The New Opium War: How China Is Poisoning America Through Fentanyl and Cannabis
What the British once did to China, China now does to us: weaponizing addiction through fentanyl, weed, and propaganda.
The United States of America, its federal, state, county, tribal, and local law enforcement, as well as nearly 100,000 Americans who die prematurely annually from drug overdoses, are engaged in a war that they don’t even know that they are fighting.
Prior to 1838, due to a trade imbalance, the British Empire waged devastating ‘state sanctioned narcotic imperialism’ as well as economic and naval warfare on the Qing Dynasty of China. What they learned as the victim in that role, they are using to their advantage today. In the mid-19th century, the main players were the British, the Chinese, the French, and the Spanish. Today, it is the People’s Republic of China, the United States of America, and Mexico. Every peace officer in our land deserves to know this brief history in order to understand what they are fighting tomorrow.
The First Opium War (1839–1842) was caused by the British shipping and selling opium from India, its nearby colony, to balance the trade deficit caused by Chinese exports of tea, silk and porcelain, but nothing of value that the British had to offer to be exported to China. The legal importation of opium had such a negative social impact including widespread addiction and economic disruption, that the Chinese emperor both outlawed the importation and seized and destroyed the British shipments in the city now known as Guangzhou.
That initiated the First Opium War. Britain responded with military force and decisively defeated China resulting in the treaty that gave Hong Kong to the British. It remained a British territory until as recently as 1997. The Second Opium war began in 1856 and was resolved in by further concessions by the Chinese, such that they describe it as the ‘Century of Humiliation’ with near total western economic dominance. China suffered the horrific consequences of an opioid addicted population for nearly 100 years until the rise of Mao Zedong, the communist, who ended the dominance of heroin abuse by killing millions of his countrymen during the Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap Forward.
Communism and American education
Despite the gruesome genocidal actions by Hitler’s Germany, there were even worse death counts than the greater than 6,000,000 Jewish murders during the Holocaust. The deliberately caused death of Russians and Ukrainians by Stalin of more than 20,000,000 and then 45,000,000 Chinese by Mao are likely underestimated. Tens of millions were killed, not by famine, but by being deliberately starved to death. Despite strides in so many areas of technology, agriculture and sanitation that have rolled back poverty, infant mortality, causing a population boom, the 20th century was the most murderous and genocidal century in human history.
Communism proved their political philosophy was the most genocidal and murderous in history deliberately causing unnecessary death at plague level. Today communist groups are parading in American streets, notably the Party of Socialism and Liberation and others, blocking traffic, blocking bridges and tunnels, setting battery-electric vehicles ablaze, attacking local police and federal agents. They are mobilizing high school and college students, barely literate themselves and completely unaware of the cause they are promoting, to disrupt on their native soil on behalf of foreign murderous regimes.
The resurgence of heroin
About twelve years ago, early in the morning, at the police department, our significant events report noted that a driver was arrested – and search incident to arrest, a suspect drug was found, and following presumptive testing, several grams of heroin were recovered. ‘Wow,’ I thought to myself, ‘I haven’t heard about heroin for a while.’ Ironically, this traffic stop took place about two traffic lights away from the long-shuttered methadone clinic that, back in the day, despite having an extra-duty officer, was broadcast on the radio so frequently, that we all knew the address before they gave the business name.
In the years since, the U.S. entered what the CDC and researchers call the third wave of the opioid epidemic, marked by a sharp increase in overdose deaths involving synthetic opioids, often illicit Fentanyl - up to 100 times more potent than morphine.
Fentanyl, and analogues, began appearing in heroin, cocaine, and counterfeit pills, often without users’ knowledge.
Total U.S. drug overdose deaths climbed from around 43,982 in 2013 to a peak of 107,941 in 2022. There were about 3,000 synthetic opioid drug overdose deaths (of nearly 44,000) in 2013, which increased, according to Time magazine, to 73,654 in 2022.
