The "National Review's" special issue advocating the legalization of drugs has rejuvenated the national debate over the drug war. But just as mobilizing state power to stamp out drugs isn't working, neither will a libertarian leap into a world regulated by personal choice and the open market. What we need is to navigate a precarious path between the two. PNS associate editor Walter Truett Anderson, a political scientist specializing in issues of global governance and author of the forthcoming "Evolution Isn't What It Used To Be." He can be reached via e-mail at <waltt@well.com>.

These days Americans are being presented with two strikingly different approaches to the drug problem: "Just Say No!" versus "Just Say Yes!"

Gen. Barry McCaffre, President Clinton's newly appointed field marshal in the war on drugs, declares a vigorous new initiative against the international trade in cocaine and other illegal narcotics. Meanwhile William Buckley's "National Review" -- flagship of the neo-conservatives -- brings out a special issue proclaiming that "the war on drugs is lost" and advocating legalization of major narcotics such as marijuana, cocaine and heroin.

In fact, there is no such clear choice. We need and ultimately have to navigate a precarious route between the two options -- some uses of force, some steps toward legalization.

The shortcomings of the stamp-it-out approach are easy enough to identify, since that is pretty much the present policy at all levels of government. The downsides are also obvious -- massive public expenditures, bulging prisons, and a prevailing cynicism -- comparable to that of the Prohibition era -- which inevitably results when there is an enormous gap between what governments say and what people do. At the federal level, the War on Drugs begins to look an awful lot like the war in Vietnam: repeated renewals of effort combined with repeated proclamations of imminent victory, and not much in the way of results.

The shortcomings of the all-out legalization approach are evident from the fact that nobody except true-believing libertarians advocate it. Most legalization proponents draw lines of one kind or another.

Buckley draws the age line: "we urge," he writes, "the stiffest feasible sentences against anyone convicted of selling a drug to a minor." Other authorities on the subject would draw lines between relatively benign drugs such as marijuana and others -- such as crack cocaine -- whose use they say is about as harmless as shooting yourself in the head.

Some indication of how we might deal with a more liberalized climate of drug use is readily apparent from how we deal with the drugs that are legal now, such as alcohol and tobacco. Alcohol use is prohibited to minors and restricted by licensing laws. So is tobacco use, and there are more and more laws and regulations about where smokers can smoke and where they can't. Furthermore -- particularly in relation to tobacco -- new information is emerging and intense public-opinion campaigns are being waged in the media and the legislatures. It isn't a permanent, stable situation; neither would any move toward legalization be.

Consider the situation in the Netherlands, where marijuana and MDMA ("ecstasy") are legally available. The Dutch are reasonably happy with the situation, and point proudly to their small number of heroin and cocaine addicts. But other European governments don't like an arrangement that gives tourists such easy access to substances illegal at home. Even in that radically liberal country, access to drugs is limited now by licensing and possession laws and may become even more limited if the Dutch make some concessions to their nervous neighbors. Also, the authorities have recently become concerned about the popularity of MDMA among teenagers and are now trying to reduce it -- with educational programs, not military actions. Another example is the Swiss experiment in prescribing maintenance quantities of heroin, morphine and injectable methadone to addicts -- a civilized and on the whole successful policy, but a long way from all-out legalization. The Swiss call theirs a "two-track" strategy -- police actions against illegal dealers combined with a "harm reduction" policy toward users.

The debates over drug policy are a murky business, but a few things are clear: One is that drugs aren't about to go away -- if anything, there will be even more of them in the future, as scientists discover more kinds of mind-altering chemicals. Another is that people aren't about to stop using them: the evidence is persuasive that most human beings in most parts of the world have found some ways to modify consciousness, and used them. Yet another is globalization -- all the world's drugs are now available to whoever wants them and can afford them.

Military or police power will not do much about these basic realities, and complete legalization will not remove the many abuses and tragedies that go with them. The only remaining course is a long, slow learning curve, with some steps in the direction of legalization and a lot of education and research along the way. Not an entirely cheerful picture, but preferable to staying in the quagmire.