Death-Squad Organizer Is NYT’s Source on Ben Carson’s Lack of Foreign Policy Smarts
November 19, 2015
he New York Times depicts former CIA officer Duane Clarridge as a “colorful, even legendary figure.” (photo: Mike Wintroath/AP)
In its effort to vet one of the leading GOP presidential candidates, Dr. Ben Carson, the New York Times didn’t properly vet its primary source in this vetting, former CIA officer Duane Clarridge—an indicted liar and overseer of Contra death squads in Central America.
While the Times‘ Trip Gabriel briefly notes the former, he completely omits the latter, instead offering this starry-eyed description:
Mr. Clarridge, described by Mr. Carson’s top adviser, Armstrong Williams, as “a mentor for Dr. Carson,” is a colorful, even legendary figure in intelligence circles, someone who could have stepped out of a Hollywood thriller. He was a longtime CIA officer, serving undercover in India, Turkey, Italy and other countries, and sprinkles his remarks with salty language.
As head of Reagan’s CIA division in Latin America in the 1980s, Clarridge took part in the effort to overthrow Nicaragua’s Sandinista government by illegally supplying funds and arms to the Contras—a right-wing terrorist movement that committed brutal war crimes. This was not an unforeseen consequence, but the point of the operation; asked by CIA Director William Casey to come up with a strategy for dealing with the Sandinista revolution, Clarridge writes in his memoir A Spy for All Seasons:
My plan was simple:
1. Take the war to Nicaragua.
2.Start killing Cubans.
in full: http://fair.org/home/death-squad-organizer-is-nyts-source-on-ben-carsons-lack-of-foreign-policy-smarts/
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