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[charango playing]

Welcome to Bolivia...

...one of the most awe-inspiring
countries on the planet.

From ragged snow-capped peaks...

...to pristine salt flats.

From sweltering
Amazon jungles...

...to bustling city streets.

It's a landlocked nation
full of colour...

...vibrant cultures...

...and stark contrast.

I first came to Bolivia in 1999.

I'd just completed
my law degree,

and backpacking
around South America

seemed like the perfect reward

before returning home
to wear a suit and tie.

Instantly,
I was enthralled by the country,

its people and its culture.

I had no idea that this trip

would lead me
to writing my first book,

and change the course
of my life for good.

Despite its sublime beauty,

Bolivia has a darker side.

In the Yungas region,

close to the world's
highest major city, La Paz...

...you will find the source
of Bolivia's most famous export.

Coca.

The coca leaf,

hailed locally
for its medicinal qualities,

has been cultivated
in these rich, fertile soils

for four centuries.

But coca is better known
in the West

for being the base ingredient
of cocaine.

They say
the highest grade leaves

make the highest grade cocaine.

And Bolivian coca
is the finest on the planet.

Back when I was travelling
through Bolivia,

I heard a strange rumour
along the Gringo Trail...

...that you could buy
the very best cocaine -

the best of the best -

in La Paz's San Pedro prison.

I was told,
"Just ask for Thomas."

Thomas McFadden
was born in Tanzania

but grew up in the UK.

Raised in a broken home,
he had very few prospects.

So he made a career
all of his own...

...as an international
drug smuggler.

I think I was addicted
to trafficking.

but later I was excited.

For me,
trafficking is like a game.

And then
you have to outsmart them.

It's like a funny game.

Hey, man!

Hey!

-Hey, man.
-Hey, mi hermano.

How are you, brother? Good man.

-Como estas?
-Excelente!

-Yeah?
-And you?

Thomas smuggled drugs
all over the world,

including from Bolivia.

He planned each run meticulously

to make sure
he'd never get caught...

...which worked just fine,

until a customs official
he had bribed double-crossed him

and miraculously discovered
five kilos of cocaine

hidden in the spines
of his suitcases.

He was incarcerated
in San Pedro prison,

the most bizarre penitentiary
system in the world.

-No, that is Palmar.
-That's Palmar.

-That's Cancha.
-Cancha.

-San Martin.
-San Martin.

-Guanay.
-Guanay.

And behind us is Alamos.

Alamos, Pinos.

Pinos.

And over there -
over there is La Posta.

La Posta.

La Posta, where all the rich
politicians hang out, yeah?

San Pedro is a bustling
micro-community...

...hidden behind 15-metre walls.

Amazingly,
there are no guards inside.

The prisoners
don't wear uniforms.

And they live with their wives,
children and pets.

And they make their own rules.

Inmates have to buy
their own cells...

...which they afford
by taking jobs

and starting small businesses.

So, how are you feeling now,
being on top

of almost the highest point
in San Pedro prison?

I never thought about
being here again.

Yeah, this is incredible.

The first day when I arrived,
I got there at night.

So I went to one building.

I fell asleep,
because I was really tired.

When I woke up in the morning,

I found myself
like I was in the village.

I said, "Fuck! Hey!"

I could see the women,

markets, children going around.

I thought maybe I was in a dream
where I was taken to prison.

For me, it was a crazy system,
you know.

I had to pay for the cabbie
from the courthouse to prison.

And then you have to buy
your own house, you know.

There were, like, five sections,

so you had to choose the section
you were going to live in.

They used to have five-star,
four-star,

three-star, up to one-star.

So that is dependent
on how much money you've got.

It doesn't depend on your crime.

Thomas, what was
different when you were here?

Yeah, you know,
I used to have my bed here.

-Bed here?
-Yeah.

Wardrobe.

I used to put a TV
on the top of the wardrobe.

I used to have a...

...dining table with six chairs.

Oh, this was your dining...
your living room?

Yeah, my living room, you know.

Later, I had to do
some improvements,

so I made a kitchen
just to make myself comfortable,

because I knew I was going
to be here for a long time.

Because my sentence, it was...

it was about
between 18 to 30 years.

If they give you trafficking,

it means you are going
to be facing 18 to 30 years.

Eighteen to 30 years
for trafficking five kilograms?

Trafficking, yeah.

And you're stuck in this prison?

Yeah.

-Let's go, man.
-Yeah.

Initially, Thomas made a modest
living working in a shop,

until he hit on the idea

of running guided tours through
the prison for backpackers,

which is when we first met.

Remember that first time when
I came on that tour with you?

Yeah, I remember.

First went in there,
I was scared, right?

I was really...
I was not scared-scared,

but I was like, "This is crazy."

And then you were there,
and you were like, "Hey, Rusty!"

Shook hands.

"That's a lovely name.
Nice to meet you."

Yeah, I think...

there were some connections
between us, you know.

The time when we were there,
you know, I met a lot of people.

Word of the tours
spread quickly,

earning Thomas
an honourable mention

in the Lonely Planet guidebook.

I used to have, like,
50 to 70 visitors a day,

Some of them,
they were spending a night.

Some of them, they spent a week,
month together.

You can have lines,
cokes, drinks.

Just to have some experience,
you know.

Some of them,
they never tried coke.

They had never seen
the coke factory before.

But inside the prison,

they used to have a chance
to see how to make coke.

Brothers.

"Brothers."

If I tell
the story of San Pedro,

you might think
it's a piece of cake,

but it's not, you know.

A lot of stabbings
happen over there,

so it's dangerous as well,
you know.

Although the kids and the women,
they are living over there.

I know many people.

Some of them,
they were a friend of mine,

and they got stabbed to death
over there.

But I can say that I was lucky

to be sent over there
to San Pedro,

because I had
a huge experience as well.

I met nice people
and I found my brother, Rusty.

I had time also to think
about my life, you know.

I came out as a better person.

I was trying to pressure them
to make them think

that I was an international
human rights lawyer

so that they
would find you innocent.

You were guilty
of the first charges,

but innocent of the second?

-Yeah, I was innocent.
-Innocent.

Thomas's story
was so incredible,

I knew I had to write it.

So we came to an agreement.

Thomas would let me stay
in his cell for four months,

interviewing him
about his crazy experiences.

And in return,

I promised to do
everything in my power

to get him out of there.

So with help from
Thomas's backpacker friends,

I raised enough money
to bribe three judges

and secure Thomas's freedom.

So I went into
the judges' chambers,

and I sat down
in front of the judges.

I'm like, "Here's your money.

Here it is, 4,000 dollars."

-Yeah.
-"See you later."

-Yeah.
-And I just walked out.

Breaking the terms
of his parole,

we fled across the border
and headed north to Colombia.

It was here that I finished

writing our book,Marching Powder.

Eventually, Thomas
moved back to Tanzania.

But I stayed on in South America
for the next seven years,

and unexpectedly found myself
working for the US government

in a counter-terrorism programme
set up to tackle kidnapping

and organised crime.

During that time, I immersed
myself in the cocaine trade,

meeting members
of terrorist organizations,

as well as the US
and Colombian elite soldiers

fighting against them.

