Pubdate: Wed, 21 Feb 2007
Source: Tracy Press (CA)
Copyright: 2005 Tracy Press
Contact: http://tracypress.com/submitletter.php
Website: http://www.tracypress.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/3862
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

IN AFGHANISTAN, IT'S OPIUM

Usually we are leery about special-interest studies, since the 
conclusions usually match the group's mission. We took a critical 
view of the Senlis Council's recommendations last week to counter the 
insurgency of the Taliban in Afghanistan. We have to acknowledge, 
though, that this international policy think-tank does offer 
innovation for a counter-narcotics strategy that could strengthen, 
not weaken, the Afghan government.

The war in Afghanistan became more economic than cultural when the 
Hamid Karzai government outlawed the cultivation of poppies for 
opium. Afghanistan supplies 80 percent of the world's opium. U.S. and 
NATO forces are part of the campaign to eradicate Afghanistan's main 
crop, and that invigorated anti-American sentiment, especially in the 
rural areas.

Re-enter the Taliban and al-Qaida insurgents who are now in the drug 
business by protecting the crop with Taliban fighters hired at 700 
percent the normal salary of Afghan security officers. The protected 
farmers are loyal to the Taliban; they profit from a stronger market 
because eradication threatens to lower the supply.

Concludes the Senlis study, "the insurgency in Afghanistan seems to 
have little to do with al-Qaida or the global Jihad, but more with 
being able to feed one's family."

Instead of just sending more U.S. troops to Afghanistan to go 
toe-to-toe with the Taliban, Senlis recommends increasing economic 
assistance to the poppy farmers by having the government legalize, 
certify and market the opium worldwide as the base for morphine and 
codeine pain relievers.

Why not? To win the Afghan war, it might be the economy, stupid!
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman