Posted by Ilya Somin:
Anne Applebaum on the The War on Drugs vs. the War on Terror:
http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2007_01_14-2007_01_20.shtml#1168991272
Washington Post columnist Anne Applebaum has an [1]excellent column on
the contradiction between the War on Drugs and the War on Terror. As I
have explained time and again (see [2]here, [3]here, and [4]here), our
efforts to eradicate poppy production in Afghanistan are driving many
Afghan peasants into the arms of the Taliban, and also enable the
Taliban to finance itself through the black market drug trade.
Applebaum makes several related points, and also points out that the
strategy of legalizing poppy production in order to help curb
terrorism was successfully pursued in Turkey, ironically with US
support. An excerpt:
Just like Afghanistan, Turkey had a long tradition of poppy
cultivation. Just like Afghanistan, Turkey worried that poppy
eradication could "bring down the government." Just like
Afghanistan, Turkey -- this was the era of "Midnight Express"-- was
identified as the main source of the heroin sold in the West. Just
like in Afghanistan, a ban was tried, and it failed.
As a result, in 1974 the Turks, with American and U.N. support,
tried a different tactic. They began licensing poppy cultivation
for the purpose of producing morphine, codeine and other legal
opiates. Legal factories were built to replace the illegal ones.
Farmers registered to grow poppies, and they paid taxes. You
wouldn't necessarily know this from the latest White House drug
strategy report-- which devotes several pages to Afghanistan but
doesn't mention Turkey -- but the U.S. government still supports
the Turkish program, even requiring U.S. drug companies to purchase
80 percent of what the legal documents euphemistically refer to as
"narcotic raw materials" from the two traditional producers, Turkey
and India.
Why not add Afghanistan to this list? ..... [E]ven if the program
succeeds in stopping only half of the [illegal] drug trade, a huge
chunk of Afghanistan's economy will still emerge from the gray
market; the power of the drug barons will be reduced; and, most
important, Western money will have been visibly spent helping
Afghan farmers survive, instead of destroying their livelihoods.
The director of the Senlis Council, a group that studies the drug
problem in Afghanistan, told me he reckons that the best way to
"ensure more Western soldiers get killed" is to expand poppy
eradication.
As they say, read the whole thing.
I'm not sure I agree with all the specifics of the Applebaum's
proposed program, and I don't know enough to evaluate some of the
details. My own preference would be for a less heavily regulated
legalization than what she describes. Be that as it may, the Turkish
model, as described by Applebaum, is far preferable to the Bush's
Administration's dangerously misguided poppy eradication campaign.
References
1.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011500967.html
2. http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2006_09_03-2006_09_09.shtml#1157345587
3. http://www.volokh.com/posts/1150641230.shtml
4. http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2006_12_03-2006_12_09.shtml#1165214721
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