Operation Tailwind: did the US use nerve gas to kill defectors in Laos?

[Minstrel Boy]

I don't know - I'm asking for informed opinion.

I didn't follow the flap concerning the 1999 story, which claimed that on a 1970 raid into Laos US special forces employed sarin gas to kill defectors. But I have recently read former CNN producer April Oliver's account of her experience pursuing the story, and losing her job for it when CNN backed away under pressure from the Pentagon, in Into the Buzzsaw.

If the US did use nerve gas, particularly "against its own people," so much for that trump card against the legacy of Saddam.

Here's an interesting passage from Oliver's entry, "A Dream Job":

"The whole point of a black operation is to conceal the facts. That's why there is so little coverage of such events.... In a chilling warning, an officer on the Tailwind raid told my cameraman at the Special Forces convention in June, 'Geez, I am really sorry we're doing this to April.' Meaning the disinformation campaign about me, casting me alternatively as a wildly imaginative conspiracy theorist, or else as the Attila-the-Hun producer who pushes hardened combat veterans to the walls, choking the truth out of them. But, this officer said, we can't let the Tailwind story have legs. It can lead to too many other things being uncovered, even worse things. Special Forces guys have got to understand they are not to talk to reporters, and reporters have got to understand they are not to try and uncover black operations, otherwise they are going to end up like April. The tactic? An old cliche of warfare: kill the messenger."

[amber dog democrat]

1. I heard and read a little about it.

I have no idea if its true or not. I know we were doing political assassinations in Vietnam via the CiA under Operation Phoenix. In the atmosphere of that time I think anything was possible. I knew of fraggings back then.

[jumpstart33]

2. yes, i asked my dad.

And we did much more than that.

[Eloriel]

3. OMG. Did I know this --

and forgot it? Or did I never know it. I'm really sorry to know it now. It makes me want to throw up.

Unfortunately, it woudln't surprise me.

[Minstrel Boy]

5. my feeling, too

My first thought was How did I miss this? and my second, How bad does it have to get?

Since the producer was told by a Special Forces vet that the story had to be killed because it could lead to worse revelations, I guess that's the answer to my second question.

[seventhson]

4. Yeah - I think we did

problem is the whole hell created by these bastards is getting as bad as the Nazis

I am afraid it is just a matter of time before we have "freedom camps" for dissenters where we can make nerve gas and starve to death for the Bush empire.

[Karenina]

9. This *cabal is well away on its first lap

to making the Third Reich look like a Boy Scout picnic. WHAT IS NOT TO GET? :shrug:

[seventhson]

10. Bushes WERE the Third Reich. They bought and paid for the Hoilocaust

it was no picnic....

and it is NOT over yet

[Minstrel Boy]

6. kick for any more thoughts n/t

[Eloriel]

7. And another

:kick:

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

8. I remember this. Considering what was going on in VN, it was

easily believable. I find it amazing that there are still apologists for our horrific actions in SE Asia.