Afghanistan and the Heroin Problem

Afghanistan and the Heroin Problem

An essay by Bill McKenna   ©2012

It will be a great day when we end our war in Afghanistan.  Now that we are free from combat operations, and hopefully all forms of war, in Iraq, the shadow of the Afghan War seems darker.  I hear that we’re planning on leaving by the end of 2013.  I wish the day was tomorrow, but the responsibility of leaving the country as stable and safe as possible correctly weigh on the minds of our leaders.  Now, if we are slowly approaching the end of our tragic adventure there, what steps can we start to take that will bring us that elusive stability and safety?  I am sure there are a vast number of things that Afghanistan and the US need to do to accomplish those goals, but I am thinking of one set of actions that, if we successfully undertake them, will help bring about a successful departure, and yield greater benefits, ultimately bringing us toward meaningful peace.  Those activities involve the disruption of the opium trade in a meaningful, permanent way.

Before you consider how difficult it might be to undertake a serious effort to disrupt black market opiates, consider the following:

·         About 90% of the world’s opium poppy cultivation occurs in Afghanistan,

·         The Taliban earn hundreds of millions of dollars, often in the form of direct barter for armaments from their control of cultivation areas, and

·         Islamic tenets strongly oppose the use of non-medicinal drugs.

Given these facts, one can see that the strategic importance of opium to the Taliban is a liability, too.  By disrupting the trade we can directly impact their ability to conduct war.  Further, we can force the Taliban to choose between their supply chain and the support of the Afghan people.  Finally, the disruption of the heroin trade to the US and Europe will yield benefits at home.

It has been notoriously difficult to disrupt illegal international drug trade.  I think one of the reasons for the difficulty has been that the traffickers are willing to take high risks to yield high profits, and that the demand side is never adequately addressed.  For this reason, we need to coordinate efforts in Afghanistan with a meaningful heroin use reduction program.  If this effort is limited to the US domestically, the effort will be effective, but can be much more effective if the effort is spread to other countries with opiate usage problems.

Most of the effort will involve the use of ‘soft’ power, as opposed to military effort, which makes the plan especially attractive as we wind down our involvement.  The only direct military effort will be to interdict poppy shipments and find and destroy processing facilities.  NATO forces need to reinvigorate efforts to compel Afghan farmers to grow crops which will yield long term economic advantage.  To bolster this effort, western markets should be encouraged to import Afghan agricultural products.  At the same time, Afghan farmers should be educated that the opium poppy they produce is used to support an illegal drug empire that in conflict with Islamic tenets.

The part of the effort to curb the opiate sources in Afghanistan could be complete with the efforts outlined above.  However, if it is deemed wise to negotiate with moderate Taliban as we prepare to depart, we should encourage Taliban leaders inclined to help in the progress in the countries future to accede to the cessation of poppy cultivation in their areas.  This would be a good step toward converting the fighters there, into future participants in a country that is not likely to be purged of Taliban influence altogether.  In fact, it may be a sort of litmus test to determine who is willing to look beyond the current conflict.

I am particularly interested in the domestic side of this program.  If we can first link resolution to the Afghan War with decreasing heroin demand, we can use the link as a way to overcome the disinterest of the heroin abuse problem.  The public relations aspect of the program needs to be vigorous, because traditional reticence about treatment on a public health scale has to be overcome.  Making distribution difficult with enhanced police efforts is important, but will only have temporary effects without attacking demand directly.  Serving addicts with adequate treatment protocols will require people to abandon puritanical notions of ‘just desserts’ for these people, and fear of treatment clinics in neighborhoods must be more than balanced by the sense of urgency to control usage.

If the US can take a lead in addressing heroin demand, we should be prepared to assist other NATO countries with similar heroin problems undertake similar efforts.  Moreover, we should make diplomatic overtures to Russia to coordinate with them, as the problem there is terrible.  If we can work with the ‘demand’ countries effectively, we will have reaped an additional benefit of international goodwill.

I have no intention or ability to discuss the Afghan War anti-drug effort in tactical detail in a short essay.  I simply want to catch the readers’ attentions and imaginations, and hopefully start a conversation which will yield a broader discussion, and perhaps even get the attention of our leaders to act in this sphere.  Any efforts we make in undertaking such a program will yield better chances for a peaceful transition in Afghanistan with the prospect for a long term economic stability, better relationships with many other countries, and a meaningful reduction in a long-standing domestic scourge.  While it is not a wholesale solution to a peaceful Afghanistan or a seemingly intractable domestic drug program, it is fair to say that these ideas merit discussion.