\n<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n <\/iframe>\n<\/p>\n<p><!-- END-BLOCK(acast)[0] --><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"has-underline\">Veronica and Charity Bowers,<\/span> a young Christian missionary and her daughter, are killed when the Peruvian Air Force shoots down a small passenger plane in 2001. The plane had been mistaken for a drug smuggling plane and was shot down as part of a joint anti-drug agreement between the CIA and the Colombian and Peruvian governments.<\/p>\n<p>President Donald Trump has made the Bowers\u2019s deaths newly and urgently relevant since he began ordering the U.S. military to strike down alleged drug smuggling boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean in September 2025. By early November, the U.S. had launched a total of 17 strikes, killing at least 70 people, and those figures seem to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/interactive\/2025\/10\/29\/us\/us-caribbean-pacific-boat-strikes.html\">grow<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/interactive\/2025\/10\/29\/us\/us-caribbean-pacific-boat-strikes.html\">almost by the day<\/a>. The attacks are illegal under both U.S. and international law. The administration also provided <a href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/2025\/10\/31\/trump-venezuela-boat-strikes-unprivileged-belligerants\/\">no documentation of the alleged drug trafficking<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The attack on the Bowers family pierced the veil that obscures drug war foreign policy because of their nationality, skin color, and relatability. More than 20 years ago, House Oversight Committee hearing members Jan Schakowsky and Elijah Cummings demanded accountability after U.S. drug interdiction forces killed the Bowers. They demanded to know how such a mistake could happen, and how we could prevent the loss of innocent life going forward.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe kind of action we saw in Peru \u2026 amounts to an extrajudicial killing,\u201d said Schakowsky at the time. Cummings added, \u201cThe Peruvian shootdown policy would never be permitted as a domestic United States policy precisely because it goes against one of our most sacred, due process principles \u2014 namely, that all persons are presumed innocent until proven guilty.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Now, a new administration openly celebrates summary execution of alleged drug smugglers without a hint of due process, and is now threatening to topple another government to prevent the U.S. from sating its appetite for illicit drugs.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The story of Veronica and Charity Bowers is a stark reminder of how aggressive drug policy is wasteful and futile, how we never seem to learn from past failures, and how the generations-long effort to stop people from getting high also \u2014 and necessarily \u2014 treats human lives as expendable.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-transcript\"><strong>Transcript<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko:<\/strong> It\u2019s April 20, 2001. In the skies above the Peruvian Amazon, a small floatplane flies over the rainforest, along the river. There are five people aboard. They don\u2019t know it, but their plane is being tracked. A U.S.-based surveillance plane \u2014 contracting with the CIA \u2014 is closely following.<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 1:<\/strong> We\u2019re trying to remain covert at this point, but what we do know is it\u2019s a high-wing single-engine floatplane that we picked up just along the border between Peru and Brazil.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko:<\/strong> Working with the CIA contractors, a plane from the Peruvian Air Force begins to pursue the mystery plane. It doesn\u2019t appear to have an authorized flight plan, and it isn\u2019t responding to their radio messages. The CIA and Peruvian government suspect that it could be trafficking illicit drugs.<\/p>\n<p>In one telling exchange, the piloting crew discuss whether they should try to identify the plane. But the U.S. officer directs them to stay covert. They\u2019re concerned that the plane might get away.<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 1: <\/strong>You know, we can go up and attempt the tail number, but the problem with that, if he is dirty and he detects us, he makes a right turn immediately and we can\u2019t chase him.<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 2: <\/strong>See, I don\u2019t know if this is <em>bandido <\/em>or if it\u2019s <em>amigo<\/em>, OK?<strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Peruvian Air Force pilot: <\/strong>OK.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 2 (in Spanish): <\/strong>I don\u2019t know.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>That\u2019s one of the CIA contractors, speaking really poor Spanish, telling the Peruvian Air Force pilot that he\u2019s not sure if the plane in question is a \u201cbandito\u201d or \u201camigo\u201d \u2014 a bandit or a friend.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The plane was then given multiple warnings to land.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Peruvian Air Force pilot (in Spanish): <\/strong>If you do not comply, we will proceed to take you down.<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 2:<\/strong> This guy doesn\u2019t, this guy doesn\u2019t fit the profile.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 1: <\/strong>OK, I understand this is not our call, but this guy is at 4,500 feet. He is not taking any evasive action. I recommend we follow him. I do not recommend \u201cPhase 3\u201d at this time.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>\u201cPhase 3\u201d is code for the most drastic action possible: shooting the plane down from the sky. Under an agreement between the United States and the governments of Peru and other Latin American countries, any planes suspected of running drugs in the region could be plucked from the clouds.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>That effectively put U.S. officials from the CIA or Drug Enforcement Agency \u2014 along with officials in the Peruvian government \u2014 in the role of judge, jury, and executioner.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Peruvian Air Force pilot: <\/strong>It\u2019s three phase, authorized, OK?\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 2: <\/strong>OK. But you sure it\u2019s<em> bandito<\/em>? Are you sure?\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Peruvian Air Force pilot: <\/strong>Yes.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong><strong>U.S. Pilot 2<\/strong>: <\/strong>It\u2019s bad? OK.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Peruvian Air Force pilot: <\/strong>OK.<\/p>\n<p><strong><strong>U.S. Pilot 2<\/strong>: <\/strong>If you sure.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Peruvian dispatch: <\/strong>Tucan, Tucan, <em>autorizado<\/em> <em>fase<\/em> 3.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 1: <\/strong>I think we\u2019re making a mistake, but\u2014\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong><strong>U.S. Pilot 2<\/strong>:<\/strong> I agree with you.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>You can hear the hesitancy in their voices, in their words. And there\u2019s good reason to be unsure. It turns out that in addition to the pilot, the plane is carrying a family of American missionaries: Jim and Veronica Bowers and their two children, 6-year-old Cody and 7-month-old Charity.<\/p>\n<p>The pilot had actually been in touch with a control tower<em> <\/em>down below in the town of Iquitos but on a different radio frequency. But by the time the CIA and Peruvian Air Force realize their mistake, it\u2019s too late.<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 2: <\/strong>[unintelligible]<\/p>\n<p><strong>Peruvian Air Force pilot:<\/strong> S\u00ed.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 2: <\/strong>He\u2019s going to Santa Clara now.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Peruvian dispatch: <\/strong><em>Approximente 30 mille de Iquitos.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 2: <\/strong>The plane is talking to Iquitos tower.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Bowers\u2019s Pilot (in Spanish): <\/strong>They\u2019re killing us! They\u2019re killing us!<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 1: <\/strong>Tell them to terminate.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 2: <\/strong>Don\u2019t shoot!<strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 1: <\/strong>Tell them to terminate. No m\u00e1s!\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radio chatter: <\/strong>Roger. No m\u00e1s, no m\u00e1s! Tucano, no m\u00e1s!<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>As gunfire strikes the floatplane, the pilot screams, \u201cThey\u2019re killing us. They\u2019re killing us.\u201d The plane then drops from the sky, leaving a streak of smoke as it plummets on to the Amazon river. The whole thing is caught on video by the CIA observers.<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 1: <\/strong>There\u2019s a plane right there. Where\u2019s the plane?\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. <strong>Pilo<\/strong>t 3: <\/strong>See them? And there\u2019s the people getting them.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. <strong>Pilot<\/strong> 2: <\/strong>Yeah, but I don\u2019t see the plane. \u2026\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. <strong>Pilot<\/strong> 3: <\/strong>It\u2019s upside down. See, the float\u2019s upside down and the people getting them? Right there.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. <strong>Pilot<\/strong> 2: <\/strong>Yeah. Yeah. OK.<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. <strong>Pilot<\/strong> 3: <\/strong>There\u2019s a bunch of boats down there.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. <strong>Pilot<\/strong> 1: <\/strong>Yeah,<strong> <\/strong>I only see one. Oh, over here by the\u2014\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. <strong>Pilot<\/strong> 2: <\/strong>You got a good, good film of that?