Understanding the US - Again
Re: Understanding the US - Again
The demonising narrative on current or potential future challengers of American dominance happens steadily and incrementally over time. Has happened with Russia, for a while with Japan, then with China and has just started wrt India. I don't expect this to go down as India grows in stature. We'll have to keep refuting this and build and broadcast our own narratives and propaganda. And not easily get drawn into heartburn, but debunk, give it back and move on.
The US has been an insecure power for as long as I can remember. This insecurity comes from some recognition and realisation deep down in their national psyche that A. A lot of the power it enjoys is underserved B. Assuming responsibility is also riding a tiger and you cant get off.
Thats why over the decades, US' capacity to genuinely do good around it has dwindled, and the Covid crisis revealed that there isn't any of it left. Forcefully extracting grudging accommodation from allies is what passes off for American leadership these days. The itch to needle India in ways mentioned in the article above comes from the fact that India wont kow tow in bi-lateral matters or gamed multi-lateral formats like QUAD, and that is frustrating for the US.
The US has been an insecure power for as long as I can remember. This insecurity comes from some recognition and realisation deep down in their national psyche that A. A lot of the power it enjoys is underserved B. Assuming responsibility is also riding a tiger and you cant get off.
Thats why over the decades, US' capacity to genuinely do good around it has dwindled, and the Covid crisis revealed that there isn't any of it left. Forcefully extracting grudging accommodation from allies is what passes off for American leadership these days. The itch to needle India in ways mentioned in the article above comes from the fact that India wont kow tow in bi-lateral matters or gamed multi-lateral formats like QUAD, and that is frustrating for the US.
Re: Understanding the US - Again
they never lose any chance to denigrate India and they are now desperate to digitally colonize India, influence the ballot in 2024 and directly manage the levers of political power to push their hegemonyCyrano wrote:The demonising narrative on current or potential future challengers of American dominance happens steadily and incrementally over time. Has happened with Russia, for a while with Japan, then with China and has just started wrt India. I don't expect this to go down as India grows in stature. We'll have to keep refuting this and build and broadcast our own narratives and propaganda. And not easily get drawn into heartburn, but debunk, give it back and move on.
The US has been an insecure power for as long as I can remember. This insecurity comes from some recognition and realisation deep down in their national psyche that A. A lot of the power it enjoys is underserved B. Assuming responsibility is also riding a tiger and you cant get off.
Thats why over the decades, US' capacity to genuinely do good around it has dwindled, and the Covid crisis revealed that there isn't any of it left. Forcefully extracting grudging accommodation from allies is what passes off for American leadership these days. The itch to needle India in ways mentioned in the article above comes from the fact that India wont kow tow in bi-lateral matters or gamed multi-lateral formats like QUAD, and that is frustrating for the US.
If a war does break out between the cheenis and the amrikis, they need India firmly in their corner, and that includes the Indian boots on the ground, India body bags.
and all the chaos that would consequently follow in India is not of the least consequence for them.
eyraaq, afghanistan, pakistan, and ukr etc stand ready testimony to their viciousness and greed
The US has openly entered the Indian toolkit market and their target is the 2024 elections
why did we welcome garcetti, the snake oil salesman.... was it for this creep to abuse our hospitality
are they recruiting a new army of trolls.......
read the deceptive tweet and the wording
https://sundayguardianlive.com/news/ant ... se-pm-modi
Re: Understanding the US - Again
VHP/BJP/RSS should send thousands of people, bring them back, debrief and start action against them
Re: Understanding the US - Again
It is because the sarkari desis do not show spine.chetak wrote:
they never lose any chance to denigrate India and they are now desperate to digitally colonize India, influence the ballot in 2024 and directly manage the levers of political power to push their hegemony
Anyway, watch this video, discussing fireworks in Oakland and Hayward.
Re: Understanding the US - Again
Vladimir Putin in the list
But no RFK Jr ?!
![ROTFL :rotfl:](./images/smilies/icon_rotfl.gif)
But no RFK Jr ?!
Re: Understanding the US - Again
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-65667783
Biden's Papua New Guinea no-show takes shine off US pact
Laura Bicker, Hiroshima, Japan, 22/5/2023
The people of Papua New Guinea were ready to party in honour of a special guest - the president of the United States.
Monday was even declared a public holiday, but the guest of honour was a no-show.
Joe Biden was supposed to be the first US president to visit a Pacific Island nation on Monday, but he cancelled his trip and instead flew home to Washington from the G7 summit in Hiroshima to focus on domestic problems.
Papua New Guinea (PNG) welcomed US Secretary of State Antony Blinken instead, but after six months of preparations, this is not the history making moment they'd longed for.
