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U.S. plans to spray Afghan poppies criticized
By JONATHAN S. LANDAY
McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON | In 2004, U.S.-contracted aircraft secretly sprayed harmless plastic granules over Afghan poppy fields to gauge public reaction to using herbicides on the opium poppies that help fund the Taliban.

The mysterious granules ignited a major outcry from poor farmers, tribal chiefs and government officials up to President Hamid Karzai, who demanded to know whether the spraying was part of a poppy eradication program.

At the time, U.S. officials up to the level of Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad denied any knowledge of the program.

snip ..

Now the Bush administration is pressing Karzai to spray real herbicide against what is expected to be another record opium poppy crop, which is refined into heroin.

There is wide opposition — from Karzai and his government, NATO allies such as Britain with troops in Afghanistan and even major parts of the U.S. government, including the Pentagon, the CIA and U.S. military commanders.

snip..

Opponents fear that spraying would trigger a backlash against Karzai, who is already politically weak, said U.S. and European officials, and deliver a propaganda bonanza to the Taliban.

final snip.. [on the 04 spray]

“It was a dry run,” said a senior State Department official. “People freaked out.”

“The results of those inert tests were, ‘Don’t do this, don’t do this,’ ” recalled another senior U.S. official. “Every goat with a bad ear and every (legitimate) crop that doesn’t grow will be blamed” on the spraying.

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I cant remember the exact details but it made sense and seemed a cost effective way of denying the Taliban needed funds.

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I cant remember the exact details but it made sense and seemed a cost effective way of denying the Taliban needed funds.

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Enter Saul, without taking political sides.

In the 1970s, he supported the idea of buying up the entire world crop and just burning it. But the flaw in that solution was that farmers would have to be paid in perpetuity for not planting.

A better Canadian idea, he said in an interview, would be to explore "realistic alternative crops," and have an Afghan marketing board set a price at double the price of poppies, and also guarantee the farmers that you would buy their entire production.

"You are not talking about a gigantic sum of money," given that farmers don't get paid much for the poppies. Most of the drug money is made downstream in turning poppies into heroin.

You would start off with a small area of Afghanistan and expand to the entire poppy-growing regions.

Such an experiment would be far cheaper than the cost of fighting the production of opium there and the distribution of heroin in the West.

It would also be "ethically and morally sound," he said, both for the West and for the Afghans, who "would be put on the road to self-dignity and, ultimately, self sustainability."

Toronto Star, 20 April 2006

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[ 26 October 2007: Message edited by: AnonA ]