New Miniseries Confronts Hypocrisy Of 'America's War On Drugs'

Screenshot via YouTube

America's War On Drugs confronts the hypocrisy of U.S. drug policy.

The History channel will be debuting its miniseries America's War On Drugs on Sunday and in anticipation of its release a clip centered around the creation of crack cocaine and Richard Donnell "Freeway Rick" Ross has dropped.

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The eight-minute long clip begins in Los Angeles, California, 1983 when Ross is introduced to drug trafficker Oscar Danilo Blandón. By now, Ross has become a major drug dealer in Los Angeles but is having a hard time finding enough cocaine to keep his dealings afloat. Blandón helps him with this problem by giving him large quantities of high-quality cocaine with an additional discount.

"My profit margin skyrocketed," Ross says. The video then transitions into Ross discovering crack cocaine and realizing he can profit even more by making the drug himself. "We went from making $300 a day, next thing we know, we're making $3 million a day [selling crack]...the rest is history," Ross says.

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Little does Ross know that Blandón, his supplier, is not only a former Nicaraguan official but a part of the CIA-backed Contra war to take down Nicaragua's Sandinista Junta of National Reconstruction government. The clip then further shows the relationship between CIA workers and Contra groups and workers, with former DEA Senior Official Phil Jordan recalling multiple cases where he arrested CIA contract workers that had cocaine, only for the charges against them to have been dismissed.

The clip also highlights how the spread of crack cocaine resulted in the destruction of black communities across the country, as the drug contributed to the mass incarceration of black people in America along with a number of other problems that are still present today.

Check out the clip below.