I witnessed first-hand
the devastating impact

that trafficking has had
on Central and South America.

And as I set off on a journey

deep into the region's
dark underbelly,

I uncovered stories
from key players

who prospered during
the so-called golden age

of drug trafficking.

People from
both sides of the law,

who were there from the
very beginning of the drugs war,

and who might also hold the key
as to how it will all end.

Theirs were stories
of corruption, daring,

revenge and death.

Legends of the Wildlands.

So, how do we begin?
Well, how else?

By tracking down the man

who got America hooked
on cocaine in the first place.

George Jung
is arguably the world's

most famous drug smuggler,

immortalised by Johnny Depp's
portrayal of him

in the major Hollywood movieBlow.

Which was quite fitting, really,

as George certainly lived
a blockbuster lifestyle,

all the while, helping to create

the most famous drug cartel
in history.

You know, like, total freewill

is to wander naked
into a dark forest

with no thought of return.

I lived that my whole life.

I failed a lot.

And I succeeded...

...only because...

I kept... refused to fail.

-Hi, darling.
-How are you?

-You're magnificent.
-Thank you.

Yes, aren't you
a beautiful creature?

You make me believe in God.

-I wasn't very studious.
-OK.

All right? I played football.

I played sports

and I majored in cheerleaders.

You know, I was obsessed with...

with girls, and then became
obsessed with women.

My ultimate goal
was to graduate from college,

and I majored in marketing,

and I was going to go
into the advertising

and promotional industry.

How did you start
getting into marijuana?

Well, my friend Tuna
had been kicked out of school

for taking his clothes off.

And I said, "Let's get
the hell out of here."

He said, "Where do you want
to go?" I said, "California."

It was like a sandbox...

...surrounded by the most
beautiful women in the world.

I'd never even seen a bikini
before, for Christ's sake.

They don't wear bikinis
in Boston.

Right?

We just looked at each other.

We knew we had found paradise.

But the problem was:

how are we going to survive
in this paradise?

What happened
is that my friend from Boston

stopped at my house
in Manhattan Beach.

We had a punchbowl full of pot.

Everybody did.

You just rolled your own joint
and life went on.

And... he said,

"Holy shit.
Where did you get this?"

And I said,

"You buy it
right here on the beach

for, like, 60 dollars a kilo."

And he said, "Do you know
how much this costs

back at
University of Massachusetts?"

And I said, "What, Frank?"

And he said, "300 dollars."

And I said...

..."You know what?
Let's go into business."

There wasn't even a Drug
Enforcement Agency until 1974.

A lot of people
don't even know that.

And nobody knew
what the hell was going on.

It was simple.

We would just take
all this marijuana...

...to my ex-high school buddies

and give them
a whole motorhome full of pot,

and they would just keep
bringing the money

and the money and the money.

And... I became bored.

We're like fucking merchants,
for Christ's sake.

Let's be pirates.

Let's go down to Mexico
and get our own fucking pot.

Let's get airplanes
and let's move our own pot.

Let's get it
at fucking five dollars a kilo

and bring it all the way
to the United States

and fucking sell it
and have a good time.

[waves lapping onto shore]

You know what I mean?

There are very few people

that get involved
in the drug business

to make a profit
and get the hell out.

But it's no longer about
the business.

It's the ego,

the arrogance, the women -

the whole goddamn thing.

And eventually,
some son of a bitch -

whether you screw his wife

or he gets caught
for some other stupidity -

is going to tell on you.

You're saying, if you go
into the drug business,

you're doomed from the start?

Right.

I got arrested
for the marijuana,

and then I was sentenced
to Danbury Federal Prison...

...for five years.

And so...

...the gods of chaos

placed me in a cell
with a Colombian.

Carlos Enrique Lehder.

And he said...

..."Do you know anything
about cocaine?"

And I said, "No, tell me."

And he said,

"The first thing
I'm going to tell you

is that it costs 60,000 a kilo
in the United States of America,

and we can get it for,
like, 10,000."

And, like, I said...

My eyes started spinning like...

you know,
and they grew wider and wider.

Hundreds and millions
and billions of fucking dollars.

My mind is just going crazy.

Carlos and I became,
of course, very, very close.

I said, "I can get it
across the border."

He said, "How will you do it?"

I said,
"I'll use the same concept I did

getting marijuana
out of Mexico."

He's also, at this stage,
a member of the Medellín Cartel?

It wasn't really a cartel then.

-OK.
-I mean...

So these guys are a bunch of...

sort of local criminals
in Medellín, Colombia,

but they're not really
exporting cocaine yet.

But they have seen
the market potential,

and you come along, and you go,

"I know
how to get it into the States

and I know
how to distribute it."

They didn't know how...
how to get it across the border.

And I told them.

I said, "I'll move
fucking tonnes of this shit."

"I'll get it across."

And I said, "I have connections
to unload it, too."

And I brought it out
to the guy,

the barber, Richard.

And I said,
"Don't ever cut this shit.

Just send it the way it is."

And I said, "You know everybody
in fucking Hollywood."

I said, "Take it to those people
and fucking sell it to them

for 60,000 dollars
a fucking kilo."

So your first clients
of your hairdresser friend

were basically
people with money, right?

-Right.
-Famous celebrities.

Poor people
couldn't buy cocaine then.

Only rich people bought cocaine.

He came back,
like, six or seven hours,

and he said, "Holy shit.

Go get more."

-It just went straightaway?
-I don't...

It was serendipity.

It was something...

...that just
was waiting to happen,

and somebody to make it happen.

And I just happened to be there.

You just happened to be the guy

who introduced
the Medellín Cartel

to the United States of America,

which started an absolute...

-Insanity.
-...epidemic.

Miami is one of
the principal branch offices

for what can be called
Cocaine Inc -

a huge international business

run by a relatively small band
of smugglers

operating out of Colombia.

I tried to teach them about...

...quality and quantity.

And I said,
"Bring it in in small amounts

and keep it
at a super-high price."

So your business model
was to keep it small

and keep the demand high -

supply low, price high.

-Right.
-That's your model.

And what did they want to do?

It turned into a monster,

a monster, like everything else.

You know?

They just wanted to flood
the market? What did they want?

Everybody and their brother
caught onto the game.

Once they knew
what the game was,

we couldn't stop it,

and it just became
a complete fucking monster.

I would bring 250 kilos
and a motorhome,

OK, at 10,000 a kilo.

"Here's the keys to it. Take it.

And when you bring back
their money,

I'll give you the keys
to the second motorhome

and the other 250 kilos."

So how much money
were you making in these days?

Shitloads -
150,000-200,000 a month.

-A month?
-Yeah.

How do you spend your money
when you're making that much?

You think you're a real slick
son of a bitch, all right?

You're the ultimate playboy
of the universe.

That's what you do.

Obviously there's a point where
you've got so much money that,

you know, you're not doing this
any more because of money.

Why--

Because something
happens to you.

Something happens,
and you find out...

...a truth about yourself...

...that you were never really
doing it for the money.

The money was just a tool.

You loved the game.

