Quote Originally Posted by Merv Benson View Post
If it were true that the enemy did not profit from the drug trade, then it might be cost effective to just buy the drugs and take them off the market or sell them to pharmaceutical companies. My speculation is that people who grow and sell drugs do not have many inhibitions and therefore, they are likely to be dealing with other people without inhibitions including the enemy.
We were going to do this and then stiffed the farmers. We told them if they planted wheat instead of poppies, we'd buy it and give them the difference. Then we cut that part out of the budget. In the end, there were a whole bunch of new wheat farmers pissed at Americans for not making good on their promise. So now poppie production is about 60% of the country. Cool little 2nd and 3rd order effect there.