Drugs and Power: Counterinsurgency in Afghanistan

Drugs and Power: Counterinsurgency in Afghanistan

By Gareth Rice

 

 

INTRODUCTION

 

Despite a significant counterinsurgency campaign since 2001, Afghanistan has transformed into a true narco-terror state.[1] Providing the source of close to 90% of the world’s supply of heroin,[2] Afghanistan’s narcotics trade has become interwoven in all aspects of Afghan society and has further compounded the country’s inability to achieve a peaceful end to hostilities. The Taliban’s relationship with this trade has slowly transformed from one of economic convenience to a dependency that sees it providing the largest source of their financing and significant political capital over large areas of the country. Moreover, that relationship has helped the group to control more territory than at any time since 2001.[3]

 

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime’s (UNODC) annual Opium Surveys have provided a stark depiction of the scale of this problem. In 2018, despite a drought in large areas of the country, Afghanistan cultivated the second largest area of opium on record, continuing the upward trend in cultivation since 2001.[4] Indeed, in the last 30 years of the 20^th Century, opium output increased in Afghanistan by 800%.[5] As a global comparison, Columbian drugs at the height of their production never reached more than 5% of Columbia’s GDP,[6] while Afghanistan’s drug trade accounted for 50% of its GDP by 2007.[7] This figure declined to between 6-11% by 2018 (due mostly to the growth in the Afghan licit economy), although opium still surpassed the value of the country’s legal exports of goods and services.[8]

 

There have been several barriers to the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF)[9] and the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (GIROA) in addressing this problem. Debate as to the extent of the Taliban’s relationship with this trade and the best methods to address the problem have contributed to some of the many reasons it has never featured as a key strategic issue.[10] Similarly, the uncertainty of Taliban profit margins from the trade have resulted in a conflicting prioritisation of counter-narcotics efforts across the member nations of ISAF and provincial governors of GIROA.[11]  The drug trade in Afghanistan has simply proved to be insurmountable and its relationship to the insurgency too unclear to deserve greater attention.

 

This study seeks to understand the relationship between the drug trade and the insurgency to provide a better understanding of the interaction between counter-narcotics and counterinsurgency campaigns. Existing research on this topic has often focused on the socio-economic factors[12] of the drug trade, criminal interactions[13] or financing of terror groups;[14] all of which fall short of providing constructive guidance to counterinsurgency campaigns. By exploring the economic, cultural and political dimensions that underpin this trade, this study will provide a greater understanding of not only how the insurgency continues to thrive but additionally, how this trade intersects with the Afghan society. In doing so, the study will demonstrate the economic motivations for entry into the insurgency and the drug trade, the cultural paradigm that ensures trust between actors and ultimately the political power that is derived from controlling an illicit drug trade. The importance of understanding these relationships has far reaching implications for counter-narcotics strategies and contemporary understanding of insurgent groups more broadly.

 

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

 

This research paper provides a literature review with a counterinsurgency focus across the various intersecting fields of study relating to the Afghan drug trade. The counterinsurgency focus is unique because the trade in illicit narcotics are often seen as a policing or socio-economic issue. As such, there are few studies into illicit drug trades that are undertaken with the express purpose of aiding a counterinsurgency campaign. This in part explains the inconsistent approach to counter-narcotic programs that have been undertaken in Afghanistan. Further, when narcotics is discussed in relation to the insurgency, it is more often an analysis of insurgent financing which does not encompass the full impact of these trades on the conflict.

 

There was a lack of reliable, quantitative data to support an in-depth analysis of insurgent financing. Cultivation data produced by the UNODC was found to be the most reliable data on narcotics cultivation. However, corresponding data on other metrics of violence and insurgent behaviour were far less reliable. Utilising data on opium production and the deaths of western soldiers, Jo Lind, Karl Moene and Fredrik Willumsen provide one example of attempting to demonstrate a causal link between conflict and opium production.[15] While the use of soldiers’ deaths is a questionable data metric, it was found by the authors to be the only reliable data available. As such, many of the findings of this paper are theoretical in nature and provide a framework from which to understand the insurgency.

 

There are a number of obstacles to conducting primary research into extremist groups. The ongoing violence in drug-cultivating areas is a significant disincentive for many researchers wishing to conduct field interviews. Similarly, the lack of modern financial infrastructure both within this region and utilised by the insurgency make it almost impossible to accurately track finances that are linked to this trade. As a result, it may well be impossible to accurately determine the level of insurgent finances derived from narcotic-related activities. It is not surprising then to see the significant debate on this topic as highlighted by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR):

 

…the extent to which the Taliban participate in the trade of narcotics is debated. While the Taliban are believed to collect payments from those involved at each stage of the value chain in Afghanistan, the extent of their control over the processing, sale, and distribution of opiates is less clear.[16]

 

Rather than contributing to the debate on insurgent finances, the focus of this research will expand on the intrinsic relationship between the insurgency and the drug trade. In doing so, it provides a framework for understanding how insurgent groups within this region operate and the often-convoluted relationship between criminal and extremist elements. More broadly, financing will always be a fundamental requirement for extremist groups to survive. Understanding how to dismantle these funding sources is therefore critical to defeating them. This research will demonstrate that narcotics is a particularly unique source of financing because of its ability to generate political capital for the group that ensures both its ongoing survival and the basis of its power.

