Drug running in the old days via airplane

[727Sky]

I was offered 25K in the 80s to make one run to Cancun and pick up a load of (???something??? 3x5 feet box wrapped in rubber) and do a kickout to a 42 foot ketch sail boat off of New Orleans on a particular bearing and distance. I grew up with the guy making the offer but never the less like I told him I have spent a lifetime getting my licenses and have no desire to get involved with the drug trade.

Maybe unrelated there was a pilot found with 7 bullet holes in his body, south Texas,...

25k was a lot of money back then but I would not cross that line...probably because I had worked for a division of NSA and did not want to get back into looking over my shoulder, watching, and waiting for something bad to happen either from our own people or some outside force.

This is one of the guys who made it big in the trade but payed a big price in the end.

[F2d5thCav]

The drug scene, following on the coattails of Prohibition, has played a huge role in enabling the massive corruption we now confront.

Cheers

[Ninurta]

The drug scene, following on the coattails of Prohibition, has played a huge role in enabling the massive corruption we now confront.

Cheers

Gene Hasenpfuss sure got in a world of hurt over it back in the '80s.

Prohibition of anything leads to corruption, as people who don't feel it should be prohibited will set up networks to make sure it isn't, and rake in big piles of cash while they do. Nearly ALL black markets are there because someone prohibited something, and other someones still demanded what was prohibited and were willing to pay for it. The Mob, Mafia, Organized Crime, whatever one wants to call it, got it's legs under it in a big way due to prohibitions, originally on alcohol, later of drugs, gambling, and prostitution. Without Prohibition, they would have remained small time.

Without the current drug prohibition, the Mexican cartels would still be small time. As it is, drug prohibition has given them the operating capital to branch out into human trafficking now.

Whenever ANYTHING gets prohibited, it opens a door for a lucrative black market, and there will always be people around who are willing to run the risks and exploit that market for cash. Drugs here, American blue jeans in the Soviet Union - any prohibition is a money-maker for someone, somewhere.

.

[BIAD]

...Drugs here, American blue jeans in the Soviet Union - any prohibition is a money-maker for someone, somewhere.

Not meaning to hijack the thread, but American jeans were a big-earner for Americans working here on the
North Sea oil-rigs. The'd have suitcases packed with them and sell them to British co-workers for a profit.
Further profit was obtained as they passed down the chain, but the limited access and the inflated cost in the
high street still made it worth it.

(Just to get the thread back on track, I think Tom Cruise's movie 'American Made' made a mockery
of the whole Barry Seal situation. The film came off as a half-comedy on a topic about drug-smuggling,
not quite the type of laughable material!)