Of Obama, Afghanistan and Opium

"Afghan heroin sells on the international narcotics market for 100 times the price farmers get for their opium right out of the field".(US State Department quoted by the Voice of America (VOA), 27 February 2004).
According to the UNODC, opium in Afghanistan generated in 2003 "an income of one billion US dollars for farmers and US$ 1.3 billion for traffickers, equivalent to over half of its national income.”
Consistent with these UNODC estimates, the average price for fresh opium was $350 a kg. (2002); the 2002 production was 3400 tons.

Obama is visiting Afghanistan.
Obviously, his primary concern is American voters.
He wishes to be taken seriously at home with his views on war in Iraq and other places.
Let’s hope that he gains something out of this escapade.
One thing that any American, to be president should learn from mistakes made outside America, especially in Afghanistan, has to be a open minded policy on cultivation of poppy.

Looking at the geo-political situation of Afghanistan,
The farmers of the god forsaken country have a little choice with kinds of crop they can cultivate.
Even to find opportunity to do anything with their lives is not easy, moreover when you have India and Pakistan helping you out with your thought process.
Taliban gives them a solution.
If the Afghans do not liberalize their heroin trade, the chances that they would be falling prey to Talibinisation, stands good.
Government restricts cultivation of poppy, which is in much demand globally.
Whether it is illegal or immoral does not affect the trade or demand.
As long as their will be demand, some one will find a way to supply it. There could be various angles to a debate on this. I personally have a view that, as I support ones right to kill himself, every adult individual is free to choose, what form of addiction or emancipation or she has chosen. Smoking is legal and that does not make the whole world a smoker. Marijuana is illegal and does that stop half of the world smoking their wits out. I am also aware that tomorrow I might be risking my children by propagating legalization of heroin trade. But then the imperative would be on my upbringing, how I am able to convince them of staying away from the perceived evils of life.
However, the point here is not morality, simply as whether it is a moral issue or not, Afghanistan will grow poppy. there are too many vested intrests.
Now the point is whether the afghans will benefit out of this trade or not.
You have Americans and Taliban both making money out of this, but Taliban gains both ways as they get support from the local farmers and also make money for their guns in the process.
The biggest losers are the Afghans, simply because the karzai government can not feel the pulse of the people or is as uaual listening to his old bosses, the CIA.
This is the beginning of disintegration.

But why should Obama spell out a policy on Heroin, that too for Afghanistan?
This is why!
The heroin business is not "filling the coffers of the Taliban" as claimed by US government and the international community: quite the opposite! The proceeds of this illegal trade are the source of wealth formation, largely reaped by powerful business/criminal interests within the Western countries. These interests are sustained by US foreign policy. Decision-making in the US State Department, the CIA and the Pentagon is instrumental in supporting this highly profitable multibillion dollar trade, third in commodity value after oil and the arms trade.
The Afghan drug economy is "protected".
The heroin trade was part of the war agenda. What this war has achieved is to restore a compliant narco-State, headed by a US appointed puppet.
The powerful financial interests behind narcotics are supported by the militarisation of the world's major drug triangles (and transshipment routes), including the Golden Crescent and the Andean region of South America (under the so-called Andean Initiative).

However, the only thing that can protect the Afghans and their intrest is to get a principled liberal approach.
Legalise cultivation and sale of opium.