 

Insurgent groups within Afghanistan operate under a number of different affiliations and with varying degrees of cooperation or competition. The most commonly understood insurgent affiliation is the Taliban, and to avoid confusion in this study all insurgent and terrorist groups connected to the drug trade will be referred to under this title.[17]  Further complicating this landscape, groups or cells within the Taliban do not always operate within a centralised, hierarchical structure. On the contrary, it is more common to see groups that are interconnected and responsible for their own finances and low-level operations.[18] The same is true of the drug trade. Where some groups have almost no interaction with the drug trade, others have achieved significant control of the trade within their areas of operation. Consequently, the findings of this study may not apply to all insurgent actors in Afghanistan.

 

HISTORY OF NARCOTICS IN AFGHANISTAN

 

Narcotics have played a role in Afghanistan since the days of Alexander the Great in the fourth century BCE.[19] Opium is believed to have been imported by Alexander’s armies and it thrived in the Afghan climate, producing yields far higher than the global average and often in spite of scarce irrigation infrastructure.[20] It is not surprising then to consider that opium has played a central role in Afghanistan for the past 40 years.[21] Indeed, conflict and drugs have become a fundamental part of the Afghan state as both a crop of convenience for those seeking to survive a war-torn country and a commodity to be exploited for criminal gains.[22]

 

Given its relationship with conflict, the drug trade has existed in its current form since the 1960s.[23] The only variables that appear to have changed are the volume of drugs being produced and where the money from the trade is flowing.  With the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, these variables would begin to change rapidly. Afghan farmers increasingly turned to opium as agricultural output declined, due in part to the deliberate destruction of irrigation infrastructure by the Soviets.[24] When the Mujahideen required funding for their war against the Soviets, this crop also provided an easy source of revenue.

 

While the Mujahideen enjoyed significant foreign sponsorship during the Soviet-Afghan war, narcotics allowed them to gain financial independence and carry out more sophisticated attacks.[25] With the help of the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), the Mujahideen encouraged opium production and subsequently imposed a tax on its output.[26] In what became a vicious debt cycle, farmers began to plant more poppy to pay for the tax and became victims to credit systems offered by an influx of drug merchants.[27] The combination of (US led) foreign funding and an expanding opium harvest allowed the Mujahideen to sustain their insurgency until the Soviet withdrawal in 1989.[28]

 

As Afghanistan’s opium production expanded from 100 tonnes per annum in the 1970s to 2,000 tonnes in 1991, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), helping to coordinate the war, chose to ignore the drug trade in order to focus on defeating the Soviets.[29] Indeed, at one point in the war, there were even plans to flood Soviet troops with heroin in an effort to undermine the military’s effectiveness – highlighting the often conflicting approach to counter-narcotics.[30] While the CIA appeared to quietly endorse the growth in narcotics, the ISI began to take a more direct role that helped contribute to a near twentyfold increase in output during the war.[31] This period undoubtedly led to a transformation of many warlords[32] into drug lords that would continue well after the war concluded.[33]

 

Following the Soviet withdrawal, Afghanistan descended into a civil war that corresponded with another doubling in opium output.[34] The opium trade would prove to be a popular market for an influx of returning refugees requiring employment and poor farmers seeking credit to sustain themselves between harvests.[35] Opium would once again play a pivotal role in conflict as warlords sought to maximise their narcotics returns to fund their struggles for power.[36] The political structures that many of these warlords created would eventually establish much of the framework for Afghanistan’s future.[37] As the concept of a central political power became an increasingly distant reality, these warlords created their own cultural, economic and political structures of which opium would play a central role.

 

When the Taliban finally seized Kabul in 1996, they continued to encourage opium production and offered protection in exchange for taxes on production and refinement.[38] Opium output increased by 25% in the year following the Taliban’s rise to power with 97% of this output coming from Helmand and Kandahar province where the Taliban held the most power.[39] Despite earning significant profits, the Taliban had an inconsistent approach to the drug trade based on an ideological belief that it was un-Islamic, as well as a practical acknowledgement that foreign aid and political recognition would often be conditional on not supporting its continued cultivation.[40] [41]

 

Poppy Cultivation By Province (2018) and Historical Trafficking Routes[42]

 

Figure 1

 

Notwithstanding their objections to the drug trade, the Taliban would (for the most part) chose their economic gains over any ideological or religious concerns.[43] This relationship would continue until 2000 when the Taliban made the sudden decision to ban all opium cultivation in an apparent attempt to gain economic aid. Despite reducing opium output by 94%, it is speculated that the Taliban was able to offload significant stockpiles at now inflated prices while simultaneously receiving $US43 million in aid from the US.[44] The Taliban’s ban on narcotics would, however, have serious ramifications for their political capital with the rural population and would contribute to their rapid removal from power following the US-led intervention.[45] This is likely to be a lesson that the group remembered during the insurgency that would follow.[46]

