CAPITALISM'S ACHILLES HEEL Dirty Money and How to

92 CAPITALISM’S ACHILLES HEEL
they can keep the cash 99.9 percent of the time. Losses of product up to that
point are merely inconveniences but not deal breakers. Cartels and kingpins
thrive because they win the end game. Countries fighting drugs falter because
they lose the end game.
An active drug trade stimulates other forms of crime and usually is accompanied
by political instability. A brief tour of Afghanistan followed by
Colombia and Peru treated together will round out the picture.
Afghanistan
“We clearly have a possible ‘narco-terrorist’ state in the making in
Afghanistan, with all that means for our short- and long-term strategic
and security interests.” 82 U.S. Congressman Henry Hyde was calling for a
greater U.S. military role in combating drug trafficking in the recently
liberated country.
Through coups, wars, and strife, drug production in Asia grew almost
continuously for a generation. As Burma and Laos reduced opium poppy
cultivation, Afghanistan took up the slack, increasing output fifteenfold
since 1979. Under the Taliban, opium production peaked to 4,600 metric
tonnes in 1999, almost all from irrigated fields, sometimes beautifully terraced
on lush hillsides.
The following year, Mullah Omar, the Taliban leader, banned poppy
cultivation. Why is unclear. One theory is that, because drugs are “haram,”
forbidden by Islam, the ban was intended to bolster the Taliban’s thrust for
diplomatic recognition from other Muslim states. Another theory is that,
with large stocks of opium on hand, the Taliban simply wanted to drive up
the price of continued sales, which they did—tenfold. Production in 2001
dropped to less than 200 tonnes. Then, after the Taliban were ousted, production
soared back to more than 3,000 tonnes in 2002 and 2003 and was
expected to exceed 4,000 tonnes in 2004.
The economics are enticing. A family cultivating poppies on as little as
one acre can generate an income of $2,000 to $4,000. There are well over
200,000 acres under cultivation, producing a value to growers of $400 million
to $800 million. More than a quarter million families are raising the
crop, spread across 28 of Afghanistan’s 32 provinces. Processing labs converting
opium to morphine base, brown heroin, and white heroin are now
appearing in many areas, adding value to the raw opium gum. According to