The War on Drugs was declared in a presser by Nixon in 1971 so we have been fighting this “war” for 46 years and spent annually in the U.S. on the war on drugs:  about $51 billion or about a trillion dollars over the lifetime of the program.

I bring this up because of a couple of articles I read…..

As if the United States needed more evidence that its sixteen-year mission in Afghanistan is an exercise in futility, a new United Nations report provides an additional reason for depression. The 2017 Afghanistan Opium Survey from the UN’s Office on Drugs and Crime, released on November 15, confirms that Washington’s effort to curb illicit narcotics trafficking in the country has failed.

Almost every aspect of the report contains bad news. Overall opium production reached nine thousand metric tons, compared to 4,800 tons in 2016. That was a record level since the UN began keeping statistics on the product in 1994. Some 328,000 hectares were used to grow poppy (the source of opium), an increase of nearly 50 percent from the previous record set in 2014. Poppy cultivation also spread to provinces that were previously free of such cultivation. That development means that twenty-four of the country’s thirty-four provinces now are directly involved in illicit drug production. Despite a 14 percent drop in price per unit, the overall value of the crop increased by 55 percent because of the sheer overall volume. An evaluation of the UN report from the Afghan Analysis Network aptly concluded that opium is “a low-risk crop in a high-risk environment.”

http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/content/america-cant-win-drug-war-afghanistan

The part of the program to eliminate the Afghan opium trade is a failure after all the cash spent to rid the countryside of the poppy fields….

Then there is cocaine problem coming out of Columbia…..

European police organization Europol on Friday said that a “significant increase in production in Colombia has caused intensified trafficking activity” to the European Union.

Europol made the claim in its “How Illegal Armed Drugs Sustain Organized Crime in the EU” report on regional drug trafficking activity.

http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/content/increased-cocaine-production-colombia-driving-cocaine-trafficking-europol

Yet another failed program…the eradication of the cocaine production….farms and factories…..

WE are throwing money at these programs and are getting no positive results….time to find another way or legalize all drugs…..