Essay / ROBERT A. JONES
Narcolandia Knocks

TIJUANAOnce, the horrors of Narcolandia seemed far
removed from our shores. Oh, perhaps the streets ran with
blood in Cali, Colombia, where the drug kings made sport of
executing honest judges. But that was 6,000 miles away.
Another continent.
No more. The drug kings can now sit on the decks of their
minimansions in the hills of this city and stare directly into the
United States. The whole, messy scene associated with their
arrivalmachinegun slayings, the flaunting of hyperwealth, the
corruption of governmenthas grown commonplace in
Tijuana. Narcolandia now knocks at our backdoor.
Here's a number that's interesting: Mexico now serves as
the principal route of cocaine into the United States, and an
estimated 70% of all Mexicandelivered coke comes through
Tijuana.
Just this week, the Mexican government arrested another of
its Army generals who supposedly flew to Tijuana and offered
the new antidrug chief here $1 million a month to overlook
certain activities of the Arellano Felix brothers, Baja's biggest
and baddest drug dealers.
A million a month. A tidy sum. Then the general allegedly
delivered what he regarded as the deal closer: If the antidrug
chief did not accept the $1 million per, he would be executed a
la Ernesto Ibarra Santes, the drugfighting police commander in
Baja who was gunned down last September.
In Tijuana, this kind of offer is known as "plata o plomo."
Take the silver, or eat lead. For what it's worth, the antidrug
chief refused the silver and thus far has defied the lead. God be
with him.
In the United States, we have taken the arrival of
Narcolandia along our border as a hard lesson in Mexico's
inveterate corruption. You just can't trust 'em, ya know.
Congress wants to "decertify" Mexico as a fellow drug warrior
and the subtext of that debate goes something like this: If only
the Mexicans were honest like us, we could be winning the
drug war.
Well, surely Mexico is corrupt. Surely its police agencies
have been converted to an army of snitches for the drug kings.
But to blame Mexico for Narcolandia's appearance is to miss
the true meaning of the event.
Narcolandia's arrival could not have been prevented by
Mexico any more than the United States can prevent the flow
of drugs into its neighborhoods. The narco kings on our
borders simply suggest, once again, the bankruptcy of the
ideas driving the U.S.'s drug war. We are losing this war, and
every year we are losing it faster.
According to Peter Smith, a Latin America drug expert at
UC San Diego, the U.S. drug war has relied almost entirely on
a strategy of reducing drug supply since its inception. The idea
is to so curtail supply that drug prices rise beyond the reach of
most consumers.
The supply strategy has been pursued for more than two
decades. And yet, today, drug prices in the U.S. are lower
than when the drug war began, suggesting only one thing:
Supply has grown rather than diminished.
"The profits [from illegal drugs] are so great that dealers will
always find a way to get the product to market," says Smith.
"In fact, Mexico became the route of choice for cocaine only
after the DEA began to harass drug shippers in the
CaribbeanSouth Florida route. The drug lords looked for an
alternative, and found Mexico."
So, in one sense, our own DEA drove the drug shippers
into Mexico. And that route proved to be a more reliable,
highervolume system.
The shift has converted Tijuana into something that
resembles Chicago of the Prohibition Era, albeit in miniature.
Caponelike figures parade through the city, defying authorities
to challenge them. Intramural squabbles between drug lords
produce regular massacres on city streets. Bribery erodes the
government. And woe to the honest prosecutor or judge who
stands up for the rule of law.
In the last several years the prominent dead have included
the abovementioned Ibarra, prosecutor Jesus Romero
Magana, Police Chief Jose Federico Benitez, and state
investigator Rafael Lopez Cruz. Meanwhile, nonprominent
drug murders are proceeding at an estimated 13 per week.
"We see a government that is desperate and turning to the
military," says Victor Clark, head of the Binational Human
Rights Center here. "In itself, that is a very dangerous
development. In the past, the military was confined to the
barracks in Mexico. Now it is being invited into the structure of
government because of the drug crisis."
This is the legacy of a drug strategy that, in Peter Smith's
words, "will not and cannot succeed." In fact, he adds, no
Western government has ever successfully controlled drugs
from the supply side.
And yet the supply strategy proceeds, year after year,
costing billions, defying any politician to express the slightest
doubt about its essential design.
A halfcentury ago Prohibition created gangster rule, civic
corruption and bloody massacres in cities like Chicago. In the
years between 1920 and 1933, when Prohibition was in effect,
alcohol consumption in this country actually increased, and
finally the country saw its folly and repealed the ban.
The parallel with drugs is almost too obvious to note. No
one likes the idea of admitting that a long war has been lost.
But until we do, we will continue to pay the price for our
stubbornness and pride. And Tijuana will be here to remind us
just how high the price can go.