The Afghan War: "No Blood for Opium"

The Afghan War: "No Blood for Opium"
The Hidden Military Agenda is to Protect the Drug Trade

It was common during the opening of the Iraq war to see slogans proclaiming “No blood for oil!” The cover story for the war – Saddam’s links with Al Qaida and his weapons of mass destruction – were obvious mass deceptions, hiding a far less palatable imperial agenda. The truth was that Iraq was a major producer of oil and, in our age, the Age of Oil, oil is the most strategic resource of all. For many it was obvious that the real agenda of the war was an imperialistic grab for Iraqi oil. This was confirmed when Iraq’s state-owned oil company was privatised to western interests in the aftermath of the invasion.



Why then are there no slogans saying “No blood for opium!”? Afghanistan’s major product is opium and opium production has increased remarkably during the present war. The current NATO action around Marjah is clearly motivated by opium. It is reported to be Afghanistan’s main opium-producing area. Why then won’t people consider that the real agenda of the Afghan war has been control of the opium trade?



The weapons of mass deception tell us that the opium belongs to the Taliban and that the US is fighting a war on drugs as well as terror. Yet it remains a curious fact that the opium trade has tracked across Southern Asia for the past five decades from east to west, following US wars, and always under the control of US assets.



In the 1960s, when the US fought a secret war in Laos using the Hmong opium army of Vang Pao as its proxy, Southeast Asia produced 70% of the world’s illicit opium. After the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Afghanistan production, controlled by US-backed drug lords, took off, till it rivalled Southeast Asian production. Since 2002, Afghan opium production, encouraged by both the Taliban and US-backed drug lords, has reached 93% of world illicit production, an unparalleled performance.



The graph below from the UN World Drug Report 2008 shows the astonishing increase in Afghan opium production that followed the US invasion.



In the 1980s the US supported Islamic fundamentalists, the Mujahideen, against the Soviets in Afghanistan. To pay for their war, the Mujahideen ordered peasants to grow opium as a revolutionary tax. Across the border in Pakistan, Afghan leaders and local syndicates, under the protection of Pakistani Intelligence, operated hundreds of heroin labs. As the Golden Crescent in Southwest Asia eclipsed the Golden Triangle in Southeast Asia as the centre of the heroin trade, it sent rates of addiction spiralling in Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan and the Soviet Union.



To hide US complicity in the drug trade, Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) officers were required to look away from the drug-dealing intrigues of the US allies and the support they received from Pakistan’s Inter Service Intelligence (ISI) and the services of Pakistani banks. The CIA’s mission was to destabilise the Soviet Union through the promotion of militant Islam inside the Central Asian Republics and they sacrificed the drug war to fight the Cold War. Their mission was to do as much damage as possible to the Soviets. Knowing the drug war would hasten the collapse of the Soviet Union, the CIA facilitated the operation of anti-Soviet rebels in the provinces of Uzbekistan, Chechnya and Georgia. Drugs were used to finance terrorism and western intelligence agencies used their control of drugs to influence political factions in Central Asia.



The Soviet army withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989, leaving a civil war between the US-funded mujahideen and the Soviet-supported government that raged until 1992. In the chaos that followed the mujahideen victory, Afghanistan lapsed into a period of warlordism in which opium growing thrived.



The Taliban emerged from the chaos, dedicated to removing the war lords and applying a strict interpretation of Sharia law. They captured Kandahar in 1994, and expanded their control throughout Afghanistan, capturing Kabul in 1996, and declaring the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.



Under the policies of the Taliban government, opium production in Afghanistan was curbed. In September 1999, the Taliban authorities issued a decree, requiring all opium-growers in Afghanistan to reduce output by one-third. A second decree, issued in July 2000, required farmers to completely stop opium cultivation. Ordering the ban on opium growing, Taliban leader Mullah Omar called the drug trade “un-Islamic”.



As a result, 2001 was the worst year for global opium production in the period between 1990 and 2007. During the 1990s, global opium production averaged over 4000 tonnes. In 2001, opium production fell to less than 200 tonnes. Although it was not admitted by the Howard government, which claimed the credit itself, Australia’s 2001 heroin shortage was due to the Taliban.