We reached the point where one in ten Americans had lost someone they knew to overdose. They took a drug, like heroin, at a dose that wouldn’t kill them, but compounded with Fentanyl unknowingly became a death sentence. These cases are due to synthetic opioid drugs added ‘hamburger helper’ style in their drug of choice. During this period, it was established that illicit Fentanyl is entering our country directly from China or via the United States southern border by Mexican cartels – who were furnished the drug precursors to produce in their labs by China.
On American property
The People’s Republic of China has been in the news lately for their ownership of American farmland. Governor DeSantis led the charge to ban sales of land to foreign actors near sensitive national interests like United States Air Force and Navy installations. Today, through investigative journalism we find that at least 300 Chinese owned properties in Maine are marijuana grow houses. Steve Robinson, an investigative journalist, has obviously only found the tip of the iceberg where 300 locations are in the plain of day and likely scores more are to be found in the abundant rural expanse of the State of Maine.
Even state sponsored NPR asks the million dollar question: “Marijuana farms are increasingly Chinese-run. Why?” In New Mexico, a weed farm is cultivated by undocumented Chinese who bear the signs of abuse and are managed by legal Chinese.
Keep politics out of policing?
“Citizens United for Smart Policy (CUSP) has prioritized safeguarding Americans from dangerous products originating from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Just last month, the organization led a panel discussion at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Tampa, drawing attention to the illegal methods Chinese vape producers use to distribute their products and deliberately target young people in communities across the United States. Chinese-backed illegal marijuana operations lace cannabis with toxic pesticides, engaging in money laundering, stealing electricity, and saturating the market and seducing our youth with chemically tainted products that pose serious health risks.” Their industry is worth billions of dollars.
In previous articles, I’ve noted that the potency of Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) in cannabis has increased five-fold since 1994. Long story short, today’s cannabis is not Woodstock’s weed. Its reputation of mellow highs has been lost to the emergence of psychotic breaks previously associated with drugs laced with psychedelics like PCP and LSD.
High potency THC and today’s increasingly common behavioral health issues like paranoid schizophrenia, anxiety, and depression combine like gasoline and fire. A recent meta-analysis study by: “researchers from the Sorbonne found that among adolescents, marijuana use was linked to 46% higher odds of experiencing suicidal ideation and 85% higher odds of attempting suicide. Their research method accounted for pre-existing depression; the data they gathered shows marijuana use independently harms mental health. This comes on top of an avalanche of evidence showing that weed is connected to other severe mental health problems, including schizophrenia.”
There has been tremendous pressure to encourage President Trump to move cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III. Last year I wrote: “Schedule I is not a description of the danger or lethality of a drug. For decades, public opinion has shifted, even to the degree of ridicule when describing marijuana as risky. Fentanyl, a drug devastating our nation, boosting overdose deaths into the hundreds of thousands in the United States is a Schedule II drug, though it has a high propensity for abuse, it has, and has had for decades an acceptable medical use. Per the Drug Enforcement Administration:
“Schedule II drugs, substances, or chemicals are defined as drugs with a high potential for abuse, with use potentially leading to severe psychological or physical dependence. These drugs are also considered dangerous. Some examples of Schedule II drugs are: combination products with less than 15 milligrams of hydrocodone per dosage unit (Vicodin), cocaine, methamphetamine, methadone, hydromorphone (Dilaudid), meperidine (Demerol), oxycodone (OxyContin), Fentanyl, Dexedrine, Adderall, and Ritalin”
When President Trump discussed rescheduling, one of his primary justifications was to allow research to be conducted on the potential benefits. This is a huge talking point but it is a dead end. Despite a tremendous body of research conducted domestically and internationally over the last 60 years, nothing has been unlocked in gold standard research. In fact, this would be the best and easiest route to get marijuana rescheduled: establish a widely accepted use of treatment.
So far, people don’t ride in ambulances to hospitals to find out that their problem was a lack of cannabis in their life. No one gets admitted to the hospital with an ailment relieved by an application of marijuana. In fact, they are much more likely to be transported by ambulance to a hospital, detox facility, or mental health receiving facility due to marijuana consumption.
