War on Drugs, War on Terror

For years, ever since Nixon started using the “war on drugs” language, in the late 1960s, I couldn’t fathom the stupendous irrationality and wastefulness of this policy. 1.5 million non-violent offenders are in prison in the US for the victim-less crime of drug possession (two thirds of all inmates). Numerous studies have been published over the years, demonstrating conclusively that (1) the overall levels of drug use have remained constant; (2) treatments, where available, do help addicts/abusers recover; (3) the so-called “war,” a $19 billion-a-year boondoggle, whether waged on producers (in Mexico, or Columbia, or SE Asia) and on street-level consumers in the US, has not made a dent in the volume of drug traffic. (For insightful and informative histories see Smoke and Mirrors by Dan Baum; or Drug Crazy by Mike Gray; or www.DrugWarFacts.org)
As an psychologist, educator and parent, I was particularly amused (when not horrified) by the absurdity of the PR campaigns to scare people off drug-use: remember the image of the egg breaking, and the authoritative voice intoning “this is your brain on drugs”? Amused, because I knew that drug-using young people of my acquaintance were not scared – rather they derided the heavy-handed and mendacious pseudo-science of these campaigns. Horrified, because if the apparent purpose of these scare-campaigns was so obviously failing, why were they continuing? What was the real agenda? Why wasn’t drug abuse being treated as a public-health matter, which it clearly is, instead of as a law enforcement issue, with the attendant monstrous social costs.
I came to some understanding and (at least partial) answer to these question in the aftermath of 9/11, and the launching of the “war on terror.” First of all, as Gore Vidal quipped , having a “war on terror” makes about as much sense as having a war on dandruff. Military metaphors have entered into discussions of the politics and economics of medicine – we have wars on cancer, on heart-disease and other abstractions. Second, why wasn’t the crime of 9/11 investigated like any other crime, with concerted international police and law enforcement agencies? Like many observers, I was struck by the parallels between the attacks of 9/11, and the burning of the German Reichstag parliament in 1933. Both events led to a precipitous increase in police state measures, increased power of an authoritarian, fascist-leaning political party, and the quashing of internal dissent. In the US, a pervasive climate of fear settled over the land – with pointlessly humiliating airport security measures, color-coded “terror alerts” and the like. At the same time, we got vastly increased mobilization of money and technology for wars of aggression and invasion against “enemy” countries, belonging to a supposed “axis of evil.”
Clearly, the events of 9/11 had been used, by the US government, to provide a casus belli, a pre-text or excuse to launch an aggressive war of invasion, most probably, world opinion seems to agree, to gain control of Middle-Eastern oil resources. To get a population to agree to go to war you have to have a plausible threat – this is a principle well understood by ambitious militaristic leaders from the most ancient times. You had to have a Pearl Harbor to motivate Americans to enter WWII. Historians have shown that Roosevelt knew of the coming attack, and used it. Leaving aside the complex and unresolved question of who actually carried out the 9/11 attacks, and to what extent governmental entities were complicit in it – there is no question about the use to which the attacks were put. They functioned to support and rationalize a fascististic control agenda as a matter of policy, by stimulating fear. What should have been a law enforcement matter became instead an open-ended “war” on terror, with stupendous profits and growth opportunities for the American military-industrial complex.
The parallels with the war on drugs are striking: both “wars” don’t actually work to diminish the targeted “enemy” – drug use and trafficking are not declining; and terrorist attacks by rogue gangs and states all over the world have increased. Polls show that Americans feel less secure since these wars have been launched. Both wars have led to spiraling cycles of violence and retaliation in many countries, as well as profound moral corruption on the part of military and police personnel (Think: decapitated bodies on the streets in Mexico; teenage suicide bombers in Iraq). Since these wars on ill-defined abstractions have no clear declaration of what a “victory” or even an “end” might be, they offer the perfect program for the unending accumulation of profits and power in the military-industrial-prison complex.
With the launching of the internal propaganda campaign to spread fear (of terrorism) throughout society, I finally understood the paradox of the ridiculous fear campaigns against drug use. These campaigns are not actually addressed to drug-using young people. From the perspective of the prison-industrial complex, it doesn’t matter if you turn your brain to scrambled eggs – in fact, it would provide more fodder for the system. These campaigns are directed at middle-of-the-road average Americans, possibly with teen-age sons or daughters –playing on their fears and getting them to vote for and support prohibition legislation and punishment. For example, when MDMA (a psychotherapy adjunct) was criminalized in the 1980s, it was not primarily doctors or pharmacologists who testified in congress, but police officials and government agents. (The same thing happened with marijuana in the 1920s, LSD in the 1960s, GHB in the 1990s … etc). Please note that I am not saying these drugs are all perfectly safe; but prohibition and “war” does not increase safety.