Following the attack on the Pentagon and the World Trade Centre on 11 September 2001, the armies of the northern alliance, led by US Special Forces, supported by daisy cutters, cluster bombs and bunker-busting missiles, shattered the Taliban forces in Afghanistan. The opium ban was lifted and, with CIA-backed warlords back in control, Afghanistan again became the major producer of opium. Despite the official denials, Hillary Mann Leverett, a former US National Security Council official for Afghanistan, confirmed that the US knew that government ministers in Afghanistan, including the minister of defence in 2002, were involved in drug trafficking.



After 2002 Afghan opium production rose to unheard of levels. By 2007, Afghanistan was producing enough heroin to supply the entire world. In 2009, Thomas Schweich, who served as US state department co-ordinator for counter-narcotics and justice reform for Afghanistan, accused President Hamid Karzai of impeding the war on drugs. Schweich also accused the Pentagon of obstructing attempts to get military forces to assist and protect opium crop eradication drives.



Schweich wrote in the New York Times that "narco-corruption went to the top of the Afghan government". He said Karzai was reluctant to move against big drug lords in his political power base in the south, where most of the country's opium and heroin is produced.



The most prominent of these suspected drug lords was Ahmed Wali Karzai, the brother of President Hamid Karzai. Ahmed Wali Karzai was said to have orchestrated the manufacture of hundreds of thousands of phony ballots for his brother’s re-election effort in August 2009. He was also believed to have been responsible for setting up dozens of so-called ghost polling stations — existing only on paper — that were used to manufacture tens of thousands of phony ballots. US officials have criticised his “mafia-like” control of southern Afghanistan. The New York Times reported that the Obama administration had vowed to crack down on the drug lords who permeate the highest levels of President Karzai’s administration, and they pressed President Karzai to move his brother out of southern Afghanistan, but he refused to do so.



"Karzai was playing us like a fiddle," Schweich wrote. "The US would spend billions of dollars on infrastructure development; the US and its allies would fight the Taliban; Karzai's friends could get richer off the drug trade. Karzai had Taliban enemies who profited from drugs but he had even more supporters who did."



But who was playing who like a fiddle?



Was it the puppet President or the puppet masters who installed him?



As Douglas Valentine shows in his history of the War on Drugs, The Strength of the Pack, this never-ending war has been a phony contest, an arm wrestle between two arms of the US state, the DEA and the CIA; with the DEA vainly attempting to prosecute the war, while the CIA protects its drug-dealing assets.



During the Nineteenth and Twentieth centuries, European powers (chiefly the UK) and Japan used the opium trade to weaken and subjugate China. During the Twenty-First century, it seems that the opium weapon is being used against Iran, Russia and the former Soviet republics, which all face spiralling rate of addiction and covert US penetration as the Afghan War fuels central Asia’s heroin plague.



Dr John Jiggens is the author of “The killer cop and the murder of Donald Mackay”. http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=18768

 

http://publicintelligence.net/more-...patrolling-opium-poppy-fields-in-afghanistan/

 

You know, if opium was legal everywhere, and Afghanistan was allowed to produce opium full speed, the resulting supply would drive down the value of it to a mere fraction of its current worth. You'd also no longer see its profits funding cartel groups.

 

This opium legal for you only and only in your coutry/state.You can repeat it twice,if you do not understand.

 

Turkey and India both grow opium poppies legally for the Pharmaceutical companies to produce medical opiates.

 

The Taliban had basically banned opium production for 2 very good reasons - it denied their warlord opponents a lucrative income and they had captured a very large stockpile of harvested opium, so they also wanted to be the sole source of opium in Afghanistan. The supply did drop, but since heroin is an inelastic good the Taliban made almost as much money with a reduced supply than various Afghans had, and are, making with a larger supply of opium.

If you want to keep many of the anti-Taliban Afghans happy, you have to turn a blind eye to their opium/heroin operations. It is noteworthy that opium production also restarted in Taliban-held areas and that is where ISAF forces have been engaging in poppy eradication programs (to deny the Taliban money).