The game was your opiate.

You were addicted to fear.

And without that fear
and challenging it...

...you had no self-satisfaction
at all in your life.

You know what? I was...

...the guy...

...the athlete
who lost the step...

...and was old.

And you can throw
1,000 touchdown passes

and get all the accolades
in the world, or whatever.

When you lose that step...

...they boo you.

But you don't care
that they boo you.

You just want to play the game

because... you love the game.

And I knew that I had lost
the step and I was out.

I didn't belong
in that game any more.

And I just wanted to play it...

...one more... once.

My best friend...

...once upon a time, Cliff...

...we did everything.

We did dozens of...
hundreds of fucking trips.

We did everything.
We were like brothers.

And he walks
in a hotel room with...

...fucking two DEA agents...

...undercover.

I mean,
I'm going to tell you something,

and this is
the God's honest truth.

Seventy-five percent
into this whole thing...

...I got really bad
fucking vibes.

And I looked in Cliff's eyes
and I said...

..."You would never fucking
set me up, would you, Cliff?"

And he said, "No. Why?"

And you know what?

I knew he was going to do it,

but yet I... I played it out.

I... just wanted
to be free of it all.

And I found a freedom in it.

I found a freedom.

I wrote the goddamn book...

...and I found myself.

After a long time,

after thousands of years
of looking for myself,

I found myself.

And I'm at peace.

I'm at peace.

I was looking for me
a long time.

George was a philosophical
thrill seeker,

but unfortunately, his lifelong
love affair with drugs

meant that he'd always have one
foot inside the jailhouse door.

After Jung's arrest,
he was sentenced to 60 years,

but that was reduced to just 20

when he agreed to testify
against Carlos Lehder,

his friend from prison

and the man who had introduced
him to Pablo Escobar.

Lehder cofounded
the Medellín Cartel with Escobar

in the 1970s.

This small outfit
of street thugs

quickly became
one of the world's

highest earning businesses,

bringing in upwards
of 25 billion dollars a year.

They now needed hardworking,
respectable-looking people

to fill middle management
positions.

So Lehder,

and one of the cartel's
US money men, Alvaro Triana,

tried to persuade
a childhood friend, Carlos Toro,

to take one of
the more legitimate posts

within the business.

But could this educated,
law-abiding man be swayed?

Carlos had approached you
a number of times

to join his organisation,
and you had said no.

-I said no.
-What made you change your mind?

Greed.

That's a hard question
to answer.

I was... I had a good job.

I was making a decent living,

middle class in New York City.

I had an apartment
on Lexington and 82nd Street.

I was young, I was single.

It was a good life.
It was a good life.

But every now and then,

when Carlos sent me his private
airplane to LaGuardia Airport,

and I went there
to spend a weekend...

...I landed
on a different planet.

It was red carpet.

It was millionaires,

beautiful women...

...marijuana, cocaine.

It was fun.

I wanted it.

Trust me.
I'm not going to lie to you.

I wanted that kind of living.

But I was scared to death.

And I told Carlos many times...

..."I won't do it because
I'm afraid to get caught."

"I will not join you,

only because I don't want
any part of cocaine.

I don't want to be caught
with cocaine.

I don't want to be part of
the cocaine, the product itself.

It scares the shit out of me."

What broke the deal,

and why I accepted the deal,

is because Carlos said to me -
through Alvaro Triana -

"You will be
our public relations manager."

My job description
was very simple.

You are to go
anywhere you want to.

We are going to provide you
with an airplane and a pilot,

and you go and find us
landing strips.

You go and tell
heads of government

to let us land in your country.

I would travel to Mexico City
quite often,

and I would meet with
heads of the military.

I would travel
to the United States,

and then we would hire
people inside the FAA,

Federal Aviation Administration,
that we were paying.

It was those people in the FAA

that would let us know...

where the DEA was nearby,

so we would, you know,

reroute, or land,
or airdrop the loads.

So that was my job.

And...

...Carlos kept his promise.

I was never involved in cocaine.

And the thing was
that I was in denial.

I was not a criminal.

No, I was
a public relations manager.

And my plan was short-term,
to myself and to my wife.

I said, "Look, honey,

it's going to be
just six months to a year."

"We make 2 million dollars...
we're done."

That was my goal.

But you didn't leave.

Oh, I left.

But when I left...

...it was under
very strange circumstances.

After three years in the cartel,

Carlos's relationship with his
increasingly erratic employers

began to sour.

Carlos discovered that Triana
was helping himself to the money

that he needed
to pay his pilots.

Unable to carry out his job
effectively, Carlos wanted out.

All he asked for
was the money he was owed.

In those days,
they owed me 1,525,000 dollars.

But every week
I was calling Triana.

"Where's my money?"

"Where's my money?
Where's my money?"

He would hang up on me.

One day, I ran into his brother.

And I said, "Look, tell him
that on my father's grave...

...I would never have snitched
on him or any of you,

but you give me my money."

Archie calls me an hour later.

"Carlos. Hey, buddy,
I've got some money for you.

I'm going to send so-and-so,
this gentleman.

Meet him at a bar."

"At 7 o'clock tonight,
he's giving you the money,

the 100,000 dollars
I'm sending."

"And with that, give me a week;
I'll give you the rest."

I went there.

I said, "Monstruo,
how much is in here?"

He said, "100,000 dollars."

"OK, thanks. Bye."

I put the money in my car
and I went to my office.

So I went in, put the light on,
and I opened the bag.

There was nothing
but newspapers...

...and maybe 200 dollars
in one-dollar bills on top.

And I went nuts.

I opened the safe,

I pulled out a revolver
and I went to Archie's house.

Fortunately,
the garage was open.

I drove right in.

His maid, Juliana,
came up to the garage.

She saw me and she panicked.

I said to her,
"Where is that son of a bitch?"

He was sitting in a chair,

drinking a glass
of Scotch and ice.

He turned around and he said,

"Who the fuck do you think
you are, coming into my house?

You don't work for me any more,"
blah-blah-blah.

And I had the bag with me,
and I threw it at his face.

The dollar bills
flew all over the place.

He picked up an Uzi machine gun.

Right then and there,

I had never used a gun.

I had never been trained
to use the gun.

I pulled my revolver.
I shot three times.

I just... panicked.

His chair flips over
and falls back.

His bodyguard comes in,

and he's pointing
the shotgun at me.

And I pulled the gun on him
and I said,

"We all die here. We all die.

Please don't use it.
We're all going to die here."

His own bodyguard says,

"Carlos, finish the job, man.
Finish it."

I couldn't.

I couldn't. So I jump on him.

He's trying to talk,

but he doesn't realise
that his jaw is kind of hanging.

I called him up and said,

"I need you here right away."

"I don't know if he's alive,
but he's going to die.

He's bleeding.
Get your ass in here."

The doctor comes up.

He says, "Carlos, we've
got to get him to hospital."

I said, "Are you kidding?"

So I called my pilot.

I said, "I need to get him
to hospital in Colombia."

I fell to my knees,

praying to that God
that I had abandoned.

I find out through my family
in Colombia

that Archie was at
La Soma Hospital in Medellín,

that he made it.

