductions. This means the book is not really unified, but more a collection of essays with some overlap and repetition which I found sometimes confusing. Counterintuitively, it moves backward in time, starting with a discussion of Afghanistan in 2002 and progressing to Colombia in 2001 and Indochina from 1950 to 1970. The book is not a single narrative or a single argument, and its unity suffers for this.
Scott delivers what should be the most sensational pieces of information--such as that presidents Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon all had strikingly intimate ties to organized-crime figures--in a dry, unemphatic way that makes for a strangely subdued, scholarly tone (with copious end-notes), and thus a less engaging read than it should be.
Also: if you are not thoroughly familiar with things like the progression of political and military events in Indochina leading up to the Vietnam War, you will find the book heavy going, since Scott assumes this knowledge on the part of the reader.
All of that being said, this book is very important, and Scott has done a huge service to us all in writing it. In the nature of things, he can't create a seamless narrative of American skulduggery in its wars since World War Two, since this has been kept secret. But he presents a host of suggestive and damning evidence of systematic, covert wrongdoing by American intelligence and military operatives working opportunistically with drug traffickers and organized-crime figures, often without the knowledge of the administration they are ostensibly serving. These people have taken the adage "the ends justify the means" to the extreme--although what the desired "ends" actually might be is often far from clear.
So: five stars for content and its importance; three stars for presentation. We need more Peter Dale Scotts--a lot more of them. His ideas need to be popularized, but it seems that Scott himself is not the guy to do that.
24 of 25 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Essential reading
16 July 2003
By David Gribble
- Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback
Drugs, Oil, and War: The United States in Afghanistan, Colombia, and Indochina is an eye-opening journey into the deep politics of U.S. intervention in developing and third-world nations. Scott illuminates the connection between American business interests and American foreign policy with a factual depth that leaves little room for doubt. Scott also documents the CIA involvement--often via drug proxies--in furthering covert American interests. The details and references contained within the text add immeasurably to what is already an incredibly valuable and insightful history. This book is essential reading for anyone looking to understand the motivation behind American foreign policy and the military conflicts that have arisen out of American business interests on foreign soil.
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4.5 out of 5 stars
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