The Independent
14 August 2004
By Nick Meo in Kandahar

US soldiers in Afghanistan fear they are about to be launched into a bloody war on drugs amid mounting evidence that the country's booming opium trade is funding terrorists linked to al-Qa'ida.

The US Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, raised the prospect of the 17,000 combat troops based in the country taking an active role against the drugs trade on a visit to Kabul this week when he spoke of a need for a new strategy. Mr Rumsfeld did not give details, but it is widely believed that after October's presidential elections troops may be called on to assist Afghan security forces in a strategy modelled on controversial efforts to destroy Colombia's cocaine industry.

Patrolling US troops routinely turn a blind eye to opium farming and trading, ignoring poppy fields, and have recruited warlords suspected of being drug dealers to fight al-Qa'ida.

Taking on Afghanistan's powerful drug lords could force US troops to confront dangerous new enemies, however. One US soldier in Kandahar said: "We start taking out drug guys, and they will start taking out our guys." Many of the roadside bombs and sporadic guerrilla attacks on US soldiers in southern Afghanistan are already blamed on criminal gangs seeking to spread chaos as well as Taliban insurgents.

The overstretched military is thought to prefer its current brief, which explicitly excludes it from drug eradication. One senior officer said: "If we take on the drug trade in this country, that will be a bigger challenge than any other threat we have dealt with so far in Afghanistan."

The Taliban banned opium production as forbidden by Islam, but since the fall of the regime in 2001, large-scale poppy cultivation has returned. About 90 per cent of Britain's heroin is now thought to originate in Afghanistan. The drugs business is widely believed to have corrupted officials up to cabinet level, and many Afghans fear that they may have exchanged Taliban fundamentalism for rule by narco-mafias in the future.

So far Britain has taken a so-called lead role in combating the drugs trade, but US officials are thought to have become increasingly frustrated at the lack of success. No major figures have been apprehended and a UK plan for crop eradication proved a miserable failure. British diplomats have privately complained of being handed an impossible task with little assistance from America while stressing that nearly all Afghan heroin is sold in European markets, not American.

After ignoring the opium trade for two years, the US has been forced to take it seriously by growing fears that the Taliban and other terrorist groups are financing their activities from the drugs trade on a large scale for the first time. In recent months the Afghan government and its international backers have also demonstrated a growing determination to strip warlords of their power. Many are heavily involved in the drugs trade. Taliban figures in the Pakistani city of Quetta, just across the border, are also said to be deeply involved.

Appearing at a joint press conference with the US General Eric Olsen yesterday, the governor of Kandahar, Yussef Pashtun, said: "One of the most important things prolonging terrorism is drugs. "We are 100 per cent sure that some of the top terrorists are involved in drug smuggling, and eradication of this industry would not only benefit Afghanistan but would be a step towards eradicating terrorism." General Olsen said US troops would not be involved in counter-narcotics "at this point in time" but some officers believe after the hurdle of the October election has been cleared the military will start actively interdicting drug shipments and destroying warehouses. "Poppy eradication may not be the best way to address the drug issue, there may be better ways to interdict the drug trade," General Olsen said.

America may also consider using the 1,000 special forces soldiers it has stationed in Afghanistan to gather intelligence and target drug lords. Using helicopters to spray poppy fields with chemicals is not likely, however, because of fears that wrecking the livelihoods of farmers could provoke violent rural rebellions against the American-backed Kabul government - a problem the Taliban encountered when it outlawed poppy farming.

The opium trade has been blamed for worsening insecurity in Afghanistan and may have been a factor in the execution-style murder of five aid workers from Médecins Sans Frontières in June in the north-west province of Badgis. Security experts in Kabul now warn foreigners not to venture into poppy farming areas as they may be attacked if farmers believe they are involved in poppy eradication.

© 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

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