Donald Trump wants battle plans drawn up, Tom Cotton has called for troops to be sent in, and Representatives Dan Crenshaw and Mike Waltz have introduced a bill to authorize the use of U.S. military force - the same kind of law that greenlit our endless "war on terror." So toward which country are the war drums beating? One of our closest allies, literally: Mexico.
The idea of launching military strikes in, and even sending troops to, Mexico to tackle the fentanyl crisis has gone from a fringe idea to one that's become increasingly embraced by the Republican Party. It's also an idea that goes against every lesson we've learned in the decades-long disaster that is our War on Drugs. The fentanyl crisis, like all drug crises, is a public health emergency demanding a public health response. Republican plans to start a futile shooting war over fentanyl include no provisions for proven programming to reduce demand for the drug, like opioid use disorder treatment, on this side of the border.