In 2009, the reschedule of cannabis was a huge initiative of the Obama administration. The denial of petition to the White House from the DEA in July 2016 stated in part:
(1) Marijuana has a high potential for abuse. The HHS evaluation and the additional data gathered by DEA show that marijuana has a high potential for abuse.
(2) Marijuana has no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States. Based on the established five-part test for making such determination, marijuana has no “currently accepted medical use” because: As detailed in the HHS evaluation, the drug's chemistry is not known and reproducible; there are no adequate safety studies; there are no adequate and well-controlled studies proving efficacy; the drug is not accepted by qualified experts; and the scientific evidence is not widely available.
(3) Marijuana lacks accepted safety for use under medical supervision. At present, there are no U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved marijuana products, nor is marijuana under a New Drug Application (NDA) evaluation at the FDA for any indication.
Sign every petition you can
It is obvious that the People’s Republic of China has campaigned against the United States in the same manner of ‘state sanctioned narcotic imperialism’ by pushing colony collapse payloads of Fentanyl across our borders. How often do we hear law enforcement leaders say that they seized enough Fentanyl to kill every person in a city, county, and even state?
Today, China stands to gain on both the legal and illicit sides of the cannabis trade. Rescheduling marijuana as a Schedule III substance will legitimize it in the 25 states that have resisted recreational cannabis as well as bring it into the legitimate recognized banking economy. In 1838, the Chinese knew the disabling harm it was causing their nation and society. Now we know, as they do it to us.
Please keep all of our peace officers in your prayers!
Roland Clee served a major Florida police department as a Community Service Officer for more than 26 years. His career included uniformed patrol, training, media relations, intelligence, criminal investigations, and chief’s staff. He writes the American Peace Officer newsletter, speaks at public safety, recruiting and leadership conferences and helps local governments and public safety agencies through his business, CommandStaffConsulting.com.
For media interviews and podcast appearances, click here: http://bit.ly/40pT3NS
References:
https://www.npr.org/2024/03/23/1240510436/marijuana-farms-are-increasingly-chinese-run-why
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S037687162500167X?via%3Dihub
https://www.dea.gov/drug-information/drug-scheduling
https://www.propublica.org/article/chinese-organized-crime-us-marijuana-market
https://www.amazon.com/Great-Terror-Reassessment-Robert-Conquest/dp/0195316991
https://gsp.yale.edu/case-studies/soviet-union
https://www.amazon.com/Maos-Great-Famine-History-Devastating/dp/0802779239
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/oct/17/mao-great-famine-china
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db522.htm
https://time.com/7023415/the-truth-about-fentanyl-essay/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/empire_seapower/opium_wars_01.shtml
Roland, I really appreciated your efforts on this issue. The connection to the history of the Opium Wars and today’s drug policy is a warning, not just a reminder, that addiction isn’t just a public health. It is also a geopolitical weapon. It reminded me of a podcast I did with John Nores, the retired game warden and author of Hidden War. We talked about how cartel-backed grow operations are thriving in California, even after legalization, often hidden in plain sight on public lands. The idea that legalization somehow eliminates the black market just doesn’t hold up. In many ways, it actually creates more opportunities for criminal enterprises to operate under the radar.
What’s even more concerning is the growing evidence that some of these operations are tied to foreign interests — including Chinese-backed grows recently uncovered in Maine. Those of us in law enforcement have been seeing this for well over a decade! Add to that the fact that precursor chemicals for meth and synthetic fentanyl have been flowing in from China through Mexico and Canada, and you start to see a much bigger picture. When marijuana is treated like a harmless Friday night joint, we ignore the reality: super-potent THC can trigger psychosis, especially in young men, and there’s no clear scientific consensus around its medicinal value. Legalization isn’t just a moral or recreational debate — it’s a complex issue involving public safety, national security, and youth mental health. Thanks for taking the time to dig into that.
https://www.amazon.com/Sparrow-Sings-Us-All/dp/B0FJ6FSQ2G
Chapter 13
The Opium Wars 2.0