The Drug War: The War In Afghanistan
The Drug War: The War In Afghanistan
1565 Words7 Pages
The war in Afghanistan has been going on since 2001 and even though troop levels have dropped below 10,000, it continues to be a dangerous area as shown by last month’s attack which wounded three service members and last week’s death of a special operations Soldier. Afghanistan has challenges that are different from many other parts of the world in that there are large portions of the country that are sparsely populated and which lends it to be governed by local tribes rather than by the regional government. This, coupled with the fact that there are not enough Afghan National Police (ANP) or Afghan National Army (ANA) to cover all of this territory underscores that need for Civil Affairs to maintain the civil-military relationship keeping…show more content…
The Taliban uses the farmers to grow drugs as a way for them to earn quick money while they use the drugs to fund their organization. By properly training the ANP in the proper detection of growing and transportation of these drugs, the drug trade could be reduced. Stopping the illicit trade is only one piece in the puzzle, the Civil Affairs teams’ (CATs) needs to ensure that the farmers are able to be productive without the dependency on the money from the drug supply. This could be provided under another Civil Affairs core task, Nation Assistance (NA). With the coordination of resources from NGOs, host nation (HN) resources or other civilian agencies, local farmers, ranchers, and veterinarians can be taught how to be more productive with less. The money they will be receiving will never be as good as that received from illegal drugs, but if it is combined with other efforts in which the locals trust the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (GIRoA), it can be an effective incentive. NGOs such as the World Federation Against Drugs (WFAD) may be engaged to assist in providing subsidies to assist until the locals are able to implement the new techniques and are able to remove the dependence on the money from the illegal…show more content…
CIM is the process of collecting, analyzing, and storing of civil information for use by Civil Affairs and other government organizations to increase operational awareness and cultural understanding. One of the biggest challenges of the CATs when they first deployed to Afghanistan was the lack of trust from the villages including the village elders. They remember how quickly they were abandoned by the Soviet Union and were convinced that the United States was going to do the same. By conducting Civil Reconnaissance (CR), CATs were able to gather the information on each of the tribes, including their challenges while building relationships with the village elders. As projects are completed or needs are met, this relationship continues to grow. As teams rotate out a good transfer is conducted to ensure that the relationship continues which will deny the Taliban access to the region as well as increases the local’s confidence in the GIRoA. With the current troop levels, the war has been classified as a stalemate and requests have been made to increase the troop levels to further assist ANA & ANP in holding and gaining territory from the Taliban.
The Taliban uses the farmers to grow drugs as a way for them to earn quick money while they use the drugs to fund their organization. By properly training the ANP in the proper detection of growing and transportation of these drugs, the drug trade could be reduced. Stopping the illicit trade is only one piece in the puzzle, the Civil Affairs teams’ (CATs) needs to ensure that the farmers are able to be productive without the dependency on the money from the drug supply. This could be provided under another Civil Affairs core task, Nation Assistance (NA). With the coordination of resources from NGOs, host nation (HN) resources or other civilian agencies, local farmers, ranchers, and veterinarians can be taught how to be more productive with less. The money they will be receiving will never be as good as that received from illegal drugs, but if it is combined with other efforts in which the locals trust the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (GIRoA), it can be an effective incentive. NGOs such as the World Federation Against Drugs (WFAD) may be engaged to assist in providing subsidies to assist until the locals are able to implement the new techniques and are able to remove the dependence on the money from the illegal…show more content…
CIM is the process of collecting, analyzing, and storing of civil information for use by Civil Affairs and other government organizations to increase operational awareness and cultural understanding. One of the biggest challenges of the CATs when they first deployed to Afghanistan was the lack of trust from the villages including the village elders. They remember how quickly they were abandoned by the Soviet Union and were convinced that the United States was going to do the same. By conducting Civil Reconnaissance (CR), CATs were able to gather the information on each of the tribes, including their challenges while building relationships with the village elders. As projects are completed or needs are met, this relationship continues to grow. As teams rotate out a good transfer is conducted to ensure that the relationship continues which will deny the Taliban access to the region as well as increases the local’s confidence in the GIRoA. With the current troop levels, the war has been classified as a stalemate and requests have been made to increase the troop levels to further assist ANA & ANP in holding and gaining territory from the Taliban.
