THE POLITICS OF HEROIN EXPOSED

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01350R000200300034-4
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 4, 2004
• Sequence Number: 34
• Publication Date: September 24, 1972
• Content Type: NSPR

SAN FRAI-OCI$CO, CA?,..
EXAM INZR, Approved
E - 204,749
EXA14INER & CHRONICLE
S - 640,004
SE P 2 419721,
to 1/ ht FC, T-.., ,:.c*s
For Release,2004/lfOl~`3hgIYkeR69889 OR0i0200300034-4
the evil or Communism and to,k o
.+~ e) ~- JA "P .r o .
fight: .. you must have money. .5Q
In these mountains the only c-N A
money. is opium' y--
-A Taiwan clenerbl 0(1-:.u_
young Ph.D. scholar from Yale who studied
L- a s k
d
y
the subject for 18 months and who tics alrea
been embroiled. with the Central Intelligence
Agency over there.
Before publication. his book was attacked
by the CIA for what it said were unjust accu-
Reviewed by
Thomas Lask
TIIE POLITICS OF HEROIN IN SOUTII-
-EAST.? ASIA. By Alfred W. McCoy, with
Cathicen' If. Reed and Leonard P. Adams If.
harper & Ilow; 491 pp.; $10.95.
A LTIIOUGII "The Politics of Southeast
11 Asia" is packed with information, some
of it of considerable eompexity. its charges
(for that is what its conclusions are) are sim-
ple enough to be spelled out in a school pri-
mer.
Seventy per cent of the world's supply of
heroin, the book asserts, has its origin in
Southeast Asia in an area of northeast Burma,
North Laos and North Thailand known as the
"Golden 'T'riangle.''
It is transported in the planes, vehicles and
other conveyances supplied by the United
States. The profit from the trade has been
going into the 'pockets of some of our best
friends in Southeast Asia.
The charge concludes with the statement
that the traffic is being carried on with the
indifference if not the closed-eye compliance
of some American officials and there is no
likelihood of its being shut down in the fore-
seeable future.
Quick Controversy
These conchs 'ions havd e been~lr wn by
.approve For e~ease 2404/10/13: CIA-RDP88-0135OR000200300034-4
sations that the agency knew of but failed to
stem that heroin traffic. After reading the gal-
leys (which the publisher had made available)
and sending off a critique to lIarper's. the CIA
took no further action.
It is difficult for anyone not close to the
field to assess the accuracy of McCoy's mate-
rial. But it must, be said that his book is a
serious., sober. headline-shunning study with
63 pages of supporting notes, referring to a
large number` of personal interviews, newspa-
per accounts, previously publisfhecl b o o k s,.
Congressional committee hearings, govern-
ment reports and United Nations documents,
It is so filled with information that it will take
a great deal ? more than more dislike of its
contents to demolish it.
Official Acknowicd;cment
Perhaps the greatest guarantee of its accu-
racy is a cabinet-level report prepared by offi-
cials of:-1h, CIA. the State Department and the
Defense l)el>~~rtnre'Firthat confirms the main
findings of the McCoy book. The report. dated
Feb. 21, 1972, said that "there is no prospect"
of stemming the smuggling of drugs by air
and sea in Southeast Asia and cited as one
reason the fact that `;the governments in the
l; region are unable, or in some cases unwilling"
to make a truly effective effort to curb the
traffic.
That drug smuggling is not a problem re-
mote from us can be seen from the fact that a
shipment of the Double U-O Globe brand. a
bulk heroin manufactured in the Golden
Triangle, was seized in an amount estimated
by the police to be worth $3.5 million in the
Lexington hotel in New York City last Novem-
ber and another shipment worth by police esti-
mates to be $2.25 million was taken in Miami.
The politics of heroin - and in this book
the emphasis is on the politics - is an artful
one. McCoy cites the case of Ngo Dinh Nhu,
brother of President Ngo Dinh Diem of South
Vietnam, later murdered by his colleagues.
During his brother's regime, Nhu was head
of tire. secret police and had set up a close
continued