Tour Of Duty

19 Aug 2009 02:59p.m.

New Zealand wrote:

Hi
Hummmmmmm. There are some interesting comments about those troops in Afghanistan. There is some kind of business talk going on not kepping Afghan people.

19 Aug 2009 12:46a.m.

Keith wrote:

Well put Dave - here is a link to an article written by Craig Murray, British ambassador to Uzbekistan from 2002 to 2004, giving more imformation about the Afghan heroin trade. http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=6405 And another article with information on where the Taliban actually do get their funding from - it turns out that up to 20% of the money the US spends on construction projects in Afghanistan goes to the Taliban to make sure the projects are completed - is that ironic or what? http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14808 I would like to see this on 60 minutes !! Andew - no doubt our SAS are good at what they are trained to do - at least some of them had doubts about handing prisoners to the US Army knowing they were likely to be tortured - but then I assume they are taught about the Geneva Convention as part of their training ... after all, do we want "our boys" to be war criminals?

18 Aug 2009 09:05a.m.

Dave Green wrote:

Your programme last night about the Australian troops in Afghanistan gave the impression that they were fighting against an enemy that is using the poppy seeds to make heroin to fund the Taliban.

Nothing could be further from the truth. The Taliban successfully rid Afghanistan of poppies when they were in power. In July 2000, Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar declared that growing poppies was un-Islamic. By February 2001, production had been reduced from 12,600 acres (51 km2) to only 17 acres (7 ha).

However, with the 2001 US/Northern Alliance expulsion of the Taliban, opium cultivation has increased in the southern provinces liberated from the Taliban control, and by 2005 production was 87% of the world's opium supply, rising to 90% in 2006.

This is not a coincidence. If the Taliban can rid Afghanistan of opium poppies why have the Americans failed to do so? They are no strangers to the concept of ‘defoliation’. Why was the soldier you interviewed in your program not authorised to destroy the opium crop he was standing in?

The drugs trade is a multibillion dollar industry. It’s not the poor farmers who are making money from opium, nor the Taliban. 95 percent of the revenues generated by this lucrative contraband accrues to business syndicates, organized crime and banking and financial institutions. It is in the interest of these organisations for the opium production to continue.

It’s a shame that these soldiers believe the line they fed that they are fighting for freedom and the afghan people. The reality is that they are fighting, and dying, to protect American and Business interests in the Middle East, one of which is the ongoing supply of heroin. It’s one of the reasons the US Government went into Afghanistan in the first place.