After over 16 years and almost $9 billion spent, the U.S. government’s counternarcotics programs in Afghanistan have done next to nothing to roll back the country’s opium industry.
In fact, Afghanistan produces more opium in 2018 than it has at any time since the U.S. invasion in 2001 — a record high of about 328,000 hectares of Afghan farmland were under opium poppy cultivation in fiscal year 2017.
All of the opium produced in Afghanistan that year is estimated to be worth between $4.1 billion and $6.6 billion, or 20 to 32 percent of the country’s entire gross domestic product.
The figures are just some of the discouraging findings in the latest report from the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), the government’s independent watchdog of the Afghanistan war. The report is the fifth in a series of “lessons learned” evaluations and focuses on the combined anti-drug efforts of multiple government agencies, including the Departments of Defense and State, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).
Although American counternarcotics efforts typically receive less attention than military campaigns against the Taliban and other Islamic insurgents, they account for a big chunk of government resources spent on Afghanistan reconstruction. From FY2002 through FY2017, the U.S. government spent roughly $8.62 billion on counternarcotics programs — an average of about $500 million per year.
Despite the investment, poppy cultivation remains more pervasive — and lucrative — than ever, according to SIGAR. Afghanistan remains the world’s most prolific opium producer, and opium poppies are by far the country’s largest cash crop.
Putting the scope of the opium industry in perspective, SIGAR estimates that poppy farming and related activity provide about 590,000 full-time jobs, which is more than the entire strength of Afghanistan’s security forces.
To date, not one counter-drug program implemented by the U.S. or the Afghan government has resulted in lasting reductions in poppy cultivation or opium production, according to the SIGAR report. The watchdog attributed the lack of success in part to short-sighted crop eradication policies, widespread Afghan government corruption, and a Taliban insurgency continues to destabilize large swaths of the country. (RELATED: Afghanistan Security Forces Shrinking As Insurgents Mount Devastating Urban Attacks)
SIGAR also questioned whether the U.S. military’s recent focus on conducting airstrikes on Taliban drug labs will prove effective. Similar campaigns in the past “only had limited impact on longer-term efforts to dismantle drug trafficking networks and cut off financing for the insurgency,” the report stated, adding that anti-drug airstikes that mistakenly kill civilians could alienate the Afghan population and boost support for the Taliban.
Part of the problem is that the Taliban, which banned poppy cultivation when it controlled Afghanistan, now works hand-in-hand with opium producers. The insurgents take a cut of the profits up and down the opium value chain, and in return, they shield farmers and drug producers from Afghan government anti-drug forces. (RELATED: Afghan Govt Can’t Prosecute Corrupt Official Because He Travels Around With ‘Large Entourage Of Bodyguards’)
Ultimately, there is little hope of progress on the anti-drug front as long as the security situation in Afghanistan remains unstable, SIGAR said.
“It is simply unrealistic to expect significant progress from counternarcotics efforts without being able to exert reasonable and persistent levels of control over land area and transportation routes,” SIGAR chief John Sopko said Thursday in a speech at the New America think tank in Washington, D.C.
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