Quote Originally Posted by Eden View Post
A few things to remember when thinking about poppies in Afghanistan. My last tour ended in early '07, but I think I'm still fairly current.

1. With a very few exceptions, the insurgents are not using the drug lords for support - they are working for them. It's the second job they have to support their fight against infidels and the tribe pissing in the river upstream. They provide security, intelligence, and muscle. In return, the drug lords allow a few crumbs to fall in their plates. It is not narco-terrorism on the Columbia model.

2. The drug lords - who are often also into weapons and human trafficking - have no great problem with NATO, so long as interference in their trade is limited to a few photo ops. Any concerted effort to do more will trigger violence on a scale far greater than that seen recently, and across the country. Just ask the Iranians what happened when they seriously attempted to interfere with trafficking across their borders.

3. Buying up the supply is a simple solution, but probably not an effective one. First, see paragraph 2. The drug lords won't stand idly by. Second, as has been pointed out, even if it is successful, it will merely push production outward. Do we want to solve the problem in Afghanistan by destabilizing one of the other 'stans, at least one of which has nuclear weapons?

Not to sound negative, but the tone of some posts is that there are easy solutions out there being ignored. There aren't, only long, hard, costly solutions.

Eden I think your post was excellant very good analysis... from my armchair as davidbfpo says.
I have been out of the loop on Intel for quite a few years now but here is some real wisdom here. However I agree with davidbfpo about buying the crop (which is not a new startegy) in this case it is worth the shot.