Innocents die in the drug war

Mary Anastasia O’Grady keeps the memory of Veronica and Charity Bowers alive in today’s Wall Street Journal

Of all the casualties claimed by the U.S. “war on drugs” in Latin America, perhaps none so fully captures its senselessness and injustice as the 2001 CIA-directed killing of Christian missionary Veronica Bowers and her daughter Charity in Peru.

and new information about the shooting of their plane has surfaced…

… according to Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R., Mich.), it was an accident waiting to happen because of the way in which the CIA operated the drug interdiction plan in Peru known as the Airbridge Denial Program. Mr. Hoekstra says the goods to prove his charge are in a classified report from the CIA Inspector General that he received in October. […]
“It was a rogue operation,” he told me by telephone on Tuesday. “They knew they weren’t following the rules, and they never did anything about it. They were callous about it.” When I asked him to explain further, he said: “My take on this is that they became obsessed with the mission.”

We need these operations to see the light of day. Thanks to Representative Hoekstra and Mary O’Grady for helping that happen.
O’Grady also notes:

Yet to honor the memory of Mrs. Bowers and her daughter and spare innocent lives in the future, a broader discussion in Congress about U.S. drug policy in the region is needed.

Absolutely.