At that moment,

I didn't care for that
1,527,000 dollars owed to me.

You were just happy
your childhood friend was alive.

And that I was alive.

So I called Carlos
and I sent him a message.

"It's OK."

"It's OK. We're done."

If only it were that easy.

All Carlos wanted was
to return to an ordinary life,

but that was not to be.

He soon found himself
locked in a police cell,

interrogated for 16 hours
about the horrific murder

of a 21-year-old woman he knew.

"Her body was found three blocks
from here to your house,

decapitated,

with 27 stab wounds,

and left in the trunk
of her car.

And from what
we have investigated,

you may have been the last
person that saw her alive."

So, you know,
they're trying to break me.

And they broke me to a point,
and this is what I said,

and it was recorded.

"I'll tell you what...

...to show my honesty,

I confess that I have done some
things wrong in the past.

Like, I helped my friend,
Carlos Lehder,

with some aviation things.

That's the worst
that I have ever done."

I don't know why I said that.

So you have worked
for the Medellín Cartel,

you've kept your mouth shut
for years and years,

without any trouble whatsoever,

you've shot someone,
you've kept your mouth shut,

you kept your cool,

and then something happens
that you didn't even do,

and you start talking
about drug trafficking.

I'm into
my 16-hour interrogation...

OK, so you're tired.

That's what
my attorney called...

..."a confession under duress".

OK.

After letting slip
his former involvement

with the Medellín Cartel,

the murder enquiry
was conveniently dropped.

Carlos was now facing

serious drug trafficking
charges instead.

Desperate to avoid prison,
he made a deal,

offering to turn
on his ex-colleagues

and help the DEA go after
his old friend Carlos Ledher.

It was a trade.
It was a negotiation.

So it was a give and take.

I had given something.
What was in it for me?

And I was waiting
for what was in it for me.

I knew that Carlos Lehder,
at this very moment,

is the most wanted man.

Carlos has left Colombia and
is hiding in the Chilean jungle.

So you are potentially facing
a prison sentence

for drug...

-15 years mandatory.
-15 years mandatory.

And the DA are offering you
to go undercover

in order to bust the guy
that you had a falling out with.

What were you...?

What was your reasoning process
at this point?

What were you feeling?

So there were two elements

that made me feel strong about
my decision to help the DA.

One, Carlos was disloyal to me.

He was my friend, my brother,
my school chum,

but he was the guy that ordered
Triana to kill me.

He crossed me.

So there wasn't loyalty
anymore.

And number two,

I want to spend the rest
of my life with my family.

By agreeing to testify
against Lehder,

Carlos thought the DEA
would then let him go.

But George Jung got there first.

Jung's testimony
was enough to convict Lehder

without Carlos ever needing
to take the stand.

His face was kept
out of the papers,

and the DEA
found a new use for him -

as an undercover informant.

I'm sitting at my house

in the United States.

The phone rings.

It's headquarters.

They said,
"Carlos, we need you to go

to Casablanca, Morocco,
tomorrow."

So I go to bed

and I start preparing myself

for who
I'm going to be tomorrow...

Today, I'm Carlos Toro.

I'm sleeping with my wife
in my bed and this is me.

But tomorrow,
I'm going to be somebody else.

It is through that long trip,
flying from Miami to London

or Paris to Casablanca,

that I transform
to a point where,

when I arrive in Casablanca,
I'm not Carlos Toro.

Not even a shadow
of Carlos Toro.

I'm a drug dealer
and I'm a pilot.

There was a metamorphosis.

I had a different name,
a different nationality,

a different passport.

I have put a lot of money
on the table,

a lot of cocaine on the table.

And I did that for 27 years.

So you actually
did a complete reversal

in terms of your life.

At one stage, you are working
for the drug traffickers

and now you're working
for the drug traffickers' enemy,

putting away
other drug traffickers.

In my job as
an undercover agent,

I made friends with them.

I broke bread with them.

We went to parties,
we went to church.

We take them down
and I get home that evening,

and I don't feel good.

-You felt guilty.
-I had been there.

I had been in their shoes.
It's not easy.

It's a very different equation
to manage.

But it all falls down
to survival.

The first year is difficult...

...so is the second.

But after the third
or fourth or fifth year...

...you realise
that you're good at it.

Had I not been an aid
to the Medellín Cartel...

...and a friend
of Carlos Lehder,

a negotiator for Carlos Lehder,

had I not had that exposure,

I could never have been the
successful DEA that I had been.

So that made you
the ideal undercover agent.

Yes.

I'm one of few
in the last 27 years.

Most of them either quit
or got arrested,

or did something wrong, or
got killed within three years.

Once he had completed enough
assignments to "pay his dues",

Carlos made
a monumental decision:

he began to work for the DEA,
by choice.

Travelling the world
to set up bogus deals,

Carlos risked his life to
infiltrate corrupt governments

and bring down
major traffickers.

But now, after nearly
three decades of service,

he feels the DEA hasn't
reciprocated his loyalty.

If you are being told
by the DEA...

..."Help us with this
and we'll give you this,"

it's a one-way street,
it's a one-sided deal.

On April 9th, 2015,
I got very sick.

But I have no insurance,

because I live with
a bunch of IDs and names,

and I live in many countries.

But I never worry about it,

because I've been with the DEA
for 27 years.

So I called my boss
and I said...

"Armando...

...I need to have surgery
tomorrow,

but I am in urgent need
of 10,000 dollars."

"No problem, Carlos.
I'll get it for you."

I check into the hospital.

The next day he calls me.

"Homeland Security
denied your request."

"You've got to be kidding me."

And my doctor is telling me,
"Have the surgery or die."

So what do I do? I resign.

I said, "No more. I've had it."

So do you know what happens?

I get a call.

"Say, Carlos,
we've got some problems.

You are no longer
a citizen of the United States

and you are deportable."

So the DEA lied to me
for 27 years.

If they deported you
to Colombia,

what would happen to you?

I would be dead.

I know I was a criminal...

...but I have paid my dues
to the United States

over and over again.

You worked for
the Medellín Cartel,

which was
one of the most destructive

criminal organisations
in the world.

It's responsible
for large-scale corruption,

human rights abuses,
torture, murder.

You were part of that process,

and then you started
to fight against it.

Have you changed as a person?

For three years -
or close to three years -

I took a departure
from the Carlos Toro...

I took a departure from
my family, from my children.

All because of greed.

I have recognised
that that departure

has been the biggest mistake
of my life.

And no matter how many people
are put away,

put in jail, or try to atone
working for a government...

...I'll never make it right.

What do you regret most
in your life, looking back?

Having met Carlos Lehder.

How would your life have been if
you hadn't met Carlos Lehder?

I don't know...

But it would have been
something I would be proud of.

I feel for Carlos
and what his life has become -

his one wrong decision led him
into the cartel

and into the hands of the DEA.

Then he chose to stay on
in the same dirty game

leading to a lifetime
of sadness and regret.

What followed was a double life

of constant fear,
lies and duplicity.

While smooth-talking, intellect
and international connections

might help in the upper echelons
of the cartel's US operations,

the equation south of the border
is far simpler and more brutal.