"It is going to be a disappointment for a number of the Pacific leaders who had made special arrangements to be in Papua New Guinea to meet with him," said Mark Brown, the Prime Minister of the Cook Islands and leader of the Pacific Islands Forum in a BBC interview.
Mr Biden had been expected to sign a security pact with PNG Prime Minister James Marape. The agreement, which was ultimately signed by Mr Blinken and PNG Defence Minister Win Bakri Daki, gives US forces access to the country's airfields and ports.
It also pledges tens of millions of dollars to boost security co-operation.
But with Mr Biden travelling home, this is not a good time for the US to disappoint leaders in this resource-rich and strategically placed region.
Washington and Beijing are battling for influence in the Pacific and the US is already playing catch-up after what analysts describe as years of neglect.
The 15 independent nations manage around 20% of the world's oceans. These hugely important maritime routes were used in World War Two to transport supplies to Australia and New Zealand.
Western interests in the Pacific waned after the war, but Chinese investments in the region have grown.
Beijing has worked to strengthen ties with several island nations over the last decade, sending aid and investing in schools, roads and bridges.
.....
Gautam
Biden's Papua New Guinea no-show takes shine off US pact
Laura Bicker, Hiroshima, Japan, 22/5/2023
The people of Papua New Guinea were ready to party in honour of a special guest - the president of the United States.
Monday was even declared a public holiday, but the guest of honour was a no-show.
Joe Biden was supposed to be the first US president to visit a Pacific Island nation on Monday, but he cancelled his trip and instead flew home to Washington from the G7 summit in Hiroshima to focus on domestic problems.
Papua New Guinea (PNG) welcomed US Secretary of State Antony Blinken instead, but after six months of preparations, this is not the history making moment they'd longed for.
"It is going to be a disappointment for a number of the Pacific leaders who had made special arrangements to be in Papua New Guinea to meet with him," said Mark Brown, the Prime Minister of the Cook Islands and leader of the Pacific Islands Forum in a BBC interview.
Mr Biden had been expected to sign a security pact with PNG Prime Minister James Marape. The agreement, which was ultimately signed by Mr Blinken and PNG Defence Minister Win Bakri Daki, gives US forces access to the country's airfields and ports.
It also pledges tens of millions of dollars to boost security co-operation.
But with Mr Biden travelling home, this is not a good time for the US to disappoint leaders in this resource-rich and strategically placed region.
Washington and Beijing are battling for influence in the Pacific and the US is already playing catch-up after what analysts describe as years of neglect.
The 15 independent nations manage around 20% of the world's oceans. These hugely important maritime routes were used in World War Two to transport supplies to Australia and New Zealand.
Western interests in the Pacific waned after the war, but Chinese investments in the region have grown.
Beijing has worked to strengthen ties with several island nations over the last decade, sending aid and investing in schools, roads and bridges.
.....
Gautam
Re: Understanding the US - Again
But did Epstein really kill himself?
Re: Understanding the US - Again
https://www.wsj.com/articles/elon-musk- ... l-b7db935b
Elon Musk Is Right About George Soros—and Not Anti-Semitic
The Hungarian-born billionaire has done more than anyone to turn Americans against Israel.
Non-subscription version
https://archive.ph/00bVw
Elon Musk Is Right About George Soros—and Not Anti-Semitic
The Hungarian-born billionaire has done more than anyone to turn Americans against Israel.
Non-subscription version
https://archive.ph/00bVw
Re: Understanding the US - Again
NAACP Issues Travel Advisory in Florida
"Florida is openly hostile toward African Americans, people of color and LGBTQ+ individuals. Before traveling to Florida, please understand that the state of Florida devalues and marginalizes the contributions of, and the challenges faced by African Americans and other communities of color."
Re: Understanding the US - Again
It's bad enough that the American Deep State are rigging their own country's elections.
But I really worry about attempts by them to rig Indian elections.
Re: Understanding the US - Again
https://www.rediff.com/news/interview/2 ... 230524.htm
26/11: 'Tahawwur Rana's extradition to India is not an easy matter'
PRASANNA D ZORE, May 24, 2023
'As Rana is not an Indian citizen, our leverage on the US system -- whether it's their judiciary or the executive -- is very limited in that sense.'
Former Intelligence Bureau Officer Avinash Mohananey, who spent a considerable time in Pakistan on security assignments, discusses with Prasanna D Zore/Rediff.com the challenges India could face in her efforts to seek the custody of the 26/11 planner Tahawwur Rana back to India after a Chicago court cleared his extradition to India on May 18.
