Opium: Iraq’s Deadly New Export
May 24th, 2007A week in the life of the Global Black Ops Economy / War on Terror:
On Monday, Wednesday and Friday, it’s about a generalized shakedown resulting in bogus contracts to criminal corporations. On Tuesday and Thursday, it’s about oil. On Saturday and Sunday, it’s about drugs. Everything that happens on Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday is about making sure that there’s enough money to go around for what happens on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
Via: Independent:
Farmers in southern Iraq have started to grow opium poppies in their fields for the first time, sparking fears that Iraq might become a serious drugs producer along the lines of Afghanistan.
Rice farmers along the Euphrates, to the west of the city of Diwaniya, south of Baghdad, have stopped cultivating rice, for which the area is famous, and are instead planting poppies, Iraqi sources familiar with the area have told The Independent.
The shift to opium cultivation is still in its early stages but there is little the Iraqi government can do about it because rival Shia militias and their surrogates in the security forces control Diwaniya and its neighbourhood. There have been bloody clashes between militiamen, police, Iraqi army and US forces in the city over the past two months.
…
It is unlikely that the farmers’ decision was spontaneous and the gangs financing them are said to be “well-equipped with good vehicles and weapons and are well-organised”.
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But it is evident from the start of opium production around Diwaniya that some gangs think there is money to be made by following the example of Afghanistan. Given that they can guarantee much higher profits from growing opium poppies than can be made from rice, many impoverished Iraqi farmers are likely to cultivate the new crop.
Related: Billions in Oil Missing in Iraq
On the upside, that stuff can take the edge off of just about *anything* no matter how unpleasant.
:o)
Mike Ruppert (among others) argues that much of the drug trade is wholly controlled by and for the benefit of the CIA. Prior to the Taliban, Heroin was a primary export of Afghanistan, and often the CIA would be found with dubious ties and questionable alibis for their association/involvement with the production and transport of the goods. The Taliban appeared, and they completely eradicated Poppies as a crop. Fast forward to the invasion, and now Afghanistan is producing record levels of Heroin, exporting far more than they had prior to the Taliban.
I am curious–is it not likely that if the CIA actually *did and does* control much of the global drug trade that they are also responsible for the production of Heroin in Iraq?
Didn’t George Bush Sr., during his CIA days, manage anything over their in the “golden triangle” during the Vietnam war? i.e. Air America? Inquiring minds want to know.
The opium we used to get in Da Nang (71-72) was flown in via Air America… top notch stuff…..talk about taking the ‘edge’ off……nice way to die.
The Global Drug Meta-Group:
Drugs, Managed Violence, and the Russian 9/11
by Peter Dale Scott