Book List Of Mexican Drug War History

a chronological syllabus, interspersed with handy data markers

You need to read all these by June.

Just kidding.

I know that I don’t have to read all of these books by June, either. I’ve already read them. That’s how I know they’re good enough to recommend. The books that provide the most crucial history have their pages highlighted in bold. They make the most sense when they’re read in order, but feel free to skip around. Some of you may already realize that you have to read all of a book in order to really get the full impact. If you don’t realize that, you should give it a try.

Setting the Scene (background and context, for serious students only)

2013 Home Grown: Marijuana and the Origins of Mexico’s War on Drugs, by Isaac Campos

2004 Strength Of The Wolf, by Douglas Valentine

1961 The Murderers, by Henry Anslinger

Dawn Of The Epidemic: Illicit Drug Use By American Youth Explodes

1974 Weed: Adventures Of A Dope Smuggler, by Jerry Kamstra

1975 The Frisco Kid, by Jerry Kamstra

( Jerry Kamstra passed away in 2019, at the age of 83. Rest In Peace, Jerry. https://scmemorial.com/tribute/details/2205/Jerry-Kamstra/obituary.html

https://millvalleylit.com/jerry-kamstra-reflections/ )

The 1980s Pandemic: Illicit Drugs Become Big Business

Total world trade, 1980: $1 trillion; amount missing from final accounting, -$100 billion. (R.T. Naylor, Hot Money and the Politics of Debt)

Summed global trade goods “deficit with the man on the moon”, 1977: -$30 billion; in 1984, -$110 billion. (Beaty & Gwynne, Outlaw Bank.)

1983 Outlaws in Babylon: Shocking True Adventures on the Marijuana Frontier, by Steve Chapple

1986 The Underground Empire, by James Mills

1991 Buried Secrets: A True Story of Drug Running, Black Magic, and Human Sacrifice, by Edward Humes

1991 Cocaine Politics: Drugs and Armies in Central America, by Peter Dale Scott

1990 Deep Cover, by Michael Levine The Betrayal Of Michael Levine

1985 Fatal Dreams, by Joanne Bario

1988 Desperados: Latin Druglords, U.S. Lawmen, and the War America Can't Win, by Elaine Shannon

2004 Down By The River: Drugs, Money, Murder, and Family, by Charles Bowden

The 21st Century Endemic Illicit Drug Economy

2011 Murder City, by Charles Bowden

[ Charles Bowden passed away in 2014, at the age of 69. He was the best and hardest journalist and historian working in the English language. His Wiki entry indcates that he wrote nearly 40 volumes of nonfiction creative journalism, poetry, investigative reporting, and diligent chronicler of the natural history of his local bioregion in the American Southwest. Bowden spent a lot of time in bat caves, when he wasn’t hiking and birdwatching. Bowden also spent a lot of time with a price on his head, pursuing leads like interviewing penitent professional assassins with ties to the police or the military. Anyone who enjoys the writing of Hunter Thompson should hear the high wild sound of some familiar literary notes and chords in the writing of Charles Bowden, struck somewhat more subtly. (Considering the frequency of Thompson getting name his checked and praised, nearly 20 years after his departure, sometimes I think he’s the only nonfiction journalist that many Americans have ever read.)

Readers looking for an introduction to Charles Bowden’s investigative journalism should start with Murder City, from 2011. This book should be read from page one, page by page in order, all the way through. Make the time. It’s Charles Bowden at his most gonzo. It’s also a well-researched, facts & data-heavy book. ]

2011 El Narco: Inside Mexico’s Criminal Insurgency, by Ioan Grillo

2016 A Narco History: How the United States and Mexico Jointly Created the "Mexican Drug War", by Carmen Bulluosoa and Mike Wallace

2007 The Gangs of Los Angeles, by William Dunn

2015 Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic, by Sam Quinones

2017 Gangster Warlords: Drug Dollars, Killing Fields, and the New Politics of Latin America, by Ioan Grillo

( On order: The Dope: The Real History of the Mexican Drug Trade, by Benjamin T. Smith, published 2021. )