The Border (Power of the Dog, #3)

by Don Winslow

If you asked the average citizen to name America’s longest war, he’d probably say Vietnam and then quickly amend it to Afghanistan, but the true answer is the war on drugs. Fifty years old and counting. It’s cost over a trillion dollars, and that’s only one part of the financial equation—the legitimate, “clean” money that goes for equipment, police, courts and prisons. But if we’re going to be really honest, Keller knows, we have to account for the dirty money, too. Tens of billions of drug dollars—in cash—go down to Mexico alone every year, so much cash they don’t even count it, they weigh it. It has to go somewhere, the narcos can’t stick it under their pillows or dig holes in their backyards. A lot of it is invested in Mexico, the estimate being that drug money accounts for 7 to 12 percent of the Mexican economy. But a lot of it comes back here—into real estate and other investments. Into banking and then out to legitimate businesses. It’s the dirty secret of the war on drugs—every time an addict sticks a needle into his arm, everyone makes money. We’re all investors. We’re all the cartel.