Field of Dreams
Can Afghanistan, awash in opium poppies, curtail its drug trade and the heroin tide headed this way?
KANDIBA, AFGHANISTAN--In a cool, mud room in this Afghan village nestled in a lush plain at the foot of the Hindu Kush, five farmers rue life on the right side of the law. For almost a decade, nearly everyone in this 184-family community worked in the drug trade, planting poppy and selling the opium to traders in the nearby town of Jalalabad. "The only ones not involved," says Wakil, a wan village elder, "were the mullah and small children." But this spring, facing the threat of government crop eradication, Kandiba's farmers planted wheat instead. Wakil strokes his hollow cheeks to demonstrate the result. "Look at us," he says, gesturing to his fellow farmers who ring the room, sipping green tea. "We have hungry faces."
Hungry faces may become even more common in the wake of a major new push to uproot the lucrative poppy economy. Newly elected President Hamid Karzai declared a national "jihad against poppies," and the international community has increased its counternarcotics aid pledges to nearly $1 billion. To understand the unprecedented magnitude of the challenge, consider this: Afghan opium poppy cultivation, by U.S. estimates, more than tripled last year from a near record level the year before. No other country in modern times has produced so much opium. The crop now accounts for 60 percent of Afghanistan's overall economy--and supplies nearly 90 percent of the world's opium (most of which is turned into heroin). Still, there are questions about the commitment to action by both the Afghan and U.S. governments. Amid criticism that Washington has let the problem fester, Lt. Gen. David Barno, former top U.S. military officer here, says, "Last year, the priority was the political process. This year, it's poppy."
Narcostate. Finger-pointing over who's to blame was rampant last week as Karzai visited Washington. Stung by a U.S. Embassy memo leaked to the New York Times that portrayed him as "unwilling to assert strong leadership" in the poppy fight, the Afghan president derided international antidrug assistance as "halfhearted" and called for an increase in aid. Quibbling about methods aside--the United States wants a stronger stance on crop eradication, while Karzai argues the focus should be on finding farmers other work--both governments agree the exploding opium trade threatens to turn Afghanistan into a narcostate. Says Barno, "Poppy production undermines the legitimacy and all the progress of the last three years here."
Poppy today is discussed as a handy proxy for all the forces that threaten the establishment of democracy here. Along with whatever links exist between narcotics and terrorism, no less problematic are the warlords--often the same commanders allied with U.S. forces against the Taliban--who are now involved in trafficking and resisting a democratic movement that would erode their power.
Despite a reputation as a centuries-old opium haven, Afghanistan began cultivating poppy in earnest only in the 1970s. As the country tipped into a quarter century of war, the trade thrived; aside from a one-year moratorium under the Taliban, which enforced its planting ban with beheadings, cultivation expanded. Now, like the thick dust that hangs over Afghanistan's unpaved roads, opium is everywhere. It employs up to two thirds of villagers in major poppy-producing districts as laborers, landowners, or traders. Police, widely rumored to facilitate trafficking, are said to impose an unofficial 10 percent tax on poppy crops. Afghan and international officials drop high-profile names--including current members of the ruling party--as suspected profiteers.
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