Colombia's Cocaine Submarines Take The Lead In Drug War

Time:

In recent years, the boat of choice for Colombian cocaine smugglers has been the semisubmersible, a vessel that cruises just below the ocean's surface with only its air and exhaust pipes sticking out of the water. Since the semisubs have proved so successful at dodging interdiction, it seemed inevitable that traffickers - who in the past have commandeered entire passenger jets to move their product - would upgrade to even more elusive full-fledged submarines. But narco U-boats were a murky legend of the depths, the drug-cartel version of the Loch Ness monster.

Not anymore.

Read the whole story: Time

Comments

[dbrett480]

01:48 PM on 04/01/2011

These subs should be easy to catch considering we have nuclear subs with sonar and torpedos.

[John02050]

10:42 AM on 03/30/2011

The Controlled Substances Act is unconstitutional.

Cannabis legalization is very neccessary.

All controlled substances need to be decriminalized, with fines paying for education or treatment for repeat offenders. Individuals who refuse treatment face further fines, which cannot result in payment through incarceration- fines are deducted from potential future tax returns.

This system would resolve all the principal issues surrounding substance use and enforcement.

[John02050]

10:26 AM on 03/30/2011

Big Banks want 'drugs' illegal because they make a lot of money laundering dealer cash, often as much as 30% or more. Without the services the large financial institutions knowingly provide to dealers, the $ is unspendable, and therefore technically worthless.

The CIA wants drugs illegal because they profit off them to fund their illegal international campaigns.

Pharmacutical corporations want them kept illegal to maintain their own state-sanctioned drug dealing monopoly.

The prison-industrial complex needs drugs to be kept illegal in order to keep prisoner levels high and increasing to maximize profits for private prisons.

Drug-testing companies want 'drugs' kept illegal to profit off of companies and court systems purchasing test kits for employees and probationers.

Law-enforcement agencies gain large budgets for drug enforcement and profit off of confiscated property.

The DEA is the authority that knowingly and purposefully keeps the whole system in place.

The media convinces the people that it's all for their safety and has nothing to do with everybody involved profiting off the system created for that very reason.

[Hare]

12:29 PM on 03/30/2011

The only ones that seem concerned about the drugs are the families of those addicted to them and of those innocent who were in the wrong place at the wrong time when the war takes place.

[Pippen]

10:23 AM on 03/30/2011

In the town where I was born,
Lived a man who sailed to sea,
And he told us of his life,
In the land of submarines,

So we sailed on to the sun,
Till we found the sea green,
And we lived beneath the waves,
In our yellow submarine,

[Pigeonbutt]

06:59 AM on 03/30/2011

Shame people waste their time with coke but ..... Power to the people. Supply and demand. Just givin' the people what they want.

[Hare]

12:24 PM on 03/30/2011

Many of the users were hoodwinked into thinking drugs are fun, and inoffensive, the destruction they produce has never been addressed or given the limelight it needs. At this point I believe and as much as I hate the idea legalization is the way to go as if only to end the violence it creates. The users will always continue being the victims specially when we ealize many fall into them because of being young and $tupid. It will be nice if the demand side collapsed.

[mwt]

02:16 AM on 03/30/2011

It's an evolutionary arms race, and our idiotic drug laws are creating a new strain of super narco traffickers.

[chaapai]

01:03 AM on 03/30/2011

Oh, THAT'S where left my submarine.

[SilentSolidarity]

12:03 AM on 03/30/2011

You gotta admit. Those drug lords make better investment decisions than any Wall Street company.

[Ishmael1]

10:57 PM on 03/29/2011

Well, since these subs can only dive to a depth of about 30 feet, here's MY advice as a former Destroyer Sonarman.

Set your depth charges to 30-40 feet and ROLL DEPTH CHARGES:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPGLwAlxBdM

Plus, if they ARE that shallow, they're visible from the air. Arm Customs planes with DCs, declare US territorial waters as a submarine exclusion zone and sink any subs spotted with aerial and ship DC attacks.

[scooterdme]

12:55 AM on 03/30/2011

Or just legalize it

[getoffmedz]

09:05 PM on 03/29/2011

After all these years it is good to see we are still winning the War of Drugs and that Home Depot is really behind it.

heckofajob

[Montcalms Revenge]

07:35 PM on 03/29/2011

Das Coke! ;-)

[lightningbolt]

07:34 PM on 03/29/2011

Touch screen controls.  Wow.

[Edward Standley]

10:04 PM on 03/29/2011

But nothing but canned beans and crackers to eat? And no toilet? Man, ya gotta have priorities!

[wsdave]

10:50 PM on 03/29/2011

You're at sea: Eat the beans from the can, refill the can with beans from the other end, then dumb them overboard. I mean, it's only 100*, how bad could they smell?

[kocean1]

07:25 PM on 03/29/2011

There a Wiley bunch those drug dealers. The demand will never stop-so the supply will never stop. Drug enforcement is a big business.You'd have better luck putting your finger in a dike.

[Ukie3]

06:11 PM on 03/29/2011

Please don't link stories to Yahoo! News... that place is bad for your health...

[Hare]

12:26 PM on 03/30/2011

I agree

[kamakiri001]

05:23 PM on 03/29/2011

What other business can you think of (besides banking) where the government ensures that only a handful of players will be able to play the game and will also provide the free service of eliminating smaller competitors as well as new entrants into the market for you?

The 'War on Drugs' is a dream come true for organized crime...

[diesel09]

03:51 AM on 03/30/2011

Well said!!

[Blueneck]

09:28 AM on 03/30/2011

Yup. I've always thought that the War On (Some) Drugs was an insanely inefficient price support program.