It's in countries such as
my former home, Colombia,

that the true price of
cocaine trafficking is paid...

...in corruption, torture,

and rivers of blood.

And few men
have spilled more blood

than Escobar's
most notorious assassin...

...now a free man
after two decades behind bars...

...and the only high-ranking
member of the cartel

who's somehow still alive

and walking
the streets of Medellín.

Despite his disarming frankness,

John Jairo Velásquez's
psychopathic lack of remorse

left me cold.

But was it true
what he had said?

That it's always a woman

who ends up destroying
a cocaine cartel.

Well, that's precisely the story
of former beauty queen

and airline stewardess
Pilar Angel.

A woman who took revenge,
and then some.

You're hanging out
with Pablo Escobar,

El Mexicano
from the Medellín Cartel.

You're hanging out
with the Cali Cartel,

Mighuel,
Gilberto Rodríguez Orejuela.

What sort of lifestyle
did you have?

Oh, my God!

You know, it was like airplanes,
boats, cars.

I mean, anything you can
think of, they had. Anything.

I remember the Mexican.

He had a toilet
for his favourite horse.

The toilet paper in his house
had his initials.

Everything was like, "Wow!"

This is when I was a flight...
Oh, how cute I look!

This is when I was
a flight attendant for Braniff,

a job that I loved.

And I always worked first class.

And one of the flight attendants
said to me,

"You have to see the man
sitting in 3A," for instance.

So I look at him and I said,
"Not bad."

So when we were landing
in Bogotá,

he came over when I was sitting
in the jump seat

and he said, "Can you have
dinner with me tonight?"

I said, "OK."

He was very nice
and very polite, very classy,

and that's how it all started.

I never knew what he did,

because he told me
that he worked for the CIA.

-That was what he told you?
-Yes.

So at what point
did you realise that he wasn't -

that he was actually
a drug trafficker?

Well, when he asked me
to take two suitcases to Miami,

I said, "What do they have?"

He said, "Don't worry."

And I carried the two suitcases.

They had eight kilos each.

You knew the dangers about drug
trafficking, and you could die.

Oh, yes. Yes.

And yet you became a drug mule.

Well, I would do anything
for my husband.

I just wanted to please him.
That's all.

Anything he wanted me to do,
I would do anything.

Don't ask me, "What else?"

How big a drug trafficker
was your husband?

I think he was very big.

He used to be the transportation
of the Mexican, period.

So the Mexican is a member
of the Medellín Cartel.

Yes. Very big. Very, very big.

So your husband tricked you
into becoming a drug mule.

Yes.

And he used to beat me up
every other day, if I can say.

-It was--
-He was violent?

Violent?
Look at these holes in my head.

Wow!
Your husband did that to you?

Yes. He was horrible.

Horrible, horrible, horrible.

He was crazy,

and he used to tell people
he was Jesus Christ.

He used to go around
with a white robe.

He used to bring women
to the house, kick me out,

buy them cars,
buy them Rolexes, buy them...

I never, ever said a word.

After years of abuse,
Pilar finally left Ernesto.

Even so, she vowed to keep
his criminal activity a secret.

However, as George Jung said,

if you stay in this game
long enough,

someone, at some point,
will tell on you.

And after a complex
set of circumstances,

Pilar decided
to trade Ernesto in.

After her divorce,
Pilar married again,

to yet another drug trafficker.

When this husband
was arrested and imprisoned,

he told the DEA
to speak to Pilar

in a bid to reduce his sentence.

So the DEA
knocked on her door...

...and Ernesto's days
were numbered.

So, tell me about
the operation that you used

to trap your husband.

I called him in Bogotá.
"Hi, how are you? Oh, great."

So I said, "Listen,
my boyfriend is from Chicago

and he has a company
that does transportation.

Do you still need transport?"
He said, "Of course."

"OK. Can you meet me next
week on Saturday in Caracas?

I'll introduce you to Rick."

And Richard was,
in fact, a DEA agent.

-Rick Morris, yes.
-Rick.

Rick was going to provide
transportation to him.

So then I had nothing to do.

I always said, "I'll go fishing.

I'll take the fish off it.
You do the rest." And that's it.

Ernesto and Rick
met in Venezuela.

Suspecting nothing,

Ernesto asked Rick to ship
100 kilos of cocaine to the US.

But once the shipment
arrived in Florida,

Rick pulled his gun and badge
and placed Ernesto under arrest.

So they call me and they say,

"Hey, we're going to give him
ten years. Is that OK?"

And I said,
"He could do 20, but that's OK."

I don't believe in revenge,
but this time I said,

"Forget it.
I'm going to revenge him."

And revenge tasted sweet.

Pilar didn't stop there.

She now went after her
ex-husband's cartel colleagues.

With the backing of the DEA,

she took on the role
of a wealthy money launderer

and used her wiles
to lure her prey.

Were you an employee of the DEA?

Officially, no.

I was more of a CI, but the--

-Confidential Informant.
-Yes.

But the thing is,

I suggested to them
to do the money laundry,

because I wasn't
going to be doing drugs.

So you would actually
design the plans

for the DEA to launder money
for the cartels?

Of course, because I had control
completely of the situation.

They did and I did, kind of.

You would go down to Colombia

and offer to launder
their money for them?

You know, it got to a point that
I didn't have to go down there,

because everything
was word of mouth.

The minute I got the first one,
then everybody started jumping.

If I did a good job
with this one,

he would give the numbers
to that one, so it was...

I used to go there

because I was trying
to get into Chupeta.

I was this close.

Chupeta is
Juan Carlos Ramírez Abadía.

Yes, exactly.

And he is one of the biggest
drug traffickers

in Colombian history.

I will say yes.

When the government finally
caught up to him in Brazil,

they estimated
he had 1.8 billion dollars.

Well, I'm not surprised.

Let me tell you something
about him.

He wanted a dog,
a dogo from Argentina.

I spent 5,000 dollars
for the dog,

flew it to Colombia

and gave it to his assistant.

But that was my way
of getting in to them.

"Do you want this?
You can have it.

You want to come to the States?

I'll have them clear your...
your entrance."

How much money were you
laundering for the cartels?

I think, in total,
I laundered, like, 120 million.

-A hundred and twenty million?
-I think so.

And I think they confiscated
80 million, I think.

They confiscated
80 million dollars?

When the DEA confiscates money,
what happens to that money?

I really don't know
what they do with it.

What I know is that if you made
them choose money versus drugs,

they will take the money.

And I always said that

because I worked for them,
I worked with them.

You have to pick up
100 kilos of cocaine

versus 500,000 dollars -
where would they go?

To the money. I'm telling you.

That's why,
when they lost money,

they would jump and get upset.

They didn't get upset because
they lost 100 kilos of cocaine.

They never did,
because it cost them nothing.

So, do you see the DEA
as being a kind of business?

I wouldn't say business,

but I will say
they choose what they want.

And what they want is money.

Pilar's undercover work
contributed to the extradition

of several
high-level traffickers,

including Escobar's rivals
in the notorious Cali Cartel.

But one thing
truly surprised me.