 

With the removal of the Taliban from power in 2001 and the exile of their senior leadership to Pakistan, motivations quickly turned to funding the new insurgency. The initial donors for this new movement were often drug smugglers. At the coalface, Taliban fighters quickly began adjusting battlefield tactics to focus primarily on protecting drug shipments of which they would receive a protection fee of as much as 20%.[47] As the insurgency began to develop, the Taliban began to take on a more direct involvement in the drug trade at each stage of the value chain.[48] From the outset of the insurgency it was clear that the drug trade was of vital importance to the Taliban’s ability to project power.

 

ECONOMIC POWER

 

The Afghan drug trade is most commonly understood in terms of the political economy that it generates to perpetuate the war. Loretta Napoleoni notes that war often creates alternative systems of power and profit that can be exploited by combatants and non-combatants alike.[49] David Keen takes this notion further by extending Carl von Clausewitz’s famous maxim of war as an extension of politics by other means, by observing that war is also an “extension of economics by other means.”[50] In other words, it can be observed that war does not destroy an economy but rather transforms it to the benefit of certain groups.[51] Those groups may not have caused the war but may well have strong motivations to keep it going. Therefore, we can see that war can be a rational economic pursuit for some, where ideological reasoning is not the primary motivation for hostilities.[52]

 

Afghanistan provides an unfortunate example of this economic transformation. Following the Taliban’s removal from power in 2001, farmers quickly returned to opium production to exploit the lack of governing authority and recover losses from the Taliban’s year-long opium ban. This lack of governance corresponded with an influx of criminal elements comprised mostly of drug merchants and traffickers to Afghanistan’s rural areas. [53]  Despite commentary often suggesting Taliban coercion of farmers to grow opium, the initial motivations appear to have been almost exclusively for profit.[54] This is significant because it recognises that the Taliban likely had little to do with emergence of the drug trade post 2001, but rather exploited its existence once it was established.[55]

 

In 2003, a UNODC Survey found one third of the surveyed populace reported poverty as their principle driver for growing poppy.[56] Subsequent Opium Surveys have consistently highlighted the potential profit margin as a central motivating factor for farmers. The UNODC has, however, separately argued the desire to grow poppy is driven more by greed than need.[57] These findings are supported by the work of Lind et al. in their comprehensive study examining the relationship between illicit trades and conflict conditions. [58] In doing so, they conclude that the opportunity to exploit conflict conditions for profit provide the primary motivation for individual farmers. The population engaged in this trade is therefore likely to be drawn to an insurgency that supports their cultivation, as the prospect of government control over the country would threaten the basis of the drug economy and by extension, their livelihoods.[59]

 

Poppy is simply “a low-risk crop in a high-risk environment” according to Adam Pain and David Mansfield.[60] The ease with which it is planted, stored and sold make it a highly attractive crop for the rural population. Perhaps the only down sides to this crop are its significant labour requirements at harvest and, of course, its illicit nature. Mansfield has therefore challenged the notion that opium is often a more profitable crop for farmers.[61] On the contrary, he argues that like any elastic commodity it is subject to the law of supply and demand.[62] If farmers are unable to secure sufficient economic return from the crop to feed their household, it becomes more likely that they will switch to a food crop such as wheat. This economic correction can be seen in the 2009/10 crop cycle (see table 1) in which opium production declined due in part to an oversupply of opium and an undersupply of wheat.

 

Potential Opium Production 1994-2018 ($US/Mt)[63]

                                    Table 1

 

The elasticity of this commodity would typically provide promise of the growth in opium cultivation declining once economic returns reach equilibrium. Yet while there is little evidence of farmers being coerced into growing opium by force,[64] there is significant evidence to suggest that opium related credit provides this persuasion.[65] Due to the lack of available credit in rural areas, drug traffickers have typically filled this void.[66] The resulting debt traps that many farmers find themselves in has only been further exacerbated by the impact of drought, government eradication and predatory debt lending.[67] This potentially contradicts Mansfield’s findings as farmers may be unable to grow alternative crops if they have promised to provide an agreed quantity of opium at harvest.

