We Need A Diplomatic Response to the Opioid Genocide
To save lives (and money), the US + Canada must engage in dialogue with China about drugs
The reactionary backlash against the drug legalization movement(s) has reached a crescendo with the recent arrests of Eris Nyx and Jeremy Kalicum, co-founders of the Drug User Liberation Front (DULF) in Vancouver, Canada. People across Canada and the US are fed up with our governments’ genocidal political response to the toxic drug supply that is killing Americans and Canadians in record numbers. Instead of prioritizing human rights, the governments of the United States, Canada, and China have repeatedly sculpted drug policy according to political and business interests rather than public welfare. But enough is enough. The drug problem has brought us all to a collective tipping point. We must act now, or die.
We urgently need an effective diplomatic response to the opioid genocide that entails legalization and regulation rather than prohibition and sanctions. Through sincere international dialogue about drug policy, we can save money and strengthen our economies, restore harmonious diplomatic relations between China and the US, and—most importantly—we can save lives! The astounding, tragic loss of life is really the driving factor here, but it certainly doesn’t help that this genocide-without-bombs generates a plethora of other problems in addition to death.
Odd as it may seem, today’s fentanyl politics are in fact directly rooted in the geopolitical circumstances of the Anglo-Chinese Wars, aka the Opium Wars, fought between China and Britain in the mid-19th century. These conflicts marked the start of what came to be known as the “Century of Humiliation,” an extended period in Chinese political history in which the Qing Dynasty suffered a long, slow defeat at the hands of western colonial powers. The “Century of Humiliation” came to a close in the 1940s with the rise of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). As such, the destructive legacy of the colonial opium trade itself played a key role in the development of the CCP’s political ideology.
The CCP’s political stance toward drugs has, in recent years, taken a disturbing turn that is often framed as a sort of reversal of the Opium Wars—an Opium War 3.0, perhaps—in which China is now the aggressor rather than the victim. Unfortunately, drug activists are hesitant to acknowledge this perspective because it has become a reactionary Fox News talking point. But there is a very real element of truth in the notion that today’s fentanyl pipeline represents some type of modern opioid warfare.
This perspective has been seemingly confirmed by the exhaustive investigative journalism of Sam Cooper, who took it upon himself to find out just where all the fentanyl killing tens of thousands of people in Vancouver (and across Canada and the North America more broadly) is really coming from. What he found shocked him—and me, and many others—yet provides key information for our efforts to understand and respond to the present crisis.
Through years of painstaking firsthand investigation, Cooper eventually—and reluctantly—concluded that the fentanyl comes primarily from Chinese Triads, who allegedly launder the proceeds through underground banks in Canada, all with tacit approval from the top leadership of the CCP in Beijing. It’s some seriously heavy shit. But Cooper backs up his stunning claims with case after case after case of compelling evidence, replete with primary sources, personal interviews (both named and anonymous), and extensive discussion with Canadian and US intelligence sources.
Just as British and American merchants used the opium trade to drain China’s silver reserves in the 19th century, China is now returning the favor, so to speak, and is essentially funneling money out of the US and Canada and into the hands of wealthy businesspeople and gangsters with close connections to Beijing. In a sense, we’ve always had it coming. But what differentiates the current situation from that of the OG Opium Wars is that the fentanyl and xylazine pouring into North America as you read this are many times more potent than our great-great-grandparents’ opium. Whereas the 19th century opium trade contributed to economic decay in China, the modern fentanyl pipeline has brought not just economic decay but straight up death, on an ongoing basis and in large numbers.
If China is trying to make a point, they’ve certainly made it. It’s far past time for those of us in the so-called “West” to recognize this and move on. Economic warfare is all fun and games until people start dropping dead. So…what can we do about it?
To start, we must talk with China. I mean really talk, not just the typical drug war rhetoric bullshit. We in the US must willingly choose dialogue over fearful paranoia, for it is only through dialogue that we can address the very things that cause said fear. Yes, the fentanyl genocide is scary. It’s also real, and not going anywhere unless and until we seriously address it, above board, with all parties involved. This is not something that can be solved in an executive board meeting or with a few handshakes among powerful men behind closed doors.
And Nancy Pelosi certainly didn’t help the situation by visiting Taiwan last summer. That pissed off Beijing, who responded by temporarily ceasing negotiations with the US on a number of items including drug policy. The two countries have since resumed negotiations but they are treading at a snail’s pace while our friends and loved ones die by the hour. If and when the governments of the US, Canada, and China ever actually do something about this, it will be a direct result of pressure from us, the people who these political institutions claim to represent and serve.
Although it will be wonderful to save money and ease some geopolitical tension, by far the best and most important benefit of a global dialogue on fentanyl will be the lives it would save. And while this is the most important issue at stake, it is also the most heated. Drug overdose is a particularly polarizing issue in large part because of the attendant trauma and social stigma that come with it. But we already know that easing restrictions and expanding options for legal access is the most effective and humane approach to drug policy.
Prohibition has got to go. It clearly does more harm than good and is not even grounded in genuine social sentiment but rather emerged as a political strategy of the ruling class. Whatever semblance of legitimacy the War on Drugs may have once had in the public imagination is now long gone. We know prohibition is irrational and has deadly consequences. And we know that legalization and regulation are sorely needed if we are ever to emerge from the tragedy that is drug prohibition.
A sensible diplomatic resolution would address the outflow of money from the US and Canada through underground banks linked simultaneously to organized crime and state-backed actors in China. It would also allow public reconciliation for the transgressions of the 19th century on the part of the western colonial powers against China—something that seems historically distant but which still has palpable consequences today, the fentanyl/xylazine pipeline being chief among them. Most importantly, however, a diplomatic resolution would move us one big step closer to ending the War on Drugs and saving the lives of our friends and family. Let’s break bread, make bread, and keep each other alive and thriving in the process.
Thanks for reading.