Alfonso Insuasty RodriguezOver the years, the United States has waged a so-called ‘war on drugs’ in Latin America, adopting a strategy of geopolitical control that criminalises people, benefits transnational capital, and justifies military interference.
The threat of US military intervention has increased following President Donald Trump’s order to deploy troops and warships near Venezuela’s coast.
This measure, framed by the White House as an effort to “use all its power” to “stop the flow of drugs” from Latin America, was justified by Washington’s accusation that Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro leads an “illegitimate” government that constitutes a “narcotrafficking cartel”. Caracas has vehemently rejected this claim.
Beyond the deployment of troops, the justification used by the Trump administration to “combat” drug trafficking in Latin America echoes the failed “war on drugs” that Washington has waged on the region for decades.
In fact, this new threat of military action confirms the failure of the very policy.
For countries of the Global South, the US escalation has reopened the debate around the old anti-drug policy. The so-called “war on drugs” began as a symbolic discourse by the then-president Richard Nixon, who in 1971 labelled drug use as “public enemy number one.”
Nixon announced an “all-out offensive” to address the issue globally, though, according to The New York Times, he privately expressed doubts about these measures.
Since then, Washington has spent over $1 trillion—approximately $3,100 per person—on this strategy, despite the steady increase in cocaine consumption and trafficking in the West. It has also faced criticism from its own officials.
“Over the past 50 years, we have unfortunately seen how the ‘war on drugs’ has been used as an excuse to wage war on people of colour, poor Americans, and many other marginalised groups,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a 2021 statement marking the policy’s anniversary.
For his part, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, warned last December that the “war on drugs” has “destroyed countless lives and damaged entire communities”.
He added that “penalisation and prohibition have failed to reduce drug consumption or deter related crime. These policies simply do not work, and we are failing some of the most vulnerable groups in our societies.”
The UN’s World Drug Report 2025 highlighted a sustained increase in global drug production, seizures, and consumption, underscoring the urgent need to shift the international approach to focus on prevention and addressing the structural causes of drug trafficking.
Transnational capital and private companies
Despite this evidence, which has been reiterated and warned about for decades, the US has shaped its foreign policy towards Latin America by focusing on drug trafficking and the criminal groups it accuses of perpetrating it.
Since February, in addition to intensifying its migration efforts against alleged gang members, the Trump administration has designated the Venezuelan criminal gang Tren de Aragua, the Salvadoran gang MS-13, and six Mexican organisations as terrorist groups.
This designation is generally associated, without evidence, with groups that use violence for political ends, not merely criminal gangs seeking profit.
This leads us to the hegemonic discourse that supports the decades-old “war on drugs,” which has profoundly served the interests of transnational capital.
In her well-researched book Drug War Capitalism, journalist Dawn Paley wrote that the militarised model — justified under this “fight” — enables the signing of security contracts, the privatisation of state functions, and the control of strategic territories, creating an architecture of legalised violence in service of the global market.
Antoine Perret, a researcher and specialist in the political economy of conflicts, documents how the anti-drug fight has been outsourced to private military companies that manage security as a lucrative business.
According to Perret, this privatisation of war has facilitated the consolidation of an industrial and military complex with little to no state oversight, in which security becomes a global business managed by private companies pursuing geopolitical and economic agendas.
At the same time, the penetration of this capital is deeply rooted in the current global financial system. Several studies illustrate that illicit financial flows account for between two to five percent of global GDP—equivalent to $2 to $5 trillion annually—of which less than one percent is effectively seized.
This scenario reflects structural impunity, where the true beneficiaries of international drug trafficking are not small-scale producers or the visible links of organised crime, but large financial, corporate, and banking actors operating freely from offshore banks, tax havens, and transnational corruption networks.
Sheltered by legal flows and a financial architecture designed for anonymity and evasion, these actors remain virtually untouchable, while criminalisation falls on countries and communities of the Global South.
The international flow of arms from the US to criminal networks in Latin America, such as cartels and armed groups, remains a key factor in regional violence. However, this is something overlooked in the Trump administration´s current political discourse.
Rocco Carbone, an Argentine researcher and philosopher, author of the book Global Mafia: Essays on Criminal Power and Dispossession, argues that mafia networks in Latin America should not be understood as mere deviations from the system but as organic and functional expressions of the neoliberal and colonial order prevailing in the region.
Carbone explains that these criminal structures are intertwined with the dynamics of current political and economic power, functioning as mechanisms of accumulation through dispossession and social control.
Thus, these networks must be analysed as governance mechanisms that reinforce the peripheral capitalist model, as well as neocolonial forms of domination in Latin America.
Is territorial control the underlying goal?
In countries like Ecuador, analysts warn of a growing pattern: the increased presence of US military forces or the strengthening of cooperation agreements under the pretext of combating drug trafficking.
In Ecuador, President Daniel Noboa has proposed allowing the establishment of US military bases as part of his security strategy.
Additionally, he signed an unprecedented regional agreement with the controversial private security company Blackwater, known for its involvement in armed conflicts and its role in the privatisation of military operations.
Noboa also announced that he will rely on Israel’s support for intelligence in his fight against drug cartels.
From indigenous and peasant communities in Latin America, concrete proposals have emerged that challenge the punitive and militarised approach of the international anti-drug policy, primarily promoted by Global North countries.
In Bolivia, coca grower organisations have promoted a model of community-based social control for coca cultivation. Legalised through the General Coca Law (2017), the system recognises the ancestral and medicinal value of the coca plant, establishes geographic limits for its production, and promotes self-regulation without armed intervention.
Similar initiatives have emerged in Colombia, where intercultural assemblies in indigenous territories have been developed to design regulatory policies based on ancestral knowledge. These proposals aim to ensure that economic benefits remain in the hands of producing communities.
The peace agreement signed in 2016 between the Colombian state and the former FARC included a voluntary crop substitution programme and an ambitious rural reform.
Similar elements have been considered in the peace dialogue process with the National Liberation Army (ELN).
Organisations like the International Drug Policy Consortium (IDPC) advocate for the decolonisation of global drug policies, demanding the reform of treaties like the 1961 Vienna Convention and calling for sovereignty, community autonomy, and historical justice in the face of centuries of criminalisation and cultural stigmatisation.
Peruvian sociologist Anibal Quijano, renowned for his contributions to critical thought in Latin America, argues that the power structures inherited from colonialism continue to shape the region’s social, political, and economic organisation, perpetuating racial, knowledge, and economic hierarchies.
As dark clouds of a potential US intervention gather overhead, Latin America is reminded of several dark chapters in history, such as the 2002 coup in Venezuela against then-president Hugo Chavez, which some media claimed had Washington’s backing. During a march against the opposition, snipers in Caracas buildings killed more than 12 people.
The US military deployment also goes against the declaration of Latin America as a zone of peace, adopted by the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), a regional organisation that promotes integration and development.
The declaration, based on the purposes and principles of the United Nations, underscores the need for universal disarmament and prohibits the threat or use of force, among other measures.
While the Trump administration attempts to launch an offensive in Latin America under the pretext of battling drug cartels, history shows that a belligerent approach is not the solution.
Will we continue to accept narratives that justify control and militarisation, or will we move towards a policy that addresses structural causes and builds dignified and sovereign solutions?
(This article was first published in TRT Espanol)
