Dealing with Afghani Poppy the Nixon way
An article in USA Today called “A better way to deal with Afghanistan’s poppy crop (As heroin trade grows, a Nixon-era plan in Turkey provides a model)” talks about different ways of dealing with Afghanistan’s poppy crop, which is estimated to be the source of 90% of the world’s heroin supply. The article sensibly disfavors spraying the crops with herbicide, welcoming
“…pilot projects under which the morphine factories would be set up in Afghan villages and monitored by village elders and outside groups. The factories could provide employment and income for the villages - and plow some profits into alternative industries.”
(Like I wrote in one of the previous posts, unless you are willing to legalize the stuff, buy it from farmers at black market prices. Of course, it is a temporary solution, since farmers will be induced to grow more of the stuff since it is so lucrative and there is a ready buyer. But - I digress.)
The article generally gets the situation right; however, what really caught my attention was the comparison of the current initiatives to Nixon-era crusade against the Turkey opium. The article writes about
“…a program that largely eliminated heroin production in Turkey in the 1970s with the support of President Nixon and Congress.
Like the Bush administration in Afghanistan, Nixon at first insisted on spraying the poppy fields. But Turkish leaders refused because of a revolt from their farmers. The compromise included guaranteed markets for the morphine. Within a few years, Turkey was no longer the premier source for heroin.
Boy, they really got this one wrong. First of all, according to the CIA estimates, even before the Nixon campaign, Turkey produced only from 3 to 8 percent of the world’s illicit opium and nobody was sure what percentage of that, if any, reached the United States (most was destined for European markets). Secondly, the Nixon crusade against Turkish poppy was reflective of the “administration’s determination to achieve quickly some dramatic breakthrough on the opium front.” So, the Nixon quest was largely politically, not pragmatically motivated - Turkey was chosen because as a NATO member it was more susceptible to U.S. pressure, unlike, for example, India, Laos or Burma, all of which produced substantially more poppy than Turkey.
So, to summarize - the USA Today article correctly treats some of the issues behind Afghani poppy cultivation, but gets the history totally wrong by comparing current programs to Nixon’s misguided attempt to rack up election points. For a brief, but nevertheless informative and fascinating story about Nixon’s fight against Turkish poppy, see:
- a short chapter in Edward Jay Epstein’s Agency of Fear: Opiates and Political Power in America.