\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. <strong>Pilot<\/strong> 1: <\/strong>Uh-huh.<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. <strong>Pilot<\/strong> 2: <\/strong>OK. Let\u2019s go.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko:<\/strong> Miraculously, Jim Bowers and his son Cody survive the crash, as does the pilot, despite being shot in the leg. But Veronica Bowers and 7-month old Charity are killed by gunfire before the plane goes down. The incident quickly makes international news.<\/p>\n<p><strong>George W. Bush: <\/strong>The incident that took place in Peru is a terrible tragedy. And our hearts go out to the families who have been affected.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>But as is often the case with the drug war\u2019s collateral damage, no one would be held accountable.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Brian Ross (<\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=pJVHfSip5d4\"><strong>ABC Nightline<\/strong><\/a><strong>):<\/strong> In Congress today, the CIA was accused by a top Republican of running a nine-year-long effort to stonewall and mislead Congress, failing to reveal how and why all of the program\u2019s strict rules were ignored by the CIA.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra (on ABC):<\/strong> If the rules as outlined had been followed, the Bowers plane would not \u2014 would not \u2014 have been shot down.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Garnett Luttig (on ABC): <\/strong>I want to know the truth. I want to know why. I wonder why my baby\u2019s gone.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>The CIA had been working with the governments of Peru and Colombia to shoot down planes they suspected of carrying drugs for years. We don\u2019t know how many times it happened or how many of the victims were innocent, because the people in almost all of those planes weren\u2019t American citizens. So there was no media outrage. No congressional hearings. No demands for transparency from powerful people.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Rep. Jan Schakowsky: <\/strong>We have spent billions of taxpayer dollars, employed personnel from numerous agencies around the world, and the drugs continue to flow into the United States. Are the Bowers acceptable collateral damage in this war on drugs?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian V\u00e1squez:<\/strong> The drug war creates all sorts of innocent victims. People who may have absolutely nothing to do with the drug war, which of course was the case with the shootdown of the airplane in Peru. That was a mistake, but it was directly related to bad policy that Peru was following with the help of the United States.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>As we were producing this episode, President Donald Trump\u2019s administration made the Bowers\u2019s deaths newly and urgently relevant.<\/p>\n<p>In early September 2025, Trump announced that he\u2019d ordered the military to strike a small boat in the Caribbean that he claimed was being used by drug traffickers. Eleven people, all believed to be Venezuelan, were killed.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The attack was illegal under both U.S. and international law. The administration also provided no documentation of the alleged drug trafficking. The U.S. military then expanded its attacks to include the eastern Pacific Ocean. By early November, the U.S. had launched\u00a0a total of 17 strikes, killing at least 70 people, and those figures seem to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/interactive\/2025\/10\/29\/us\/us-caribbean-pacific-boat-strikes.html\">grow almost by the day<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The attack on the Bowers family pierced the veil that obscures drug war foreign policy because of their nationality, their skin color, and their relatability. Even Republicans criticized how the George W. Bush administration reacted.<\/p>\n<p>But we now face a brazen new administration that has carried out multiple extrajudicial executions in international waters \u2014 one that even jokes about how some of those they\u2019ve killed may actually be innocent.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/ca.news.yahoo.com\/trump-jokes-people-afraid-fish-084452918.html?guccounter=1\">Donald Trump<\/a>:<\/strong> I don\u2019t know about the fishing industry. If you want to go fishing, a lot of people aren\u2019t deciding to even go fishing.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=4duZa9fiLAM\">JD Vance<\/a>: <\/strong>[Crowd laughter] I would stop, too. Hell, I wouldn\u2019t go fishing right now in that area of the world. [laughter]\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>It\u2019s also an administration now openly preparing to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.miamiherald.com\/news\/nation-world\/world\/americas\/venezuela\/article312722642.html\">invade Venezuela<\/a> under the <a href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/2025\/09\/09\/venezuela-boat-oil-trump-latin-america\/\">pretext of fighting a drug war<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The story of Veronica and Charity Bowers is a stark reminder of how aggressive drug policy is wasteful and futile, how we never seem to learn from past failures, and how the generations-long effort to stop people from getting high also \u2014 and necessarily \u2014 treats human lives as expendable.<\/p>\n<p>From The Intercept, this is Collateral Damage.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m Radley Balko. I\u2019m an investigative journalist who has been covering the drug war and the criminal justice system for more than 20 years.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The so-called \u201cwar on drugs\u201d began as a metaphor to demonstrate the country\u2019s fervent commitment to defeating drug addiction, but the \u201cwar\u201d part quickly became all too literal.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>When the drug war ramped up in the 1980s and 1990s, it brought helicopters, tanks, and SWAT teams to U.S. neighborhoods. It brought dehumanizing rhetoric, and the suspension of basic civil liberties protections.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>All wars have collateral damage: the people whose deaths are tragic but deemed necessary for the greater cause. But once the country dehumanized people suspected of using and selling drugs, we were more willing to accept some collateral damage.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In the modern war on drugs \u2014 which dates back more than 50 years to the Nixon administration \u2014 the United States has produced laws and policies ensuring that collateral damage isn\u2019t just tolerated, it\u2019s inevitable.<\/p>\n<p>This is Episode 6, \u201cAirborne Imperialism: The Tragic Deaths of Veronica and Charity Bowers.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<aside class=\"promote-banner\">\n <a class=\"promote-banner__link\" href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/podcasts\/collateral-damage\/\"><br \/><span class=\"promote-banner__image\"><br \/> <\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"promote-banner__text\">\n<p class=\"promote-banner__eyebrow\">\n Collateral Damage Podcast <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/a><br \/><\/aside>\n<p>It could be difficult to remember how the world worked, and how it felt, back before the attacks of September 11, 2001. It was easier to fly then. People felt safer. Life was less complicated. Former congressman Pete Hoekstra certainly thought so.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra: <\/strong>So it\u2019s 2001, everything in America is great. I got on the [House] Intelligence Committee in January of 2001.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Hoekstra, a Republican, was serving his fifth term in Congress, representing Michigan\u2019s 2nd District.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra: <\/strong>Someone from West Michigan called me and said, \u201cHey, a couple of your constituents have died in Peru. They were shot down. What can you find out about this?\u201d And so that\u2019s when you go to the Intelligence Committee and say, \u201cAll right, will you help me take a look at the circumstances of this tragic event? Two of my constituents are killed. It appears that the CIA may have been involved in this. And I just want to get as much information as I can.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>During his time in Congress,<strong> <\/strong>Hoekstra hadn\u2019t focused much on either the drug war or on Latin America. But now two of his constituents were dead because of an incomprehensible mistake. So he had some catching up to do.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra: <\/strong>And so I still remember George Tenet coming \u2014 who at that time is the director of the CIA \u2014 and comes in to brief the Intelligence Committee. And it was a fascinating hearing. It\u2019s when we actually, in Congress, on the Intelligence Committee, we did things in a bipartisan way. And so Tenet comes in, and he explains to us exactly what happens. And the director says, \u201cThere\u2019s a protocol in place. And every step in the protocol was followed.\u201d So basically justifying the shootdown of the Bowers plane.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>But then one of Hokestra\u2019s colleagues spoke up.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra: <\/strong>It was one of the Democrats, says, \u201cMr. Director, do you have an audio or a video capturing the events of that day, of that flight, of that interdiction?\u201d And he kind of says no, there\u2019s no recording. He looks around. There\u2019s a little commotion in the wall by someone sitting against the wall. And Tenet looks around, and the guy whispers something to the director, and the director says, \u201cExcuse me, I am mistaken. There are recordings of exactly what happened at that event.