The Powers That Narcotised the World: China, the USA, and Iran

In a world where wars are fought not only with missiles but with white powders and lethal pills, three powers emerge as the invisible architects of global chaos: the United States, China, and Iran. While Latin America bleeds in rivers of violence and corruption, these nations extract economic, strategic, and political benefits from drug trafficking. According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) World Drug Report 2025, global illicit drug use reached 316 million people in 2023—an all-time high, up 6% from 2010—with an estimated market value of $150 billion annually.

But behind these figures lies a brutal asymmetry: the US consumes, China manufactures the ingredients, and Iran finances proxy wars. Countries like Mexico, Colombia, and Venezuela act as mere "workshops" in this chain, absorbing 80% of the deaths (over 100,000 homicides a year in the region) while profits flow North and East.

This article unravels how these powers "narcotised" the world, prioritising geopolitical interests over human lives.

United States: The Insatiable Engine of Demand

The United States did not invent drug trafficking, but it fuels it like no other. With 47.7 million illicit drug users in 2023 (17% of the adult population), the US accounts for 40-50% of the global demand for cocaine and synthetic opioids like fentanyl, which caused 107,000 fatal overdoses in that year alone.

The UNODC World Drug Report 2025 makes it clear: North America leads in cocaine consumption (23 million global users, with the US capturing the bulk) and opioids (60 million, driven by the fentanyl crisis).

This "narco-dependency" has historical roots. In the 1980s, during the Iran-Contra scandal, the CIA tolerated alliances with Mexican cartels such as the Guadalajara Cartel (led by Rafael Caro Quintero) to finance the Nicaraguan Contras, generating an internal conflict with the DEA that still resonates.

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Today, fentanyl—imported via Mexico—is an asymmetric weapon: it weakens American society while cartels like the CJNG generate billions. But the impact rebounds in Latin America: Colombia produces 70% of global cocaine (1,738 tonnes in 2023), and Mexico processes 90% of fentanyl for the US market, leaving a toll of 30,000 annual homicides in Mexico alone.

The US spends $50 billion annually on the "war on drugs," yet its rampant consumption perpetuates the cycle. As a 2025 DEA report ironically stated, "demand is the true king of the narco."

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China: The Chemical Laboratory of Global Poison

If the US is the consumer, China is the indispensable supplier. Beijing dominates 90% of the global market for chemical precursors for synthetics like fentanyl and methamphetamines, exporting thousands of tonnes annually that are converted into 13 billion lethal doses.

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In October 2025, the Canada Border Services Agency seized 4,300 litres of Chinese precursors en route to illicit laboratories, sufficient for a massive fentanyl "bomb."

Although China regulated fentanyl in 2019 following diplomatic pressure from the US, loopholes persist: companies like Hubei Aoks Bio-Tech were accused in February 2025 by ICE of exporting 11 kg of precursors to the US between 2016 and 2023, capable of producing millions of doses.

A 2024 US Congressional report (updated in 2025) indicates that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) indirectly subsidises this chemical industry—which grew 15% in illicit exports in 2024—as a geopolitical tool to weaken its US rival.

The link with Latin America is direct: these precursors arrive at Mexican ports (Manzanillo, Lázaro Cárdenas) to be processed by cartels, which pay with cocaine that returns to Asia. In 2025, the value of these flows exceeded $5 billion, enriching Beijing while sowing death in Sinaloa and Guerrero.

China denies complicity—even boasting of its "positive role" in global drug governance—but the reality is that its chemical industry is the "chemical heart" of the narco trade.

Iran: The Shadow Financier of Proxies and Chaos

Iran, strangled by sanctions, has turned drug trafficking into a lifeline for its proxy network, such as Hezbollah, laundering billions that finance operations in the Middle East and beyond. While not the "main investor" in production, Tehran facilitates routes for Afghan opium and Captagon (synthetic amphetamine) to Europe and the Gulf, generating up to $1 billion annually for Hezbollah.

In Latin America, the connection is deep: since 2005, Venezuela under Maduro has been a "bridge" for Hezbollah networks in the Triple Frontier (Argentina-Brazil-Paraguay), allied with Mexican cartels like Los Zetas and the CJNG to move cocaine to Africa and Europe.

In 2025, post-Gaza conflict, Hezbollah doubled its narco operations in the region to offset losses, according to testimonies before the US Congress. The Venezuelan "Cartel de los Soles" launders Iranian funds in exchange for protection, while Iran uses these flows to destabilise rivals like Saudi Arabia via Captagon.

The US Treasury Department sanctioned Iranian networks in 2024-2025 for $2 billion in narco-oil laundering, with Mexico and Venezuela as key nodes.

For Iran, the drug trade is pure geopolitics: it weakens the US (via fentanyl) and empowers allies in Eurasia, all at the expense of Latin American stability.

Latin America: The Collateral Victim in the Great Web

The price is paid by Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Venezuela, and Argentina: economies captured by organised crime, with a GDP loss of 3.5% annually due to narco-violence, according to the World Bank in 2025.

In Panama, 117 tonnes of cocaine were seized in 2024 (10% of the regional total), but Colombian production rose 20% under Petro, feeding the cycle.

US air strikes in the Caribbean in 2025 killed 70 civilians without denting traffic, confirming that the "war" is ineffective without targeting demand and precursors.

Conclusion: Breaking the Cycle?

China, the US, and Iran compete head-on—in trade, missiles, and sanctions—but they "unite" in the shadow of the narco trade, a market that exploits global crises like post-pandemic instability and wars in Ukraine and Gaza.

Solutions such as decriminalisation in the US (Oregon has already tried) or stricter Chinese regulations could dismantle this triad, but geopolitics complicates matters. Meanwhile, Latin America calls for a new paradigm: treating the drug trade as a public health issue, not a war. How long will these powers continue to "narcotise" the world?