Manuel Noriega: "CIA Dope Calypso"

Today marks the 19th anniversary of the U.S invasion of Panama, during which "executive officer" Manuel Noriega was overthrown by the United States' "Operation Just Cause" and replaced by Guillermo Endara. In 1989, as seems to be our habit when we have a president named Bush, we invaded the nation of Panama, killing 325 civilians and loosing 24 U.S GI's. After his removal from power, General Noriega was indicted on eight charges of money laundering, racketeering, and drug trafficking and tried in U.S courts. He completed his U.S prison sentence in September of 2007, but remains detained in U.S custody more than year after the end of his sentence.

Manuel Noriega WORKED FOR THE CIA from the 1950's through the late 1980's, THIS RELATIONSHIP BECOMING CONTRACTUAL in 1967. This is the leader of a sovereign nation, a dictator ruling with the same totalitarianism of U.S-labeled-"terrorist" Fidel Castro, officially working for and receiving payment from a governmental agency of the United States of America, another sovereign nation, while in power. In fact, his official, paid affiliation with the U.S didn't end until February of 1988 when he was officially indicted on drug-related charges by the DEA.




Though published in January '72, some 11 years before Noriega's rise to power in Panama, I believe Mr. Allen Ginsberg's "CIA Dope Calypso" is especially appropriate today...

In nineteen hundred forty-five
China was won by Mao Tse-tung
Chiang Kai Shek's army ran away
They're waiting there in Thailand today

Supported by the CIA
Pushing junk down Thailand way

First they stole from the Meo tribes
Up in the hills they started taking bribes
Then they sent their soldiers up to Shan
Collecting opium to sell to The Man

Pushing junk in Bangkok today
Supported by the CIA

Brought their jam on mule trains down
To Chiang Rai that's a railroad town
Sold it next to the police chief's brain
He took it to town on the choo-choo train
Trafficking dope to Bangkok all day
Supported by the CIA

The policeman's name was Mr. Phao
He peddled dope grand scale and how

Chief of border customs paid By Central Intelligence's U.S. aid

The whole operation, newspapers say
Supported by the CIA

He got so sloppy and he peddled so loose
He busted himself and cooked his own goose
Took the reward for an opium load
Seizing his own haul which same he resold

Big time pusher for a decade turned grey
Working for the CIA

The whole operation fell in to chaos
Till U.S. intelligence came in to Laos
I'll tell you no lie I'm a true American
Our big pusher there was Phoumi Nosavan
All them Princes in a power play
But Phoumi was the man for the CIA

Touby Lyfong he worked for the French
A big fat man liked to dine & to wench
Prince of the Meos he grew black mud
Till opium flowed through the land like a flood

Communists came and chased the French away
So Touby took a job with the CIA

And his best friend General Vang Pao
Ran our Meo army like a sacred cow
Helicopter smugglers filled Long Cheng's bars
In Xieng Quang province on the Plain of Jars

It started in secret they were fighting yesterday
Clandestine secret army of the CIA

All through the Sixties the dope flew free
Through Tan Son Nhut Saigon to Marshall Ky
Air America followed through
Transporting comfiture for President Thieu

All these Dealers were decades and yesterday
The Indochinese mob of the U.S. CIA

Operation Haylift Officer William Colby
Saw Marshall Ky fly opium Mr. Mustard told me
Indochina desk he was Chief of Dirty Tricks
"Hitch-hiking" with dope pushers was how he got his fix

Subsidizing the traffickers to drive the Reds away
Till Colby was the head of the whole wide CIA