The war on drugs is interfering with the US effort to destroy al-Qaeda and the Taleban in Afghanistan. American officials increasingly want to eradicate drugs, as well as nurture Afghanistan's embryonic democracy, symbolised by the pro-western regime of President Hamid Karzai. But they need to face the reality that it is not possible to accomplish both.

Afghanistan has been one of the leading sources of opium poppies and, therefore, the heroin supply, for many years. Indeed, there has been a steady upward trend in opium production for more than two decades. The only significant interruption to that trend occurred in 2001, following an edict by the Taleban regime banning opium cultivation on pain of death. (Taleban leaders had previously stockpiled large quantities of opium and wanted to create a temporary scarcity to drive up prices and fill the regime's coffers with additional revenue.) Today, Afghanistan accounts for nearly 75 per cent of the world's opium supply.

During the civil war between the Taleban and the Northern Alliance in the 1990s, both sides were extensively involved in the drugs trade. Since US forces and their Northern Alliance allies overthrew the Taleban in late 2001 and drove them, as well as al-Qaeda operatives, into neighbouring Pakistan, drugs commerce has been even more prominent. The trade now amounts to approximately US$2 billion a year, nearly half impoverished Afghanistan's annual gross domestic product.

Some 264,000 families are estimated to be involved in growing opium poppies. Given the role of extended families and clans in Afghan society, the number of people affected is much greater. Indeed, it is likely that 20 to 25 per cent of the population is involved directly or indirectly in the drugs trade. For many of them, opium poppy crops and other aspects of drugs commerce are the difference between modest prosperity and destitution. They will not look kindly on efforts to destroy their livelihood.

Unfortunately, this year, the US government has increased pressure on the fragile Karzai government to crack down on drug crop cultivation. In August, US Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld also ordered American military forces in Afghanistan to make drug eradication a high priority.

That move is a big mistake. The Taleban and their al-Qaeda allies have already shown a resurgence in Afghanistan, especially in the southern part. If zealous American drug warriors alienate hundreds of thousands of Afghan farmers, the Afghan government's hold on power could become even more precarious.

US officials need to keep their priorities straight. America's mortal enemy is al-Qaeda and the former Taleban regime that made Afghanistan a sanctuary for the terrorist organisation.

The drugs war is a dangerous distraction in the campaign to destroy those forces. American officials should look the other way with regard to the drug activities of Afghan farmers. In this case, the war against radical Islamic terrorism must take priority.

by Ted Galen Carpenter

Ted Galen Carpenter is vice-president for defence and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute in Washington.

This article originally appeared in The South China Morning Post on October 27, 2004.

back | to top | full article >>