"Mena" - Barry Seal biopic starring Tom Cruise

The Barry Seal character was in Narcos briefly, but he had an important role. He was a drug runner for the CIA in the early 80s. The reason the film is called Mena is because it's named after Mena, AR...the town where the secret CIA airport was where they did all their flying out of. He was later hunted down and killed by the cartel.

The Crimes of Mena

This is also not the only story involving Mena having to do with the CIA and shady stuff. Later in the 80s two local boys were murdered, then layed on railroad tracks and run over by a train. The story always was that these two kids saw something really secretive around that area and were killed. The case has still not been solved. Supposedly the Clintons were also heavily involved in this as Bill was the governor from the early 80s to early 90s. You can really go down a rabbit hole with the CIA, Reagan, Clinton, black ops stuff. There is story after story about it.
The great Arkansas railway mystery


Two teenagers are murdered and their bodies placed on railroad tracks



There are also yet another Arkansas connection to this stuff, except this one is far more personal. I was elementary classmates and playground pals with a kid whose father had been killed in a plane crashed in Nicauragua in 1986. He lived in my town and was married with a son(the kid I knew). He was also an ex Air Force pilot who was discharged in 1974. Yet he was the pilot in the 1986 crash that was running guns and supplies to the anti communists in Nicauragua. He was clearly a CIA black op pilot, yet the cover story was he was just a kind guy and wanted to help the poor people of Nicauargua.
1 of 2 Pilots Killed Went to AF Academy

Crew of Ill-Fated Plane Part of Fraternity of Ex-CIA Fliers


There are multiple stories like this involving central and South America CIA stuff from the 80s.

They're not all about Seal but very very interesting nonetheless...this stuff fascinates me

Interesing...I was just doing some further reading on this and apparently the cargo plane that Seal used was also the same cargo plane that Sawyer(CIA Pilot whose son I knew) was flying over Nicaragua. He had to have been flying it in and out of Mena, which is about 3 hrs from where he lived.

its a damn shame Cruise has turned into a nut case, because throw all of that shite aside, he's one of my all time favorites. looking forward to this

the airport in mena AR, in the middle of gotdam nowhere, is one of the biggest, nicest and most modern general aviation airports in the country. the CIA spent millions upgrading it for its use in this and other operations

barry seal's story is amazing and im really looking forward to seeing this

Narcos completely glossed over the Barry Seal/CIA storyline.

It's not like Seal was the only American flying in and trafficking columbian powder. He just had the bigger names and government agencies connected to him.

I'm sure there guys flying into all of the southern border states. They flew that shite in all over the country.

Mena, Arkansas? Really

Lol had an account there once. Good god what an awful drive

His son posts on the OT every now and again. If the movie fails to mention the Clintons, then it is a non-starter. Seal was running drugs into Mena, Arkansas while Clinton was the governor.

(Edit: Take a look at Google Maps and Mena, Arkansas - the airport is pretty amazing for a hole in the wall town and still has a bunch of identical business class and turbo prop planes on the tarmac).

Seal was operation 40/Mongoose

I wouldn't doubt Seal was potentially involved in all of those events. If he was entrusted with the Mena/cartel stuff he was viewed as a highly capable guy by the agency.