Now that a Chicago court has approved the extradition of 26/11 accused Tahawwur Rana, what will the Indian government do to expedite his extradition to India?
What steps will India follow now to have Rana back in India?
Can Rana go in appeal against this extradition?
He can certainly go in appeal because this is the first step towards (Rana's) extradition (to India).
The issue is that extradition by and large is an apolitical issue to be settled by the (governments of) two countries.
Since Tahawwur Rana is not an Indian, the Americans would not be bound to send him back here.
While he is a Canadian (citizen) he was prosecuted in the United States. So it is now for the US government and the judiciary to take a call (on Rana's extradition to India) whether he can be sent (back to India to face trial here).
If we go by his culpability in the 26/11 terror attacks in India, there is no doubt that he is involved.
Our intelligence and investigation agencies have proved that he was working in close tandem with David Coleman Headley (born Dawood Gilani in Washington in 1960 and the terrorist who prepared the blueprint for 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks and is currently serving 35 years in a US prison after he turned approver and admitted to having recced the terror attack targets in Mumbai: Read more on David Coleman Headley here), whose visits he facilitated to India.
Headley, in turn, was regularly in touch with the Lashkar-e-Tayiba (the terrorist organisation based out of Pakistan and the mastermind behind the 9/11 terror attacks).
Tahawwur Rana worked as a doctor in the Pakistan army, and he had connections with Major Abdur Rehman of the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (the ISI). Major Abdur Rehman could be a nom de guerre (an assumed name or alias) as these ISI officers use several names.
.....
Gautam
26/11: 'Tahawwur Rana's extradition to India is not an easy matter'
PRASANNA D ZORE, May 24, 2023
'As Rana is not an Indian citizen, our leverage on the US system -- whether it's their judiciary or the executive -- is very limited in that sense.'
Former Intelligence Bureau Officer Avinash Mohananey, who spent a considerable time in Pakistan on security assignments, discusses with Prasanna D Zore/Rediff.com the challenges India could face in her efforts to seek the custody of the 26/11 planner Tahawwur Rana back to India after a Chicago court cleared his extradition to India on May 18.
Now that a Chicago court has approved the extradition of 26/11 accused Tahawwur Rana, what will the Indian government do to expedite his extradition to India?
What steps will India follow now to have Rana back in India?
Can Rana go in appeal against this extradition?
He can certainly go in appeal because this is the first step towards (Rana's) extradition (to India).
The issue is that extradition by and large is an apolitical issue to be settled by the (governments of) two countries.
Since Tahawwur Rana is not an Indian, the Americans would not be bound to send him back here.
While he is a Canadian (citizen) he was prosecuted in the United States. So it is now for the US government and the judiciary to take a call (on Rana's extradition to India) whether he can be sent (back to India to face trial here).
If we go by his culpability in the 26/11 terror attacks in India, there is no doubt that he is involved.
Our intelligence and investigation agencies have proved that he was working in close tandem with David Coleman Headley (born Dawood Gilani in Washington in 1960 and the terrorist who prepared the blueprint for 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks and is currently serving 35 years in a US prison after he turned approver and admitted to having recced the terror attack targets in Mumbai: Read more on David Coleman Headley here), whose visits he facilitated to India.
Headley, in turn, was regularly in touch with the Lashkar-e-Tayiba (the terrorist organisation based out of Pakistan and the mastermind behind the 9/11 terror attacks).
Tahawwur Rana worked as a doctor in the Pakistan army, and he had connections with Major Abdur Rehman of the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (the ISI). Major Abdur Rehman could be a nom de guerre (an assumed name or alias) as these ISI officers use several names.
.....
Gautam
Re: Understanding the US - Again
We can certainly see the rise of Machine Politics in USA, due to ideological bankruptcy.
Vote Bank cultivation is at an all-time high.
Huge amounts of spending on Vote Banks is now rampant (eg."We need to spend on new roads! Because old roads are racist!")
This massive spending profligacy is being carried out under the auspices of Modern Monetarist Theory (ie. Dollar is King -- TINA(There Is No Alternative). So it will always be capitalized from abroad. So it can never go down. So just spend as much as possible. We cannot be sunk, because TINA)
Is America's system unraveling?
Vote Bank cultivation is at an all-time high.
Huge amounts of spending on Vote Banks is now rampant (eg."We need to spend on new roads! Because old roads are racist!")
This massive spending profligacy is being carried out under the auspices of Modern Monetarist Theory (ie. Dollar is King -- TINA(There Is No Alternative). So it will always be capitalized from abroad. So it can never go down. So just spend as much as possible. We cannot be sunk, because TINA)
Is America's system unraveling?