Pilar's laundering commissions

and a percentage

of cash seizures

were then used to fund
further DEA operations.

So not only

were the DEA assisting

the traffickers they were
supposed to be imprisoning,

but their discretionary budget
almost became dependent on it -

a vicious cycle at least,

if not a conflict of interest.

Carlos Toro
felt he'd been tricked

into risking his life
for decades,

and now Pilar's story
only made me more cynical

about the
Drug Enforcement Administration.

But what about their agents
out in the field?

Were they indifferent to
the lives of their informants?

And was money
what really drove them?

I decided to seek out

two of their most
highly respected former agents.

This is 1979.

I'm the youngest guy
in the department.

"Hey, Mike, we need a narc."

I loved working undercover.

You know, it was like living
the lifestyle of a James Bond.

The streets of South Florida
were flooded with cocaine.

Dadeland shootings.

Murders, Colombian cartels
coming into Miami.

I'd be in Rio de Janeiro
one day.

I'd be in Mexico City.

I found it really phenomenal
to be playing cat and mouse

with some of the most ruthless
drug traffickers in the world.

My partner gets kidnapped.

We get involved in a shoot-out.

I end up going home that night
and telling my wife,

"I now know what I want to do
for the rest of my life.

I'm going to put every one of
these motherfuckers in jail."

And if I'm going
to really take this serious,

I've got to go bigger.

And bigger is DEA.

How much do you hate
the traffickers

and how much do you hate drugs?

I hate drug traffickers
because they poison our youth.

You know,
they basically destroy,

you know,
economic and political fabrics

and they undermine
fledgling democracy.

So they do untold damage

not only to the United States,

but to many countries
around the world.

DEA looks at the drug war
from a different perspective

than many local police.

We look at it as,

we've just arrested that
trafficker in your community.

Now,
who is his source of supply?

Who is giving him the drugs?

Where did his money go?

We look at it
from a bigger perspective.

And not only are we
looking at it domestically

in the United States,

we're looking
to feed intelligence

to our agents
all across the world.

We want to be able to take down

as much of an organisation
as we can at one time

and put them out of business.

And nobody walks in
and hands us a file

like a bank robbery
and says, "Here, solve it."

We have to go out and find these
crimes and solve these crimes,

and arrest these bad guys.

The way I would penetrate
a lot of these organisations

is usually through an undercover
introduction by an informant,

somebody that they trusted.

We've got to be very creative
in what we do.

Whether it be
supplying chemicals

to these organisations;

whether it be laundering
their money.

We would fly around the world,
picking up their money,

to be able to understand
the banking system

and the way they manipulate it
and worked.

Once the introduction was made,
I would cut the informant out

and I would take it from there,

and try to penetrate
the organisation

to the upper levels.

We were doing a lot
of what we call reverse stings.

We would get people coming down
from Chicago, New York, LA,

to buy marijuana.

A sting is when you go in
and you pretend to be the buyer.

A reverse sting is when
you pretend to be the seller.

Correct.

I'm just not interested
in seizing 300 keys of coke.

My goal
is to put the bad guys in jail.

I'm the middleman.

I'm controlling it.

Because, ultimately,

I want to identify
the distribution network

in the United States.

So the DEA is basically
trying to get involved

at every single stage
of the illegal drug trade,

from the chemical manufacturing,

the production side,

their transport apparatus,
their distribution network.

Those are all
the different strands

that the DEA is attacking.

We were only limited
by our imagination.

I want to be able to beat you
at your own game,

and I have to play by the rules
and you don't.

That's the challenge for me.

It is a game of chess.

You're pitting your intellect

against the cunning
of major drug traffickers,

and you can't afford
to be nervous

when you're dealing with
these individuals,

because they can sense fear.

They can sense nervousness.

And a bead of sweat
on your forehead

can actually lead to your death.

I remember on one occasion

I was wearing
what we call the KEL unit.

It's a wide belt

which contained the mic that
was usually taped to your chest.

And then it had
nine-volt batteries in there.

And the battery
started to leak acid...

...and it started to burn
my stomach area,

and I mean severely,

but, you know,
I couldn't flinch.

You know,
it smelled like barbecue.

A barbecue pit.

So you have to have
a very strong mind-set.

You know that
you can recover from the burn,

but you're not going to recover
from a bullet to your head.

When going undercover,
how would you prepare yourself,

in terms of getting dressed
and mentally prepare yourself

to go into that extreme
psychological situation?

I converted myself
psychologically

into a drug trafficker,
100 percent.

I would play the part.

I would buy Italian loafers,

you know, gold chains,

diamond-studded pendants.

The role was that you exuded
wealth and money and power,

and that is one of the things

that major drug traffickers
understand.

Can you tell me the most
dangerous undercover operation

that you have ever
been involved in?

I was in Miami.

My partner and I were buying
six ounces of cocaine.

I'm in Caborca, Sonora, Mexico.

I started to negotiate for
several tonnes of marijuana.

Two of the traffickers said,

"Let's go,
and we'll show you the cocaine."

One of the traffickers tells me,
"I'll take the informant.

I'm going to go and pick up
the marijuana

and I'll be right back."

So my partner got up
and went to look at the cocaine,

and ultimately never came back.

The other individual
sitting there with me,

he's telling me, he says,

"Look,
if you're a Federal Agent,

we're going to kill you."

As I'm walking out the door to
go get the rest of the money...

...I realise
that this is going bad.

All of a sudden, I see one of
the Mex Feds by the window

and he's going like this.

You know, giving me these hand
gestures, like, "What's up?"

So I give
the typical bust signal -

both my hands through the hair.

Nothing happens.

Sure enough, we're walking out,

and the same Fed
that was giving me the gestures

pulls out his gun

and sticks it into the chest
of the trafficker.

There was a bad guy here
and a bad guy here.

Bad guy number two over here

goes inside his waistband
and pulls a gun out.

Trafficker grabs the barrel

and hits the Fed
right in the forehead.

And I saw a spray
of dark red blood

go up in the air in a mist.

I pull my gun out

and grab bad guy number two
by the hair.

All of a sudden,
the trafficker turns to me

and he fires two rounds
very rapidly.

In the struggle
of holding bad guy number one,

bad guy number two
tried to shoot me.

I could hear the bullets
whistle by my left ear.

I took my weapon,

and I came across
the bad guy's head,

and I broke the wrist
of the other bad guy.

I returned fire

and I hit him twice
in the chest,

and he gasped as he fell
onto the ground on his back.

At that time,
my surveillance agents came in.

And as it was,

it was six ounces of flour,

and it was a drug rip-off.

You spend months undercover,

or sometimes up to years
working on a specific case,

where you are
obviously trying to win

someone's trust and confidence.

How do you feel
when you finally get your guy?

You know,
you have to be very careful,

because sometimes they are
just like most psychopaths.

You know,
they have great personalities.

You know, you have to be careful

that you don't become
a friend to them

and all of a sudden, you know,

that you... you know,

don't want to put them in jail.

What's the typical
reaction of someone

when they are finally caught
and they realise

that they have been tricked
by a DEA agent?

You're not
who you said you were.