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>It seems unlikely that the CIA wouldn\u2019t have known that there was video of the incident. Perhaps Tenet wanted to keep the damning footage away from Congress and the public. Or perhaps someone further down at the CIA wanted that, and so they never told Tenet that it existed. Hoekstra isn\u2019t sure. But that recording prevented the incident from being swept under the rug. It made the deaths of Veronica and Charity Bowers an explosive international story.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra: <\/strong>If my Democratic colleague had not asked the question \u2014 \u201cIs there a video or an audio tape of what happened before that shootdown?\u201d \u2014\u00a0if he had not asked that question, that first hearing might have been the end of it.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Instead, it was just the beginning.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ray Suarez (PBS NewsHour): <\/strong>Peru and the United States offered differing views today on the downing of a missionary plane.<br \/><strong><br \/>Newscaster (ABC): <\/strong>According to senior administration officials, the Citation V surveillance plane used in the operation is owned by the Pentagon. Its crew was hired by the CIA from a private contractor.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Richard Boucher (State Department spokesperson): <\/strong>The father, Jim Bowers, the son, Cory Bowers, and the pilot, Kevin Donaldson, returned to the United States on Sunday. We think that the remains of the mother, Veronica Bowers, and the daughter, Charity, can be brought back to the United States today, and we\u2019re assisting with that as well.<\/p>\n<p>[Funeral organ music]<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>The <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/5yL2u5g3plg?si=HC3kXR9L9iG6RHKy&t=764\">memorial service<\/a> for Charity Bowers and her mom Veronica, known as Roni by those closer to her, was broadcast by a Grand Rapids, Michigan, TV station.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Jim Kramer (Bowers\u2019 friend): <\/strong>Shall we pray? Dear Heavenly Father, we have come here today to honor your servant \u2014 your faithful servant \u2014 Roni Bowers, and her baby girl, Charity. We thank you, dear God, for the confidence that we have that they are with you right now in Heaven.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Here\u2019s Jim Bowers speaking at his wife and daughter\u2019s memorial.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Jim Bowers: <\/strong>We were shot down right over a town of witnesses, which helped at the very beginning. And some of them were very good friends of mine. Incredibly, the town had a radio in which we were able to call for help. That\u2019s very unusual. And the radio worked.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>The incident was difficult for some in the community to comprehend. As missionaries, the Bowers were deeply religious people. And Hoekstra, a Republican, was generally supportive of the drug war, as were most of the people in his conservative district.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s also true of Jim Bowers himself, who was torn about doing an interview with us, and ultimately declined. In an unrecorded call, Bowers emphasized to me that while he thinks the drug war has clearly gone too far in some ways, he\u2019s opposed to legalizing or decriminalizing drugs, including marijuana. But Bowers does support ending the CIA operation that killed his wife and daughter, known as the \u201cAir Bridge Denial Program.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s President George W. Bush describing it, as questions raged about the tragedy in Peru.<\/p>\n<p><strong>George W Bush: <\/strong>Our government is involved with helping \u2014 and a variety of agencies are involved \u2014 with helping our friends in South America identify airplanes that might be carrying illegal drugs. These operations have been going on for quite a while. We\u2019ve suspended such flights until we get to the bottom of the situation to fully understand all the facts.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>The U.S. government restarted the operation just two years later in Colombia, but shut it down in Peru. They made minor protocol tweaks, adding supervisors to enforce rules, setting Spanish language fluency standards, and creating a dedicated communication channel. But protocols weren\u2019t really being followed in the first place. And what\u2019s more, Air Bridge Denial was just one part of a much broader, much more destructive U.S. policy in Latin America.<\/p>\n<p><strong>PBS NewsHour: <\/strong>The Latin America drug connection is where our major attention goes tonight. The State Department issued a major report on the subject today as part of a process aimed at denying U.S. aid to countries that fail to act against drug trafficking. It\u2019s a story of politics and murder, corruption, and revolution \u2014 a story that grows more sensational with most passing recent days.<\/p>\n<p><!-- BLOCK(cta)[0](%7B%22componentName%22%3A%22CTA%22%2C%22entityType%22%3A%22SHORTCODE%22%2C%22optional%22%3Atrue%7D)(%7B%7D) --><\/p>\n<p><!-- END-BLOCK(cta)[0] --><\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Coca is a crop that\u2019s been cultivated in Latin America for centuries. It has medicinal, nutritional, and religious uses. But of course coca is also used to make cocaine. It was a crop that had not only been a part of Andean culture dating back to pre-Colombian times, but due to Western appetites, it had become extremely lucrative for farmers in an impoverished part of the world.<\/p>\n<p>And by the mid-1980s, the United States was facing twin epidemics fueled by the rise of the crack form of the drug \u2014 both in overdose deaths and in black-market violence as distributors fought over turf. So the U.S. government provided foreign aid, military training, and weapons to the Peruvian authorities to halt the cultivation of coca.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian V\u00e1squez: <\/strong>In the 1990s in Peru, there was a concerted effort to go against the production of drugs. And what that led to, at that time Peru was the world\u2019s largest producer of coca.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>That\u2019s<strong> <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cato.org\/people\/ian-vasquez\">Ian V\u00e1squez<\/a>, vice president for international studies at the Cato Institute.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>And what that led to was, it just pushed coca production to other countries, namely to Colombia. Colombia then became the world\u2019s largest producer of coca.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>This is sometimes called the \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/insightcrime.org\/news\/analysis\/how-peru-beat-colombia-to-be-worlds-biggest-cocaine-producer\/\">balloon effect<\/a>.\u201d When there\u2019s enough demand for an illicit drug, someone will figure out a way to supply it. So when the U.S. has helped precipitate a crackdown on coca, heroin, or meth production in one country or region, the production just ramps up somewhere else.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Peru and Colombia are neighbors; they share the same ecosystem that\u2019s ideal for growing the coca plant. So when the U.S. squeezed the <a href=\"https:\/\/coha.org\/the-balloon-effect-and-displacement-part-2-of-2\/#:~:text=The%20Balloon%20Effect%20and%20Displacement&text=Squeezing%20one%20end%20of%20the,into%20another%20region%20or%20country.\">balloon<\/a> in Peru, coca production simply moved next door.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Then the U.S. government squeezed the balloon again. In 2000, President Bill Clinton signed the bill funding <a href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/2021\/04\/27\/biden-plan-colombia\/\">Plan Colombia<\/a>, a sweeping anti-drug operation in Latin America.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>Plan Colombia spent about $12 billion supported by the United States in fighting the drug war and trying to pacify the country. The United States did not accomplish its primary goal there, but it did spend a lot of money. It did try to repeat that kind of policy in other places with the same kinds of unfortunate results.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Plan Colombia had two primary goals. The first was to end the armed conflict between the Colombian government and the narcotics-funded guerrilla group known as FARC. The second goal was to crack down on coca growing and the production of cocaine. The U.S. planned do this by giving money, weapons, and strategic assistance to the Colombian government.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>When Peru started to crack down, this led to coca production in Colombia. But it didn\u2019t take that many more years until the crackdown in Colombia to lead to an increase in coca production in Peru.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>That back and forth continues to this day, with coca production now spilling into Ecuador as well.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>And that\u2019s true with almost every aspect of the drug war. Crop substitution, drug interdiction, eradication. You can see temporary successes \u2014 if you want to call it that in the drug war \u2014 where you see production in one region go down, but it ends up popping up in another region.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-pullquote\">\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u201cYou can see temporary successes \u2014 if you want to call it that in the drug war \u2014 where you see production in one region go down, but it ends up popping up in another region.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>And so despite decades of international drug suppression efforts in individual countries, the overall supply and consumption of cocaine has remained relatively stable. In real dollars, the price per gram of the drug hasn\u2019t changed much since the early 1990s. And to the extent that the cost does fluctuate, it\u2019s driven far more by demand \u2014 which drugs come in and out of vogue \u2014 than it is by supply.