Re: Understanding the US - Again
Gautam saar,g.sarkar wrote:https://www.rediff.com/news/interview/2 ... 230524.htm
26/11: 'Tahawwur Rana's extradition to India is not an easy matter'
PRASANNA D ZORE, May 24, 2023Gautam
rana is a also canadian citizen and that might complicate things even more
Re: Understanding the US - Again
https://twitter.com/Rasmussen_Poll/stat ... 9967809547
Look at scientific rigging by NY state (Democrats)
Look at scientific rigging by NY state (Democrats)
Re: Understanding the US - Again
https://twitter.com/America1stLegal/sta ... 2580287489
Another tool to lie and spread propaganda .. Most of the Fact Checking is being funded and controlled thru State Dept worldwide to spread communal violence, terrorism and woke propaganda.
Another tool to lie and spread propaganda .. Most of the Fact Checking is being funded and controlled thru State Dept worldwide to spread communal violence, terrorism and woke propaganda.
Re: Understanding the US - Again
"Ministry of Truth" game farmed out to privateersvijayk wrote:https://twitter.com/America1stLegal/sta ... 2580287489
Another tool to lie and spread propaganda .. Most of the Fact Checking is being funded and controlled thru State Dept worldwide to spread communal violence, terrorism and woke propaganda.
Re: Understanding the US - Again
How many citizens of India have been repatriated to US and vice versa? If it is lopsided in US's favor, then the extradition treaty should be junked for all we care.
Re: Understanding the US - Again
Chetakji,chetak wrote:Gautam saar,g.sarkar wrote:https://www.rediff.com/news/interview/2 ... 230524.htm
26/11: 'Tahawwur Rana's extradition to India is not an easy matter'
PRASANNA D ZORE, May 24, 2023Gautam
rana is a also canadian citizen and that might complicate things even more
Yes, unfortunately he is and that is why it will not be easy. But if his crimes were against the UK, Germany or Japan, they would have easily extradited him.
Gautam
Re: Understanding the US - Again
Unfortunate for whom... the US would not have bothered that much if the perpetrator was a pak citizen, and the victims were only Indians (and maybe Asians)...g.sarkar wrote:...
Yes, unfortunately he is and that is why it will not be easy.
The level of ease would also have been in that precise orderBut if his crimes were against the UK, Germany or Japan, they would have easily extradited him...
Re: Understanding the US - Again
Unfortunate for India, for not being able to bring him to Indian justice. If he were a US citizen, they would never let him be extradited period. That has been the track record. The case in point is that of David Headley of 26/11, I am sure there are many others. The victims were mainly Indians, but there were many foreigners including Jews (in the Nariman House killings).
Gautam
Gautam
Re: Understanding the US - Again
Corruption is institutionalized in the administration of many a state of the US. This is not particular to Democrats or to Republicans.
In this case of Texas, the breaking point was when the corrupt official wanted the legislature to provide the money for a pay-off.
https://www.texasmonthly.com/news-polit ... xas-house/
The genius of American corruption is that (a) where feasible they make legal what would be considered corrupt by Indian standards, and (b) generally they try and succeed in not letting the effects of corruption directly impact the voters.
There are plenty of old cases to point to, if the skeptical need convincing; but rather than rake up history, I will post such cases here as and when they pop up.
In this case of Texas, the breaking point was when the corrupt official wanted the legislature to provide the money for a pay-off.
https://www.texasmonthly.com/news-polit ... xas-house/
....most of the material behind the twenty impeachment charges the committee gave to the House is publicly available. Some of it has been known for the better part of a decade.
Details in the link above.On Friday, the House committee conducting the investigation released a statement in which it underlined the connection. “We cannot over-emphasize the fact that, but for Paxton’s own request for a taxpayer-funded settlement . . . Paxton would not be facing impeachment.”
The genius of American corruption is that (a) where feasible they make legal what would be considered corrupt by Indian standards, and (b) generally they try and succeed in not letting the effects of corruption directly impact the voters.
There are plenty of old cases to point to, if the skeptical need convincing; but rather than rake up history, I will post such cases here as and when they pop up.
Re: Understanding the US - Again
LinkedIn has suspended the account of US presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, because of 3 particular statements he had posted on their platform. Isn't that "Election Interference"?
To recap, the offensive statements were:
"The CCP is playing the Biden administration like a Chinese mandoline. China has weaponized the "woke pandemic" to stay one step ahead of us. And it's working."
"If the climate religion was really about climate change, then they'd be worried about, say, shifting oil production from the U.S. to places like Russia and China."
"The climate agenda is a lie: fossil fuels are a requirement for human prosperity."
