Letters to the Editor: Is military action really the most efficient way to help American drug users?

To the editor: President Trump is threatening to attack Venezuela and apparently considering the same for Colombia, supposedly because it supplies cocaine to U.S. citizens (“In Colombia, anger and disbelief at Trump threats of U.S. strikes,” Dec. 3). Cocaine use is a problem for many people and drug addiction can ruin a person’s life. But is using the military the right answer?

According to the 2024 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, about 1.5% of Americans ages 12 or over (4.3 million people) used cocaine in the prior year. How much are we spending to help these people?

Mark Cancian, a senior defense advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, recently told the Washington Post that it can cost as much as $8.4 million per day to operate an aircraft carrier. The USS Gerald R. Ford entered Latin American waters on Nov. 16, along with a number of destroyers. Per Cancian’s estimate, 20 days of operating the aircraft might come in at around $168 million. Each strike, meanwhile, costs hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Could there be a cheaper way to help cocaine users directly? Or, further, is this even our biggest problem? What about the leading cause of youth death in the U.S. — which is firearms, not cocaine? Why is stopping cocaine use apparently more important than saving children?

The cost to completely destroy cocaine trafficking from Venezuela and Colombia via naval operations could be considerable — and I don’t think it will diminish demand here or stop this drug from being trafficked from other countries.

Using the military to solve domestic problems is wildly expensive, risks our soldiers’ lives and, given the legally dubious nature of these strikes, risks our military leaders’ careers as well.

Barbara Snider, Huntington Beach