Methamphetamines

Analysis from Stratfor.com

Methamphetamine production is on the rise in Mexico. More cost-effective to produce than other illicit drugs, meth presents distinct advantages to Mexico's criminal organizations: Unlike other drugs, it can be manufactured independent of environmental or climatic considerations. Equally advantageous is that it can be produced in small spaces on both small and industrial scales.

However, production is limited by the quality of precursor chemicals used and the integrity of the manufacturing process. These precursor chemicals are regulated to varying degrees around the world, though most of them can be legally obtained because they have licit, industrial applications. Therefore, in assessing the dynamics of Mexico's methamphetamine market, and by approximation the U.S. market, the legal regulations of precursor chemicals is critically important. The effectiveness of law enforcement to enforce the laws regulating these chemicals is likewise important, as is the manufacturer's ability to circumvent the laws in countries where precursor chemicals are obtained -- and in the countries where the final product is manufactured and sold.

Methamphetamine: An Introduction

Meth is a potent stimulant of the amphetamine drug class. It heightens alertness and activity, decreases appetite, induces euphoria and provokes overall feelings of increased personal power and strength. Its effects also last longer than other stimulants, such as cocaine. Meth can be fabricated into a pill, capsule, crystal or even a powder, which means the drug can be ingested, smoked, injected intravenously or snorted. The preferred method for most users is inhalation because the effects are instantaneous.

Meth has not always been illegal ...

Read more at Stratfor.com.

Ike on U.S. Strategy in Europe in the Second World War

Speaking as General Eisenhower on the U.S. military strategy in Europe in World War II ---

General Eisenhower

The first problem we were faced with in World War II, once we were officially in the war, was that it was a war in two widely separated theaters.  We were fighting both in Europe and in the Pacific.  Obviously, would could not fight in both places equally well at the same time.  We settled, however, almost immediately upon a “Europe-first” strategy, devoting the preponderance of our efforts in that theater while trying to use our remaining resources in such a way as to gain time and prevent further decay of our situation in the Pacific.

However, before we would really establish ourselves in the European theater, there was the problem of mobilizing a fighting force and figuring out where best to insert that force into the fight.  Working with our British allies, who shortly after our entry into the war felt themselves unready to embark upon a cross channel invasion of the continent straight into the enemies teeth, we worked out a way —operation TORCH — to help them push the Germans out of French and British territorial possessions on the continent of North Africa.  This required amphibious landings in Morocco and Algiers and a linking up with our British allies in Tunisia and a vast pincer movement against Rommel’s forces.  The operation took much longer and was far more costly than we would have liked, but it gave us tremendous battlefield experience and helped us reset our corps- and division-level leadership prior to undertaking further operations against the European mainland.

Having just been to the hospital, couldn't resist this ...

 

Favorite TV Shows of the Past: All in the Family

Those were the days!

 

Favorite TV Shows of the Past: The Beverly Hillbillies

Still watch re-runs whenever I can!

Europe First in WW2

Map of Europe showing divisions between
Allied and Axis powers

The “Europe First” strategy, derived from the ABC-1 Allied Staff Agreement of March 1941, recognized that the Axis center of gravity lay with Germany’s economic ability to prosecute the war with little to no reliance upon Italy or Japan. Therefore, the sooner—and heavier—that Allied warmaking capabilities were deployed to the European theater, the swifter would be the German defeat and the shorter the overall war.

There was dissention among FDR’s military chiefs over the practicality of a Europe-first strategy. Most disagreement stemmed from the psychological angle, meaning that it was the Japanese who actually attacked the nation, not the Germans, therefore we should dispose of the Japanese first. That was the thinking, more or less, of men like MacArthur, King, and Nimitz, to a certain extent. But their thinking was also influenced my military necessity in that, to fight even an economy of force action in the Pacific theater required resources and resources were not to be had in sufficient quantities because of the Europe-first strategy. Moreover, in actually executing the Europe-first plan, the U.S. went to Africa first relying upon the Soviet Union to bleed German Wehrmacht strength before undertaking an actual assault upon the European continent, and even then assaulting weaker Italy than the European mainland, and this almost a full year into the war since Pearl Harbor.

Favorite TV Shows of the Past: Gomer Pyle, USMC