To recap, the offensive statements were:
"The CCP is playing the Biden administration like a Chinese mandoline. China has weaponized the "woke pandemic" to stay one step ahead of us. And it's working."
"If the climate religion was really about climate change, then they'd be worried about, say, shifting oil production from the U.S. to places like Russia and China."
"The climate agenda is a lie: fossil fuels are a requirement for human prosperity."
Re: Understanding the US - Again
https://tomdispatch.com/the-wars-we-dont-care-to-see/
Only recently, however, the Costs of War Project’s Stephanie Savell released a new study suggesting that there may have been another 3.6 to 3.7 million indirect deaths that can be attributed to the conditions created by those conflicts. So, in total, we may be talking about almost five million dead people from the American war that began as a response to al-Qaeda’s devastating air assaults on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Consider that the definition of a genuine hell on earth.
And yet, as Norman Solomon has made clear in the very title of his remarkable new book, War Made Invisible: How America Hides the Human Toll of Its Military Machine, remarkably few Americans have any sense of just how devastating (not to say unsuccessful) that now more than two-decade-old war on terror has been, or how many more civilians this country has killed than al-Qaeda ever could have
You’ve got NPR and PBS unwilling to challenge, but all too willing to propagate and perpetuate the assumption that, yes, the United States might make mistakes, it might even commit blunders — a popular word for the U.S. invasion of Iraq that resulted in literally hundreds of thousands of deaths. Still, the underlying message is invariably that yes, we can (and should) at times argue over when, whether, and how to attack certain countries with the firepower of the Pentagon, but those decisions do need to be made and the U.S. has the right to do so if that’s the best judgment of the wise people in the upper reaches of policy in Washington.
And keep in mind that, living in the United States, we have, with very few exceptions, no firsthand experience of the wars this country has engaged in and continues to be engaged in. So, we depend on the news media, a dependence that’s very dangerous in a democracy where the precept is that we need the informed consent of the governed, while what we’re getting is their uninformed pseudo-consent. Consider that a formula for the warfare state we have.
More than a century ago, William Dean Howells wrote a short story called “Editha.” Keep in mind that this was after the United States had been slaughtering hundreds of thousands of people in the Philippines. In it, a character says, “What a thing it is to have a country that can’t be wrong, but if it is, is right, anyway!”
Now, here we are in 2023 and it’s not that different, except when it comes to the scale of communications, of a media that’s so much more pervasive. If you read the op-ed pages and editorial sections of the New York Times, Washington Post, and other outlets of the liberal media, you’ll find such doublethink well in place. Vladimir Putin, of course, is a war criminal. Well, I happen to think he is a war criminal. I also happen to think that George W. Bush is a war criminal, and we could go on to all too many other examples of high U.S. government officials where that description applies no less than to Vladimir Putin.
Can you find a single major newspaper that’s been willing to editorialize that George W. Bush — having ordered the invasion of Iraq, costing hundreds of thousands of lives based on a set of lies — was a war criminal? It just ain’t gonna happen.
I quote, for instance, President Obama speaking to troops in Afghanistan. You could take one sentence after another from his speeches there and find almost identical ones that President Lyndon Johnson used in speaking to American troops in Vietnam in 1966. They both talked about how U.S. soldiers were so compassionate, cared so much about human life, and were trying to help the suffering people of Vietnam or Afghanistan. That pernicious theme seems to accompany almost any U.S. war: that, with the best of intentions, the U.S. is seeking to help those in other countries. It’s a way of making the victims at the other end of U.S. firepower — to use a word from my book title — invisible.
This is something I was able to do some thinking and writing about in my book. There are two tiers of grief in our media and our politics from Congress to the White House — ours and theirs. Our grief (including that of honorary semi-Americans like the Ukrainians) is focused on those who are killed by official enemy governments of the United States. That’s the real tier of grief and so when the media covers, as it should, the suffering of people in Ukraine thanks to Russia’s war of aggression, their suffering is made as real as can be. And yet, when it’s the U.S. slaughtering people in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere, that’s something else entirely. When it comes to the people at the other end of U.S. weaponry, the civilians, hundreds of thousands of them directly slaughtered, and millions indirectly killed by U.S. warfare, their tier of grief isn’t, with rare exceptions, on the media map. Those human beings just don’t matter.
Re: Understanding the US - Again
Since the author is gracious enough to label the Ukrainians as 'Semi-Americans', he should just be gracious to accept those slaughtered by the MIC being labeled as 'semi-humans'. Thus there is ready-made justification available leaving no room for any guilt or remorse. Easy-peasy and non-queasy.ricky_v wrote:https://tomdispatch.com/the-wars-we-dont-care-to-see/
...Our grief (including that of honorary semi-Americans like the Ukrainians) is focused on those who are killed by official enemy governments of the United States....
