First of all I wan to point out that this is a somewhat speculative and theoretical post. But still, a quite possible scenario from my research into the matter.

It is proven that if a countries government really want to keep drugs out of the country they can do so, though of course some will always come in.

But USA is amazing, it is basically so much drugs that it makes you wonder how it all gets in there and if they really do anything to try stop it.

Lets take some examples.

The numbers of persons arrested in South Korea for use of psychotropic substances, mostly club drugs, increased from 3,657 persons to 4,478 persons (a 23 percent increase) while persons arrested for marijuana use fell from 1,276 to 940 (a 26 percent decrease). The overall arrest rate for drug offenders increased slightly, from 6,086 arrests in 2003 to 6,529 arrests in 2004.

So roughly around 6-7000 thousands arrests for drug use a year.

Then lets go over to USA:
Law enforcement made more arrests for drug abuse violations in 2006 (an estimated 1.9 million arrests, or 13.1 percent of the total number of arrests) than for any other offense. (Based on Table 29.)

In percentages, that means roughly 0.6% of the US population were arrested for drug crimes, while only around 0,01% where arrested in south korea.

The reason I'm using south korea as an example here is simply because my brother has lived there some years now and was surprised to see that there virtually is no drug addicts there. We both come from Norway, which has an amazing amount of drug abusers - there are about 1000 drug crimes per 100 000 citizen, which equals 1% of the population.

That's some statistics and background info.

So lets continue, to how and why I think the governments allow and help get the drugs into the country. In this example I will use USA and cocaine, as well as some heroin.

Obviously, drugs are a lot of money - big business. It also gives more power and control, specially with the "drugs on war" and how the US are (in my opinion) working on getting monopoly on the drug distribution. Look at their alliance with Colombia, this is one of the "how's", also notice the occupation of Afghanistan, one of the worlds biggest producers of opium and heroin, and after the US took over the heroin and opium production has INCREASED manyfolds!

I think that is because that was the main purpose of taking over Afghanistan, to control the drugs. Making was against a country and taking over just because a few private terrorists performed an attack is just outrageous, it was not the country Afghanistan making any war against USA. If some US terrorists went and blew up some things in any other country, there is no way that country would attack the whole of USA because of it, they would rather try get the responsible terrorists.

The other "how" is CIA - they've been busted several times for smuggling cocaine. In 2007, september, a CIA plane crashed in Mexico and was busted with 3 tons cocaine. Some years earlier another CIA plane was busted with more than 5 ton cocaine. And if you look it up there is much more to CIA and drug trafficking. In addition several of the big drug barons and smugglers around in south america have themselves stated that the US government is their main customer, to put it like that.

Ok and at last we get to Coca Cola now, they have officially stated that they import more than 200 tons of coca leaves from bolivia and peru yearly. They use the coca leaves in their coca cola soft drink. They do use a decocanized version of the leaves before using it as an ingredient though, this means they extract the cocaine. And of course this is done in collaboration with the governments and brings perhaps a ton of cocaine. What they do with this yearly ton of cocaine we can only really speculate, but considering the above mentioned facts I dont find it too improbable that they are doing something naughty here too. And heck, 200 tons is the official numbers they import, who knows if that is indeed the real numbers?

With that said I would also point out that I find the most logical reason for going to war against Iraq, and the obvious want to control more of the surrounding area, is due to the oil. More money, more control, monopoly and power.

This was just a brief overview, there are many other incidents and historical facts and wars that has been fought that further supports these theories. But for now I'll leave this open for speculation, reflection and discussion.

-EA

If the US government wanted to "Take out" the Afghanistan drug trade - they're doing a rather poor job of it. As I understand, they're reluctant to tackle the problem there, as the local warlords in charge of the Opium production are helping the allied forces keep the country Taliban-free. Ironically - the Taliban almost completely removed the Opium cultivation from Afghanistan prior to the invasion.

In fact - as you can see - According to Wikipedia, the Opium cultivation (in hectares) has boomed since the Allied occupation, due to the collapse of the Afghanistan economy after the removal of the Taliban.



In the same article, however, you'll notice that Russia accused the CIA of trafficking the Opium during the Russian occupation of Afghanistan.

The price of Opium, however, seems to tell a darker story - the official story seems to indicate that it is being stockpiled and the price, which skyrocketed during 2001, is being kept artificially high, in order to fund future Terrorist action. Whether that's the case or not, and who exactly is stockpiling it, remains to be seen.

As regards the OP's idea that the American Government is involved with drug smuggling - the name Gary Webb is an excellent place to start investigating from.