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>France24: <\/strong>The first ever global report on the cocaine industry paints a picture of unprecedented growth.<\/p>\n<p><strong>CGTN America: <\/strong>The growth of coca, the leaf used to make the illicit drug, has reached highs not seen in decades.<\/p>\n<p><strong>BBC:<\/strong> Now the United Nations says Colombia has broken its own record for cultivating coca, the main ingredient of cocaine.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>As of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/06\/27\/world\/americas\/cocaine-drug-market.html\">2023<\/a>, Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia remain the largest cocaine producers on the planet. For 40 years, the United States has unleashed destructive anti-drug policies in Latin America. And for 40 years, those policies have done little to reduce the supply of cocaine.<\/p>\n<p>Crop eradication programs have <a href=\"https:\/\/biologicaldiversity.org\/w\/news\/press-releases\/new-study-agricultural-pesticides-cause-widespread-harm-to-soil-health-threaten-biodiversity-2021-05-04\/?_gl=1*yzozom*_gcl_au*NzQwNDk2ODQ3LjE3Mzc0ODUyMDM.\">poisoned farmland<\/a> with pesticides, often making the soil unusable for years at a time. Those efforts have pushed coca and poppy cultivation into the rainforest, where the farming does yet more environmental damage. Here\u2019s the publication <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/tXAzTcKXqZI?si=HPn_0v9MDN60j6iQ&t=207\">Vice<\/a>, reporting on that ecological disaster a few years ago.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Vice: <\/strong>It is not just the drug traffickers who are dumping toxic chemicals into the rainforest. Between 1994 and 2015, the Colombian and American militaries sprayed tons of the chemical pesticide glyphosate onto the Amazon in an attempt to destroy coca crops.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Kendra McSweeney: <\/strong>If the government comes along and eradicates your crop, they may be spraying glyphosate, <a href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/2025\/03\/21\/trump-epa-monsanto-roundup-bayer-cancer-chemicals\/\">a known carcinogen<\/a>, on your family, your animals, and your neighbors. So it comes at great risk. But the needs of small farmers is often so great that they\u2019re willing to take that risk for the economic return.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>These fumigation programs use highly concentrated herbicides, which have destroyed other crops, and can drift far afield from their intended targets. Much of this eradication work has been done by private contractors who operate in a legal netherworld, unaccountable to either the U.S. government or the government of the country in which they\u2019re operating.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>At the same time, every squish of the balloon disrupts the black markets where turf and market share are established and controlled with violence. So each new disruption means more death and destruction. V\u00e1squez says that due to U.S. wealth, influence, and military might, it has often been difficult for leaders of Latin American countries to say no to these programs.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>A lot of the countries that are receiving the United States so-called aid are countries with governments that want the money, that want their politicians to declare that they\u2019re being tough on crime and drug trafficking. And unfortunately, it\u2019s countries like Peru, like Bolivia, or Colombia, or Central American countries that have weak governments in the sense that the institutions are weak there \u2014 the rule of law, transparency, accountability.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko:<\/strong> But some Latin American countries have been pushing back. In recent years, Bolivia has attempted to reduce U.S. influence by promoting legal coca cultivation. And in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2022-08-23\/colombia-halts-forced-destruction-of-plants-used-to-make-cocaine?embedded-checkout=true\">2022<\/a>, Colombia\u2019s President Gustavo Petro suspended fumigation efforts and other government-enforced eradication of coca. He argued that suppression programs had failed to curb cocaine demand, while having devastating consequences on poor farmers.<\/p>\n<p>In early 2025, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/shorts\/IMYTV0PCTm8\">speaking at a cabinet meeting,<\/a> Petro said:\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>President Gustavo Petro<\/strong> <strong>(in Spanish)<\/strong>: Cocaine is not worse than whisky. And what hit the United States is fentanyl. It is killing them, and that\u2019s not done in Colombia.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>But like Venezuela, Colombia now faces renewed tensions with the U.S. from the Trump administration. When one of the U.S. military strikes in international waters killed a Colombian man, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/newshour\/world\/trump-calls-colombias-petro-an-illegal-drug-dealer-and-cuts-off-u-s-aid-to-the-country\">Petro wrote<\/a> on social media, \u201cThe United States has invaded our national territory, fired a missile to kill a humble fisherman.\u201d Trump responded by calling Petro \u201can illegal drug leader\u201d and threatened military strikes in that country too.<\/p>\n<p>After the break, how Washington\u2019s counter-narcotic policies in Latin America failed the Bowers family.<\/p>\n<p><!-- BLOCK(newsletter)[0](%7B%22componentName%22%3A%22NEWSLETTER%22%2C%22entityType%22%3A%22SHORTCODE%22%2C%22optional%22%3Atrue%7D)(%7B%7D) --><\/p>\n<div class=\"newsletter-embed flex-col items-center print:hidden\" id=\"third-party--article-mid\" data-module=\"InlineNewsletter\" data-module-source=\"web_intercept_20241230_Inline_Signup_Replacement\">\n<div class=\"-mx-5 sm:-mx-10 p-5 sm:px-10 xl:-ml-5 lg:mr-0 xl:px-5 bg-accentLight hidden\" data-name=\"subscribed\">\n<h2 class=\"font-sans font-light uppercase text-[30px] leading-8 text-white tracking-[0.01em] mb-0\">\n We\u2019re independent of corporate interests \u2014 and powered by members. 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Delivered to you. <\/span><br \/>\n <span class=\"group-[.default]:hidden\"><br \/>\n Will you take the next step to support our independent journalism by becoming a member of The Intercept? <\/span>\n <\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/join.theintercept.com\/donate\/now\/?referrer_post_id=502991&referrer_url=https%3A%2F%2Ftheintercept.com%2F2025%2F11%2F12%2Fcollateral-damage-episode-six-airborne-imperalism%2F&source=web_intercept_20241230_Inline_Signup_Replacement\" class=\"group-[.default]:hidden border border-accentLight text-accentLight font-sans px-5 py-3.5 inline-flex items-center gap-3 text-[20px] font-bold\" data-action=\"handleDonate\"><br \/>\n Become a member <span class=\"font-icons icon-TI_Arrow_02_Right\"\/><br \/>\n <\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"font-sans text-accentLight text-[10px] leading-[13px] text-balance [&_a]:text-accentLight [&_a]:font-bold [&_a:hover]:underline group-[.subscribed]:hidden\">\n<p>By signing up, I agree to receive emails from The Intercept and to the <a href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/privacy-policy\/\">Privacy Policy<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/terms-use\/\">Terms of Use<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><!-- END-BLOCK(newsletter)[0] --><\/p>\n<p><strong>[Break]<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Ian<strong> <\/strong>V\u00e1squez remembers hearing about the death of Roni and Charity Bowers in 2001. He wasn\u2019t surprised.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>Peru in the early 2000s was a country that was transitioning to a more open, more prosperous economy. It still, though, had a lot of problems, like it does today, in terms of weak rule of law. So that when you set up a shootdown policy, you should fully expect that some tragedy is going to happen \u2014 and that\u2019s exactly what happened.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>In the days and weeks after the Bowers\u2019 plane went down, Rep. Hoekstra began trying to piece together what went wrong.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra: <\/strong>There was a protocol \u2014 a protocol that the CIA was supposed to follow \u2014 something like seven to nine steps of escalation: identify the plane, verify the tail numbers, reach out, try to establish contact with the plane. If you fail to reach the pilot, to potentially fly next to the missionary plane \u2014 kind of wiggle your wings, I guess, which could be interpreted as an international signal to follow the plane. <\/p>\n<p>So there were like seven to nine steps that should have been put in place, should have been conducted before there was any type of activity, aggressive activity, that would result in the potential downing of the plane.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Part of the confusion was due to the unclear chain of command leading up to the decision to shoot down the plane. The crews of these surveillance teams typically consisted of former military personnel and pilots recruited by the CIA, often working as private contractors. There would also be an officer from the Peruvian military. And in this case, the unarmed surveillance plane was property of the U.S. Air Force.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>When the crew on the surveillance plane decided the Bowers\u2019 plane looked suspicious, they alerted the Peruvian Air Force pilot, who was waiting on standby. The U.S. government later claimed that its contractors had no authority and were simply advisers to the Peruvian military. But listening back to recordings of the cockpit chatter, it\u2019s not at all clear exactly who was in charge.<\/p>\n<p><strong>U.S. Pilot 1: <\/strong>OK, I understand this is not our call, but this guy is at 4,500 feet. He is not taking any evasive action. I recommend we follow him. I do not recommend \u201cPhase 3\u201d at this time.