 

I hate to point this out, but, an informed reader would check and see what was going on before thinking the US was inolved in the opium trade and protecting it with our blood.

Lets ask soem questions:

#1 - if not opium, what else would Afghans grow?

#2 - if they cannot grow anything but opium, how will they support their families?

#3 - if they cannot support their families, wht will they:

a. Not join the insurgency.

b. Stay to build the projects that will allow them to grow other crops.

c. turn to criminality.

#4 - you are aware that the counter narcotics plan is a five year, minimum plan, that requires local farmers to exchange 20% of their available land per year to to a different crop. This gives them economic security if something bad happens and the new crop fails. After five years, opium production is significantly reduced.

#5 - Guess how long the increased number of troops have been in Afghanistan? Just over a year.

That means they have to fight their way in, wait for the crops to come up, sell the plan (after defeating the Taliban or their henchmen), protect them from reprisal attacks, while sterring clear of tribal rivalries that make finding a needle in a haystack look easy.

But, I guess its easier to think we are over there killing people to sell drugs on the illegal market ... through local Afghans .... exporting it through central Asia and Pakistan and destablizing the region entirely for ... why would we do that?

BTW - opium production soared under the Taliban. They used it to finance their war against the various factions, including the Northern Alliance, and use it now to finance their efforts in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

But really, its us. We are spending a between 50-60 billion a year to proetct a few billion (at best) in opium? Makes perfect sense.

 

Granny says, "Dat's right - Obama freezin' dat opium dealer's assets off...

Treasury targets alleged Taliban narcotics trafficker
November 15th, 2012 - The U.S. government sanctioned a senior Taliban official on Thursday for his alleged role in the narcotics trade in Afghanistan and across the region, saying illicit drugs are used to finance violence.

 

Progress against Afghan opium...

Afghanistan opium harvest drops by a third - UN
20 November 2012 - The opium crop has fallen this year, but more Afghan farmers are trying to grow it

 

As does Australia (Tasmania) for a couple of international pharmaceutical companies.


To add, it's not the first time America (namely the CIA) has encouraged illegal opium cultivation. An entire war was funded by illegal opium cultivation.

 

"It was common during the opening of the Iraq war to see slogans proclaiming “No blood for oil!” The cover story for the war – Saddam’s links with Al Qaida and his weapons of mass destruction – were obvious mass deceptions, hiding a far less palatable imperial agenda. The truth was that Iraq was a major producer of oil and, in our age, the Age of Oil, oil is the most strategic resource of all. For many it was obvious that the real agenda of the war was an imperialistic grab for Iraqi oil. This was confirmed when Iraq’s state-owned oil company was privatised to western interests in the aftermath of the invasion."

Well how do you know the reverse isn't happening? First of all, the Iraq war was NOT about oil. Before we went to war with Iraq only five percent of our oil came from them. FIVE percent. Even after the denial of oil, we simply borrowed 5% more from our ally countries, helping their economy. Oil was not the point or cause of the Iraq war. I know the cause, but since this is about that I won't. So what makes you think that opium can't simply be a side effect of the war? You can't deny that we were fueled into Afghanistan after 9/11. That's just plain stupidity.

 

Near record poppy crop in Afghanistan...

Afghan opium production increases for 3rd year in a row, nearing record
Monday, Apr. 15 2013, Opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan has been increasing for a third year in a row and is heading for a record high, the UN said in a report released Monday.

 

LMFAO they slowed and haulted opium production because there was a glut in the market so they needed to artificially reduce supply to increase prices, but thanks for your (*)(*)(*)(*)ing Taliban propaganda though. The coalition actually destroys popi crops when we come across them, which (if they are not in Taliban hands) is actually kind of messed up considering that these are some of the poorest people in the world and opium production would be a huge boost to their economy regardless of idiotic prohibition laws.

 

The OP speaks as if there was some evil plot to encourage opium production and heroin export in Afghanistan. The reality is that if you are Afghani and have some power and land in Afghanistan you will at least grow opium poppies and you may well refine it as well (more profit). Whether it is the Taliban, local warlords or even clan elders in villages, the incentive for profit will drive you to participate in the opium trade. When outsiders try to interfere with this desire, the outsiders become enemies.

