During the past sixty to seventy years the United States has been involved in countless invasions, “conflicts”, and wars in various countries. Looking back on some of these events will help us put into perspective the “drug on wars”!  At the height of the Vietnam conflict,  US intelligence documented a strategy being utilized by our adversary to flood the US occupied areas with extremely potent heroin. Many of the returning veterans can speak to this reality. In the early 1900s the Golden Triangle in southeast Asia ruled the heroin industry. In terms of production and distribution no other region could match the output.  Mountains connecting Thailand, Laos, Myanmar  and Vietnam formed this triangle. The Opium Wars involving China and the British Empire during the middle 1800s, clearly serves as the precursor to this southeast Asian alliance. In the early 1700s exportation of opium to China was a booming business for the United Kingdom. With nearly three-hundred years of clear and documented history regarding the beginning of this huge industry, we now refer to as “the international drug problem”,  why do we keep our heads in the sand.  This lucrative commodity continues in 2010, to yield huge fortunes.  Most countries and governments realize the impact that drugs continue to have on their respective citizenry.  The Poppy plant will continue to be harvested,  opium will be derived and heroin will find its way to people looking to anesthetize themselves.  Clearly,  opium is a “drug on wars”!!

Throughout the rise of the Inca civilization in Peru,  coca was reserved for use by it’s royal family.  It is general knowledge that chewing the coca leafs,  although non-addictive, have many effects similar to the processed form known as cocaine.  Growing high in the Andes the leafs were called,  ”gifts from the gods”.  In the mid 1800s,  coca leafs were beginning to be processed,  isolating the active ingredients.  We all know that Coca Cola contained small amounts of the drug when it was initially introduced and marketed.  Peru,  Bolivia,  and Columbia are the most efficient “producer” countries with regard to this expensive commodity.  Thirty-five years ago during the Iran/Contra debacle in Latin America,   the US government assisted the resistance covertly.  The US congress would not allow the Reagan Administration to support the “contras”,  in their war against the Sandinistas in Nicaragua.  Without the backing of the US congress,  the administration had to use alternate funding practices to bankroll the war effort.  As the story goes,  six American hostages being held by the Lebanese group Hezbollah,  would be released if the US would provide arms to Iran.  Some of the profits from the sale of weapons to the Iranians,  would be appropriated to the contras.  What does all this have to do with cocaine?  During subsequent investigations of this Iran/Contra Affair,  it has been intimated that the CIA and Contras were trafficking cocaine in the USA,  as part of the war funding effort.  In the mid ’80s after FBI probes and press investigations,  the Reagan administration admitted to involvement in these actions.  To what extent was the involvement,  we’ll never know.  Gary Webb,  an investigative journalist reported in the San Jose Mercury News,  that the Nicaraguan contra received assistance from the CIA to move large shipments of the drug to US ports.  He further asserts,  that the “crack cocaine” epidemic that brutalized inner city America during the 1980s,  was a direct result of these shipments.  In Webb’s book,  Dark Alliance he chronicles the involvement between the CIA and the contra,  along with lots of cocaine distribution.  Cocaine is a drug on wars.

In 2010 Afghanistan leads the world in production of the Poppy plant.  This is extremely relevant as the US continues to prosecute a war in this region.  With billions of dollars being generated by the sale of this potent drug,  purchasing weapons,  intelligence,  and manpower makes this enemy formidable by any standard.  Funding the Taliban’s jihad against the west,  heroin is the drug on wars.  The mighty US military,  should be moving through this country with relative ease.  However,  the monopoly that the drug lords of Afghanistan enjoy will continue for quite some time.  As long as the plant can continue to generate revenues in the billions,  we will see our brave soldiers die.  These are all very complicated dynamics.  The mere fact that these drugs exist and are being purchased and sold on international markets,  like automobiles,  motivates me and many others to look at the options.  Policy changes on a global scale could put a huge dent in the blood baths experienced world-wide.  Personally I’d like to blog about the “drug on health care”,  or the “drug on education”!  As for our global society,  drugs have funded enough wars.