Smugglers.

This is coolbert:

Article in the paper today describes a smuggling technique used by some Columbian drug cartel to bring heroin into the U.S.

The technique was to surgically implant bags of heroin into the bodies of puppy dogs. Those beloved little critters that constantly adorn the calendars of animal lovers.

The dogs were to be brought into the U.S., evading the normal customs checks OF PERSONS for drugs, the bags of heroin to removed later from the bodies of the dogs, probably not with surgical delicacy.

The smuggling ring was tripped up and the dogs-a-bearing-heroin discovered. Attempts in several cases to remove the bags of heroin were unsuccessful, and the puppies died.

This sort of stuff DOES get the attention of a dog-loving-American-public. Indignation at this sort of thing is intense.

This is however, precedent for this sort of thing. A precedent established during the Vietnam War, forty years ago now.

Smuggling of heroin from Vietnam to the U.S. was done by sewing bags of "smack" into the bodies of dead GI's.

Dead GI's, in caskets, being shipped from the preparatory mortuary in Saigon to Hawaii, had their remains stuffed with bags of heroin. A further going over of the bodies was done at another mortuary in Hawaii, the drugs being surreptitiously removed, prior to transport back to the burial site stateside.

The normal customs and drug checks were bypassed and the shipment of heroin got through all the customary and normal barriers without incident.

This was the work of the "Khaki Mafia".

A very disreputable group, about twenty, of most senior non-commissioned officers [NCO's] that were long term service and high ranking. Men that knew each other from a prior basis of serving in the same units, etc.

Ran "rackets" in the enlisted mens' clubs set up for GI's in Vietnam. Engaged in a whole host of ILLEGAL activities, from which they profited mightily.

The entire milieu surrounding this criminal enterprise was captured very well in the book, "The Khaki Mafia", by Robin Moore.

"Rackets" such as fixed slot machines, bringing in professional gamblers to cheat the GI's at cards, prostitution, the previously mentioned smuggling of drugs and automatic weapons into the U.S. [some of those automatic weapons ended up in the hands of American radicals that wanted to overthrew the government!!!], and black marketeering. This was all done to the American GI by the senior NCO's. The very men that the young GI's were told to look up to.

Very shameful.

This sort of behavior of course should not be considered to be confined to the Vietnam War.

My uncle, now deceased, was a military policeman [MP] who served in New Guinea and the Philippines during World War Two [WW2]. A lot of MP duty revolved around the search for deserters. But also preventing crime and catching GI's that perpetrated criminal acts. Such as pulling gold teeth, stealing watches and gold rings, all done off the dead bodies of their fellow GI's!! This sort of thing does happen.

Such behavior by soldiers in wartime [or any other time for that manner] is totally intolerable and perpetrators of such crime DO DESERVE the harshest punishment possible.

[the leading member of the "khaki mafia" was at one time the Sergeant Major of the Army. The most senior enlisted rank in the Army, period. This man had the good-will even of the commander of the MP branch, a Major General. There was a famous incident where this General personally stopped a group of American Nazis' from burying their murdered leader, George Lincoln Rockwell, in a military cemetery. The Nazis's were wearing fascist regalia, forbidden under law. Under those circumstance, the General was diligent. With regard to the "Khaki Mafia", he was not!!]

coolbert.