marines ignore poppy and opium
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An expert on Afghanistan's drug trade, Barnett Rubin, complained that the Marines are being put in such a situation by a "one-dimensional" military policy that fails to integrate political and economic considerations into long-range planning. Last week, the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit moved into southern Helmand province, the world's largest opium poppy-growing region, and now find themselves surrounded by green fields of the illegal plants that produce the main ingredient of heroin.TRANSCRIPT
David Guttenfelder / AP
Afghanistan supplies some 93 percent of the world's opium used to make heroin, and the Taliban
militants earn up to $100 million from the drug trade, the United Nations estimates.
updated
GARMSER, Afghanistan — The Marines of Bravo
Company's 1st Platoon sleep beside a grove of poppies.
Troops in the 2nd Platoon playfully swat at the heavy
opium bulbs while walking through the fields. Afghan
laborers scraping the plant's gooey resin smile and wave.
Last week, the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit moved into
southern Helmand province, the world's largest opium
poppy-growing region, and now find themselves
surrounded by green fields of the illegal plants that produce
the main ingredient of heroin.
The Taliban, whose fighters are exchanging daily fire with
the Marines in Garmser, derives up to $100 million a year
from the poppy harvest by taxing farmers and charging safe passage fees — money that will buy weapons for
use against U.S., NATO and Afghan troops.
Yet the Marines are not destroying the plants. In fact, they are reassuring villagers the poppies won't be
touched. American commanders say the Marines would only alienate people and drive them to take up arms
if they eliminated the impoverished Afghans' only source of income.
Only source of income
Many Marines in the field are scratching their heads over the situation.
"It's kind of weird. We're coming over here to fight the Taliban. We see this. We know it's bad. But at the
same time we know it's the only way locals can make money," said 1st Lt. Adam Lynch, 27, of Barnstable,
Mass.
The Marines' battalion commander, Lt. Col. Anthony Henderson, said in an interview Tuesday that the poppy
crop "will come and go" and that his troops can't focus on it when Taliban fighters around Garmser are
"terrorizing the people."
"I think by focusing on the Taliban, the poppies will go away," said Henderson, a 41-year-old from
Washington, D.C. He said once the militant fighters are forced out, the Afghan government can move in and
offer alternatives.
An expert on Afghanistan's drug trade, Barnett Rubin, complained that the Marines are being put in such a
situation by a "one-dimensional" military policy that fails to integrate political and economic considerations
into long-range planning.
"All we hear is, not enough troops, send more troops," said Rubin, a professor at New York University. "Then
you send in troops with no capacity for assistance, no capacity for development, no capacity for aid, no
Marines ignore opium — Taliban's cash crop Marines fear locals would fight back if they destroyed the lucrative plants
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capacity for governance."
Most of the 33,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan operate in the east, where the poppy problem is not as great.
But the 2,400-strong 24th Marines, have taken the field in this southern growing region during harvest
season.
Smugglers make money
In the poppy fields 100 feet from the 2nd Platoon's headquarters, three Afghan brothers scraped opium resin
over the weekend. The youngest, 23-year-old Sardar, said his family would earn little money from the
harvest.
"We receive money from the shopkeepers, then they will sell it," said Sardar, who was afraid to give his last
name. "We don't have enough money to buy flour for our families. The smugglers make the money," added
Sardar, who worked alongside his 11-year-old son just 20 yards from a Marine guard post, its guns pointed
across the field.
Afghanistan supplies some 93 percent of the world's opium used to make heroin, and the Taliban militants
earn up to $100 million from the drug trade, the United Nations estimates. The export value of this harvest
was $4 billion — more than a third of the country's combined gross domestic product.
Though they aren't eradicating poppies, the Marines presence could still have a positive effect. Henderson said
the drug supply lines have been disrupted at a crucial point in the harvest. And Marine commanders are
debating staying in Garmser longer than originally planned.
Second Lt. Mark Greenlief, 24, a Monmouth, Ill., native who commands the 2nd Platoon, said he originally
wanted to make a helicopter landing zone in Sardar's field. "But as you can see that would ruin their poppy
field, and we didn't want to ruin their livelihood."
Sardar "basically said, 'This is my livelihood, I have to do what I can to protect that,'" said Greenlief. "I told
him we're not here to eradicate."
The Taliban told Garmser residents that the Marines were moving in to eradicate, hoping to encourage the
villagers to rise up against the Americans, said 2nd Lt. Brandon Barrett, 25, of Marion, Ind., commander of
the 1st Platoon.
'Stuck in the middle'
In the next field over from Sardar's, Khan Mohammad, an Afghan born in Helmand province who lives in
Pakistan and came to work the fields, said he makes only $2 a day. He said the work is dangerous now that
Taliban militants are shooting at the U.S. positions.
"We're stuck in the middle," he said. "If we go over there those guys will fire at us. If we come here, we're in
danger, too, but we have to work," said the 54-year-old Mohammad, who supports a family of 10.
An even older laborer, his back bent by years of work, came over and told the small gathering of Afghans,
Marines and journalists that the laborers had to get back to work "or the boss will get mad at us."
Staff Sgt. Jeremy Stover, whose platoon is sleeping beside a poppy crop planted in the interior courtyard of a
mud-walled compound, said the Marines' mission is to get rid of the "bad guys," and "the locals aren't the bad
guys."
"Poppy fields in Afghanistan are the cornfields of Ohio," said Stover, 28, of Marion, Ohio. "When we got here
they were asking us if it's OK to harvest poppy and we said, 'Yeah, just don't use an AK-47.'"
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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