Article

2018-06-18 Afghanistan

Watchdog: U.S. $8.6 Billion Antinarcotics Campaign in Afghanistan a Pricey Failure

[Free Beacon] The drug trade in Afghanistan has strengthened in recent years despite billions of dollars in U.S.-funded counternarcotics operations aimed at choking the Taliban's top revenue source, a government watchdog said Thursday.

The United States alone has spent $8.6 billion on counternarcotics efforts in Afghanistan since 2002, but the country remains the world's largest producer of opium, with poppy cultivation reaching a record high last year.

According to a new report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), opium cultivation in 2017 reached 1,265 square miles‐more than 20 times the size of Washington, D.C.‐marking a 63 percent increase from the year before. The unprecedented harvest could produce 900 tons of export-quality heroin and helps to fuel insurgent violence, SIGAR said.

"To put it bluntly, these numbers spell failure and the outlook is not encouraging," John Sopko, the special inspector general, said in prepared remarks at the New America think tank in Washington.

The United States in November retooled its air campaign to target Taliban drug labs as part of a sustained effort to undercut the group's $200 million-a-year opium trade. Gen. John Nicholson, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, told reporters at the time that American and Afghan warplanes had taken out several of the labs, which he said numbered some 400 to 500 across the country.

SIGAR acknowledged the bombing campaign as a "good start," but said it was too early to determine the effectiveness given that setting up new labs takes three to four days at a cost of just a few hundred dollars.

Posted by Besoeker 2018-06-18 03:23|| || Front Page|| [11138 views ] Top
File under: Taliban

#1 That's where the opioids devastating America are coming from. Why would they cut off the supply?

Posted by Herb McCoy 2018-06-18 04:23|| 2018-06-18 04:23|| Front Page Top

#2 Would napalm cost that much?

Posted by Abu Uluque 2018-06-18 10:22|| 2018-06-18 10:22|| Front Page Top

#3 Best to decriminalize it and watch the price fall.

Of course make the entitlement to take it difficult and separate those who decide to be temporarily mentally ill for the duration the drug has an effect.

Posted by Bright Pebbles 2018-06-18 10:30|| 2018-06-18 10:30|| Front Page Top

#4 That's where the opioids devastating America are coming from.

That would be Chinese factories. Chinese fentanyl smuggled into the US via Mexico or the US Post Office surpasses both heroin and prescription opioids.

Posted by Ebboluting Hapsburg6925 2018-06-18 12:38|| 2018-06-18 12:38|| Front Page Top

#5 What ever happened to designer bugs like poppy fungus or cocaine mosaic virus?

Posted by 3dc 2018-06-18 13:36|| 2018-06-18 13:36|| Front Page Top

#6 Give me a Spooky and a KC10 with crop dusting bars and I'll get it done for a tenth.

Posted by gorb 2018-06-18 14:34|| 2018-06-18 14:34|| Front Page Top

#7 *Sigh* Windmills, knightly lance, donkey optional.

Posted by magpie 2018-06-18 16:16|| 2018-06-18 16:16|| Front Page Top

#8 Wouldn't Agent Orange work?

Posted by Rambler in Virginia 2018-06-18 17:14|| 2018-06-18 17:14|| Front Page Top

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