On March 11, 1987, The Free Lance-Star, a newspaper of Fredericksburg, VA published an article that would alarm numerous Americans and alert countless more. It was an issue, which was spreading like a wildfire within the American civilization, affecting both the domestic policy as well as the foreign policy. Around this time, drug smuggling was evolving in places where it had never before, the Chesapeake Bay region was seeing drug smuggling increase, striking terror into the government to get involved, this lead to domestic policy and foreign affair policy expressing itself in small places, such as on the Rappahannock River with the Daddy Warbucks incident of 1984.
Many would have viewed the Chesapeake region as a small peaceful community, where nothing unusual or out of the ordinary took place such as drug smuggling. However, the drug smugglers around this time were getting smart; they realized that by going somewhere secluded they were more likely to succeed. Such lead to the events of 1984, when aboard the Daddy Warbucks six tons of marijuana within the ship lead to the arrest and downfall of a huge drug smuggling operation. However, such events would also take place around the Chesapeake Bay, leaving many to demand for a change and many more fearing what could become of their hometowns.
To help ease these fears the government of Virginia promised that there would be change to the problems. The government held to their word and built in Reedville, VA a Customs Service, who with the help of the Coast Guard and federal law enforcements received the best training available at that time. However with all this pressure into fixing the drug smuggling problem, it was nowhere near perfect, the Coast Guard estimated during that time that only a quarter of all drugs being smuggled on the Chesapeake Bay was being intercepted. The problem it would seem is one that will not be stoppable anytime soon if ever, as Mason, who had at the time served with Custom Services for 22 years, shares that he feels the only way to fix the problem is through education.
Also going on around the whole United States around this same time was the continuing battle of the War on Drugs. The War on Drugs is a campaign of prohibition and foreign military aid and military intervention lead by the United States government, with the assistance of participating countries, intended to reduce the illegal drug trade. President Nixon was actually one of the first to use the term on June 17, 1971. As early as 1982, Vice President George H.W. Bush and his aides began pushing for the involvement of the CIA and U.S. military in drug interdiction efforts. In terms of Domestic policies, the War on Drugs led the incarnation rate to skyrocket; also, many new laws passed within the nation to control the drug spread and distribution within the United States. Foreign affairs also played a part during this time; the United States government many times throughout history have pumped money into the country and used troops to invade other countries. One of the first anti-drug efforts in the realm of foreign policy was President Nixon's Operation Intercept, announced in September 1969, targeted at reducing the amount of cannabis entering the United States from Mexico. The effort began with an intense inspection crackdown that resulted in an almost shutdown of cross-border traffic Because the burden on border crossings was controversial in border states, the effort only lasted twenty days. Overall, it had a huge impact on
In conclusion, the War on Drugs had a huge impact all throughout the United States, the Daddy Warbucks incident of 1984 showed the influence the government had on controlling drug smuggling during this period. The Chesapeake Bay proved to be a good place for trade, until the government realized what had to happen to stop this smuggling. However, like smuggling before this war started it will most likely continue with no way to stop it totally.
