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|---|---|
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Mohrbooks Literary Agency
Sebastian Ritscher |
| Original language | |
| English | |
NARCOTOPIA
How Asia's top Drug Cartel Suvived the CIA
A thrilling investigation into the richest narco-state you've never heard of - the Wa nation - from award-winning investigative journalist Patrick Winn who has been reporting from South East Asia for over fifteen years.
His writing and short documentaries have appeared in or on The New York Times, the BBC, The Atlantic, and many other outlets. He gained special and secure access to Wa and was able to interview numerous sources in the nation's government as well as regular citizens, and his research and reporting will comprise one of the first thorough accounts of the nation.
Nestled in the Golden Triangle of China, Burma and Nepal, the Wa nation has existed and thrived for over five decades. Like mountain peoples from Chechnya to the Ozarks, the Wa like to do things their own way. A tribal authority called the United Wa State Army (or UWSA) controls their native terrain. The UWSA makes laws, defends the motherland and builds roads and schools. It even issues driver's licenses. In every sense, it is a government. And as a nation, its armed forces command 30,000 troops and 20,000 reservists, more than the militaries of Sweden or Kenya. The Wa possess high-tech weaponry: cannons, drones and missiles that can knock jets out of the sky. Yet the one difference from their nation and those that surround them is their preferred commodity: drugs.
Illegal drugs are indeed one of the UWSA's top revenue sources. Over the years, tons of narcotics produced on Wa soil have hit the black market and traffickers have smuggled them onto American shores. Their ability to have a functioning government, economic system and freedom from their neighbors derives from their sophisticated, profitable and illegal trade. Yet, the origin story of this narco-army is smudged with American fingerprints. Not only did the CIA create the conditions for its inception, but one of its foremost leaders was a DEA asset.
In Narcotopia, Patrick Winn investigates and uncovers the true story of Wa, untangling the relationship between the DEA, CIA and Wa people. The result is a saga of an indigenous people who have tapped the power of narcotics to create a nation where there was none before and the covert operations of US intelligence to transform and undermine it for their own agenda.
Patrick Winn is an award-winning investigative journalist who covers rebellion and black markets in Southeast Asia. He enters the worlds of guerrillas and vigilantes to mine stories that might otherwise go ignored. Winn has received the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award (also known as the 'poor man's Pulitzer') and a National Press Club award. He's also a three-time winner of Amnesty International's Human Rights Press Awards among other prizes.
Nestled in the Golden Triangle of China, Burma and Nepal, the Wa nation has existed and thrived for over five decades. Like mountain peoples from Chechnya to the Ozarks, the Wa like to do things their own way. A tribal authority called the United Wa State Army (or UWSA) controls their native terrain. The UWSA makes laws, defends the motherland and builds roads and schools. It even issues driver's licenses. In every sense, it is a government. And as a nation, its armed forces command 30,000 troops and 20,000 reservists, more than the militaries of Sweden or Kenya. The Wa possess high-tech weaponry: cannons, drones and missiles that can knock jets out of the sky. Yet the one difference from their nation and those that surround them is their preferred commodity: drugs.
Illegal drugs are indeed one of the UWSA's top revenue sources. Over the years, tons of narcotics produced on Wa soil have hit the black market and traffickers have smuggled them onto American shores. Their ability to have a functioning government, economic system and freedom from their neighbors derives from their sophisticated, profitable and illegal trade. Yet, the origin story of this narco-army is smudged with American fingerprints. Not only did the CIA create the conditions for its inception, but one of its foremost leaders was a DEA asset.
In Narcotopia, Patrick Winn investigates and uncovers the true story of Wa, untangling the relationship between the DEA, CIA and Wa people. The result is a saga of an indigenous people who have tapped the power of narcotics to create a nation where there was none before and the covert operations of US intelligence to transform and undermine it for their own agenda.
Patrick Winn is an award-winning investigative journalist who covers rebellion and black markets in Southeast Asia. He enters the worlds of guerrillas and vigilantes to mine stories that might otherwise go ignored. Winn has received the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award (also known as the 'poor man's Pulitzer') and a National Press Club award. He's also a three-time winner of Amnesty International's Human Rights Press Awards among other prizes.
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Book
Published 2024-01-30 by Public Affairs |
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Book
Published 2024-01-01 by Public Affairs |