Thanks for this interesting extra information and statistics which further fuels my theory as I see it

Here are some videos related to governments and drug trafficking as well. I have not seen all of these myself but I am currently looking into them:

Mena Connection - Clinton, Bush and the CIA drug smuggling (50 min):
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8...h&plindex=0

Dateline report on CIA drug trafficking into the US (13 min):
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=57...h&plindex=1

Mike Ruppert - CIA and Drug Running (1h 45min):
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7...h&plindex=3

Former CIA/DEA Drug Trafficker Pilot Beau Abbott Speaks:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=53...h&plindex=4

CIA Drug Ops Conspiracy (1h 46min):
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=46...h&plindex=5

Enjoy

Theres so much evidence to support government trafficking its not funny. Kerry committee uncovered some. Also San Jose Mercury News ran articles on CIA trafficking in los angelas.

All government seem to do it and ya know what, it's been going on since before this country was ever created. The Dutch used to get opium dirt cheap in China and trade it to the Polynesians for thier resources instead of putting them to the sword. It was easier for them to get the tribes addicted. Ruthless and clever.

Also the Opium Wars between Brittain and China is illuminating.

Lord Russell a dignitary and funder of Yale University and originator of Skull and Bones was a Brittish loyalist and businessman that brought opium from China accross the United States on his railroad Union Pacific so it could be disperssed to the rest of Europe via New York.

Why do you think they advertise drugs openly on TV?
Are you a white blobby thing hopping around aimlessly through life depressed?
Zllythepratrite!
ask your doctor about it...

In a text book from 1997 an excerpt reads...



You know as well as i do that pharmaceuticals rose up like a sick twisted plant that became all too large all too quickly. Drugs being given under the guise of health turned into a money making machine like no other. They have thousands of lobbyists working for them... so its no surprise to find this on 60 minutes

Big Tobacco... addictive
Alcohol... addictive
Cocaine... addictive
Coca-Cola and other high fructose corn syrup(do you realize how often everything you eat is covered in corn sugar, or other refined sugars?), sodium benzoate
(salt-gasoline) soft drinks.
"Legal" drugs... what do you think? In most cases i would have to say yes. I see all too many people getting F'ed up on zanex and prozac(and drinking) like its a street drug!!! And somehow you don't think "medical school" which is now funding universities and such has a hand in that too???

We know it makes money...
We know it is advertising to us...

As you might suspect, this is but one instance of a far more sinister scheme to dumb down the american populace(jesus!! we are dumb enough!!!) by means of rotting our brains and bodies and minds for our own "health"...

The Elite only use one line of reasoning in their affairs with the world they have all too much control over, you must realize these people are not "human" in any way.
They have no inner struggle between "right" and "wrong", no morality, and the open willingness to do anything to keep their power and influence and to expand it ever farther.

Im short of time, i must make haste, hopefully more people will start coming around to the real world soon!!!

and there's no big secret to it.. the same modus operandi all over..

get the person thinking only of themself..
get the person acting only for themself..
get the person caring only for their self..
(ad infinitum)

the goal is to make you lose sight of the inter-connective nature of it all (how actions have an effect) to make you (us) feel like we have no 'input' into the (our) world.. to make you (us) only relate to the physical body and lose touch with higher realities..

life is so amazing.. but notice how it's the corporations and gov.org detracting from this? with their constant threats of 'terrorists' and 'buy *this* to ease the pain'

..doesn't take a phd to connect the dots either

Currently I live in one of the few countries in the world where coca is still legal. That is in its natural form, as coca leaves. Here these are considered very healthy and beneficial in many ways and also a good supply for vitamins and minerals, and a medicinal herb that helps for many problems such as rheumatism, digestive problems, pain, fibromyalgia, fatigue, depression, anxiety, various infections and more. It is also a fantastic replacement for coffee, and do not have the side effects frequently experienced by caffeine such as "jitters" or nervousness, etc.

It is available as both tea and dried leaves you can either chew the traditional way, make tea of, or even smoke.

Personally I support the use of medicinal plants and herbs used in a responsible way for real problems the way they traditionally have and should be used.

The main problem seems to be, regarding the legal status, that the powers that be have figured out there is a lot of money in creating the hard type of drugs from such plants and herbs, lets take cocaine and heroin as examples, and thus banned these plants to make sure to get the prices up and the availability low to maintain the high prices and then take part of the smuggling, manufacturing and distribution of such drugs, both for making money and for weapon trading.

Personally I find it both outrageous and ridiculous that anyone can tell us that some part of nature is "legal" and other part is "Illegal" as if they are the ones in charge to act on behalf of God to come with such laws.

Dark Alliance by Gary Webb - This book answers a lot of those questions and unfortunately cost the author his life, one of those 'shot himself in the back of the head' incidents of course. I recently found a copy of it for $60 luckily.

