Solutions to Mission: Solutions to the Drug War

Description

Join GTSC for an exclusive book launch and conversation with Jake Braun, former White House and DHS official and author of Fentanyl: Fighting the Mass Poisoning of America and the Cartel Behind It. Uncover the untold story of America’s secret campaign against the Sinaloa Cartel and its Chinese chemical suppliers with a rare inside look at how the U.S. government built a coordinated counter-fentanyl strategy that saved lives and reshaped national security policy. 

The evening will feature a book talk and panel discussion with current and former law enforcement, intelligence, and policy leaders, exploring how cyber tools, intelligence integration, and international cooperation are transforming the fight against global cartels. This event will dive into the intersection of cybersecurity, national security, and counter-narcotics policy—and ask what’s next in the ongoing battle against fentanyl and transnational crime.

Fentanyl is a first-person, insider account of how the crisis consumed the Biden Administration amid a series of other national security emergencies. It follows Jake Braun, a senior White House official, and his colleagues while they scramble to respond to the epidemic. As Mexican cartels ruthlessly executed their most radical transformation in 50 years, Braun and his colleagues architected the first U.S. government wide strategy to combat fentanyl in history.

The effort brought him to Mexico to meet with Mexican agents who kick down cartel doors for the U.S. government there. He also spent time with data analytics wizards buried in nondescript offices in Virginia suburbs that hunt down Chinese fentanyl precursor chemicals on the Dark Web. He even takes a detour to gather intelligence from Russian migrants in U.S. detention facilities that migrated through cartel-controlled areas of Mexico. In the process, Braun uncovered the remarkable transformation cartels in Mexico underwent over the last 50 years. They morphed from narco-empires the size of Fortune 50 companies specializing in marijuana and cocaine to ones specializing in human migration and, separately, fentanyl.

Buy the book here.