Customer Reviews

Powderburns: Cocaine, Contras & the Drug War

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Castillo, a former DEA field agent, stationed in Central America became an unwitting witness to the CIA's, Oliver North's, and the Reagan Administration's involvement in the smuggling of cocaine to fund the Contra army. Published years before the 1997 San Jose Mercury News/Gary Webb article, "Dark Alliance", about the CIA's role in bringing crack to the streets of America, Castillo provides a shocking but entirely credible story from the inside. Castillo, during the course of his field investigations into cocaine smuggling, inevitably ran into the CIA's cocaine network. A fly-drugs-up/fly-guns-down network operated by Oliver North, Richard Secord, and CIA front company Southern Air Transport out of the Ilopango airbase in El Salvador. He was repremanded time and time again by his DEA superiors for sticking his nose places it didn't belong. Warned off by claims he was endangering missions critical to our National Security. Yet, Castillo continued to file tell-all reports to the DEA in Washington. This is the story of the uncovering of these revelations, and one man's fight to expose the truth and bring these injustices to light. I highly recommend it.

The foreward, written by Michael Levine, encourages the reader to cancel all appointments for the next several hours as the reader will not be able to put this book down. Levine wasn't kidding. This book is about the life of Cele Castillo. It begins with Cele's childhood under the rule of a military father. Cele ends up being drafted for the Vietnam war and his experiences in Vietnam are so amazingly vivid that it's impossible to put this book down. The drug use in Vietnam was so rampant that this is where Cele learns that narcotics were much more of a threat to America than Communism as he vows to fight the illegal drug industry if he ever makes it out of Vietnam in one piece. Cele survives the jungle, the snipers, and even his first helicopter crash. He's hired by the DEA and assigned to work in New York. He works hard, risking his life many times to bust drug dealers and ends up working in Central America. As if a second helicopter crash and being the guy responsible for upsetting powerful drug lords weren't risky enough, Cele stumbles upon the CIA and Oliver North's involvement in the illegal drug industry & illegal gun running during the Iran-Contra scandal, which also involved Bush Sr. & the Reagan administration. North & his crew were selling over-priced weapons to Iran as well as selling tons of cocaine to American cities as they used all of those profits to buy massive amount of weapons that they flew in to the Contras. As the cash and weapons were flown into the Contras, cocaine was brought back to America under the protection of the US military and CIA. The airplanes & airplane hangars were all CIA and NSA owned, and the pilots (Barry Seal & others) were contracted by the CIA. The corruption and involvement of our own CIA in the illegal drug industry wasn't enough to make Cele give up, he kept fighting to make a dent in the illegal drug industry. He was warned to stay away from the operations of Oliver North and the CIA but he pressed on anyway. That's when his career suffered as an internal investigation was launched against him. As if death threats and surviving a plane crash (his 3rd crash) weren't enough, trumped-up charges were used against him to end his career at the DEA. Cele risked his life countless times, got tons of cocaine off the streets of America & traded his marriage for dedication to his career. Senator John Kerry's investigation went nowhere, Bush Sr. pardoned North's crew as they only got a slap on the wrist (probation) while the DEA rewarded Cele by ending his career.

Celerino Castillo III spent 12 years in the DEA raiding cocaine labs in South America, training anti-narcotics units, and investing drug rings. His account shocks and amazes. I have met Mr. Castillo, and he as he humbly recounts his stories, it astounds me what the government is really up to. This is a four star winner.

I live in El Salvador and know many of the people involved. Down here this is all highly common knowledge to the point that it is not even a conspiracy. I have personally spoken with many of the people who were on the side of the CIA and contras, and who benefitted from this, who sit and laugh about it over beers and talk about how gullible Americans are for believing that only foreign governments are corrupt. I also am friends with a CIA "consultant" during the war, an American ex-marine (this was before Blackwater made this sort of thing common) who was contracted to train the contras in the jungle. He was friends with Oliver North, and has photos of the two of them all over his house. He said that he personally escorted and helped pilot boatloads of crack and cocaine from Puerto Cabezas, Nicargua to Houston, TX and New Orleans, and the govt, coastguard, etc. was instructed to look the other way. This guy went to jail for Iran Contra for 2 years and was pardoned, and even though he fully admits to all of the activities and shenanigans, and took the fall for it, he thinks that Oliver North is a the greatest American we have. Yet even he concedes that Americans and the media are gullible idiots for everything that they got away with. Others have mentioned that there was no incentive becuase the US was funding the operation- this is BS- the whole reason for Iran Contra, as well as the drugs, ws because congress was cutting off funding and heavily restricting the funding that they did get. The guy who said otherwise on this board is either lying or has no idea what he is talking about. There are still a lot of spooks down in this part of the world, although its mellowed out since 9/11 since the govt. has other priorities...

