By that standard, the drug war is not a war. That s not how we conduct law enforcement. One of the core competencies that the Coast Guard brings to bear in the national drug control strategy is the ability to sort out the guilty from the merely suspicious and handle each unique case according to the rule of law. War has its own set of rules, and they don t apply to the civilian law enforcement authority that governs our interdiction efforts. Again, that s not how we conduct business.
Drug control is a priority of the administration and congress, but it isn t the only priority.
Devoting less than one percent of the federal budget to address the National Drug Control Strategy is barely a commitment let alone a war. If we agree that it s not a war and that we can t ever achieve a decisive win. We probably ought to justify what it is that we are doing. I will declare up front that I am an unabashed proponent of drug interdiction with harsh criminal penalties for the smugglers. Let s tackle first the notion that we ought to direct our drug control efforts towards reducing demand and stop trying to curtail supply.