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Peruvian Air Force pilot: <\/strong>It\u2019s three phase, authorised, OK?\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong><strong>U.S. Pilot 2<\/strong>: <\/strong>OK. But you sure it\u2019s bandito? Are you sure?\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Peruvian Air Force pilot: <\/strong>Yes.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong><strong>U.S. Pilot 2<\/strong>: <\/strong>It\u2019s bad? OK.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Peruvian Air Force pilot: <\/strong>OK.<\/p>\n<p><strong><strong>U.S. Pilot 2<\/strong>:\u00a0<\/strong>If you sure.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Subsequent investigations only underscored just how opaque U.S. overseas drug operations could be. <a href=\"https:\/\/americanarchive.org\/catalog\/cpb-aacip-507-6h4cn6zj8b\">PBS\u2019s Jim Lehrer <\/a>questioned then-Secretary of State Colin Powell about the program.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Jim Lehrer (PBS NewsHour): <\/strong>Is it a CIA operation?<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-pullquote has-text-align-right\">\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u201cDon\u2019t read anything nefarious into the words CIA.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n<p><strong>Colin Powell: <\/strong>A number of government agencies are involved in it. The CIA has the lead on it, and they will be taking all the specific questions on it. But don\u2019t read anything nefarious into the words CIA.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Powell then defended Operation Air Bridge.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Colin Powell: <\/strong>It was a good, solid program that has been well known. People have known about it. It is not something that is dark and secret. In fact, we have credited this program with helping to reduce drug trafficking coming out of Peru, so it\u2019s a successful program that has had this tragedy now associated with it, and we\u2019ve got to review the entire program.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Less than two weeks after the Bowers\u2019 plane went down, a <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/nlp9bNnvPLo?si=_0sRge95bNWMuIAa&t=31\">House Oversight Committee<\/a> held hearings on the incident that aired on C-SPAN.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Mark Souder: <\/strong>The Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources is now called to order.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>That\u2019s Rep. Mark Souder, a Republican from Indiana and the chair of the subcommittee that held the hearing.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Mark Souder: <\/strong>Just a little over a week ago, a terrible tragedy occurred that broke the heart of every American when, through a preventable mistake, a missionary, whose life had been committed to serving others on behalf of God, was killed, along with her little girl.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>By 2001, the crack epidemic was finally on the wane, along with the violence that came with it. The U.S. had begun what would be a historic 25-year drop in crime. But those trends were not yet apparent. So for many, the urgency of eradicating illicit drugs was still as apparent as ever.<\/p>\n<p>Souder himself was one of the most enthusiastic supporters of a restrictive, militaristic drug policy. That even he was bothered by the shootdown of the Bowers\u2019 plane \u2014 that even staunch, drug war Republicans were demanding answers \u2014 that was a big deal.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Mark Souder: <\/strong>From a public policy standpoint, where is the United States government to head? What will the United States\u2019 anti-drug efforts in South America be after the Peru incident?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>The<strong> <\/strong>Bush administration first tried to blame the Peruvian military for the Bowers\u2019 deaths. But the media, some members of Congress, and outside experts pushed back on the official government position. At the time, that was pretty rare with respect to the drug war.<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s Adam Isacson from the Center for International Policy, testifying before Souder\u2019s committee.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Adam Isacson: <\/strong>While the Peruvian pilot pulled the trigger, he pulled the trigger of a gun provided by the United States while flying a plane provided by the United States. He was trained in these operations by the United States, and he was alerted to his target by intelligence provided by the United States.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Up to that point, the Air Bridge Denial Program had enjoyed bipartisan support, as did most U.S. anti-drug policies in Latin America. And Plan Colombia had of course been signed and championed by President Clinton. But at least some congressional Democrats, like Jan Schakowsky and Elijah Cummings, lambasted the operation.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Rep. Jan Schakowsky: <\/strong>The kind of action we saw in Peru last week amounts to an extrajudicial killing, and we in this country now have innocent blood on our hands because of it.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-pullquote has-text-align-right\">\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u201cIt goes against one of our most sacred, due process principles; namely, that all persons are presumed innocent until proven guilty.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n<p><strong>Rep. Elijah Cummings: <\/strong>The Peruvian shootdown policy would never be permitted as a domestic United States policy precisely because it goes against one of our most sacred, due process principles; namely, that all persons are presumed innocent until proven guilty.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Rep. Jan Schakowsky: <\/strong>The U.S. taxpayers are unwittingly funding a private war with private soldiers. This is a shoot-first-and-ask-questions-later policy encouraged by the United States in its war on drugs.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Rep. Elijah Cummings: <\/strong>Certainly Veronica and Charity Bowers are not the first innocent victims of the war on drugs. Is a policy that also sacrifices core American values a prudent and acceptable course to follow?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>In one particularly telling moment<strong>, <\/strong>Rep. Cummings asked John Crow, who led the State Department\u2019s narcotics efforts in Latin America, how many planes had been shot down through the Air Bridge Denial Program. It was an entirely reasonable question: How many times had the U.S. pressured foreign governments to shoot down civilian aircraft based on nothing more than mere suspicion of drug running?<\/p>\n<p>And yet Crow couldn\u2019t answer.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-pullquote\">\n<blockquote>\n<p>How many times had the U.S. pressured foreign governments to shoot down civilian aircraft based on nothing more than mere suspicion of drug running?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n<p><strong>Elijah Cummings: <\/strong>Can somebody tell me how many airplanes have been shot down since 1995? \u2026 Shootdowns and force-downs?<\/p>\n<p><strong>John Crow: \u2026 <\/strong>We were not able to come up with one, or agree on the same figure. \u2026 Our figures would show that starting in 1995, aircraft were not all shot down, some forced down, but through a combination, a figure of some 50 aircraft \u2014 and that is not precise.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Elijah Cummings: <\/strong>\u2026 Why can\u2019t you tell me that? \u2026 We are talking about shooting down people.<\/p>\n<p><strong>John Crow: <\/strong>Yeah.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Elijah Cummings: <\/strong>Like, dead. I mean, we are talking about using \u2014 I mean, this is some serious stuff. I am trying to figure out, if I was just a regular citizen just sitting here looking at this, and I\u2019ve got some of my top-flight people in the drug war talking about they don\u2019t know how many shootdowns or force-downs, I would be a little bit concerned about what\u2019s going on.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Cummings\u2019s frustrations back then seem almost prescient today, as the Trump administration continues to elude questions about its own killings off the South American coast.<\/p>\n<p>Still, this is the drug war. And so it didn\u2019t take long for a reliable foot soldier like Souder to retreat to familiar territory.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Mark Souder: <\/strong>Unfortunately, many people in America are becoming convinced \u2014 falsely \u2014 that the war on drugs has not worked.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Souder then deployed the sort of hyperbole and demagoguery that had long defined U.S. drug policy.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Mark Souder: <\/strong>And what is the alternative of those who oppose the war on drugs? Having more weed-wacked, meth-wasted, heroin-junkie crackheads driving a car headed in your direction or prowling your neighborhood? Or, perhaps even more painfully, coming home to beat you or your child? The facts are simple. When this country focuses on the war on drugs, we make progress.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Rep. Schakowsky responded with a laundry list of reasons why the status quo was not working.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Jan Schakowsky: <\/strong>I know some of those with us today would like to put this tragedy behind us and get back to the business of the drug war. However, there are so many questionable aspects of our policy and so many unanswered questions.<\/p>\n<p>Why do we have to hire private contractors to do our work in Andean countries? How much of the public\u2019s money has been spent to hire what some have referred to as mercenaries? Where is the accountability? Who exactly are they? Do they even speak Spanish?