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Authors: Dawn Paley
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the dominant discourse about the drug trade and the war on drugs is not a new phenomenon. In fact, the frequency with which the dominant narratives of the drug war are reproduced by the press could be considered one of the fundamental reasons for the longevity of the drug war discourse.[72] “Most information about narcotraffic is furnished by the Miami Herald and other U.S. newspapers that use the U.S. DEA (Drug Enforcement Agency [sic]) as their information source,” wrote Colombian historian Germán Alfonso Palacio Castañeda in 1991. “Such media tend to follow the DEA’s strategic orientation, which is empirically unacceptable.”[73] It’s been more than twenty years since Palacio wrote those words, and unfortunately, they still hold true today. For example, in early 2011, I met a photographer based in Monterrey, another city that plunged into drug war-related violence beginning around 2010. He didn’t want to speak on the record, but having established anonymity, he didn’t hold back. He told me that photographers regularly embed themselves with the army, waiting until soldiers visit the scene, as there is no other way to access certain areas safely. He explained how he once took photos of cadavers on a ranch not far out of the city, and how the victims looked like they had been holding automatic weapons, which he knew had been planted by soldiers. He and other photographers didn’t question the set up or refuse to run the images they shot, out of fears for their safety.
Regardless of the risks, critiques of the drug wars in Mexico, Central America, Colombia, and South America are becoming more sophisticated as time reveals their lasting impacts. The links between drug war policies and an improving investment climate for transnational corporations are increasingly intelligible, especially as the outcomes from US engagement in Colombia, specifically between 2000 and 2006, are lauded, refined, and applied elsewhere. The first phase of Plan Colombia officially ended in 2006; the next year, the Mérida Initiative, or Plan Mexico, started. The Mérida Initiative would have been in the works early in former President Felipe Calderón’s term (2006–2012), if not before. The Mérida Initiative was announced in fall 2007, and originally included Central America within it, but in 2010, the United States split off the Central America Regional Security Initiative (CARSI), which covers Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama. The US funded CARSI to the tune of $496 million between 2008 and 2013.[74] In April 2009, the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative (CBSI) was announced, and the Caribbean is increasingly the centerpiece of the drug war.[75] There is continuity in these US-backed aid packages. Though this book only deals with a handful of the countries affected by planned drug wars and drug war capitalism, the outcomes of these policies are similar wherever they are applied.
According to Gian Carlo Delgado Ramos and Silvina María Romano, Plan Colombia and the Mérida Initiative can be understood as two more examples of US interference in Latin America. In the name of protecting US national security, the United States pushes self-interested policies in target countries. This not only contributes to historical processes of despoliation, plundering, exploitation, and the transfer of wealth in Latin America, but also leads to the reorganization of internal power relations between civilian and military groups in the nations in which such programs are implemented.[76] Though the focus of this work is Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala, and Colombia, the drug war is under way around the globe. This is evidenced by the fact that in 2012, the US Drug Enforcement Administration worked in partnership with sixty-five countries.[77] In some areas, the drug war is latent, and in others (like the United States) its principle characteristic is criminalization and mass incarceration, particularly of
Regardless of the risks, critiques of the drug wars in Mexico, Central America, Colombia, and South America are becoming more sophisticated as time reveals their lasting impacts. The links between drug war policies and an improving investment climate for transnational corporations are increasingly intelligible, especially as the outcomes from US engagement in Colombia, specifically between 2000 and 2006, are lauded, refined, and applied elsewhere. The first phase of Plan Colombia officially ended in 2006; the next year, the Mérida Initiative, or Plan Mexico, started. The Mérida Initiative would have been in the works early in former President Felipe Calderón’s term (2006–2012), if not before. The Mérida Initiative was announced in fall 2007, and originally included Central America within it, but in 2010, the United States split off the Central America Regional Security Initiative (CARSI), which covers Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama. The US funded CARSI to the tune of $496 million between 2008 and 2013.[74] In April 2009, the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative (CBSI) was announced, and the Caribbean is increasingly the centerpiece of the drug war.[75] There is continuity in these US-backed aid packages. Though this book only deals with a handful of the countries affected by planned drug wars and drug war capitalism, the outcomes of these policies are similar wherever they are applied.
According to Gian Carlo Delgado Ramos and Silvina María Romano, Plan Colombia and the Mérida Initiative can be understood as two more examples of US interference in Latin America. In the name of protecting US national security, the United States pushes self-interested policies in target countries. This not only contributes to historical processes of despoliation, plundering, exploitation, and the transfer of wealth in Latin America, but also leads to the reorganization of internal power relations between civilian and military groups in the nations in which such programs are implemented.[76] Though the focus of this work is Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala, and Colombia, the drug war is under way around the globe. This is evidenced by the fact that in 2012, the US Drug Enforcement Administration worked in partnership with sixty-five countries.[77] In some areas, the drug war is latent, and in others (like the United States) its principle characteristic is criminalization and mass incarceration, particularly of
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