 

The reluctance of agencies such as the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to offer alternative seeds and credit has provided little competition to the drug trade.[68] In 2012, Rajiv Chandrasekaran argued that USAID refused to provide support to farmers switching to cotton, in part due to a US law prohibiting aid being used to assist foreign agriculture that might compete with US markets.[69] This was partially addressed by the establishment of the Agricultural Development Fund in 2010, however, SIGAR has criticised the program’s effectiveness in reaching rural populations with an ambitious goal of default rates below 5% in “one of the world’s most volatile environments.”[70] Indeed the bulk of foreign aid to Afghanistan has failed to provide any viable economic alternatives to the drug trade[71] despite 70% of the nation living in rural areas and 61% of households generating income from agriculture.[72]

 

A significant portion of the Afghan labour market is now dependent on the production of narcotics.[73] In 2009, it was estimated that nearly two million people (or 8.7% of the population) had some involvement in narcotics.[74] By 2017, the market was providing the equivalent of 354,000 full-time jobs.[75] Despite a perception that drug labs are owned and operated by Taliban or criminal enterprises, there are a significant number of small family-run laboratories throughout the country.[76] This adds to the challenge of attempting to distinguish between the civilian, criminal and insurgent sectors of the population. Moreover, any alternative to the drug trade will need to replace the existing labour market or risk further alienating the rural population and creating further poverty. Considering the opium crop requires nine times as many workers to cultivate than wheat, this will not be an easy transition for the local economy.[77]

 

The economic incentives for the Taliban to become connected with the drug trade are significant. With an annual export value in recent years of between $US1.5 - $US3 billion a year,[78] the potential for the Taliban to secure even a small percentage of this trade would provide an attractive source of financing for their insurgency. Unfortunately, it is impossible to accurately determine the Taliban’s profits from the drug trade due to distinct differences in how various regional nodes operate.[79] Similarly, the difference in the price of opium as it moves along the value-chain from farmer to market varies greatly with fiat currency not always being the preferred exchange for goods and services.[80]

 

The Taliban’s initial profits from this trade appear to have manifested from the imposition of a land tax[81] on farmers and protection fees to drug traffickers.[82] The imposition of a land tax is perhaps the simplest method of securing a profit from the illicit trade. As a global comparison, Yasser Arafat was able to negotiate a 10% tax on the drug trade within the Bekaa Valey of Lebanon, which resulted in an estimated net return of $US150 million per year.[83] This method is also similar to what occurred when the Taliban held power before the war under the guise of a zakat.[84] The question of what is provided in exchange for this tax will be explored in the next section.

 

US Forces-Afghanistan have estimated that the Taliban receives 20% of the annual narcotics revenue.[85] While it may be impossible to determine the accuracy of this figure, understanding where and how the Taliban establishes their profit along the value-chain is of fundamental importance when attempting to disrupt their finances. To demonstrate this, consider the prevalence of interdictions within counter-narcotics strategies as opposed to eradication schemes (see figure 2). The prevalence of interdictions presumably occurs because traffickers and drug labs are seen as being more affiliated with the insurgency than farmers. Briefly ignoring the accuracy of this perception, it is difficult to see how interdictions would successfully reduce the Taliban’s finances if their primary source of income is achieved through a tax at the beginning of the value-chain.

 

US Counter-narcotics funding allocation 2002-2017 ($US Millions)[86]

 

Figure 2

 

As a fragmented insurgent group, it is also important to establish that the drug trade does not appear to be controlled by a central element but rather multiple independent groups who coexist in a mutually supportive arrangement.[87] Such arrangements are also by-products of economic power which is inherently decentralised and dispersed.[88] If the trade is in fact controlled by multiple independent elements, that may make the problem more challenging to confront.  If there are no large cartels to dismantle and no central drug figures to arrest, it may prove ineffective to target traffickers and labs exclusively in an effort to bankrupt the insurgency.[89] Following the money is also difficult in a country that has no traditional banking system and relies heavily on the hawala[90] financial system which offers little in the way of records.[91]

 

The ideological motivations of the Taliban appear to have shifted over time, with economic rewards now providing the principle driver, as is often the case when encountering illicit trades.[92] While often appearing as ethnic conflicts on the surface, economic and political motivations have historically always shaped group and individual behaviour in Afghanistan.[93] Gretchen Peters argues that the drug trade has fundamentally transformed the Taliban into a drug enterprise which is devoid of much of its ideological origins.[94] This is a view that is also indirectly supported by the work of Paul Collier and Anke Hoeffler whose “greed and grievance” theory argues that the profits from illicit trades provide little incentive for insurgencies to seek an end to hostilities.[95]

 

Regardless of the extent of Taliban involvement in this trade, the existence of an illicit trade of this magnitude significantly increases the potential for widespread corruption.[96] While there have undoubtedly been Western perceptions of corruption as a cultural issue within Afghanistan,[97] such perceptions fail to acknowledge the negative views of Afghan people towards corruption[98] and its propensity to drive support for the Taliban. Indeed, the initial rise of the Taliban movement was due in large part to the corruption of many Mujahideen factions.[99] The paradox here is that despite the Taliban’s connection to the drug trade, they have been able to escape similar allegations of corruption which have consistently undermined the legitimacy of the Afghan government. Whether the Taliban deliberately facilitate aspects of this corruption (or at least allegations of it) to support their narrative remains to be seen.

 

The economic interests of both combatants and non-combatants remains a powerful barrier to any peaceful end to hostilities.[100] Further, to accept Peters’ description of the Taliban as a cartel devoid of its ideological inceptions,[101] it must also be accepted that narcotics plays a central role within the insurgency. Yet, while the value of this commodity to the Taliban explains much of how the group has managed to survive and potentially even recruit, it does not explain how the Taliban has continued to exert such significant resistance against both GIROA and ISAF. An economic analysis on its own simply does not explain how individuals and groups can interact with an illicit trade or, how a source of funding can generate political capital for an extremist group.