\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>From what I do know, outsourcing in the Andean region is a way to avoid congressional oversight and public scrutiny. The use of private military contractors risks drawing the U.S. into regional conflicts and civil war. It is clear to me that this practice must stop.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Rep. Hoekstra took a subtler tone. He wasn\u2019t interested in overhauling the war on drugs. But because the victims were his constituents, he focused instead on the need for some level of transparency.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Rep. Pete Hoekstra (at Oversight Committee hearing): <\/strong>The families and the American people deserve to know how this happened. I know there are certain pieces of this complex puzzle that we will never be able to explain, but there should be no part that we keep hidden.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-pullquote has-text-align-right\">\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u201cIt was pretty clear that there were people inside the agency that were ready to cover this up from day one.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra: <\/strong>And so it was pretty clear that there were people inside the agency that were ready to cover this up from day one.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Looking back on that time, Hoekstra says that the government agencies involved slow-walked the investigative process.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra: <\/strong>Because the information, especially the information going out to the public, was so different from what actually happened, it provided cover for people to reimplement this flawed program.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>So the government agencies involved avoided accountability and there would be no substantial change in policy. The CIA\u2019s inspector general report on the incident was published in 2008, but it wouldn\u2019t be fully declassified until 2010. When it finally was made public, the details were damning.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Brian Ross (<\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=XgOU6MtTblA\"><strong>ABC News<\/strong><\/a><strong>):<\/strong> Today, the CIA was accused of an almost 9 year long campaign to mislead and stonewall Congress and others about how and why the rules were broken.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra (at Oversight Committee hearing): <\/strong>If there\u2019s ever an example of justice delayed, justice denied, this is it.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Brian Ross (ABC News): <\/strong>The CIA insists the entire episode was handled thoroughly and professionally and that there was no cover-up \u2014 to the outrage of the dead woman\u2019s parents.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Gloria Luttig (Veronica Bowers\u2019s mother): <\/strong>I want somebody to tell me why they killed my girl.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra: <\/strong>Those of us on the committee and I think a number of members of Congress knew exactly what happened. The CIA knew exactly what happened. The Justice Department should have known exactly what happened. They would have had access to the tapes and those types of things. And the calculus at some point in time that is made by the Justice Department, by the intelligence community, and by the administration at that point is, this program is more important than focusing or rehashing the mistakes that were made.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-pullquote\">\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u201cThis program is more important than focusing or rehashing the mistakes that were made.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>The CIA inspector general tallied 15 incidents in which a plane had been shot down through the program between 1995 and 2001. The watchdog found violations of required procedures in all 15 incidents. In some cases, suspected aircraft were shot down within minutes of being sighted by the Peruvian fighter, without being properly identified, given required warnings, or given time to respond. Another congressional committee estimated that there could have been many more planes shot out of the sky \u2014 as many as 50.<\/p>\n<p>More disturbing still, the report concluded that \u201cCIA officers knew of and condoned most of these violations, fostering an environment of negligence and disregard for procedures designed to protect against the loss of innocent life that culminated in the downing of the missionary plane.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>Brian Ross (ABC News): <\/strong>Today the CIA said its nine-year long investigation had determined that 16 CIA employees should be disciplined, including, we learned, the woman then in charge of counternarcotics. Many of the 16 are no longer with the CIA, and one of them told us his discipline was no more than a letter of reprimand placed in his file, which he was told would be removed in one year. That\u2019s the punishment for his role in the wrongful deaths of two innocent Americans, Diane.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Diane Sawyer:<\/strong> After nine years.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Brian Ross: <\/strong>Yes, after nine years.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Diane Sawyer: <\/strong>OK, thanks Brian.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra: <\/strong>Even after nine years, I\u2019d say there was never really a full accountability to the individual or the organizations that precipitated these events. I\u2019m worried that there were more. That the Bowers family is not the only family, or the only Americans, or the only innocent people that were impacted. Were there other Peruvians, were there other innocent individuals that might have been killed through this process? I don\u2019t know the answer, but I suspect that the answer would probably be yes.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>I think that a lot of times when people talk about the war on drugs, they think about going after the bad guys, the criminals who are ruthless, the mafia guys, the cartel guys, the people who are breaking the law knowingly.\u00a0<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-pullquote has-text-align-right\">\n<blockquote>\n<p>The drug war \u201cis much more about turning innocent, ordinary people into victims. \u2026 It\u2019s not just the farmers. It\u2019s the entire populations of countries whose institutions of civil society and government are undermined. \u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Ian V\u00e1squez again.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>But the larger picture is that the drug war is not just about going after the so-called bad guys. It is much more about turning innocent, ordinary people into victims. And it\u2019s a lot of them. It\u2019s not just the farmers. It\u2019s the entire populations of countries whose institutions of civil society and government are undermined.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko:<\/strong> It\u2019s now been more than two decades since the Bowers\u2019s plane plunged into the Amazon River. But Jim Bowers expressed his forgiveness right away, back in 2001, speaking at his daughter and wife\u2019s memorial in Michigan.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Jim Bowers: <\/strong>One thing I want you to know, Roni has forgiven the pilot who shot her. She\u2019s forgiven the Peruvian government and whoever might have made their mistake. And so should I. And I have. How could I not, when God has forgiven me so.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>The U.S. government paid $8 million to the Bowers family and the pilot of the plane. That payout came years before the investigation and report were finally made public.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, according to the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.unodc.org\/unodc\/press\/releases\/2025\/June\/unodc-world-drug-report-2025_-global-instability-compounding-social--economic-and-security-costs-of-the-world-drug-problem.html\">United Nations<\/a>, global coca production reached a new high in 2023, jumping 34 percent over the year before. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/06\/27\/world\/americas\/cocaine-drug-market.html\">Colombia\u2019s coca<\/a> output drove much of the increase. Bolivia\u2019s production has remained steady. Peru saw a slight decline, but had produced a record amount of the drug in 2021. The air in the balloon just keeps moving around.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>V\u00e1squez<strong> <\/strong>says the futility of drug prohibition is inescapable.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian V\u00e1squez: <\/strong>It\u2019s just virtually impossible to fight against an industry that \u2014 because it is prohibited, because it\u2019s in the black market \u2014 creates astronomically high black market profits and so creates these massive incentives for people to go into the business, all the way down from ordinary farmers who produce coca to the big drug traffickers. And the structure of the industry itself, because it\u2019s outside of the legal framework of the market, means that the profits just shoot up incredibly, especially once the drug comes into the United States.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>V\u00e1squez breaks down the numbers.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>And to give you an idea of what we\u2019re talking about. In Colombia, it can take, I don\u2019t know, $500 to $800 to get the coca leaves and then another, I don\u2019t know, $800 or so to produce the coca paste that then produces cocaine in Colombia. So that one kilo of cocaine produced in Colombia is maybe about $1,600. By the time it crosses the United States, the retail price of that same kilo is $160,000. So there\u2019s this enormous markup.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko:<\/strong><strong> <\/strong>In 2022 the Colombian government brokered what it called a \u201cTotal Peace\u201d agreement with the armed guerrilla groups vying for control of key cocaine trafficking routes. But it wasn\u2019t long before the violence returned.