EDITORIAL - Brace for the shifting of tides

The war on drugs is effectively over. The critics have won. Without meaning to demean the PDEA, the Presidential Drug Enforcement Agency, to whom the war has been entrusted, cannot hack it. The drug problem in this country has simply become too massive for PDEA's numbers and meager resources. It takes time to whip it up to a certain level of competence commensurate to the difficult assignment ahead.

By the time PDEA reaches that level, provided it does so at all, the problem shall have grown even more and will be several steps ahead of the PDEA, no matter how enthusiastic as a pursuer. And that is looking at the PDEA as a highly professional and dedicated unit. But all things being equal, expect frustrations and major disappointments to weigh down the effort.

Before the PDEA was given the assignment exclusively, it used to belong to a large extent to the police. But the bleeding hearts got in the way. Mistaking the trees for the forest, they completely ignored the fact that nobody promised the war not to be bloody. Nobody made the promise because it was a promise that could not be made, unless of course people preferred to be lied to.

But wars are what they are. Drug wars and holy wars make no difference in any body count. Filipinos had a choice in 2016 and made it without being coerced. In unexpectedly large numbers, they elected the man to whom they entrusted the war they could not fight themselves. The presumption at the time was that everybody was on board, that everybody understood, both the nature of the problem and how it was to be licked.

That was the forest, and the presumption based on the results of 2016 was that everybody saw it for what it was. But then a few people started seeking only the trees and did not like what they saw. And they started making noise. In fact they made so much noise it actually reversed the 2016 results. And that is why the war on drugs was effectively halted. Giving it to PDEA was just window-dressing, meant to hide and disguise the deep personal hurt.

So let us wait and see what the bleeding hearts will be up to next now that they got their wish. Let us see for whom the hearts will bleed next time when the tides shift and the side of illegal drugs launches the anticipated counter-attack and begins exacting revenge. As already said, the war is not going to be easy, no matter who does the waging and who is winning. But at least we used to be the side that was on top.