Deadliest Drug Cartel? Communist China

The world’s number one drug cartel is not Mexican, Colombian, or Bolivian. It is not a non-state actor like the Sinaloa, Jalisco New Generation (CJNG), Gulf, or Los Zetas cartels, which control Mexico.  It is a government with 600 producers of fentanyl and precursor chemicals and hundreds of illegal (high potency THC) “grow houses” in America, from Maine to Georgia. It is Communist China.

How can this be? Let’s start with facts. With no close second, China is the number one producer and exporter of “illicit fentanyl and fentanyl-related substances” to the US.

Chinese traffickers bring fentanyl to America – now to every county in America – directly and via third countries, including Mexico and India. The origin – either completed in China or made from Chinese precursor chemicals – is always China.

Second, to help Mexico produce fentanyl from Chinese chemicals – and profit from sales in the US – Chinese traffickers use the Communist Chinese banking system to launder proceeds.

Third, approximately two-thirds of all drug deaths in the US – now over 100,000 a year – come from fentanyl, which is all traceable directly or indirectly to Communist China.  The overall number of US opioid deaths, and the percentage of deaths tied to fentanyl.

Fourth, while much of the Mexican-origin fentanyl comes over the US southern border, added fentanyl comes directly from China via international mail. China has done little to restrict the flow of precursors to Mexico or the drug itself (often 90 percent pure) via international mail.

Fifth, while Republican and Democrat administrations have sought to get China’s attention, China’s regulations and scheduling of fentanyl appear to have been little more than diplomatic window dressing, registering no effect at all in the US – as the inflow has just intensified.

Sixth, as if shipping one of the world’s deadliest drugs into the US were not enough, Chinese communist traffickers have recently bought up hundreds of homes per state and converted them to high-potency, THC or marijuana “grow houses,” then shipped these drugs to markets in (and possibly beyond) the US, tapping into the inevitable black market, triggering higher levels of fentanyl use by high potency marijuana users, and (according to experts) sending the money back to China.

So, what is China doing? They are addicting and killing Americans with drugs made in China, made in Mexico, and now even made in the US, with the aim – can there be any doubt? – of making the American public sicker, more addicted, and more susceptible to drugs, corruption, and crime.

In some states, notably those with Republican legislatures and governors, the law enforcement community has been empowered to chase down, arrest, and prosecute these Chinese traffickers, who range from so-called “triad” members (organized crime syndicates) to smaller traffickers.

In other states – and at the federal level under the Biden team leadership – almost nothing has been done. Reporters have put their lives on the line to unearth this dangerous, law-defying Chinese criminality, which is quickly eroding public safety, public health, and public trust – to no effect.

Where joint interagency task forces should be working with aggressive attorneys general and lining up on, catching, deporting, prosecuting, and imprisoning these Chinese traffickers, little is being done at all.

In states like Maine, as more young people fall victim to Chinese high-potency drugs, and grow houses to fentanyl, the legislature, attorney general, and governor minimize, look the other way, and in one case even have relatives profiting from the sale of real estate to these Communist Chinese traffickers.

Can it get any worse? Yes. China has realized that the best way to sow divisions in this free society is to corrupt, addict, push criminality, and use freedom against the free. The best way to stop that is to understand the stakes, not minimize but publicize, and then prosecute unremittingly.

When will that happen? How many more kids must die of Chinese-origin drugs, face criminality in their daily lives, and struggle with addiction to Chinese fentanyl and other synthetics?

Let me speak bluntly and from the heart: I have talked with these young victims, many of whom will not live to see their 20^th birthday, who are addicted and dying, recovered a few times with Narcan, and then gone. I have talked with and know the families. This is inexcusable.

Bottom line: We need prevention, treatment, and strong law enforcement, we need answers. From Maine to Georgia, Boston to Los Angeles, America MUST stop Chinese drug traffickers. They are ripping us apart, killing the young in record numbers, shattering the rule of law. Who is the world’s top drug cartel? Not Mexico or Colombia. The top drug cartel in the world is Communist China.

Robert Charles is a former Assistant Secretary of State under Colin Powell, former Reagan and Bush 41 White House staffer, attorney, and naval intelligence officer (USNR). He wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003), “Eagles and Evergreens” (2018), and is National Spokesman for AMAC.