<\/p>\n<p>In January 2025, the guerrilla group ELN resumed a bloody territorial war with FARC <a href=\"https:\/\/insightcrime.org\/news\/renewed-war-for-colombia-cocaine-center\/\">dissidents<\/a>. In less than a week, the fighting left at least 80 people dead and forced 11,000 people to flee their homes.<\/p>\n<p>But Colombia is not alone. Black-market drug violence persists across Latin America.<\/p>\n<p><strong>ABC News: <\/strong>Authorities in Ecuador investigating a brazen attack on a public television station by an apparent armed gang as \u201cacts of terrorism.\u201d [gunshots]<\/p>\n<p><strong>PBS NewsHour: <\/strong>Here in the Honduran heart of the drug trade, the cartel has everything under their control.<\/p>\n<p><strong>NewsNation:<\/strong> It\u2019s a region of Mexico where residents are always either in mourning or living in fear.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>If you look at homicide rates, the top 15 countries, in terms of homicide rates in the world, it\u2019s not really a surprise that 12 out of those 15 are on the cocaine route from the Andes to the United States. That kind of statistic changes from year to year, depending on where the drug war is really cracking down on. But overall, those numbers stay high.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>This has been particularly true in Central America, Mexico, and the Caribbean. Aggressive, militaristic drug enforcement by local authorities \u2014 nearly always prodded and often financially backed by the U.S. government \u2014 has resulted in a bloody, perpetual war between the military, police, and competing drug cartels. And those entities can often be difficult to distinguish, as cartels exert control over politicians, police, and military officials through corruption and through the threat of violence. The fighting in Mexico alone has wrought more than 460,000 homicides since 2006. That\u2019s the year the Mexican government began warring with the cartels.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Not learning from previous mistakes, in 2007 President George W. Bush launched what was described at the time as a \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2007\/aug\/10\/usa.mexico\">Plan Colombia for Mexico<\/a>.\u201d It was a policy that would continue into the Obama administration.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Hillary Clinton: <\/strong>These drug cartels are now showing more and more indices of insurgency \u2014 all of a sudden car bombs show up, which wasn\u2019t there before. So it\u2019s looking more and more like Colombia looked 20 years ago, where the narco-traffickers control certain parts of the country.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>That\u2019s Secretary of State Hillary Clinton<a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/jOqp4dE6ohs?si=8g1Oc1MohHYb-A2y&t=3519\"> in 2010<\/a>. She\u2019s talking about how Mexican drug traffickers had taken over the routes used by Colombian cartels in the late 1990s.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Hillary Clinton: <\/strong>Mexico has capacity, and they\u2019re using that capacity. And they\u2019ve been very willing to take advice. They\u2019re wanting to do as much of it on their own as possible, but we stand ready to help them.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko:<\/strong><strong> <\/strong>Speaking at the Council on Foreign Relations, Clinton demonstrated that the Obama administration had learned nothing from her husband\u2019s own mistakes in the 1990s.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Hillary Clinton: <\/strong>I know that Plan Colombia was controversial. I was just in Colombia, and there were problems and there were mistakes, but it worked. \u2026 And we need to figure out what are the equivalents for Central America, Mexico, and the Caribbean.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>The United States still budgets more than $1 billion annually on overseas drug interdiction. The U.S. also often conditions additional foreign aid on cooperation from foreign governments on drug policy.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The international drug war is also as opaque as it is bloody and destructive. Media investigations have uncovered clandestine operations involving the U.S. military, private contractors, and CIA, FBI, and DEA agents all over the world. So the real amount of money we spend on overseas drug eradication is likely quite a bit higher.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The United States has also helped fund notoriously brutal drug crackdowns like the <a href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/2025\/03\/19\/rodrigo-duterte-icc-arrest-accountability\/\">extrajudicial executions<\/a> in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnbc.com\/2017\/11\/14\/us-involvement-in-south-china-sea-philippine-drug-war.html\">Philippines<\/a>. U.S. anti-opium efforts also have effectively funded and propped up the Taliban in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.govinfo.gov\/content\/pkg\/GOVPUB-S-PURL-gpo93745\/pdf\/GOVPUB-S-PURL-gpo93745.pdf\">Afghanistan<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>With much of the international operations of the United States, it\u2019s difficult to get a handle on what\u2019s exactly going on. How much do the United States spend internationally on the war on drugs? Well, there\u2019s so many different agencies involved in that. There are aid agencies. There\u2019s the Defense Department. There\u2019s the DEA. You can\u2019t find one budget line that says \u201cInternational War on Drugs\u201d budget.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Today, the fight isn\u2019t so much about marijuana or cocaine as it is fentanyl. And while the drugs of choice come and go, the same counterproductive policies persist.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Donald Trump: <\/strong>We\u2019re talking about a tariff of 10 percent on China based on the fact that they\u2019re sending fentanyl to Mexico and Canada.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>While fentanyl can be far deadlier than other illicit drugs, the incentives for producers are similar: Prohibition has no effect on demand. It only makes the payoff more lucrative for suppliers.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-pullquote\">\n<blockquote>\n<p>Prohibition has no effect on demand. It only makes the payoff more lucrative for suppliers.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>Fentanyl is even more of an enormous markup. The precursor chemicals for fentanyl are about $800. And the retail value for the same amount of fentanyl in the United States is about $640,000. So, what we\u2019re talking about is a situation where the incentives to always bring in fentanyl are going to be enormous, and any disruption, however violent, that you can cause to that illicit industry will only be seen as a small price that the business has to pay in order to get the drug to the United States.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Fentanyl itself is popular because of the prohibition on other opioid drugs. Yet our government seems intent on continuing to make those same mistakes too.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ian <strong>V\u00e1squez<\/strong>: <\/strong>It is not true that somehow Mexicans are smuggling in fentanyl into the United States and that\u2019s the main problem through some sort of illegal routes or whatever. We\u2019ve looked into it here at Cato, and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cato.org\/blog\/us-citizens-were-80-crossers-fentanyl-ports-entry-2019-2024#:~:text=New%20data%20obtained%20by%20the,entry%20from%202019%20to%202024.\">90 percent of the fentanyl<\/a> is coming in through regular ports of entry in the United States, and at least 86 percent of it is being brought in by Americans. It\u2019s easy to blame Mexicans for this, but it\u2019s something that Americans are very much involved in.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>But blaming Mexico, Canada, and now Venezuela is exactly what Trump is doing.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Donald Trump:<\/strong> Billions of dollars of drugs are pouring out of Venezuela and other countries. Look, China, what they\u2019re doing with fentanyl is a terrible thing. It comes through Canada and it comes through Mexico, but a lot of it\u2019s coming through Venezuela. Venezuela has been a very bad actor.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Since the start of his second term, Donald Trump has issued a <a href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/2025\/08\/15\/trump-mexico-war-cartels\/\">series of executive orders<\/a> claiming the power to invade countries under the pretext of fighting drug trafficking. He has now explicitly threatened military action against Mexico, Colombia, and Venezuela.<\/p>\n<p>Trump has designated international drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations \u2014 likely illegally \u2014 and declared a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/fact-sheets\/2025\/01\/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-declares-a-national-emergency-at-the-southern-border\/\">national emergency<\/a> on the U.S. southern border. He also launched those military strikes on suspected drug boats \u2014 again without evidence of a crime and in violation of U.S. and international law. And then the administration began to amass <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/world\/americas\/u-s-eyes-striking-venezuelan-military-targets-used-for-drug-trafficking-cafcfe47?gaa_at=eafs&gaa_n=AWEtsqeXFtW57j6LpkBuSq6kQK-DG3WwQMxoTmFaZzG2Cd6IsEowVm7ooRYpYPEXavY%3D&gaa_ts=6907fcf7&gaa_sig=t1UL7p3QfhLIfnFGN0rRbbigfRxDYIOdk9LTnc74y2PMzCW45NTaBU9ig0CI4g4DnXyd_rZFr6aVLFiMnP2fDg%3D%3D\">warships near Venezuela<\/a> in preparation for striking military installations inside the country. But Venezuela has nothing to do with fentanyl, the current drug that\u2019s menacing the United States.