So what do we do about these endless wars? First, what would be a public-health centered approach to the problems of drug abuse and trafficking? To think of “legalize” or “prohibit” as the only options is stupidly simplistic. The key strategies here are decriminalization, regulation and education, with the overall goal of harm-reduction. Increasing numbers of European countries (e.g. Netherlands, Switzerland, Germany), recognizing that drug use is not going away any time soon, are adopting such strategies. Prior to the 1960s, Britain used to have a system where opiate addicts could register with the National Health Service, and obtain their needed supply – in one fell swoop eliminating a vast and hugely profitable criminal underclass, and minimizing the health and social harm from addicts stealing to support their habits.
In the US, there is precedent for such strategies in how we deal with nicotine and alcohol – two powerful psychoactive drugs, widely used recreationally, but with high potential for abuse and devastating for health when used addictively. The use of these drugs is not prohibited or criminal – instead they have hugely profitable worldwide industries involved in their production and distribution. Certain behaviors associated with these drugs are punishable by law (driving while drunk, providing the drugs to youth) – and no one finds that an infringement of their freedom. The regulation provides a safer framework for distribution. In the case of tobacco, massive PR campaigns and legal prosecutions in recent decades have reduced the incidence of smoking and thus the costs in health and lost productivity.
Treatment and recovery programs for alcoholism and addictions of all kinds should be made widely available to all who need them – the benefits to society would far exceed the costs. Alcoholics Anonymous is an excellent model for one such program. Treatments with consciousness-expanding substances such as ayahuasca, ibogaine, peyote or LSD have been used successfully to counter the consciousness-contracting addictions and compulsions.
A case could be made (and I for one would support it) that there should be more education and stricter regulation of the sale of tobacco and alcohol. Perhaps a kind of licensing exam could be devised prior to obtaining a permit to buy these products, demonstrating that the adult purchaser fully understands the health consequences of use. My former colleague in the Harvard University studies of psilocybin, the much-maligned Timothy Leary, testified in 1962 before a Congressional Committee chaired by Robert Kennedy, that using consciousness-altering drugs responsibly and safely requires a similar level of education and skillful preparation as piloting an aircraft, and should be similarly tested and licensed.
What to do about the “war on terror?” What is our present situation? During the eight nightmare years (now blessedly coming to a close) of the Bush neo-con presidency, America’s imperialist ambitions have been overtly supported and publicly promoted. (For the longer historical view read Howard Zinn’s powerful recent illustrated People’s History of the American Empire). “Exporting democracy” and “regime change” have becomes the smoke-screen cover phrases for military intervention to bring about forced subservience to American corporate interests. So-called “free trade” agreements are a smoke-screen covers for neo-colonialist exploitation agendas which seek to assure free movements of finance capital, with elimination of any controls in favor of justice for workers or protection of the environment. In the name of expanding markets and controlling access to key natural resources we’ve seen the blatant undermining of democratic practice, contempt for international law, restriction of civil liberties and the use of state terrorism to further foreign policy objectives.
It is possible that the shocks to the body politic of the attacks of 9/11 will ultimately have the effect of strengthening the progressive momentum within civil society of the US and elsewhere. There is a global movement of resistance to wars of aggression and desire for peace; increasing commitment to racial and ethnic equality; increasing commitment to environmental preservation and conservation; support and protection of equal rights for women and children; recognizing the normality of diversity of sexual orientations; the flourishing of an incredibly rich global culture in the areas of the arts, communications, films, music and lifestyles. We could say also that the heightened knowledge we have of our extra-planetary environment, with space-faring scientific missions, and of our evolutionary cosmology, represents an enormous expansion of collective consciousness.
Perhaps the time has come when we will be able to live up to the founding declaration of the United Nations in 1945 – “to free mankind for ever from the scourge of war.” Perhaps we will manage to fully establish non-violence as the foundational principle of resolving our differences, following the teachings of Martin Luther King, the Dalai Lama, Mahatma Gandhi in the 20th century, and many other spiritual leaders throughout history, including Jesus of Nazareth. If and when this occurs, I believe it will make it possible for the human civilization on Earth to enter consciously into the evolving network of civilizations in our galaxy and beyond.