...
When it comes to the people at the other end of U.S. weaponry, the civilians, hundreds of thousands of them directly slaughtered, and millions indirectly killed by U.S. warfare, their tier of grief isn’t, with rare exceptions, on the media map. Those human beings just don’t matter.
Re: Understanding the US - Again
I don't understand why the US still allows these leeches to "thrive" - A future "peaceful" lawyer graduating from CUNY law school calling for "rage" and "violence" and "insurrection" as part of her nut-case graduation speech. And take a gander at the applauding Dean of CUNY our own Marxist nut-case.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/law-d ... 8419&ei=10
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMuhl9KOYA0
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/law-d ... 8419&ei=10
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMuhl9KOYA0
Re: Understanding the US - Again
Japan's Shinzo Abe was very smart and forthright in shutting down all these liberal arts protest programs by cutting funding for all of them.krithivas wrote:I don't understand why the US still allows these leeches to "thrive" - A future "peaceful" lawyer graduating from CUNY law school calling for "rage" and "violence" and "insurrection" as part of her nut-case graduation speech. And take a gander at the applauding Dean of CUNY our own Marxist nut-case.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/law-d ... 8419&ei=10
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMuhl9KOYA0
Such programs and schools produce nothing but Andolan Jeevi. The people who graduate from these programs are suited for nothing else. Better to stop building their nests.
Re: Understanding the US - Again
POOF
Admin note: don’t post US political sleaze of zero interest to India
Admin note: don’t post US political sleaze of zero interest to India
Re: Understanding the US - Again
JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon is being urged to run for President of the United States in 2024
Re: Understanding the US - Again
Trump has been indicted -- Deep State must really want him gone.
Re: Understanding the US - Again
https://www.cfr.org/podcasts/fentanyl-e ... lbab-brown
transcript excerptThe Fentanyl Epidemic, With Vanda Felbab-Brown
Vanda Felbab-Brown, a senior fellow in the Strobe Talbott Center for Security, Strategy, and Technology in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution, sits down with James M. Lindsay to discuss why the United States is struggling to stop the flood of fentanyl entering the country.
If we may, I'd like to begin by identifying the scope of the problem, Vanda. Something on the order of 100,000 Americans died last year from preventable drug overdoses, a number that is up nearly 60 percent in just the past four years and up nearly 800 percent over twenty-five years. The statistics show that the vast majority of those preventable overdoses involve fentanyl. Indeed, the head of the drug enforcement agency has called it the single deadliest drug threat our nation has ever encountered. What exactly is fentanyl?
Nonetheless, fentanyl is also a drug that is being used in the illegal market that has very high addictive properties and that is enormously potent. Its potency is multiple times that of heroin, on the order of fifty times as potent than heroin, perhaps 100 times as opium. Because it is so potent that, the potency per weight ratio makes the drug ideal to smuggle. It is the dream drug for traffickers because very small amounts are sufficient to supply very large markets, but it is a nightmare for users and from public health perspectives.
On the one hand, it can give very intense highs because of the potency, but the chance that overdose will result is enormous. Now, you know mentioned those really devastating statistics, 100,000 Americans dying, but fentanyl today in the United States and more broadly, North America, also Canada is being mixed into not just heroin and opioids, it's also being mixed into methamphetamine and cocaine. In fact, arguably the presence of fentanyl is one of the reasons that's keeping the cocaine market in the United States alive. So it's really swept through the North American markets and we are seeing fentanyl emerging in other parts of the world.
So broadly in the world, in the illicit markets and in legal markets as well, there are two types of drugs; those that are derived from plants like heroin and cocaine or cannabis, and those that are synthetically mixed in labs. Synthetic opioids like fentanyl or methamphetamine are part of that latter class. Just as the fentanyl is devastating the United States and spreading in Canada and spreading to other parts of the world, the globe is really undergoing synthetics drugs revolution that's taking place from Afghanistan to Australia and New Zealand to Latin America and features other drugs, not just synthetic opioids, but synthetic opioids are currently the most dangerous drugs on the market.
Now, fentanyl is different than the drug problem we saw emerge at the beginning of the century in the United States with the abuse of OxyContin, correct?
Well, it is a different drug, but it is also an opioid, so the United States is experiencing an opioid epidemic. Its current phase, the most lethal phase is the synthetic opioid element of the opioid epidemic. But the epidemic started with a legal market.
