Further Reading

Dr Strangelove

A Modest Proposal to Save the World from Drugs — Destroy It
(Dr. Strangelove is not dead!)

Following is Stanton's satirical response to an actual editorial(!) below

Editorial: A Modest Proposal to Save the World

Now that we have tried the wise but inadequate strategy recommended by grizzled veterans of the Vietnam War like David Hackworth — to take off the gloves and to really duke it to the drug producing and dealing nations — we must go one step further.

Having found that (a) the drug producers and benefactors extend to the doorsteps of every nation in the world, including not only our friends and allies, but to us ourselves (!), (b) drug use will never disappear when evil human nature forces sinners to consume psychoactive substances, (c) we no longer deserve to preserve ourselves as a civilization and a species, I propose all-out nuclear holocaust as the only potential solution to the drug scourge.

Rather than recruit General McCaffrey (who is already oversubscribed), I recommend we get Middle Eastern terrorists to loose their secret supplies of nuclear weapons on all major cities in the world. But, since drug production and use extends into every corner of the globe, we must then turn to our secret stores of pestilence in all-out germ warfare on the remainder of humankind.

I realize this is a drastic solution for drug use. But for the majority of right-minded citizens who I know share my views, this is the only possible resolution to the otherwise interminable war on drugs we are forced to fight with both hands behind our backs.

See you in heaven! (sig heil)

Dr. Strangelove

Austin American Statesman (Austin, TX), September 18, 1997

Editorial: More action needed in drug war

By David H. Hackworth

The most serious long-term enemy threatening America is the drug epidemic that's destroying our future — America's youth.

Drugs are infecting our kids in every big and small town in this land. Sixteen-year-old kids are hooking 12-year-olds, and it ain't on Joe Camel.

Tens of billions of our tax dollars have been spent fighting drugs. A Coast Guard chief says, We've lost the drug war. I've punched enough holes in the ocean off Colombia and some Caribbean nations to know that what we're doing is a big, expensive sham. Drugs on the street are cheaper and more plentiful now than ever.

Meanwhile, our military forces, charged with the mission of defending America, are deployed in 100 countries around the globe, accomplishing little except protecting the Pentagon's budget — keeping the pork flowing and the Military-Industrial-Congressional Complex glowing.

Our military is the one force that can win this battle. It has the leadership and savvy to accomplish the mission. This force, including all the spy agencies, costs the nation almost $300 billion a year to run. Yet little of this money goes to fighting the drug business, which annually nets more than $400 billion.

Imagine the results if this massive military machine were unleashed on the drug barons' infrastructures, or if President Clinton informed Mexico, Colombia and all other narco countries that the United States of America had declared war on drugs.

Simultaneously, he could return every airman, Marine, soldier and sailor to our continent, except those forces involved in missions of national security, and commit them to attack the source of most of the drugs: Latin America.

Then he could — and should — announce: Let the leaders of those nations know we are no longer going to fight this war with Just don't do it' anti-drug doublespeak but with military power that will go to the source of the drugs and take them out.

Let everyone know that the drug business is threatening our national security, not unlike the Soviet missiles in Cuba did. And we are going to close it down with the same national sense of purpose as we used to remove those missiles, and with a total concentration of military power.

No place will be safe. Our forces will strike and eradicate growing, processing, shipping, command and control modules and every narco leader's lair. Everything of value will be confiscated or razed to the ground. Sherman's march through Georgia will look like an environmental save-the-trees program in contrast to the devastation left in the wake of our drug fighters.

Let all bankers in the world know that if they launder drug dollars, they're out of business. And starting soon, every American bill over 20 bucks will be exchanged for new dollars. Anyone trying to swap a bag of old green he can't justify earning will lose it — on his way to jail.

We could start by deploying the Army along the 2,000-mile border we share with Mexico, with orders to interdict drug operations and conduct hot pursuit missions into that country.

Our Marines and Special Operations warriors would be the raiding force that would also train and supervise the foreign anti-drug teams. The Air Force and Navy would control the sky and sea, using every asset and high-tech gadget from satellites to spy planes to win this critical fight.

Gen. Barry McCaffrey, the current drug czar, who whipped Iraq in just four days, is the right guy for the job. Just put him in charge of the whole shebang, give him the military assets and get out of his way.

Constitutionalists will say my fantasy strategy is breaking the law; others will say we're violating basic human rights. And supporters of Ezequiel (sic) Hernandez — an 18-year-old goat herder who was accidentally killed by Marines on a drug stakeout along the Texas border last May — will rightly argue that the military solution will result in more friendly-fire incidents.

Despite these valid objections, with drugs now zapping kids everywhere, America hasn't a chance unless we make the elimination of the source of drugs and its insidious apparatus our primary military objective.

Hackworth is a highly decorated retired Army colonel. Distributed by King Features Syndicate.