War on Drugs

UnHolyMoe

YouTube clip of Terence McKenna sharing his thoughts on the so called "war on drugs" and capitalism:

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=eWEmS4LAGEo

It's not a war on drugs it's a war on personal freedom and a covert means for gov security agencies to raise funds for black ops and keep them off the books:

And for a laugh heres Bill Hicks giving his point of view:

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=jSH6ofHbeUw

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=vX1CvW38cHA

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=J10w3FuCwfQ

Jocksereire

google Mike Ruppert

UnHolyMoe

Jocksereire wrote: »

google Mike Ruppert

Thanks. Just reading the wikipedia page about him and shows how his family is well connected to the CIA, it just makes you wonder how much inside information he has?

Jocksereire

check out his documenteries on the CIA and drugs on google video. just do a search on him in there. there is a link to one of his films in the sticky links thread on page one which is good too

casey212

John Gotti replied to a judge who asked him if he was involved in the drug trade: "no, i cant compete with the government".

The war on drugs is a war on competition.

iezuit

Gary Webb (purlitzer prize-winner) exposed much of the governmental drug runnings, do a search on him, he showed how the CIA controlled the Cocaine industry. They also control the heroin industry, this is why heroin production out of Afganistan was reached record levels each year since the the US/UK invaded Afganistan, most people know that heroin became much more freely available on the streets since that evil invasion.

Diogenes

iezuit wrote: »

Gary Webb (purlitzer prize-winner) exposed much of the governmental drug runnings, do a search on him, he showed how the CIA controlled the Cocaine industry.

Gary Webb won neither the Pulitzer or indeed the purlitzer prize. His work has been discredited by the paper he wrote for who described his work as

"only one interpretation of complicated, sometimes-conflicting pieces of evidence”

They also control the heroin industry, this is why heroin production out of Afganistan was reached record levels each year since the the US/UK invaded Afganistan, most people know that heroin became much more freely available on the streets since that evil invasion.

Don't suppose you have any evidence to support this claim? the problem with Heroin growth in Afghanistan is due to the fact that the Taliban banned poppy cultivation. Since the fall of the Taliban rival warlords have resumed trade of their own accord.

Offalycool

It could almost be called the War "for" Drugs. Seems there was more to Operation Enduring Freedom than "smoking Osama bin Laden out of his cave"

Legal opium importation from India and Turkey is conducted by Mallinckrodt, Noramco, Abbott Laboratories, and Purdue Pharma in the United States, and legal opium production is conducted by GlaxoSmithKline, Johnson and Johnson, Johnson Matthey, and Mayne in Tasmania, Australia; Sanofi Aventis in France; Shionogi Pharmaceutical in Japan; and MacFarlan Smith in the United Kingdom.[74] The UN treaty requires that every country submit annual reports to the International Narcotics Control Board, stating that year's actual consumption of many classes of controlled drugs as well as opioids, and projecting required quantities for the next year. This is to allow trends in consumption to be monitored, and production quotas allotted.

A recent proposal from the European Senlis Council hopes to solve the problems caused by the massive quantity of opium produced illegally in Afghanistan, most of which is converted to heroin, and smuggled for sale in Europe and the USA. This proposal is to license Afghan farmers to produce opium for the world pharmaceutical market, and thereby solve another problem, that of chronic underuse of potent analgesics where required within developing nations. Part of the proposal is to overcome the "80-20 rule" that requires the U.S. to purchase 80% of its legal opium from India and Turkey to include Afghanistan, by establishing a second-tier system of supply control that complements the current INCB regulated supply and demand system by providing poppy-based medicines to countries who cannot meet their demand under the current regulations. Senlis arranged a conference in Kabul that brought drug policy experts from around the world to meet with Afghan government officials to discuss internal security, corruption issues, and legal issues within Afghanistan.[75] In June 2007, the Council launched a "Poppy for Medicines" project that provides a technical blueprint for the implementation of an integrated control system within Afghan village-based poppy for medicine projects: the idea promotes the economic diversification by redirecting proceeds from the legal cultivation of poppy and production of poppy-based medicines (See Senlis Council).[76]

Wikipedia

Diogenes

Offalycool wrote: »

It could almost be called the War "for" Drugs. Seems there was more to Operation Enduring Freedom than "smoking Osama bin Laden out of his cave"

Wikipedia

Mmmm I notice this is a proposal and not actual policy.

I'm not sure what your point is here offaly. Currently the US government buys it's opium from India to stop Indian farmers from growing it for the heroin trade, and is legally required to do so due to trade treaties.

Poppies are an incredibly easy crop to grow, and provide easy cash, the proposal means the US and EU would be free to buy the opium from Afghanistan, stopping a cashflow for the Taliban.

If they wanted a steady flow of opium onto their streets they could allow any country to provide it, it isn't that poppies grow only in Afghanistan it's just that it's the most lawless country in the region, and poppy cultivation goes on there unchecked.

Offalycool

Currently there is zero legitimate profit to had from poppy cultivation in Afghanistan. I can see this changing in the near future. There is a lot of money to be made in the pharmaceutical industry from the occupation of Afghanistan. The poppy is easy to cultivate but the law closed expansion of the market.. now its like " we must open this market to help people and discourage terrorism".. This is not necessarily a bad thing but I find it hard to believe the west is there for the benefit of the indigenous people.

Diogenes

Offalycool wrote: »

Currently there is zero legitimate profit to had from poppy cultivation in Afghanistan. I can see this changing in the near future.

And that is a bad thing? Afghan farmers get a fair wage, Nato forces cut off a source of income for smugglers and the Taliban, and the world gets more of a valuable drug.

The "sinister conspiracy" you see is that it was the West intention to do this from the get go, but you've no evidence to support this.

