The United States is intensifying its controversial overseas ‘war on drugs’ even as a prolonged government shutdown paralyses domestic policy, a combination that threatens to reshape the outlook for cannabis reform and regulation
This morning, news broke that the US military had carried out another series of airstrikes on alleged drug traffickers in the Eastern Pacific Ocean, bringing the total confirmed death toll to 57 since early September.
Authorised by President Trump and spearheaded by Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth, this so-called ‘war’ is now prompting concern among international leaders, and not just because of the flagrant breaches of international law.
‘War on Drugs’ 2.0
Germany’s Federal Drug Commissioner, Hendrik Streeck, told German publication BILD in an interview last week that the US government’s ‘tougher approach’ would likely lead criminal networks to ‘react with alternative routes, new transit countries and also new, usually even more potent substitutes’.
“For Germany, this would mean: There could be shifts in shipping routes, both sea and land, as well as in digital distribution. We already have highly dynamic structures of organised crime, especially on the internet. This could be further exacerbated by the announced ‘War on Drugs’ by the US government.”
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Streeck’s comments come as he and his new right-leaning government are pushing for renewed restrictions on cannabis in Germany, and the US’s actions are acting as rocket fuel for his cabinet’s prohibitionist rhetoric, reinforcing arguments that drug enforcement must again take precedence over reform.
The result is a shifting political climate in which cannabis regulation, once framed as a public-health and market-governance issue, risks being recast within a revived security narrative.
Conversely, Gustavo Petro, President of Colombia, has urged the United States to replace its prohibitionist drug policy with a regulated cannabis trade, proposing the legalisation and export of cannabis.
In a post on X, Petro said such reform would strengthen Colombia’s rural economy, support crop-substitution efforts and reduce the violence fuelled by the cocaine trade.
Citing the UN’s removal of cannabis from its most dangerous-substances list, he argued that legal trade and long-term US agricultural partnerships could offer a more effective alternative to militarised drug enforcement.
