Afghanis Get Help Growing Opium : Americans Get Life For Growing Weed

Real News @ http://RevolutionNews.US — KABUL, Afghanistan — The effort to win over Afghans on former Taliban turf in Marja has put American and NATO commanders in the unusual position of arguing against opium eradication, pitting them against some Afghan officials who are pushing to destroy the harvest.

From Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal on down, the military's position is clear: "U.S. forces no longer eradicate," as one NATO official put it. Opium is the main livelihood of 60 to 70 percent of the farmers in Marja, which was seized from Taliban rebels in a major offensive last month. American Marines occupying the area are under orders to leave the farmers' fields alone.

"Marja is a special case right now," said Cmdr. Jeffrey Eggers, a member of the general's Strategic Advisory Group, his top advisory body. "We don't trample the livelihood of those we're trying to win over."

United Nations drug officials agree with the Americans, though they acknowledge the conundrum. Pictures of NATO and other allied soldiers "walking next to the opium fields won't go well with domestic audiences, but the approach of postponing eradicating in this particular case is a sensible one," said Jean-Luc Lemahieu, who is in charge of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime here.

Afghan officials, however, are divided. Though some support the American position, others, citing a constitutional ban on opium cultivation, want to plow the fields under before the harvest, which has already begun in parts of Helmand Province.

"How can we allow the world to see lawful forces in charge of Marja next to fields full of opium, which one way or another will be harvested and turned into a poison that kills people all over the world?" said Zulmai Afzali, the spokesman for the Afghan Ministry of Counternarcotics.

"The Taliban are the ones who profit from opium, so you are letting your enemy get financed by this so he can turn around and kill you back," he added, referring to how the Taliban squeeze farmers for money to run their operations.

The argument may strike some as a jarring reversal; in the years right after the 2001 invasion, tensions rose as some Afghan officials vehemently resisted all-out American pressure to stop opium production.

Though the United States government's official position is still to support opium crop eradication in general, some American civilian officials say that the internal debate over Marja is far from over within parts of the State Department and the Drug Enforcement Administration.

A spokesman for the United States Embassy in Kabul, Brendan J. O'Brien, said officials would decline to comment while the matter was under review.

Full Article: NY Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/21/world/asia/21marja.html?pagewanted=all

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[WhatAxBrit]

so they're letting the product be made into real opium, then capturing it from "drug traffickers"? what a backward and ridiculous policy.

[RevolutionNewsUS]

@WhatAxBrit it even gets worse...

the Government Admits they Deal Heroin, Terrorize Families for Pot:

/watch?v=4WcuYafh1ek

BCCI - The CIA Bank Of Mujahadeen Heroin, Iran-Contra Cocaine:

/watch?v=XTYLoej8JRc

Wells Fargo Launders $380 Billion in Drug Money, Pays small fine:

The bank's penalty for laundering over $380 billion in drug money is going to be a promise not to ever do it again, and a $160 million fine. The fine is so small that Wachovia will almost certainly turn a profit...

[busterhyman21]

the war on drugs is fake.

it's to keep the price of drugs high so the cia gets more money for their drugs, so they have a pretense to cconfiscate people's property without due process, to keep the prisons full so they can have free slave labor, and a booming prison industry.

the same megabanks lauundering the drug money are the same banks that own corrections corporation of america as a subsidiary.

[berlinrelic]

We are such a mess,child rape gets 5 years, pot smoker gets life and a broken families.

[andrew75056]

GOD ? Guns, Oil, Drugs. Think on it.

[drgreenshum188]

This is such a joke

[drgreenshum188]

Rifukinfdiculous what is going on in this world

[IwasaBushfan]

HahahahaahHHahahahahah

[ChristianWorldOrder2]

why am i not suprised oh the government is the biggest drug dealer of all time

[plexx365]

So that's why the US military is in Afghanistan...is this what they have to be proud of? Guarding this means of destruction?!?

[bugsz1]

Inanimate things are neither good or bad. It is the actions of a man that are judged good or bad.

[bugsz1]

Do I have a contract with them? No. Then what reason do I have to follow their rules for? Do they have to follow my rules? Well they don't. They don't even follow God's rules. So what would compel me or anyone else to follow their unlawful laws? Force or threat of force and removal of inalienable rights.

Great government you have there. A true beacon of hope. *barf*