While the U.S. opioid epidemic should be a strong warning against that, with respect to many drugs, it was the legal market in pharmaceutical prescriptions like OxyContin that really started the opioid epidemic that caused massive levels of substance use disorder and ultimately, mutated to the current legal phase of fentanyl. No illegal market could get as many people addicted to use the common parlance as a legal commercialized, heavily promoted marketed. With the major companies, the major villains in the story, like Purdue Pharma, really being able to co-opt and subvert essentially every regulatory body that was supposed to protect consumers and public health by making fallacious claims that drugs like OxyContin were not addictive.
Okay, so we had the issue with OxyContin in that epidemic. Those were legal drugs that were over-prescribed by doctors who at least in the beginning thought that these had magical properties in the sense the alleviated pain and would not be addictive. It turned out, in fact, they were. Fentanyl, we're seeing as the spread largely through illegal manufacture and distribution. One of the things you said, Vanda, that struck me is that we're seeing fentanyl combined with other drugs. Why is that? Why is fentanyl being added to cocaine or to heroin or to methamphetamines?
So after the 1990s and 2000s, when there is this massive overprescription of legal opioids, pharmaceutical opioids like OxyContin, the United States wakes up to the fact that OxyContin, thebaine-based opioids are still highly addictive. The spigot is turned off, not completely turned off, but very much turned off compared to the fifteen years. But at this point, you have vast numbers of Americans with substance use disorders, specifically opioid use disorders. This is a different market.
This is not just kids when they are thirteen, fourteen in their teens or even younger, starting to experiment with illicit recreational drugs. This is everyone from young people, perhaps high school sports, athletes all the way to sixty, seventy-year-old grandmothers who are suffering from substance use disorder. But all of a sudden, they can no longer just show up at their doctor and say, "Give me more Vicodin." "Give me more OxyContin," and so they start sourcing opioids in the illegal market.
It is two set of actors that come in; Mexican cartels and Chinese producers, the Mexican cartels such as Sinaloa Cartel and Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generación at first start bringing in the opioid to which they are used, which is heroin. So we see poppy cultivation going up significantly in Mexico and heroin being produced and brought into the U.S. market. But the Chinese producers with Chinese traders, with the vast pharmaceutical chemical sector industry in China, second perhaps in the world, perhaps the largest in the world with very poor monitoring comes in and brings in much more potent synthetic opioid, fentanyl, that is very cheap and now very easily made and much more potent than heroin. So the Chinese traders start shipping directly through mail, fentanyl to the illegal U.S. drug market.
The Mexican cartels are watching it and all of a sudden realize that there is this drug that's superior to what they can bring from Mexico and has tremendous advantages. It's very potent, so very small amounts are sufficient to supply the market. That means that evading law enforcement becomes very easy. You don't need to control territory. Growing poppy, growing coca requires the control of territory and the ability to prevent the government from destroying those crops. All of a sudden, all you need is precursors to be bought in China or India and a few labs and you can supply the U.S. market. Because synthetic opioids in particular are so cheap to make, it's also easy to mix them. It's also appealing to traffickers to mix them to other drugs because that reduces the cost. But because of their qualities, their highs, the intensity of the high and the addictive quality, they also generate new substance use disorders, new addicts.
You quoted the statistics at the beginning about lethal overdose, but for every overdose for which someone dies, there are five overdose that are reversed, but not all overdose that are reversed mean that the person is completely healthy. Many of the people who will experience overdose will have devastating morbidity effects for the rest of their lives. So the level of devastation is much greater than already the huge number of tens of thousands of people dying actually from the drug.
I take your point that fentanyl appeals to producers on the basis that you get a lot of potency out of a small amount of substance. I read recently that the customs and border patrol in the United States intercepted a shipment. It was fifty-four pounds of fentanyl, and it was estimated that that would produce enough doses to kill 12 million people. So again, it goes a long way. Let's talk first about the provision of what are called precursor chemicals from China to drug cartels in Mexico. I take it that you have these pharmaceutical companies and other perhaps mid or small size companies in China make the ingredients, sell them to drug traffickers who combine them in labs in Mexico to create fentanyl. But I thought the Obama administration had reached out to Beijing to get Beijing to crack down on this trade. What happened?
So when first fentanyl emerges in the illegal U.S. market in around 2013, 2014, it is shipped as a whole finished fentanyl from China directly to the United States, from Chinese traders, pharmaceutical companies, chemical brokers directly to wholesale suppliers or even retail dealers and sometimes directly to customers. Essentially, people would just log into the web and buy fentanyl from China. This is at a time when fentanyl and other opioids in the fentanyl class of opioids are produced in China without any restrictions. So as the problem emerges in the United States, two things happens. Two set of actors notice it. One is the Mexican criminal groups, the big cartels who are fearing that their heroin is no longer of interest because there is this new potent opioid coming out of China and they want to get in on the game. The second is U.S. authorities, law enforcement authorities, the U.S. government, who are starting to comprehend the much worse mutation of the opioid crisis is taking place.