 

POLITICAL POWER

           

The Political Capital Model is derived from the work of Vanda Felbab-Brown who argues that the true strength of insurgent involvement in drug trades is derived from the political capital that it creates. [102] While the financing of any extremist group is fundamental to its survival, there is no other source of financing which also provides this degree of political capital. Due to the labour-intensive nature of the drug trade and the ease of entry into the market, narcotics involves a larger portion of the population than many other illicit trades. By providing either land, credit or security (or a combination of these factors), the Taliban is able to facilitate the market that is sustaining the rural population’s livelihoods and, in the process, ensures their dependence on the existence of the insurgency.

 

Whether political capital was the initial motivation for the Taliban is uncertain and perhaps irrelevant. It is this influence over the rural population that ultimately allows the Taliban to survive. Notwithstanding the fact that drug revenue allows the Taliban to pay its fighters and carry out attacks against GIROA and ISAF, it is the population from which any insurgency (and indeed any government) draws its strength.[103] Of note, both Australian and US military counterinsurgency doctrine focuses on the ideology of the insurgent which presumably allows it to derive its legitimacy and win the support of the people.[104] While there is undoubtedly an ideological element to the Taliban movement that forms the basis of their recruitment, there is little evidence to suggest that it is widely supported by the Afghan populace.

 

The Political Capital Model is significant because it contradicts the popular notion that a population will withdraw support for the insurgency once it loses its ties with the ideological basis of its group.[105] A 2018 survey of the Afghan population by the Asia Foundation would certainly support the view that the population has lost support for the Taliban[106] and yet, the group continues to flourish in large parts of the country. While it could be argued that the population supports the Taliban out of fear[107] rather than any other motivation, this does not provide a conclusive explanation for the Taliban’s continued survival. It is perhaps more likely that the rural population has formed a relationship of convenience with the Taliban born out of the illegality of the drug trade and the protection that it requires from both criminal elements and the government itself.

 

Dipali Mukhopadyay’s study of Afghan warlords provides a strong foundation for understanding the relationship between the governed and the governing authority in Afghanistan.[108] Since political power in Afghanistan has rarely been centralised, the power of warlords at the periphery has often been the norm.[109] These warlords have typically derived the origin of their power through an ethnic, religious or tribal affiliation; however, their ongoing legitimacy is projected through the protection that they provide rather than any ideological foundation. The importance of political legitimacy (often featured in counterinsurgency doctrine)[110] is therefore seemingly rejected by Mukhopadhyay.[111] She goes on to state that “Predation and protection often go hand in hand,”[112] which reflects both the Taliban and many warlords’ control of rural populations.

 

The historical lack of Afghan governance at the periphery has typically resulted in taxation in exchange for only one commodity: protection.[113] ISAF’s counterinsurgency strategy that focused on providing more government services in exchange for that taxation may therefore have missed the mark. Indeed, the rural population may well be interested in protection above all other services. For GIROA to provide that protection would require them to either endorse the drug trade, or to remove it. Unfortunately, attempting to remove the drug trade plays strongly into the Taliban narrative that GIROA is only engaging in counter-narcotics to appease foreign governments.[114] Any effort to threaten opium production therefore risks a reduction in political capital and the loss of popular support.[115]

 

When the governors of Nangarhar and Balkh provinces both chose to enforce narcotics bans under President Karzai’s rule, it was mostly successful although resulted in a significant degree of predation.[116] These often-temporary bans isolated to one or more provinces also had the unintended consequences of causing internal migration of farmers seeking ungoverned areas for cultivation, as well as sharp increases in the price of opium in surrounding provinces.[117] According to Mansfield, the bans also resulted in a loss of political capital for the respective governors,[118] similar to what was observed by the Taliban’s ban in 2000-01. The political legitimacy of the state is therefore undermined when the populace no longer believes that they are being afforded protection from the state.

 

The success of these temporary bans in the short-term, highlight that eradication can be successfully achieved when supported by local power-brokers. At the same time, it also highlights the risks of attempting such piecemeal eradication and not supporting it with viable alternatives. The loss of political capital from these actions and the corresponding increase in political capital to the Taliban are unlikely to warrant the projected gains from eradication. Further, if the government is unable to compete with the Taliban’s information narrative, allegations of corruption will only add to the predatory perception of the state.[119]

 

In 1919, Max Weber provided a definition of the state as “a human community that (successfully) claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory.”[120] If one was to accept this definition, the Taliban can be seen as using force to create a “state shell” – a term coined by Loretta Napoleoni to describe a territory that is “constructed around the economics of war.” [121] In doing so, the Afghan government is unable to compete with the Taliban for the protection of the community because they would also be required to protect the drug trade. Herein lies the challenge for the Afghan state: it needs to destroy the drug trade to destroy the Taliban, but it cannot destroy the drug trade without destroying the livelihoods of the very people they are trying to win over. As long as that threat remains, the Taliban continues to be relevant to the mostly rural population by providing the one commodity that is most desired by this population: protection.[122]

