The (home-grown) war on terror

There has been an on-going war on terror that started way before 9-11 and it has been waged against fellow Americans. I am of course talking about the war on gangs.

2008 marks the twentieth anniversary of the movie ‘Colors’ which introduced the country to what Los Angelenos had already been dealing with for years, gangs. Gangs are probably still the 2nd biggest export from LA, second only to Hollywood movies.

Here are some disturbing numbers. According to the Department of Justice, today America has at least 30,000 gangs, with 800,000 members, in 2,500 communities across the United States. At last count, Los Angeles County had more than 714 gangs and 80,000 gang members. That makes one of every hundred county residents either a hardcore soldier in a gang or an “associate.” In New Jersey alone, 13 gangs have direct affiliation with LA gangs. LA gangs are expanding faster than Starbucks and Wal-Mart.

Different answers are given as to the origins of LA gangs: Watts riots of 1965, the preemptive dismantling by the government of the Black Panther Party which left hundreds of black youths a sense of organization and discipline without having gotten the political education, the massive influx of cocaine into urban cities in the 1980s, not to mention all the more general sociological, economic, racist, and cultural explanations.

Now in LA, there is a vicious triangulation going on, which is eerily reminiscent of what is going on Iraq right now. Two black gangs, Grape Street Crips and Bounty Hunter Bloods are going at it. The rivalry goes back so long, no one can quite remember how the beef started, why they are fighting, and how it got so bad so quick for so long. What makes it even more complex is the growing dominance of Hispanic gangs, particular MS-13. The Hispanic gangs are particularly important, because not only are they growing in numbers but they also have the connections to the drugs, which makes sense since Mexico is the primary drug supplier. In other words, you have two sects fighting it out with a third group hovering in the background, watching the two sects fight it out. What all three have in common is that they all are trying to get their hands on the same resource, in this case, drugs.

In the 80s and early 90s, the occupying authorities/police department had compromised the rule of law and fought fire with fire, all for the sake of law and order. They had curfews; they banned cavorting in groups of more than 2; they indiscriminately arrested and detained people; they had show trials; they killed people. All in the name of law and order. The LAPD created a CRASH unit, which basically operated as a lynch mob in that they were not beholden to the rule of law and were free to harass, imprison, torture, and murder whomever they deemed dangerous.

But gangs are still here. Shit, they are becoming multinational conglomerates.

Now in LA, after they realized that their war on gangs wasn’t working, they then simply tried to contain the problem, making sure it doesn’t spill out into the nicer areas. In some areas, like the Jordan Downs housing project, if you have a problem, you don’t go to the cops, you go to the Grape Street Gang. (It reminds me of Sadr City in Iraq, where if you have a problem, you don’t go to the occupying authorities, you go to the Sadr army.)
This strategy is highly problematic, if only because containing the problem in certain areas is analogous to putting a cover on a pot of boiling water. Not only will it get hotter faster, but once it gets hot enough, it will inevitably get out. And once it gets out, it won’t just spill over. It will burst. We are beginning to see that. Just hear me out.

1985-1992 was one of the most violent periods of gang violence in LA. It tapered off in 1992, mainly as a result of a peace treaty between four of the biggest gangs in LA. This peace treaty was legit. 1998 reported the lowest rate of gang-related homicides as compared to the previous ten years. This also happens to be the period when the drug supply chain shifts from Columbia to Mexico, thereby significantly reducing the supply of crack cocaine and substituting it for other drugs like meth. This shift is important because crack is regarded as a major reason for violence. Anyways, this peace treaty, combined with the shift in the drug supply chain had national repercussions and allowed urban areas, like New York, New Jersey, and LA somewhat a respite and an opportunity to really deal with the problem. But the treaty is now over and we are beginning to see in the last couple of years that violence is going back to its pre-1992 levels. Perhaps I am placing too much importance on the 1992 peace treaty. But when it comes to the future of gangs, you look at LA. Gangs are to LA what fashion is to Soho. If you want to know what it is going to be hip and happening in fashion tomorrow, you go to Soho today. Same thing with gangs and LA.

To sum up, what we see in LA is the initial ‘war on gangs’ which was blatantly short-sighted and draconian and was subsequently followed up by a resigned, apartheid-like strategy of containment that was equally short-sighted. I fear not only could there be a teeter-totter effect in which we revert back to the initial ‘war on gang’ strategy, but that this teeter-totter effect would have to be even more short-sighted and draconian because the stakes are much higher now. In essence, I fear that a war that fails to resolve the issues that underlie it is doomed to not only be repeated, but also escalated.