Party of god

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An ambitious U.S. task force targeting Hezbollah’s billion dollar criminal enterprise ran headlong into the largest drugs and arms network with connections to Vladimir Putin, Bashar Assad in Syria, and the military leaders that controlled narcotics trafficking in Venezuela.

Operation Cassandra was launched in 2008 after the Drug Enforcement Administration amassed evidence that Hezbollah had transformed itself from a Middle East focused military and political organization into an international crime syndicate that some investigators believed was collecting $1 billion a year from drug and weapons trafficking, money laundering and other criminal Activities.

The untold story of Project Cassandra illustrates the immense difficulty in mapping and countering illicit networks in an age where global terrorism, drug trafficking and organized crime have merged, but also the extent to which competing agendas among government agencies, and shifting priorities at the highest levels can set back years of progress.

The clandestine team of investigators had informants inside trafficking and other criminal activity worldwide but also into Hezbollah’s illicit conspiracies with top officials in Iranian, Syrian,Venezuelan, and Russian governments, all the way up to presidents Maduro, Assad and Putin, according to former task force members.