The one exception to this rule is when the Afghans are fighting among themselves. Thus production was high when they were fighting the Soviets (everyone needed money in order to fight the invasion) and even higher while the Taliban was taking power. The Taliban thus captured large stocks of heroin and processed opium and instituted their famous ban because they could deny their enemies (various warlords) money while actually increasing their own income.

Now we have the opposite case to the pre-Taliban takeover where no-one has control, so production is high again. The Western forces ignore opium production by their supposed allies because they don't want them to switch sides, but go after attempted production by the Taliban to deny them income (not because they are trying to stop heroin production), Framing the situation in terms of a War Against Drugs or a deliberate betrayal of such a War just doesn't capture the reality on the ground.

 

I wonder, how many people have died from drugs from Afghanistan since then when the article was published. And what have been changed?

 

The United States apparently can't win the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan and the United States apparently can't win the War on Drugs at home. EvilAztec feels that we can improve our record of success by tackling the War on Drugs in Afghanistan - I'd love to see the evidence behind that theory.

 

Nope, drugs consumption would grow up sky-high. The only barrier, which somehow stops spreading of heavy drugs is that they are expensive, hard to find and dangerous to keep. If they would be legalised, you'll see hordes of my fellow youth to "test" and "expierence" them, which will lead to drug pandemy soon enough. So good luck, legalise it in the USA. Will see what will remain of your population in 10 years.

Some twisted logic over here.

How about crops? Or that is too hard?

Actually they can grow something but opium. I hope you don't really think they were growing only opium through their entire history?

 

In Russia, addiction rates are among the highest in the world. Not surprisingly, laws against drug use are very harsh as well.

By contrast, Portugal has decriminalized all drugs. Addiction rates are basically the same as before this change in policy. Drug-related crimes are at an all-time low.

So, as far as real world evidence goes, your assumptions are vastly incorrect.

 

Troubles with indification of reasons and consequences?

Any link?

Because majority of organised crime investigasions in Nederlands are related with drugs, and defeating organised crimeseems to be your goal. It smells with failure.

No, they are not. But as I said, I would approve US legalising drugs. If it help we'll use that expirence. If not...well, there will be nobody to put long nose into our affairs. Works for me.

 

I read an article that stated that the Queen of England is head of the opium trade. It started with the Opium War in China. The Chinese had wanted to eliminate the opium trade but the West wouldn't allow it and sent in troops to ensure the supply. The English royal family got the concession.

When the Taliban came to power they reduced the supply. Unfortunately it was around the same time as 9-11 so they got an invasion in return. Gotta keep the drugs flowing.

 

Ironic post is ironic.

http://www.cato.org/publications/wh...essons-creating-fair-successful-drug-policies

 

In 1900, the USA invaded China, bombed Peking and looted the city and then forced the Chinese to accept opium merchants throughout China.

Many famous US universities got their funding from American opium lords.

The CIA has been in the drug business for decades. So there is no doubt that the USA is backing opium production to benefit the super-rich. Most people in jail for drug running are imprisoned for undercutting the price for the big guys.
AIR AMERICA CIA drug running during the Vietnam war:
[video=youtube;bBmFtarnVq8]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBmFtarnVq8[/video]

 

The entire CIA's campaign during the "Secret War in Laos" was funded by the opium/heroin trade. The CIA coerced the Hmong in northern Laos to step up their opium production (they had been growing opium for centuries but never for a cash crop) for the promise of aid. Opium was then shipped to Vientiane via Long Chieng, at that time one of the busiest airports in the world, where it was refined into heroin. This heroin ended up in veins of US servicemen in Vietnam and on the streets in America.

By the way, Air America is totally fiction. Mel Gibson couldn't even get his Lao language right,, he was speaking Thai.

 

Another bumper crop of poppies in Afghanistan...

Afghans revel in bountiful opium harvest
Sun, May 22, 2016 - Lashes swished and whirled through the air in a burst of celebration around a sea of opium poppies, as farmers in a southern Afghan village rejoiced over a bumper harvest with a traditional rope game.

 

And before long every living person on the planet would be on a permanent high. What a good idea!