Excellent book. Not only is this book based on a life of a top DEA agent, but it's also written very well! It's not dry nor tedious, it's a pleasure to read! And the information contained here is a goldmine.

This book is a 'must-read' for every single hard-working Patriotic American who is ready to Wake Up.

review by www.truthring.org

On March 16, 1989, President Reagan accused the Sandinistas of drug running : "I know that every American parent concerned about the drug problem will be outraged to learn that top Nicaraguan government officials are deeply involved in drug trafficking."

The one-million-dollar question is : Wouldn't every American parent "concerned about the drug problem" also be outraged to learn that top *American* government officials were deeply involved in drug trafficking ?

This book reads like a thriller. It is full of action, intrigues and revelations. It shows how politics really works, in the field. It is written by a soldier, from the front line perspective. Castillo served in Vietnam, and saw many of his friends die from heroin abuse. That made him want to fight the "war on drugs". His story as a DEA-agent begins in New York, and later he moves on to Peru, Guatemala and El Salvador.

After more than 10 years of service he finally understands not only that this "war on drugs" is a futile effort - "every bag of heroin or cocaine I took off the streets had about the same impact as removing a cup of sand from the desert" - but on top of that the government is full of hypocrisy. In the words of Castillo : "By the end of 1988, I realized how hopelessly tangled DEA, the CIA, and every other US entity in Central America had become with the criminals. The lines that should have defined our ethical boundaries were stepped over and scuffed until they melted into nothingness."

Castillo doesn't make any difference between drug smuggling for the "good" or the "bad" guys - whatever that would mean. His base line is : he absolutely hates drugs. That's why he became a DEA-agent, and that's how he interfered with the drug smuggling operation for the Contras, only to find out he was crossing a line, since this was a "White House Operation" (in the words of Ambassador Corr).

Castillo was finally forced to retire from the DEA. President George Bush on the other hand was willing to pardon the Iran-Contra conspirators on Christmas Eve, 1992, because their motives were "patriotism". Does that mean that drug trafficking is good when motivated by "patriotism" ?

Powderburns is Cellie Castillo recapping his career as a soldier, police officer and DEA agent. This culminates in him figuring out that the CIA was helping the Contras smuggle Cocaine into America. He would present the evidence and of course he would be given the runaround, ignored and finally after a while his career was ruined, as well as his life was in serious danger. Castillo put his life on the line as a soldier in Vietnam and as a cop and DEA agent and this was the reward he was given. This is just another example of the United States government being caught redhanded in international dealing of dangerous life destroying hard drugs. But hey keep locking those pot smokers up in the phony drug war money making scam back in the States.

A very plausible and chilling account about humanity and America's role south of the border. Yes there are some typos but the brutality and sentiment expressed in this book stay with me today just as if I had read it yesterday. A great read, not too long, and intriguing to boot.

This is an EXCELLENT book. Not only do the authors lay it on the line about all the rampant corruption and dirty dealing behind the scenes...it's also, as one reviewer has already noted, enhanced by one of the most vivid recountings I've ever read about the true combat experience in Vietnam. My brother-in-law was a Marine Lieutenant in combat there, and like most vets, never talks about it. He's always been powerfully anti-drugs, however. Reading this book, now I finally "get it."
The only negative about this book -- which most of the one-star reviews have harped on -- is the flood of awful typos and grammar errors in both the Forward and the Introduction. Having read Michael Levine (recommend "The Big White Lie"), I know this can't be HIM...some drunken monkey was asleep at the switch for both this and the "DKH" Introduction. Fight your way thru this stuff -- or just skip these two sections -- and you'll find an outstanding book for the rest of the way...

It's hard to trust a premise (especially an incendiary one) when the book is so full of grammatical errors. I'm not talking about a "their" for a "there," I'm talking misspellings ON EVERY PAGE. Even on the dedication page! If you can't check the grammar effectively, how can you fact check your book????