 

Protection does, however, not automatically equate to political power. Michael Mann by example, notes that political power is centralised and inherently territorial.[123] The Taliban’s political power in this sense is not centralised to the state but rather centralised to local independent micro-societies (or state shells) at the periphery of the state. Similarly, while there is an authoritative power dimension to the Taliban’s use of force, it can be seen that the fundamental source of their power is diffused. Mann’s description of diffused power is that it: “spreads in a more spontaneous, unconscious and decentralised way throughout a population…. It typically comprises, not command and obedience, but an understanding that these practices are natural or moral or result from self-evident common interest.”[124] The drug trade therefore can be seen as creating both authoritative and diffused power for the Taliban that equates to local political power.

 

By providing protection services to the drug trade, the Taliban also assumes a role not dissimilar from how many mafia organisations have operated throughout the world. Diego Gambetta’s work on the Sicilian Mafia provides a comparison that is worthy of consideration.[125] Gambetta asserted that mafias are fundamentally an economic enterprise that sell private protection.[126] That protection thrives in an environment where there is distrust within the market and a lack of central government authority.[127] The situation in Afghanistan has many similarities to this environment with limited governance in rural areas and an illicit drug trade that perpetuates distrust between the government and those who are involved in the trade.  Such factors give the Taliban ample opportunity to facilitate protection services. 

 

To apply Gambetta’s analysis, it may therefore be helpful to describe the Taliban as a business rather than an insurgency based on the service that the Taliban provides. The population may therefore be willing customers of the Taliban’s services, whose power is extended by further perpetuating distrust within the market.[128] Gambetta asserts that those who provide protection services are naturally inclined to exaggerate the threat that requires their services.[129] This in part explains much of the population’s distrust of any government counter-narcotics efforts. Similarly, it illustrates the importance of the information domain within any counterinsurgency campaign.

 

Protection is unsurprisingly often synonymous with violence, or at the very least, the threat of violence.  Yet despite the Taliban’s primary business function being the provision of protection from government eradication of the opium industry, they have also been known to provide mediation services to local disputes. As Gambetta states of the Sicilian Mafia, they “can supply a real service while being at the same time an evil that must be opposed.”[130] Protection undoubtedly has a predatory element, but it is also in the interests of the Taliban to monopolise that predation to ensure that the drug trade is not adversely impacted from their presence.[131] This has the dual function of reducing corruption (within the drug trade) which encourages further Taliban support as well as ensuring the protection of the market upon which their own revenue is dependent.

 

Like the opium trade, protection services are manpower intensive. This may therefore equate to a lower profit margin at higher levels of the insurgency, however, allows for greater strength in the size of their movement.[132] More importantly, it also dilutes the notion of who the Taliban are. The employment of informants, drivers, smugglers or even doctors is not uncommon in protection services, and yet employment does not require full-time membership with the insurgency.[133] This raises important questions for military targeting of insurgent networks. While opium farmers are often seen as victims of the drug trade that need to be protected, that same sympathy is not afforded to traffickers or those who refine opium to heroin. Given that each of these roles are illegal and support the insurgency, it is not clear why this opinion prevails.

 

Whether GIROA and ISAF choose to focus on eradication or interdiction is irrelevant in a protection market. The Taliban needs a threat to justify its protection services and any counter-narcotics strategy that uses force, fits that narrative. Here we see that opium is at the centre of governance issues within Afghanistan and as Mansfield observes, “the two are intrinsically linked.”[134] The lack of governance at the periphery combined with the political capital derived from the control (or at least, influence) over this trade provide significant challenges to any attempt to counter its growth. The final gap in understanding this trade is explaining how actors are able to generate trust and cooperation within an illicit industry. If a “Lack of central government authority leads to lack of trust” as Gambetta claims, then there is likely to be an underlying ethnic, religious or cultural element that underpins the drug trade’s operations.

 

ETHNIC, RELIGIOUS AND CULTURAL DIMENSIONS

 

The intersection of ethnicity, religion and culture provide further challenges to the issues that confront Afghanistan. Loyalty is often derived from the membership of a family, village, region or ethnic group.[135]  While ethnic allegiance is perhaps the most visible, it appears to be more “descriptive than operational” as Thomas Barfield  describes.[136] In other words, ethnicity is an important aspect of individual identity; however, rarely forms the basis of political action unless it is perceived that the ethnic group is being threatened by another. Despite physical force still being a fundamental component of legitimacy in these traditional societies, Raghav Sharma contends that ethnicity has emerged in the last thirty years as another important attribute of power.[137]

 

The vacuum of governance at the periphery of the Afghan state has created a complex web of social dynamics within the numerous micro-societies controlled by local warlords.[138] Sharma’s contention that ethnicity has to continually “live and negotiate” with tribe and Islam is likely to hold true in these societies.[139] Historical Afghan governments and foreign powers that have attempted to subvert or interfere with these dynamics have invariably met resistance. Similarly, the linguistic, geographic, ideological and economic differences between the various Afghan ethnicities creates further barriers to national identity.[140] This is not to say that national identity is unachievable, however, it offers an explanation of why many of these micro-societies are cautious of outsiders and how individual and group identity is formed. This identity is important in understanding how the drug trade intersects with other components of Afghan society.