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Rand Paul:<\/strong> Number one, there is no fentanyl made in Venezuela, not just a little bit. There\u2019s none being made in Venezuela. These are outboard boats that in order for them to get to Miami, would have to stop and refuel 20 times. They\u2019re all likely going to Trinidad and Tobago, which is an island right off of the coast of Venezuela.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>That\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/reel\/DQH8gGZiFry\/\">Republican Sen. Rand Paul <\/a>on Piers Morgan\u2019s show, challenging the Trump administration\u2019s use of drug trafficking to justify both extrajudicial executions and potentially invading another country.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Unlike Colombia\u2019s president, Venezuelan President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro is an authoritarian who remains in office despite having lost his country\u2019s last presidential election. But the evidence that Maduro is actively participating in the drug trade is thin. Yet Trump seems intent to go to war with Venezuela \u2014 with or without approval from Congress.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Reporter: <\/strong>And Mr. President, if you are declaring war against these cartels and Congress is likely to approve of that process, why not just ask for a declaration of war?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Donald Trump: <\/strong>Well, I don\u2019t think we\u2019re going to necessarily ask for a declaration of war. I think we\u2019re just going to kill people that are bringing drugs into our country, OK? We\u2019re going to kill them. You know, they\u2019re going to be like dead.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Rand Paul: <\/strong>That\u2019s why when we declare war, it\u2019s supposed to be done by Congress. It\u2019s supposed to be thoughtful. It\u2019s supposed to be debated, and we\u2019re not supposed to do it willy-nilly.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>That\u2019s Sen. Paul again. And here\u2019s Paul making another important point: Drug trafficking is not an act of war.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Rand Paul: <\/strong>Interdicting drugs has always been a criminal activity and a criminal, anti-crime activity where we don\u2019t just summarily execute people, we actually present evidence and convict them.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>More than 20 years ago, House Oversight Committee members Jan Schakowsky and Elijah Cummings demanded accountability after U.S. drug interdiction forces killed Roni and Charity Bowers. They demanded to know how such a mistake could happen, and how we could prevent the loss of innocent life going forward.<\/p>\n<p>Now, a new administration celebrates summary executions of alleged drug smugglers without a hint of due process, and it is now threatening to topple another government to prevent the U.S. from sating its appetite for illicit drugs.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>At the time of our interview in 2023, former congressman Pete Hoekstra told me that the Bowers incident changed the way he looked at drug policy\u00a0and how he assesses the government officials who enforce it.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra: <\/strong>I don\u2019t think there\u2019s reason to have much faith or belief in what the community is telling us about a number of different programs, whether it is a drug interdiction program, or its activities on the ground, or its activities even inside the United States.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko:<\/strong> All these years later, Hoekstra said, he still thinks about the larger ramifications of the Bowers saga \u2014 and the likelihood that the Air Bridge Denial Program may have taken other innocent victims.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-pullquote has-text-align-right\">\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u201cThe difference was the other folks that saw planes shot down or lives lost were not Americans.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n<p><strong>Pete Hoekstra:<\/strong> That\u2019s one of the haunting things that is out there; I believe that there were others. The Bowers were not the only family that was affected in this way. The difference was the other folks that saw planes shot down or lives lost were not Americans. <\/p>\n<p>And they didn\u2019t land in a river where they were saved by people coming from shore. They were shot down over remote areas \u2014 nobody there to help them. There was no investigation, no visit to the crash scenes. And it was just one more statistic, and it would have been taken at face value that it was a drug smuggling plane, and not a lot of investigations into whether they were innocents.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Pete Hoekstra left Congress in 2011. In November of 2024, shortly after winning reelection, Donald Trump announced that Hoekstra would be his ambassador to Canada. Hoekstra has not commented on the administration\u2019s boat strikes in Latin America.<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<aside class=\"promote-banner\">\n <a class=\"promote-banner__link\" href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/podcasts\/collateral-damage\/\"><br \/><span class=\"promote-banner__image\"><br \/><img width=\"300\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/CD_podcast-landing.jpg?fit=300%2C150\" class=\"attachment-medium size-medium\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/CD_podcast-landing.jpg?w=2000 2000w, https:\/\/theintercept.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/CD_podcast-landing.jpg?w=300 300w, https:\/\/theintercept.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/CD_podcast-landing.jpg?w=768 768w, https:\/\/theintercept.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/CD_podcast-landing.jpg?w=1024 1024w, https:\/\/theintercept.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/CD_podcast-landing.jpg?w=1536 1536w, https:\/\/theintercept.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/CD_podcast-landing.jpg?w=540 540w, https:\/\/theintercept.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/CD_podcast-landing.jpg?w=1000 1000w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\"\/> <\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"promote-banner__text\">\n<p class=\"promote-banner__eyebrow\">\n Collateral Damage Podcast <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/a><br \/><\/aside>\n<p>Next time on Collateral Damage.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Joel Berger: <\/strong>Alberta Spruill was a Black woman, a perfectly innocent person with no criminal record of any kind.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Derek Sells: <\/strong>The police on May 16, 2003, at a little past 6 a.m. broke into Ms. Spruill\u2019s apartment. They knocked the door off its hinges. They threw in a stun grenade.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>C. Virginia Fields: <\/strong>Created the smoke. And she was there getting ready or dressed to go to work.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Derek Sells: <\/strong>When the police went in instead of finding some drug den, what they found was a neat, tidy apartment of a older woman who lived alone.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Radley Balko: <\/strong>Collateral Damage is a production of The Intercept.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>It was reported and written by me, Radley Balko.<\/p>\n<p>Additional writing by Andrew Stelzer, who also served as producer and editor.<\/p>\n<p>Laura Flynn is our showrunner.<\/p>\n<p>Ben Muessig is our editor-in-chief:<\/p>\n<p>The executive producers are me and Sumi Aggarwal.<\/p>\n<p>We had editing support from Maryam Saleh.<\/p>\n<p>Truc Nguyen mixed our show.<\/p>\n<p>Legal review by Shawn Musgrave and David Bralow.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Fact-checking by Kadal Jesuthasan.<\/p>\n<p>Art direction by Fei Liu.<\/p>\n<p>Illustrations by Tara Anand.<\/p>\n<p>Copy editing by Nara Shin.<\/p>\n<p>Social and video media by Chelsey B. Coombs.<\/p>\n<p>Special thanks to Peter Beck for research assistance. <\/p>\n<p>This series was made possible by a grant from the Vital Projects Fund.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>If you want to send us a message, email us at podcasts@theintercept.com<\/p>\n<p>To continue to follow my work and reporting, check out my newsletter, The Watch, at <a href=\"http:\/\/radleybalko.substack.com\/\">radleybalko.substack.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Thank you for listening.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/2025\/11\/12\/collateral-damage-episode-six-airborne-imperalism\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Veronica and Charity Bowers, a young Christian missionary and her daughter, are killed when the Peruvian Air Force shoots down a small passenger plane in 2001. The plane had been mistaken for a drug smuggling plane and was shot down as part of a joint anti-drug agreement between the CIA and the Colombian and Peruvian […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4149,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-4148","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-usa-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gunowner-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4148","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gunowner-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gunowner-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gunowner-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gunowner-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4148"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gunowner-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4148\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gunowner-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4149"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gunowner-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gunowner-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gunowner-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}