Independence Week is here. Drums beat in the distance, schoolkids dress in traditional garb, and Costa Rica celebrates 205 years of freedom and self-determination. With our national celebration in mind, it is a good time to consider the implication of the recent discourse of our President Laura Fernandez. While discussing the current state of our nation, she left the door open for the possible future involvement of the US military on the ground in Costa Rica. This would be a big step beyond the joint maritime patrols that the two countries have conducted the past several years in search of boats full of cocaine cruising the high seas.
The US military posted visibly here? As a citizen of both countries, I think this is a terrible idea. Yes, Costa Rica has a big problem with the drug cartels, the homicide rate, and the lack of effective policing. Here we are caught in the middle of the insatiable demand for cocaine in the US and elsewhere, and the producers and distributors ready to meet that demand from this part of the world. This is nothing new. Costa Rica has always been an easy place to score the powder.
Here I confess– in my younger days in the 1990s and early 2000s I was an occasional user, doing my tiny bit to contribute to the problem. It was as easily available then as it is now. I knew several different sources to contact if I wanted a gram. There was a local taxista, a professional Tico friend, a couple of Euros and a couple of US born folks. It was always cheap, around $25 in US dollars, and of very good quality.
Something I have always noted about cocaine is that it cuts across ideological and even economic lines. While it is sometimes associated with a wealthier class of people due its price in the US, you are as likely to find a warehouse worker sneaking into the bathroom for a quick snort as you are to find a stocks and bonds seller keying himself up for the afternoon trading session. Users run the gamut from conservative Repub to liberal Dem and everything in between. Once that first line hits the bloodstream, the user could not care less about the damage done– from the pollution caused in the jungles of Colombia by the manufacturers to the violence in the streets of Costa Rica caused by the distributors fighting over territory.
Recently there was a campus coke distribution ring bust in the US, centered at a frat house at Penn State University. The guys busted were mostly scions of upper class families. They are all out on bail, and will likely get light sentences at a medium security facility. There is an irony at work here as it is not hard to imagine these same frat boys doing lines while cheering on the videos of the US bombing suspected or alleged drug boats in our part of the world.
Which brings me back to the idea of another country’s boots on the ground here in Ticolandia. Absence of a military is one of our points of pride, but there seems to be an unfortunate correlation with a lack of serious policing. There has been a recent uptick in arrests of cartel-linked criminals, and the homicide rate for the first half of the year is down almost fifteen percent compared to the past few record setting years.
Slow progress is being made. Inviting the US military here to be present in cities and ports nationwide is an unnecessary overreaction that would compromise the nation’s independence. And in truth, in my lifetime the US military record is tarnished– Vietnam was a loss, the long Iraq and Afghanistan incursions cost trillions and changed little, the present situation in Iran looks like a quagmire at this point.
Costa Rica is caught in the middle of a long standing problem, brought on by the reality of both the supply and demand of the drug market, and our own reputation as an easy place to skirt the law. But this is Costa Rica’s problem and needs to be addressed and solved by Costa Ricans. So Happy Independence Day, and let’s keep Costa Rica independent by saying no to the idea of a US military presence being part of the equation in the fight against the cartels.
Read more of Don Mateo’s writing from his newly published ebook.
