Thai Stick
Surfers, Scammers, and the Untold Story of the Marijuana Trade
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- 12,99 €
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- 12,99 €
Beschreibung des Verlags
The untold history of the underground marijuana trade in Thailand—from surfers and sailors to pirates.
Located on the left bank of the Chao Phya River, Thailand's capital, Krungthep, known as Bangkok to Westerners and "the City of Angels" to Thais, has been home to smugglers and adventurers since the late eighteenth century. During the 1970s, it became a modern Casablanca to a new generation of treasure seekers, from surfers looking to finance their endless summers to wide-eyed hippie true believers, and lethal marauders left over from the Vietnam War.
Moving a shipment of Thai sticks from northeast Thailand farms to American consumers meant navigating one of the most complex smuggling channels in the history of the drug trade. Many forget that until the mid-1970s, the vast majority of marijuana consumed in the United States was imported, and there was little to no domestic production.
Peter Maguire and Mike Ritter are the first historians to document this underground industry, the only record of its existence rooted in the fading memories of its elusive participants. Drawing on hundreds of interviews with smugglers and law enforcement agents, the authors recount the buy, delivery, voyage home, and product offload. They capture the eccentric personalities of the men and women who transformed the Thai marijuana trade from a GI cottage industry into a professionalized business moving the world's most lucrative commodities, unraveling a rare history from the smugglers' perspective.
"Highly recommended for anyone who loves adventure, cannabis, surfing, or all of the above. It's every single bit as heady, energetic and captivating as the title implies."—Cannabis Now
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Historian Maguire (Law and War) and former drug smuggler Ritter delve into the world of the international marijuana trade of the 1960s and 1970s, tracing its quasi-utopian roots to its suppression during the War on Drugs. Utilizing hundreds of interviews, the authors reveal how early entrepreneurs bringing high-quality marijuana into the United States sincerely believed that these drugs could provide epiphanies otherwise inaccessible; making fortunes by supplying illicit drugs was, for them, a case of doing well while doing good. Such sums of money attracted genuine predators, from ruthless drug lords to brutal pirates. In addition, the hapless transcendental entrepreneurs found themselves faced with an American government marching grimly towards an enforced prohibition on all illegal drugs, hard and soft. The authors are sympathetic to the loftier goals of the soft drug pioneers while acknowledging the realities of uninhibited capitalism; grand ambitions often led to a dank prison cell or an unmarked grave.