Dois Gene Chip Tatum - Former CIA pilot and drug trafficker, ex-FBI agent Ted Gunderson has allowed two of his interviews with Chip to be online and can be watched on www.video.google.com, one is called "Presidential Secrets" and can't recall the name of the other one off-hand. Chip's tortured body was found washed up in Panama not long ago from what I'd last heard. Unfortunately the situation is much worse than what most people would assume.

Long story short, I think Afghanistan is one big drug factory, and many U.S. troops are reporting spending most of their time gaurding poppy fields there. I'll go way out on a limb here also, and venture as far as to say that tons of cocaine don't regularly get acrost the border, coast guard, custom's inspections, etc. etc. without a little govt "help", we can thank the Criminals In Action for that, and it's said that George H. W. Bush's nickname amongst fellow Bonesmen and other "friends" is "Poppy".

Also, I agree majorly with your views about plants being used in their proper medicinal context as being an obviously good thing. How can anyone really question if these conspiracies are true, when their govt has outlawed medicinal plants? Many are still calling these facts "theories", what blatant-rampant-insanity, and it's those types who worship at the altar of the greatest hypnotist in the world, the hellevision, who's flicker rate is MIT-designed to induce a dreamstate in it's audience. THEmKULTraOFminDControl is doing it's thing yet still today, I pity da fools.

yup

Jobs?
You mean, drug dealer?
Well, yes, I suppose it creates that sort of job...But that job is beneficial how, and to whom, other than the dealer, or the meth lab operator?




You know, you have an ever so slightly cloudy point about legalizing drugs. But it's so clouded over by your skewed ideas that it really can't be seen too clearly.




Really?
You ought to cite some data to support that conclusion.



Wait a minute. You just stated that there are no jobs to speak of and yet here you cite "how it works" by illustrating a "fella that has a good job".

What?


Honestly...

While I do agree that US drug policy is absolutely wrong, and that there is strong evidence that members of the CIA were involved in cocaine trafficking, you all seem to be making some fairly big assumptions.

What the world needs to do is legalize all these substances then go into business with the farmers in Afghanistan and Columbia and take all of that money away from the people who really should not have it like the Pablo Escobars of the world. People will abuse these substances whether they're legal or not, but throwing a drug addict into jail will not solve the problem.

I agree with Cradle of Fish, these substances should be legal as it is no ones right to tell other people what they can put into their own system or do with themselves.

However I'd say that such would be a fairly unrealistic dream, specially considering who is more or less in control of the mentioned countries at the moment. Here in south america where I live most people consider Colombia the "little latin broher" of USA, and everyone knows what happened to Afghanistan.

For this to change something really big has to happen within the top chain of the current governments and I think we may be waiting long for that.

With that said, in my home country Norway they are currently debating whether to legalize heroin for prescription use.

I have very little doubt parts of the US government are involved in helping/making drug use spread throughout the country.

If you look into it enough, you'll pretty much find some things that almost tell you that is the case. Hence CIA planes packed with tons of cocaine that crash and then there is almost nothing reported about it.

Actually, if it weren't for this forum, I wouldn't have heard about it at all.

Are there any chemists out there?

I wrote some fiction a few years back, and in the course of my research, I noted that cocaine is an ester. My question is, would it be chemically possible to turn cocaine into fabric (i.e. polyester) as a means of smuggling it undetected across international boundaries? And then break it back down again into cocaine?

I'm no chemist, so I don't know.

Anybody?

yup

Having no fear of retribution, other than a chant at me, I've noted several agents in the area. Higher than cootie-brown, as they say.

This is common, more common than most would think. It's simple, within the cartels, lies manpower. There's a network. Should they become anti-gov't it could be like the 1950's with hits quite common.
So, they proliferate the heirarchy with agents, to control the ebb. These agents are allowed to succumb to the euphoria of the drugs. This is necessary for belief in, as well as encouragement to continue operations.

It's not uncommon in my area, where M13, Asian Pride, and the Crips are vying for territory; to see a badge prominently displayed next to a heap of goodtimes, with the officer in tow.
I've witnessed this, an officer blowing like there was no tomorrow, heading to the end of the road.

The money for operations is extensive, so if you have agents on a stake-out or some such, this liquid money can be shifted to them for costs of operations. Untraceable, and no where near budgeted. Funding for anything anyone could desire.

Of amusement to me, when there's a stance nothing in the absurd, and it goes terribly awry. You'll see this behaviour extensively. Where they challenge the very nature of law enforcement, and you hear them, among the shadows, exclaiming: "You ain't gettin' my smack, get your own..."