619 Review organising, controlling and acting in retaliation when necessary is what is fundamental. This innovative idea of business was introduced by the Chapo, it is what catapulted the Mexican cartels to the highest-ranking positions in international trafficking. Starting out in the land of the Aztecs, the current nerve-centre of cocaine trafficking, Saviano embarks on a journey that takes the reader to places like Colombia, Italy, Spain, Nigeria and Russia. He describes the effects of cocaine in the crudest terms, introduces us to the ambience and the haunts of organised crime groups and takes us on a tour of the main focal points of the problem in the world. References to Spain, far from anecdotic, are repeated several times throughout the text, thus situating the country as a fundamental player in the business. Spain is home to the drug lords. Not only does it illustrate the all too well known geographic advantages of the peninsula, but also the importance it has acquired as a money-laundering centre and residence. On the journey undertaken by the reader there is no shortage of detailed descriptions of the make-up of the cocaine trafficking trade, viewed from multiple perspectives; the effects that it brings about in numerous arenas, from its initial production and subsequent treatment, before moving on to an analysis of the existence of a cocaine-oriented cult and culture. On the other hand, it also deals with how the mafias go about their business, the birth of some of the most noteworthy cartels, the availability of resources allowing criminal organisations access to submarines, or to send planes loaded with cocaine to the Sahel, the training of “mules” in Curacao, the preparation of suitcases with fibreglass and cocaine, and the difficulties of detecting liquid cocaine. Not surprisingly in such activities they avail of the assistance of analysts or “travel doctors” who study legislative loopholes, weaknesses in policing, modes of transport and routes, estimates of losses through seizures and financial and technological tangles designed to hide such activity and launder the proceeds. Saviano’s contribution does not, however, end there; in his research he dares to go one step further in demonstrating links to the financial system and how the cartels have assisted banks during the crisis, providing liquidity, and the existence of what is called narco-capitalism. Aid that was initially highly advantageous for the US Banks, but which at the present time has found the perfect sanctuary offered by European banks which lack the mechanisms to operate against this permeability in relation to money-laundering. In this sense this is a necessary work, one that attaches names, places and stories to what generally reaches us in the form of statements or data, especially through organisations like UNODC (the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime). A text of huge interest for investigating police, specialists in organised crime, and for all those attempting to come to grips with what is happening; not only in countries like Mexico or Colombia right now, but also right across the international spectrum. http://revista.ieee.es/index.php/ieee
REVISTA IEEE 5
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