 

Following the Soviet-Afghan war, the internal divisions that ultimately led to Civil War comprised factions based predominately along religious and ethnic lines.[141] Under the Taliban’s rule, the mostly Pashtun group enforced its own brand of Pashtun-Sharia law which only served to deepen these divides.[142] With the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, the non-Pashtun groups were given the opportunity they were waiting for to overthrow the Taliban regime.[143] Combined with the loss of political capital from their opium ban, the Taliban had little hope of providing a formidable resistance when confronted with both the US-led coalition and various ethnic groups marginalised under the Taliban’s rule.  As could be expected then, the Taliban insurgency has struggled to expand past its own Pashtun ethnic base.[144]

 

Conversely, the subsequent Afghan governments that have attempted to appease the minority ethnic groups may well have created grievances among the Pashtun base. Amitai Etzioni argued that this “aggrieved ethnic nationalism” is what drives many Pashtuns to support the Taliban movement.[145] Alternatively, Hassan Abbas has argued that the “occupation” of foreign forces provided the foundation of this grievance.[146] Both of these elements are likely to be core components of Taliban recruitment; however, there is little research as to the extent this features as an ongoing source of motivation for front-line fighters. Similarly, there is little research to indicate the extent to which involvement within the drug trade forms part of the initial or ongoing motivation of these combatants. Indeed, as Barfield identifies, “Conflicts that appeared ethnic on the surface were, in reality, fights over control of political, economic, and military resources.”[147]

 

For the Sicilian Mafia, the endorsement of the church was fundamental to the group’s legitimacy, with many young men often choosing between a life in the clergy or in the mafia.[148] The blessing of the church (whether implied or stated) formed a key part of the mafia’s recruitment. This notion was extended by Napoleoni’s work when she stated that “religion is simply a recruiting a tool; the real drive is economics.”[149] This statement is likely to hold true for the Taliban. While combatants may draw on religious or ethnic grievances to justify their actions, the ongoing motivations are unlikely to be ideological. Having said this, the prestige that is derived from providing protection holds significant respect in Afghan culture[150] and its motivation for insurgents deserves separate analysis.

 

Barfield notes that “networks based on ethnicity have become stronger conduits for patronage and protection and have often merged with criminal syndicates that exploit similar ties.”[151] This supports the UNODC’s findings that most drug labs in Afghanistan are small family enterprises rather than larger organisational structures.[152] One might see that while the motivation for participants is likely to be economic, entry into the drug trade is based on a cultural or ethnic membership that inspires trust between criminal elements and protection from an insurgency that is generally of the same membership. Like the mafia, the Taliban has an incentive to exaggerate the lack of the trust outside of this membership to reinforce the desire for their services.  

 

Despite the prevalence of narcotics among Pashtun majority provinces, participation in the drug trade does not appear to be exclusive to any particular ethnic group. Similarly, while the majority of Taliban fighters are of Pashtun ethnicity, this dynamic has shifted in recent years to see a growth in participation from minority ethnic groups.[153] Given that reliable data is absent for ethnic participation in both the insurgency and the drug trade, attempting to examine this relationship further may not be possible at this time. Nevertheless, accepting Collier and Hoeffler’s theory on the importance of greed in conflict, it is not surprising to see an illicit trade transcend ethnic lines. How the Taliban interacts across these ethnic lines warrants its own analysis.

 

CENTRAL FINDINGS

 

Examining the economic, political and cultural dimensions of this problem facilitates a better understanding of why the drug trade exists, how it exists and ultimately its impact within a conflict environment. There is a straight forward nexus among the constituent elements whereby economics provides the motivation for entry into the trade, while cultural dynamics support its operations and political capital provides the power for any group that ensures its continuation. Commentary that focusses on only one of these dimensions will ultimately fail to address the complex nature of this trade and how it should be addressed.

 

The economic motivations for entry into an illicit drug trade are not surprising, especially for a nation with high levels of poverty and instability. It is important to highlight though that the perceptions of farmers being coerced into the trade do not stand up to qualitative analysis. It is equally important to highlight the importance of credit within conflict zones, particularly for agricultural industries. If the government is unable to facilitate legitimate alternatives to criminal sources of funding, it should not expect to have any success in transitioning to a licit economy. Lastly, the importance of funding on insurgent groups should not be underestimated and its propensity to change the character of that group requires further investigation.