So the Obama administration starts engaging China to get China to schedule fentanyl class drugs. Now what does scheduling mean? It does not mean banning the drugs. We don't want to ban them because they are important in surgeries. They are important as an anesthetics. They are important for palliative care, but to produce them and sell them and export them with tight control and restriction special licenses, this process is called scheduling. So the Obama administration starts the process and ultimately, during the Trump administration in December 2018, President Xi Jinping announces that the entire class of fentanyl type drugs would be scheduled in China, a regulation that comes in effect in May 2019. Now, this was a significant move by China because there are really only two countries in the world that scheduled drugs by class: The United States where fentanyl class drugs are currently scheduled as a class of drugs, but actually it's just a permanent measure. The U.S. Congress still has to make this measure permanent, and the second is China.
So China had to change its laws to be able to accommodate this request from the United States. So after China's schedules in 2019, we see changes in behavior in the Chinese market with many of the traders that were selling fentanyl to the United States now switching to selling precursor chemicals. Those are basic chemicals from which fentanyl is mixed, and they're selling those chemicals to Mexican cartels that then mix them into fentanyl and export fentanyl from Mexico to the United States. China subsequently scheduled three other precursors for fentanyl, but in the current market, both in fentanyl and in methamphetamine, the crystal meth and fentanyl are produced from such basic chemicals. They have such wide use in all kinds of legal, chemistry, pharmacology, pharmaceutical industry that they will just not be scheduled. They are very basic chemicals with wide use. The Mexican cartels have now perfected methods with both crystal meth and fentanyl to be making those dangerous drugs out of those very basic chemicals.
That's giving China a claim to say, "Look, we cannot do anything more on enforcement because those drugs are not scheduled." That's not completely true, however, because it's quite obvious when Chinese sellers sell to the Mexican cartels, they often advertise a combination of precursors for methamphetamine, fillers for cocaine, precursors for fentanyl. They will sometimes combine their sale pitch with commercials such as, "We know how to evade Mexican customs." In some of the webpages, it's pretty obvious that the target is criminal groups.
Because China views counternarcotics cooperation as derivative of the overall geostrategic relationship it has with countries.
So with countries whom it has a good geostrategic relationship or whom it seeks to court, it cooperates in law enforcement and counternarcotic efforts. This was the case with Australia until relations between Australia and China soured. This has been the case to some extent it's Southeast Asian countries, but when the relations tense, certainly relationship with the United States has approached Cold War like dynamics, China stops law enforcement cooperation. So China invested in this counternarcotics law enforcement cooperation with the U.S. when in hope that would make the Trump administration to back off from the tariff war and would make the Biden administration lessen the economic pressure and basic containment geostrategy competition. When neither happened, China just pulled back and really frankly, abrogated its law enforcement and counternarcotics corporation.
the problem will increasingly become complex with every iteration as chemistry and human ingenuity is involved, hopefully, our own internal agencies are on the lookout for fentanyl, india as of now too has underlying drug abuse in certain areaswill note the historical irony China suffered in the nineteenth century from the flood of opium into China was one of the causes of the Opium Wars. Now China seems to be facilitating the flow of deadly drugs into the United States.
So unfortunately, especially with China, I think we are in a tough bind because of this basic calculus that China makes of subordinating law enforcement, narcotics cooperation to the geostrategic relationship. I think it's very unlikely that we would see significant improvements in the geostrategic relationship that would likely be necessary for much better, more robust and sustained Chinese cooperation. Nonetheless, we have a set of opportunities. China very much likes to position itself as the global drug cop because of the Opium Wars and the opioid epidemic that China went through, certainly in scale, if not lethality, perhaps the second-largest opioid epidemic after the current North American one, China is very sensitive about drugs and likes to define itself as a very strict drug cop.
China is also the principle exporter of precursors for the production of crystal meth, devastating Southeast Asia and of Asia Pacific, including Australia and New Zealand, and Chinese triads are the principle traffickers. China is very focused on that region, so we can be combining forces with countries like Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines, all of which are experiencing big devastating increases in crystal meth use and substance use disorder to push China on cracking down on trafficking, on acting more robustly on money laundering measures.
Re: Understanding the US - Again
Biden whitehouse is engaging in a politically motivated prosecution against Trump, the political opposition leader.
This same whitehouse has no moral highground when it comes to lecturing other countries on human rights & freedoms.