60 THE COASTAL BEND MAGAZINE • Winter 2018-19 TheCoastalBend.com Coastal Bend Community (Above) Colombian“panga”speedboat photographed smuggling in the Caribbean; (Middle) Semi-Submersible Narco-Sub built at a cost of about $2 million by Colombian drug cartels, and; (Lower) Record cocaine seizure by U.S. Coast Guard off the Pacific Coast of Mexico. Mexico—these planes travel across Northern Mexico to the Pacific, and then patrol zones along the west coasts of Mexico, Central America, and waters off the northern coast of South America, especially Colombia. The CBP squadrons stop at U.S. bases in Panama, and others in the area, for rest, mission planning and refueling. Working as the two-plane “Double Eagle” team, the P-3 Airborne Early Warning (AEW) plane will track and positively identify each and every aircraft in flight and every vessel at sea in its patrol section, while the second P-3 Long Range Tracker (LRT), which lacks the radar dome but is equipped with the most advanced digital optics, will visually inspect targets from distances that will not alert said targets. When the AEW is unable to identify a target it is tracking, the LRT is dispatched to take a closer look. Once a target is positively identified as a suspected smuggler, interdiction teams are dispatched that can be Coast Guard and/or naval units from the U.S. and/or cooperating countries, which will use necessary force to stop and apprehend the suspects. We’ve all seen the grainy video from above of smugglers throwing bales of nar- cotics off their speedboat or out of small airplanes—bundles of South American co- caine have even been found on Padre Island National Seashore in years past, adding an unexpected element of surprise to an otherwise unspectacular island vacation. Since 2010 or so, the option to bale out no longer exists for most Colombian coke smugglers doing their best to outrun military aircraft and sea power in the open Pa- cific Ocean—at least those traveling in semi-submersibles and, some speculate, fully submersible vessels, as in, submarines. While the volume of cocaine actually making it to its destinations cannot be known, the volume of single and overall seizures has been historic over the last decade. In fiscal year 2010 (from October 2010 through September 2011) CBP P-3 teams assisted in the seizure of over 150,000 pounds of narcotics with a value of over $1.8 billion. On one day in May 2011 a $30 million seizure of 2,400 pounds of cocaine was executed off the coast of Honduras. A shift in strategy has also sig- nificantly contributed to the capture of record loads of narcotics and their handlers, which is to focus on the South American sources that are shipping the largest quan- tities at once, to be broken down for overland smuggling through Central America and Mexico. But while improved tactics and strategies have resulted in the biggest cocaine seizures since the War on Drugs was started in the 1970’s, it is estimated that less than 20% overall is being interdicted. Mexico is not a producer of cocaine—the entire world supply comes from Co- lombia, Peru and Bolivia—and neither is Mexican society a big consumer of the drug—the rate of cocaine use in Mexico is 1/6 that of the U.S. which, along with Australia, has the world’s highest rate of usage, by far. With the legalization of mari- juana spreading to more U.S. states each year, Mexican cartels have had to replace lost volume with home-grown products such as heroine and methamphetamine, as well as Fentanyl and other synthetic drugs imported from China—but cocaine is on the comeback, and in contrast to the success of record seizures leaving Colombia, coca cultivation reached its all-time high in 2017. The previous peak occurred in 2000, but fell to a record low in 2012. The trend in South American cocaine production suggests that for every 20-ton load that is stopped, 80 other-tons are making it to their destinations. Thus, the ingrained lesson of the War on Drugs, like that conveyed in the Oscar-winning film, Traffic, which told the story of narcotics addiction and smuggling from multiple per- spectives—they will never stop until they want to stop. The users will use. The sellers will sell. The traffickers will traffic—as long as the demand exists, and the cure for addiction remains an enigma and of little concern to most of society. Some believe the solution is the legalization of all drugs. A heavy risk to take in the most addicted society on earth, also the wealthiest country on earth. Others be- lieve that marijuana should be left alone and the focus of law enforcement and treat- ment should be on the hard drugs. Still others think that our country must continue to suffer before we do something bold to address the core causes of addiction. Until then, the battle against the cartels carries on at sea and in the air.