 

The lack of the trust within an illicit trade lends itself to two common attributes: membership and the market for protection services. Membership in Afghanistan appears to be founded on allegiance to family, village, tribe or ethnicity. This membership allows for the cooperation of multiple criminal elements and the continued acceptance of the Taliban to tax that membership in exchange for protection services. The foundation of the Taliban’s ideology grounded in religious and ethnic grievance continues to provide a strong foundation for recruitment while simultaneously allowing it a credible reason to be involved in the drug trade.

 

Lastly, it can be seen that the true power of the Taliban’s involvement in the drug trade relates to its political capital rather than any economic return. The labour-intensive nature of the drug trade demands significant participation from the rural populace which has transformed their livelihoods. GIROA is unlikely to ever be able to accept the drug trade as a legitimate economic enterprise and will therefore always be a threat to this portion of the labour market. The Taliban’s ability to provide protection from the threat GIROA presents and ensure the drug trade is allowed to continue with minimal disruptions, affords them a level of legitimacy that GIROA is unable to counter.

 

IMPLICATIONS FOR FURTHER ANALYSIS

 

By approaching this study with a counterinsurgency focus, it is evident that significant frictions exist between policing, military and aid programs when confronting an illicit drug trade. This in part stems from the uncertainty of which actors are engaging in insurgent or criminal behaviour, or both. ISAF strategies that have rejected counter-narcotics programs due to the risk of alienating the rural base, miss the underlying importance of this commodity. Similarly, strategies that result in predatory counter-narcotics methods undermine the role of the state in protecting its citizens. The disparate backgrounds of the various specialists who comprise a counterinsurgency campaign further compound these frictions. Studies into methods of improving the interoperability between these groups would be a logical and worthwhile path forward.

 

Both Australian and US military counterinsurgency doctrine appear to overlook the impact of the political capital derived from a drug trade. While the doctrine of both the Australian and the US military addresses the potential relationship between insurgencies and criminal organisations, the monetary value of this relationship is the sole focus. Further, such relationships are typically seen as an advantage to the counterinsurgent who may be able to use the criminality of the insurgent group to undermine their legitimacy.[154] This notion seems to overlook the reliance of a population on an illicit trade and how the concept of criminality may differ across cultures. Legitimacy in this sense is presumably applied to political legitimacy rather than the legitimacy to monopolise violence for protection services.

 

The other implicit failure of existing counterinsurgency doctrine is to address ways of dismantling the state-shell structure that can be created through the control of illicit trades. This failure stems from a lack of appreciation for the greed vs grievance dynamic expressed by Collier and Hoeffler that extends to both the insurgency and the civilian populace. If the goal is to separate the populace from the insurgency,[155] the counterinsurgent must provide a better economic alternative. Addressing the root cause of the insurgency’s inception may be irrelevant once the insurgency has established its state-shell and its character has evolved. It is thus more important to dismantle the framework that allows it to maintain its relevance to the populace.

 

Seth Jones & Martin Libicki’s study of 648 terrorist groups over a 38-year period determined a strong relationship between the duration of the conflict and economic condition of the country.[156] In other words, elevating Afghanistan from poverty is likely to be a more successful strategy than one of military action. This is by no means a new concept in counterinsurgency theory; however, it reinforces the importance of economic aid. The prevailing sentiment throughout this study has highlighted the impact of a lack of accessible credit to poor farmers and aid programs that do not provide viable alternatives to the illicit market. Further analysis is therefore warranted on how aid programs can be used more effectively to undermine illicit trades.

 

There is an enduring challenge among coalition nations to understand the changing character of an insurgency once it becomes connected to an illicit trade. The modern Taliban clearly did not become a mafia organisation overnight. The sophisticated methods of trafficking, refinement, money laundering and protection rackets that underpin this multi-billion-dollar enterprise are more than worthy of closer analysis.  Existing open-source literature has struggled to explain how insurgent groups interact with or transform into criminal elements outside of a theoretical framework. To better understand this relationship would go a long way in helping to undermine it.

 

CONCLUSION

 

The importance of the drug trade in Afghanistan goes to the heart of understanding the role of the state. A government that is unable to protect its citizens is likely to forfeit its right to rule in the eyes of the governed.[157] If the Taliban is able to perform this role by encouraging and controlling an illicit economy then they have effectively replaced the role of the state in the areas that they hold influence. This notion helps to explain the failure of counter-narcotics efforts to date and perhaps more broadly the counterinsurgency campaign itself. While the financing of insurgencies has always been recognised as a key issue, the importance of this financing in changing the character of the insurgency and the war more broadly is clearly overlooked.

 

Addressing the drug trade requires a multi-faceted approach supported by the acknowledgement that its impact transcends the economic, political and cultural dimensions of the state. Reducing it to a policing issue or even an issue of poverty simply does not lend itself to a solution that will address its root cause. The Taliban has proven to be a remarkably resilient insurgency and while narcotics may prove to be only one element of its underlying success, it has demonstrated how damaging that commodity can be when its destruction is not prioritised within a counterinsurgency campaign. More broadly, it is difficult to see how the Taliban would have survived this long without the political and economic capital that this commodity has provided.

 

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the Australian Defence Force or Australian Government.