Well, often, the bad guy

who you have been undercover
with for six months says,

"Mike,
I thought you were my friend."

And you have to tell them, "No.

I'm a Federal Agent
working undercover."

The key is to treat
that person with respect,

because now you are going to
potentially be an asset for me.

And, if you want
to help yourself,

I'm going to give you
that opportunity.

As an example,
George Jung from the movie Blow,

we arrested him
with 300 keys of coke.

He was looking at multiple
counts, at 15 years per count.

As a result of his co-operation,

his sentence
was reduced to five years.

There are several different
types of informants.

You have a mercenary informant.

The mercenary informant
is doing it for the money.

Then there is
the defendant informant.

Carlos Toro
was a defendant informant first.

Carlos Toro says,
"I don't want to go to jail.

What do I have to do
to get out of jail?"

So, then you have
the revenge informant.

This is the guy

that wants to put his competitor
out of business.

These are the most dangerous.

How horrific are these tortures

that the cartels practice
upon informants?

The tortures are horrific.

For example,
there is one torture method

that the Medellín Cartel used,

Pablo Escobar in particular,

which they call
the "Colombian necktie."

And what they would do

is they would slit the throat
of the victim

and then pull out his tongue
through that slit,

and it would hang
like a necktie.

When I was in Medellin, Colombia

during the heyday of Pablo
Escobar and the Medellin Cartel,

a lot of my informants -

in fact, I would say
virtually all of them -

were killed by the Cartel.

They would shoot them. But they
would brutally torture them.

I remember, I would leave
my house in the morning

and there were dead bodies
strewn alongside the roadway.

I would come back in the evening

and those cadavers
were still on the road,

because the authorities
could not keep up

with the number of homicides

that were being committed
in that city.

It was just...

Violence was the namesake
of Medellin Cartel at that time.

Drug trafficking, in my opinion,

is the most potent
and virulent form of terrorism

that exists in the world.

And when you take a look
at some of these organisations,

you know, they make ISIS,

you know,
look like a bunch of choir boys.

How violent
are the Mexican cartels

in comparison
with the Colombian cartels?

The Mexican cartels

are one of the most violent
cartels that I have ever seen,

but we have to keep in mind

that they were tutored
by the Colombians

in terms of exerting violence.

The Colombians taught them,
if you do violence,

do it in a horrific way,

and this way
you intimidate the authorities

in terms of not
taking action against you.

So that led to a tremendous
amount of violence in Mexico,

and the violence continues.

From 2006, when Felipe Calderon
became the president,

to the present time,

there have been easily
150,000 people killed

as a result of the efforts
against the Mexican cartels

in that country.

Would it be fair to say that...

Let's say that
you are successful

in terms of interdiction,
prosecution, military operations

in one country or one region.

It might be Colombia.
It might be Bolivia.

It might be the Caribbean.

You squeeze that balloon and
the air is still in the balloon,

it just goes
to a different country.

-Is that a fair comment?
-Yes.

They find another way of
getting it in in another place

and a way of doing business.

Because we were putting so much
pressure on South Florida,

the Bahamas, Haiti, Cuba,
these different regions,

they made a natural migration
over to Mexico

and Central America

and thus started the problems
that we see now.

Looking back over the course
of the War on Drugs,

are there any mistakes
that the DEA has made?

Wow.

My initial gut reaction
is to tell you... no.

I really believe the DEA

has always done the right thing
for the right reasons.

So the US government
goes after the Medellín Cartel,

kills Pablo Escobar.

They extradite
the leaders of the Cali Cartel.

They then dismantle
Norte del Valle in Colombia.

The problem
then gets transferred,

and perhaps
even made worse in Mexico.

Mike Vigil, can you put
your hand on your heart

and say that we're winning
the War on Drugs?

I'm going to say that we are
more determined than they are.

You know, they do...

They are determined
in terms of intimidation,

but the fact of the matter
is that, you know,

justice may be blind, but she
certainly has a very long reach.

I walked out of DEA headquarters
June 25th, 2004,

and the last person I spoke to

after turning my gun
and badge in

was the security guard
at the front door.

He says,
"Mike, what are you doing?"

I said, "This is it. I'm done.
I retired today."

Now, I had an apartment
two blocks away.

That was the longest walk
of my life.

Because this was not about
what I did for a living.

This is about who I was.

And when you turn in that gun

and you turn in that badge,

and that's it, it's tough.

If I had a thousand lives,

I would have done this
for a thousand lifetimes.

And, quite frankly...

...I probably would have done it
for free.

I went in expecting to dislike

these upholders
of the establishment.

But I came away having met
two brave, honest men,

who are passionate believers
in their work...

...even to the point
of addiction.

Mike and Mike played key roles
in the DEA's war on drugs

by infiltrating
and ultimately bringing down

the Medellin and Cali cartels,

and closing down
their trafficking routes

into the Caribbean.

But they could never
have predicted

that these
successful operations -

which the DEA hoped would
have lasting, positive effects -

would help fuel

the dramatic destabilisation
of Central America

over the next two decades.

With the Caribbean closed off,

producers were now looking
for new paths into the US -

and they turned to Mexico's
crime lords for assistance.

In the 1980s,

the Guadalajara cartel reigned
supreme on the American border.

With politicians
on their pay roll

and heroin and marijuana
trafficking routes

already established,

they were perfectly positioned

to take advantage of the
Colombians' logistical problems.

At first,
the Colombians paid cash

to access the border crossings.

But soon, the Guadalajara Cartel
demanded product as payment,

becoming major traffickers
themselves

and marking a radical shift
in criminal power and wealth

from Colombia to Mexico.

The DEA, playing catch-up,

scored what appeared to be
a major victory,

when their informants led them

to a huge marijuana operation
belonging to the cartel.

But their best intentions
only led to more chaos

and bloodshed...

Seeking to destroy the DEA's
network of informants,

the Godfather of
the Guadalajara Cartel,

Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo,

had DEA Agent Enrique Camarena
kidnapped, brutally tortured

and murdered.

In retaliation,

the DEA launched
an extensive operation

to capture Camarena's killers,
forcing Gallardo into hiding.

With the full might of the DEA
now bearing down on him,

Gallardo decided
to protect his empire

by splitting it
amongst his capos.

One cartel became five -

including the Sinaloa Cartel,

headed up by the infamous

"El Chapo"-

and an unprecedented wave
of violence broke out

as the new cartels
battled for supremacy,

fighting between themselves
and new challengers.

A change in government
for the first time in 70 years

further destabilised
the country.

And so the insanity continues
to this day.

Every breakthrough,
every cartel defeated,

every kingpin taken out

is followed by
yet more death and sorrow,

as a new generation of
increasingly ruthless criminals

step in to take their place.

The US government continues
to pump billions of dollars

into the war on drugs,

upping the ante with more guns
and military force.

The war rages on and on.

The question is,
by using the same strategy,

is this a fight
that can ever be won?

To find out,

I'm heading to the US
for the final leg of my journey

to speak to
a highly respected soldier

who fought on the front line
of the drug war

and gained extensive insights
into this complex world...

