January 16, 2025 | Foreign Policy

What Will Happen to Assad’s Secret Drug Empire?

The ousted Syrian regime financed its war machine by producing and trafficking Captagon.
January 16, 2025 | Foreign Policy

What Will Happen to Assad’s Secret Drug Empire?

The ousted Syrian regime financed its war machine by producing and trafficking Captagon.

Excerpt

Early last December, opposition fighters led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) entered the Syrian capital of Damascus, capping a lightning offensive that had captured significant territory in just over one week. A day later, Syrian dictator and President Bashar al-Assad fled to Moscow by plane. Assad’s ouster unraveled an illicit industry embedded within his regime: the Captagon trade.

Since the late 2010s, Assad’s regime had been involved in the production and trafficking of Captagon, an amphetamine-type stimulant. The drug trade provided Damascus with a crucial financial lifeline during the Syrian civil war, undermining the effects of international sanctions. The regime orchestrated the trade through its security agencies and branches, including the Fourth Armored Division and Air Force Intelligence Directorate, as well as via Assad family members and elite business associates.

With backing from the commercial, security, and political sectors, the Captagon trade flourished. Regime cronies in agriculture, pharmaceuticals, and industry helped manufacture, package, and conceal pills with licit goods, while security agencies facilitated transport and immunity from law enforcement. Meanwhile, ministerial officials maintained a strict counternarcotics narrative, denying the presence of Captagon production in regime-held territories.

Caroline Rose is a director at the New Lines Institute and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University. She previously served as the Middle East and Europe analyst at Geopolitical Futures, a forecasting firm. Her work focuses on security, geopolitics, and the crime-conflict nexus. X: @CarolineRose8

Matthew Zweig is the senior policy director at FDD Action. He previously served in roles on Capitol Hill and at the U.S. State Department. X: @MatthewZweig1

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Issues:

Sanctions and Illicit Finance Syria