The Trump administration once claimed the noble goal of stopping drug trafficking in defense of one of its most controversial campaigns, but according to a new report from The Atlantic, it has "all but given up the pretense" that it was accomplishing what it claimed.
Atlantic assistant editor Marie-Rose Sheinerman broke down the situation in the report from Monday morning.
"The official line remains the same: The 10-month campaign of strikes on small boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific has nearly stopped the flow of drugs by sea into the United States. In December, President [Donald] Trump boasted about a 92 percent drop in seaborne shipments," she explained. "Last month, in an apparent sign of further progress, he said the decline was up to 97.2 percent.
She added: "But government officials and agencies closest to the action, at sea and on America’s streets, tell a different story. In hearings, official reports, and interviews they have all but given up the pretense that the campaign has succeeded in reducing the flow of drugs into the U.S., even as 221 people have been killed in more than 60 strikes."
Sheinerman further cited comments that Southern Command leader General Francis L. Donovan, who helped oversee the strikes, made to Congress earlier this year, stating that "the boat strikes aren’t the answer,” but just “one of the many tools" in fighting the flow of drugs. She also noted that the price of cocaine in the U.S. has plummeted recently, "the opposite of what would be expected if smugglers were being deterred."
"Trump has made unsupported claims that fentanyl, the drug most responsible for an epidemic of fatal overdoses, is on the targeted boats," Sheinerman detailed. "That line began to fall apart shortly after the initial killings when top officials acknowledged to lawmakers that the strikes were aimed at cocaine smuggling. A Pentagon inspector-general report published in May confirmed that, saying fentanyl is 'produced almost entirely in Mexico' and enters the U.S. through the southern border—not via boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific."
Jonathan Caulkins, a drug-policy researcher at Carnegie Mellon University, told the outlet that while some of the boats could have been carrying cocaine, it was unlikely that they were bound for the U.S., with Europe or Africa being their likely destinations.
Adam Isacson, an expert on Latin American drug trafficking at the WOLA NGO in Washington D.C., told the outlet that the ultimate goal of the strikes probably to send a message, "to prove the point that you’re willing to go as far as possible to confront that enemy—unless, of course, they’re the president of Honduras or something."