The war on drugs is very profitable for state and the Federal governments which allows it to increase the number of people needed to enforce it. Without drug arrests for law enforcement, a slew of public and private attorney's and judges, their case load were be drastically reduced. All of those private prisons were built for drug offenders. The Afghanistan war created a path for the increase in Heroin into this country. Meth used to be made here in the US, law enforcement cleaned that up and it moved to Mexico as the main supplier of this drug to the US. The potency of Cocaine has been drastically reduced since the 80's to reduce the effects this drug has on the population. The states will all eventually have control of the weed so they make sure they get their money first.

The message here is there is no real war on drugs because if they won it, the loss of revenue would make state governments and the entire legal system employee population decrease significantly. Our society depends on drugs being illegal and everything else associated with the black market.