Russell H. Bartley - Eclipse of the Assassins: The CIA, Imperial Politics, and the Slaying of Mexican Journalist Manuel Buendía

Eclipse of the Assassins

The CIA, Imperial Politics, and the Slaying of Mexican Journalist Manuel Buenda

Russell H. Bartley and Sylvia Erickson Bartley

The University of Wisconsin Press

Publication of this volume has been made possible, in part, through support from the Anonymous Fund of the College of Letters and Science at the University of WisconsinMadison.

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Copyright 2015 by Russell H. Bartley and Sylvia Erickson Bartley

All rights reserved. Except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles and reviews, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any format or by any meansdigital, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwiseor conveyed via the Internet or a website without written permission of the University of Wisconsin Press. Rights inquiries should be directed to .

Printed in the United States of America

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Bartley, Russell H., author.
Eclipse of the assassins : the CIA, imperial politics, and the slaying of Mexican journalist Manuel Buenda / Russell H. Bartley and Sylvia Erickson Bartley.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-299-30640-3 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Buenda, Manuel, 19261984Assassination. 2. United StatesForeign relationsMexico. 3. MexicoForeign relationsUnited States. 4. United States. Central Intelligence Agency. 5. Espionage, AmericanMexico. 6. Drug trafficMexico.
I. Bartley, Sylvia E., author. II. Title.
E183.8.M6B375 2015
327.73072dc23
2015008379

In memory of
VALENTN FERRAT,
killed in Guatemala on 7 December 1981 by proxy assassins of
American empire,
TAREQ AYYOUB,
targeted in Baghdad on 8 April 2003 by an American air strike,
ANNA STEPANOVA POLITKOVSKAYA,
shot to death in Moscow on 7 October 2006 by the
Machiavellians of Russian rule,
and
CHARLES BOWDEN
(19452014),
who passed peacefully in Las Cruces, New Mexico, on 30 August 2014, and whose insights from decades of exposing inconvenient truths make this a better book.

Charles Bowden ()
John Womack Jr.
George Marshall Davis

(readers)
Michael de la Cruz, Mark Ruedrich, David J. Springer, Stuart L. Wagner, Charles Wollenberg

(research assistance)
Jos A. Barrn, Manuel Becerra Acosta (), William Benemann, Julin Cardona, Adrienne Hunter, Lionel Martin, Edward M. Medvene, Molly Molloy, Bill Mulvihill, Fernando Ramrez de Aguilar, Carlos Ramrez Hernndez, John Ross (), Matthew Rothschild, Miguel ngel Snchez de Armas, Peter Dale Scott, Maryellen Sheppard, Gary Webb ()

(informants)
Mara Dolores balos Lebrija (), Adolfo Aguilar Znser (), Hctor G. Berrllez, ngel Buenda, Jorge A. Bustamante, Miguel ngel Garca Domnguez, Lawrence Victor Harrison, Kathleen A. Henson (), Michael Keith Hooks, Phil Jordan, Michael Levine, Rafael Loret de Mola, William Robert Tosh Plumlee

(logistical support)
Richard and Julie Steckel
Harold () and Jackie Wollenberg

(institutional support)
Fundacin Manuel Buenda
University of WisconsinMilwaukee

Any undertaking of this complexity and duration generates many debts of gratitude, only a portion of which can ever be duly acknowledged. In the present instance, we must commence with author Charles Bowden and Harvard University historian John Womack Jr. Our indebtedness to both men for their insights, unstinting support, and encouragement over the past decade is beyond measure. Each read and critiqued every chapter as we drafted them, more than once obliging us to revise, expand, or otherwise hone our account. They likewise actively advocated for the books publication. To our great sadness, Charles Bowden did not live to see our books physical birth under the imprimatur of his own graduate alma mater, the University of Wisconsin. We were still going around with him about interpretive issues in our epilogue when he failed to awake from an afternoon nap on the last Saturday of August 2014.

We are equally indebted to George Marshall Davis (aka Lawrence Victor Harrison), without whose courage and principled determination we could not have exposed the perverse political agendas responsible for the murders of Manuel Buenda and U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent Enrique Camarena Salazar. His assistance has come at a grievous personal cost, itself a reflection of those same perverse agendas. In part, this book is his as well as ours.

Likewise, we express special thanks to the five readers named in addition to Bowden and Womack. They were selected as a representative sample of the books eventual readership, persons of intelligence and diverse educational backgrounds but without specialized knowledge of the topic. Doubting at times that they had anything helpful to contribute, they nonetheless read the entire manuscript and in doing so provided us with useful insights into how best to frame this multifaceted account for general interest readers as well as regional and international affairs specialists.

The list of individuals who assisted us with research tasks for this book is not exhaustive but does recognize those who facilitated our work in especially significant ways. For the most part, we note their respective contributions in the text. Several, however, deserve additional comment. Maryellen Sheppard graciously documented real estate histories related to matters discussed in chapters 15 and 16. Bill Mulvihill expertly transferred recorded interviews and television news reportage to CD and DVD formats for ready consultation and long-term preservation. Lionel Martin and Adrienne Hunter facilitated our Buenda inquiry in Cuba. Border and Latin American specialist Molly Molloy at the New Mexico State University Library (Las Cruces) secured key documentation and, together with Charles Bowden, engaged us in insightful dialogue based on firsthand knowledge of and personal contact with several key informants discussed in the epilogue. Jos Barrn, webmaster for convicted Camarena case defendant Ren Verdugo Urqudez, facilitated our access to a veritable treasure trove of trial and law enforcement documents assembled by the Verdugo legal defense team and made publicly available as an online digital archive at a website devoted to the defense of Verdugos innocence (http://reneverdugo.org/docs.html).

We are, of course, grateful to all our informants but wish to express special gratitude here to those who ran personal risks in talking to us or who simply shared what they knew in the hope that it would help expose the true perpetrators of the Buenda assassination and the related murder of DEA special agent Enrique Camarena Salazar. Given the time that has elapsed since we commenced this inquiry, some of the informants listed here have since died. Where we know this to be the case, we so indicate with the symbol .

During the final decade of our Buenda investigation, the Wollenbergs and Steckels provided welcome shelter in the San Francisco Bay Area and Southern California whenever we were on the road conducting interviews or related research. For their warm generosity and logistical support, we remain ever grateful. We also wish to acknowledge the institutional support we received during the first dozen years of this project from the Department of History and the Center for Latin America at the University of Wisconsins Milwaukee campus, which enabled us to conduct key portions of our investigative work in Mexico. In this same vein, we express our deepest gratitude to University of Wisconsin Press Editorial Director Gwen Walker, who together with Senior Editor Sheila McMahon and their skilled staff deftly shepherded our manuscript through the multiple stages of publication to the final book.