You are flying very low level

and going through some
mountainsides and stuff.

Keep the noise down.

It's being shielded
by the mountains.

You will get an indication.
"Hey, we're ten minutes out.

We're five minutes out.
We're one minute out."

You will be sitting right at
the doorway of the helicopter.

You're just ready
to kick it out.

The helicopter comes to a hover.

"Go, go, go."

Grab a hold, slide down.

The next guy slides down,
slides down.

You get down to the bottom,

and you will fan out
in a 360-degree perimeter.

Now, if you're not already
engaged in a firefight,

you're going to sit there
for a bit,

look, listen, feel, smell -
whatever.

And after about five minutes,

you will patrol
toward your target.

We're moving through the jungle.

We're going to go hit
a laboratory.

But going through the jungle,

that's a little bit difficult,

so oftentimes you're stacked
one behind the other.

And you've got one guy online,

maybe two guns online

as a second guy
comes off to the side,

but everyone else
is right behind.

We're going to come in fast.

We're going to come in silent...

until we go loud.

And once we go loud,

then it doesn't go silent again
until it's over.

Adam Newbold
was a Navy SEAL for 22 years.

After making it through
the gruelling SEALs training,

Adam was put into action

in some of the harshest terrain
on the planet,

pushed to the limit
of skill and endurance.

As well as being
a member of the team

that tracked and killed
Osama bin Laden,

Adam spent years carrying out
missions in South America,

helping to smash
drug-trafficking networks.

But it's only
since returning home

that he has reflected
on the war he's been fighting,

and whether
it's actually working.

["The Star-Spangled Banner"
playing]

Thank you, bartender.

You bet.

A really tight-knit community
here in Lisbon.

Small-town USA for sure.

-Yeah.
-Yeah.

Small town. You know,
kind of a depressed area.

The industry
that used to be here

that made this town grow
100 years ago

has long since gone.

There's nothing to do
around here, OK?

In a lot of these small towns,
there's nothing to do.

There's not even
a movie theatre.

So young folks,

and not only young folks,

they end up going to the bars
and drinking,

which, you know, that's fine,
but without any other options.

I was watching the news
last night

and they found another couple

that had just overdosed on drugs
in the front seat of the car,

and a kid was in the back.

Yeah,
and that's the next town over,

just south of here,
East Liverpool.

It's really scary.

When I was a kid,
people would drink.

You know, you drink some beers.

But now it's crack cocaine
and heroin.

And heroin's...

heroin's hardcore
and it's everywhere.

It's unreal.
It's unreal how bad it is.

You know,
I think they have found

these small towns in America...

...as a secret spot
or an untapped market,

because everything used to be
in the big cities.

And, for me,
to see how that's grown,

and, you know,
from where working

down in Central
and South America

and then to see it up here

and the effects
of these different things...

...it's pretty disheartening.

So what sort of operations
would you be sent on?

Well, you know our job is...

...whatever it takes to win a
war in an unconventional manner.

If the unconventional forces
don't do it, we do it.

I was Country Action Officer
for Colombia and Panama.

I've been in Brazil,
Mexico, Bolivia.

So I spent a lot of time
in South America.

My job was

to co-ordinate
and train their forces, police,

and special forces, military,
on how they could...

...fight our drug war.

And...

And it can be tough,

because you have folks

that really don't care
about our drug war.

The only reason they cared about
doing what we wanted them to do

is because we were giving them
a lot of money.

Can I ask you a question
as a soldier?

If you are getting... enlisting
other people to fight your war,

but they haven't got
their heart in it,

can they be effective soldiers?

They can be effective,

but I'll tell you what,
it's difficult when...

when you are training someone

and, you know,

a drug cartel

or someone working
in that business

is paying them more money.

Twice as much
or ten times as much

just to give them a call
whenever...

...you know,
whenever we're coming.

So you're training and equipping
and financing a group

that's going against
drug traffickers.

And then, on the other side,
the enemy has got more cash

and they're...

-Yeah.
-...bribing them to...

Yeah.

...to inform on you.

But, believe me,

if we think
we're being effective...

We've collected tonnes and
tonnes and tonnes of cocaine.

But when there's one speedboat
that you interdict,

there's ten more
that go right on by.

So, you know,
we're having a very, very little

or small impact on... on that.

Because if I can get cocaine
in Colombia for two bucks

and I can sell it in Australia
for 300, that's a...

Where do you find
a profit margin like that?

Adam, how well-equipped

and how strong
are the cartels militarily?

They are very well-equipped.

It's scary
how well-equipped they are.

It's more scary...

It's far more scary

how well-trained
they are becoming.

And not only are they equipped
and trained, they are violent.

I...

I was involved in an...

...investigation of sorts
in Mexico...

...where there were ten bodies,

and one of the girls
was probably 13 years old,

maybe 12 - young...

...and one of the boys
about the same age.

And...

...they were all bound and shot
in the back of the head.

Just executed.

They were poor folks
from a small town.

You know,
the clothes they were wearing,

they were pretty ragged,

who were trying
to better their life.

And the drugs didn't make it,
and neither did they.

But...

those drugs,
they're coming to the US still.

That's where they were coming
and that's where they ended up.

So the drugs
were always going to get here,

but along the way,
poor people are dying.

Poor people are dying.

They are dying in transport,

they are dying in production,

they are dying in use.

So now they get to this country,

and folks go out,

and they will pay for them
and they will use them,

and they have no idea what...

...what it took
to get those drugs to them.

So what's the answer to this
big mess that we have created?

We're the ones
that are consuming the drugs

and we're the ones that are
persecuting the war on drugs

in other countries.

What do we do
about this big mess?

We've got to change
our strategy.

Yeah, we put the pressure on.
We keep the pressure on them.

But there has to be
a worldwide campaign...

...inviting another generation

to look differently at...
at this stuff.

To take pride in their mind
and their body

and... just not... not engage
in that type of lifestyle

and utilising those drugs,

because if the demand
is there...

...what are we going to do?

We're just going to...
The war will be never-ending.

And it has been.
It's never-ending.

For 22 years,

Adam lived a life of a highly
trained military machine,

and came out the other side

with incredibly rounded
and impartial viewpoints.

I found his personal journey
surprising

and inspirational.

Looking back on my own journey,

I realised
that the stories I've heard

all share similar elements.

Just like cocaine addicts,

the people I met
experienced the highest highs

and the lowest lows.

The smuggler.

The trafficker.

The launderer.

The lawmen.

The cartel man.

The cold-blooded killer.

Each and every one of them
locked into a life

that wouldn't exist
without cocaine.

Each one driven by the danger,

adrenaline, and spoils
offered by this dirty game.

But what kind of world
have they left us, as a result?

Whether the solution
to the war on drugs

lies in education
or legalisation,

it's clear to me that
something needs to change

to end the grip cocaine has
on users in the West

and families
just trying to stay alive

in Central and South America.

George Jung said that they had
created a monster.

Well, that monster
is still on the loose today.

And if we in the West

can't curb our appetite
for this insidious white powder,

these stories of corruption,

betrayal, revenge and death

will repeat themselves
for generations to come.

[music ascending]

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