The Fort Bragg Cartel: Drug Trafficking and Murder in the Special Forces by Seth Harp

The Fort Bragg Cartel: Drug Trafficking and Murder in the Special Forces

by Seth Harp

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Crime & Justice

Rolling Stone reporter Seth Harp's investigation of a pattern of drug-trafficking and homicide cases involving active-duty Special Operations soldiers at Fort Bragg — a series the military justice system has handled in ways that suggest institutional cover, not just bad apples.

Core ideas
  • The pattern Harp documents — multiple unexplained deaths, fentanyl- and steroid-related, around the same units, often ruled non-criminal — is more coherent than the official accounts allow, and the institutional defenses against scrutiny are part of the story.
  • The combination of access to controlled substances (operational supply chains, intelligence networks), exposure to combat trauma, and the closed culture of the Special Operations community produces conditions for exactly this kind of corruption-and-violence pattern.
  • The book is the most-uncomfortable recent military-journalism reading because the institution at the center is one of the most-celebrated; Harp is not anti-military, but the documentary record is what it is.
Published2025
Pages357
ISBN9780593655085
ReadNov 2025
drug trafficking, investigative journalism

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