Does anyone really know the acreage involved in poppy growing? Why not let the farmer grow his opium crop, pay him fair market value then destroy it when it is half grown and can't be salvaged? Farmer gets his money for only half his labor and doesn't hate America. The Taliban has to extort him to replace their opium income that has been destroyed. Major drug dealers are replaced as fast as they go down - its market driven and the money runs up into the echelons of politics, any cop knows that, what Holbrooke means is popping some of the middle men, which looks good in print.