Operation Naked King: U.S. Secretly Targeted Bolivia's Evo Morales In Drug Sting

[marmar]

Operation Naked King: U.S. Secretly Targeted Bolivia's Evo Morales In Drug Sting
A confidential informant says the DEA had its sights set on Bolivia's populist leader.


The United States has secretly indicted top officials connected to the government of Bolivian President Evo Morales for their alleged involvement in a cocaine trafficking scheme. The indictments, secured in a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration sting called "Operation Naked King," have not been previously reported.

Morales, a former leader of Bolivia's coca growers union, has long been at loggerheads with the DEA. In 2008, Morales expelled the agency from the country and embarked on his own strategy of combatting drug trafficking, acknowledging the traditional uses of coca in Bolivian culture and working cooperatively with coca growers to regulate some legal activity and to promote alternative development elsewhere. Morales' plan has been effective at reducing cultivation, according to the United Nations.

But that doesn't mean the DEA accepted its eviction quietly. In fact, the agency went after members of Morales' administration in an apparent effort to undermine his leadership.

The sealed indictments, revealed last week in a lawsuit filed by long-time DEA informant Carlos Toro, target Walter Álvarez, a top Bolivian air force official; the late Raul García, father of Vice President Álvaro García Linera; Faustino Giménez, an Argentine citizen and Bolivian resident who is said to be close to the vice president; and Katy Alcoreza, described as an intelligence agent for Morales. Toro said in the court document that he played an integral role in securing the indictments as part of the DEA's undercover investigation into the alleged Bolivian cocaine trafficking ring, which the agency ran out of its office in Asuncion, Paraguay. .....................(more)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/operation-naked-king-evo-morales_55f70da2e4b077ca094fdbe1

[Fred Sanders]

1. Even more regime change operations by the worst offender the world has ever known.

[malthaussen]

2. What a quaint code name.

I remember reading somewhere-or-other how one of the signs of encroaching imperial decadence is code names that are chosen for political propaganda. You know, like "Iraqi Freedom." It's also kind of interesting how operations always have at least two words in their names nowadays. I guess "Operation Overlord" is too tame for today's strategists.

-- Mal

[MinM]

3. Why has there never been a military coup in the United States?

There is a running joke in Bolivia and other Latin American countries that goes like this:

[font color=blue]Q: Why has there never been a military coup in the United States?[/font]

[font color=darkred]A: Because there's no U.S. embassy in the U.S.[/font]

In September 2008, Morales made sure there wouldn't be one in Bolivia, either, and kicked U.S. Ambassador Philip Goldberg out of the country.

Then, that November, Morales expelled the DEA, arguing that the agency had committed human rights violations, covered up murders and was routinely using its investigative powers to target politicians and movement leaders who were challenging Washington's neoliberal agenda. Morales had made a campaign promise to nationalize the country's natural gas resources and use the proceeds to develop the economy from the bottom up...

http://boliviarising.blogspot.com/2015/09/operation-naked-king-us-secretly.html

[SpearthrowerOwl]

4. A couple comments:

1.) There's no evidence that Evo Morales was "targeted," just that members of his administration were indicted by the DEA.

2.) The DEA should never be taken at face-value: "Drug Enforcement" Agency is simply the title, not its function. Anyone who thinks the DEA's presence in Bolivia is primarily about drugs, and not primarily to overthrow the government, is an idiot. It's far from just "mission creep."

[bobthedrummer]

5. Targeted Killings Are a Drug Dealer's Best Friend

"Washington's 'assassination policy' has been very effective...at increasing drug trafficking and promoting terrorism" (Andrew Cockburn Tom Dispatch.com article reposted 4-28-15 The Nation)
http://www.thenation.com/article/targeted-killings-are-drug-dealers-best-friend

Elements of the US government are the world's biggest drug dealers. K&R.