The war on drugs has been long, highly financed, and generally a failure.
The drug trade is governed by the same laws of supply and demand that as any other product. When the demand is high, and it seems it is, then there will people who will find a way to supply that demand.
If the government decides that some product, for which there is a high demand, is illegal, then a black market will develop. We experienced that during prohibition when we outlawed the manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages. The result was a rise in gangs that exploited the demand for beer and whiskey. That was the spur that created organized crime. There was just too much money involved.
We tried the same tactics then that are being employed today to combat the flow of illegal drugs in to the country. We tried to go after the supply side of the trade. The feds tried to shut down the flow of spirits into the country. Indeed, they did make a lot of arrests. They displayed their haul for public consumption to show how successful they were being in shutting down the alcohol trade. But, what they managed to intercept was just a drop in the bucket to the massive flow of beer and whiskey. The demand was just to great and the money just too good.
Today we are engaged in "The War on Drugs", using the same tactics that were tried during prohibition. We are going after the supply side of the criminal activity. And, we're having about the same results. We capture some of the drugs, bust some of the drug gangs and lower bosses, but the drugs just keep on flowing in and the money keeps flowing into the syndicates that are supplying them. No matter what you do, the drugs will continue to flow as long as the demand remains high.
One solution is simple to state, but likely impossible to implement. Shut off the demand. Clearly that is not going to happen any time soon although that would be the ideal solution. Drugs are highly addictive. But, the addict is not the only user. Some of the drugs appeal to a set of young people who use them for recreational purposes. They love the feeling they get. And then there is the set of users that are addicted to drugs as pain killers. They generally got hooked as a result of over use of pain killers originally prescribed by some doctor. If you really want to win the war on drugs this is where the emphasis should likely be. Cut off the demand or at least significantly reduce it. How you do that, I have no idea. It likely would take enormous amount of money and a concerted effort from a large number of people. How do you convince that college student that he or she shouldn't snort cocaine if they want to. After all that age group knows everything there is to know. And, they would never get hooked. It's just all for fun.
Another solution is to make the drug trade unprofitable by legalizing them. Make drugs regulated the same way we do alcohol. Some countries have done that without to many dour consequences. This approach has it's down side. If the repeal of prohibition is any indicator, legalizing narcotics would result in an increase in addition and all that implies in the public health arena. After all, people forget the prohibition really worked to a large extent. There was far less spousal abuse and public drunkenness during prohibition. Men were coming home with the paychecks instead of spending them in a bar. Today's war on drugs has an effect of keeping a lot of people from trying narcotics for recreational uses, with the subsequent morphing into addiction, and pushing people into sometimes successful rehab programs.
Of course a third option would hardly be tolerable to our neighbors down south. That would be to go after the drug cartels with all our military might. Literally invade Mexico. Send in the special forces including the Navy Seals, Army Rangers and any other elite group in our military, to wipe out the headquarters and personnel operating the cartels. That would not be a one time thing because even if all the drug cartels were wiped out with all it's leadership, we would have to maintain a presence. You can be assured that new cartels would arise. The money is just too great.
Something like 80 percent of the people in prison today are there because of some relation to the illegal drug trade. About 20% of them were under the influence of narcotics while committing a crime. Would this mean that the prisons would be emptied if drugs were legalized? I'm not sure what the result would be, likely a large number of the same people who were sent to prison for dealing or manufacturing illegal drugs would find some other way to break the law. That pipe line would dry up. The big money involved with drugs would disappear. But, there are lots of ways to make money by illegal means. Generally however, those methods don't effect to large population as does the drug trade. Human trafficking comes to mind. It's harder to smuggle humans around than it is drugs. But, that activity is already in place and flourishing.
