US expands drug war in Latin America

Martha Mendoza of Huffington Post provides a brief laundry list of US drug war military action taking place in Latin America.

In the most expensive initiative in Latin America since the Cold War, the U.S. has militarized the battle against the traffickers, spending more than $20 billion in the past decade. U.S. Army troops, Air Force pilots and Navy ships outfitted with Coast Guard counternarcotics teams are routinely deployed to chase, track and capture drug smugglers...

At any given moment, 4,000 U.S. troops are deployed in Latin America and as many as four U.S. Navy ships are plying the Caribbean and Pacific coastlines of Central America. U.S. pilots clocked more than 46,400 hours in 2011 flying anti-drug missions, and U.S. agents from at least 10 law enforcement agencies spread across the continent.

The U.S. trains thousands of Latin American troops, and employs its multibillion dollar radar equipment to gather intelligence to intercept traffickers and arrest cartel members.

Billions of dollars spent on radar, jets, helicopters, ships, submarines, pirates, smugglers, big guns, and all kinds of military toys just to keep people from getting psychoactive powders from someplace other than your local pharmacy. This is not a sustainable business model.