There is a lot of money to be made in the pharmaceutical industry from the occupation of Afghanistan. The poppy is easy to cultivate but the law closed expansion of the market.. now its like " we must open this market to help people and discourage terrorism".. This is not necessarily a bad thing but I find it hard to believe the west is there for the benefit of the indigenous people.

No, true, seven years it's doubtful the majority of Americans could find Afghanistan on the map.

It is however beneficial to the West that Afghanistan does not relapse and return to a state that is a harbor and sanctuary for terrorism, thats the reason they are there. In order to do that you need there to be a state with infrastructure, organisation, and control of the country. Paying for the poppy crops helps that.

See your conspiracy doesn't make sense. The INB governs the growth and control of opium, but as you point out it is a lucrative trade. Now for your sinister conspiracy to work someone has to want to grow more opium, but does not control the International Narcotics Board (who could simply allow the countries who already legally grow opium to grow more), right? But at the same time this conspiracy has to be powerful enough to control both the US Army and Nato forces.

It seems like an awful lot of work don't you think? The NWO invade a country partially because they want to grow more opium, why not just deregulate the body that controls the growth of opium?

Offalycool

Mobilising the war machine reinvigorated the American economy.. bolstering that economic growth with lucrative drug production and other markets ensures the economic growth doesn't decline as sharply when the military industrial complex must shift a gear. Corporations wish to capitalise on drug production.. what better way than justify it through the war on terror.

While I accept I cant prove a lot of my speculation I must say that you could make your points with a little less sarcasm. It is hard to discuss ideas without lapsing into "i'm smarter than you syndrome", which is pointless.

Diogenes

Offalycool wrote: »

Mobilising the war machine reinvigorated the American economy..

What? Open the business section of any newspaper, Bush's reckless spending means the US is about to enter a major recession, the only thing that staved it off for the past seven years was building up a massive deficit.

The US war machine did not reinvigorate the american economy.

bolstering that economic growth with lucrative drug production and other markets ensures the economic growth doesn't decline as sharply when the military industrial complex must shift a gear. Corporations wish to capitalise on drug production.. what better way than justify it through the war on terror.

But how. Seriously how. How is allowing the legal growth of opium bolstering the US economy. Perhaps if the US allowed its farmers to grow the opium you'd have a point. If there was a shortage of opiates in the US, or a greater demand for legal opiates you'd have a point. If the manufacturing base for all these drugs were in the US maybe you might have a point.

Please explain how an increased supply of legal opium makes the US richer.

While I accept I cant prove a lot of my speculation I must say that you could make your points with a little less sarcasm. It is hard to discuss ideas without lapsing into "i'm smarter than you syndrome", which is pointless.

I don't see the sarcasm. You suspect a sinister global shadow government can pull the strings of entire armies, but lack the wherewithall to control a UN NGO? Thats not sarcasm, thats a valid flaw in your thinking.

Offalycool

During the 1990s, the national debt increased by 75%, GDP rose by 69%, and the stock market as measured by the S&P 500 grew more than three-fold.

Over his term, Clinton would introduce welfare reform, while with Republicans in control of Congress, most major spending programs were opposed and government spending increases stayed relatively low.[citation needed]

From 1994 to 2000 real output increased, inflation was manageable and unemployment dropped to below 5%, resulting in a soaring stock market known as the Dot-com bubble. The second half of the 1990s was characterized by well-publicized Initial Public Offerings of High-tech and "dotcom" companies. By 2000, however, it was evident a bubble in stock valuations had occurred, such that beginning in March 2000, the market would give back some 50% to 75% of the growth of the 1990s. The economy worsened in 2001 with output increasing only 0.3% and unemployment and business failures rising substantially, and triggering a recession that is often blamed on the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks.

Wikipedia
This highlights the panic the powers that be must have felt on the run up to 9/11.

Wilson had been the CEO of a General Motors subsidiary, and had been impressed with the productivity of U.S. industry during World War II. This period of economic growth brought the U.S. out of the Great Depression, and was driven by the social imperative, called the "war effort," as directed by the needs of the Department of Defense. Wilson warned at the close of the war that the U.S. must not return to a civilian economy, but must keep to a "permanent war economy."[1] Wilson was made Secretary of Defense under Dwight D. Eisenhower, and was largely instrumental in reforming the Pentagon as an instrument for facilitating a closer relationship between the military and industry.

Wikipedia
The military industrial complex was and is a huge part of the American economy, there is every reason to think this economic model would be implemented to reinvigorate the US. Weather or not it has been successfully does not mean it was not policy.

The term is used often in the case of the United States currently, which has by far the largest arms industry in the world. It is difficult to estimate the degree of dependence of the U.S. economy on its military and defense spending, but it is clearly enormous, and legislators fiercely resist defense cuts that affect their districts. In Washington State, an economist estimated in 2002 that in Western Washington 166,000 jobs, or about 15% of the workforce, depended directly or indirectly on military installations alone, not counting defense industries. In Washington State overall in FY2001, about $7.06 billion arrived in U.S. Department of Defense payroll, pensions, and procurement contracts—and Washington State was only seventh among the fifty states in this regard. Overall, U.S. spending on defense acquisitions and research is equal to 1.2% of the GDP.

Wikipedia
Another big industry left in America is pharmaceuticals. Considering we are now in a situation where production of opium in Afghanistan is higher than its ever been the only "right" thing to do is to refine Afghani opium into medicines and sell them to the third world (largely because up till now six nations received most of it). I can only guess what multinationals will be doing this but you can bet there will be a profit considering the largest market for them now is the US and that market is growing.

Consumption

In the industrialized world, the USA is the world's biggest consumer of prescription opioids, with Italy one of the lowest.[78] Most opium imported into the United States is broken down into its alkaloid constituents, and whether legal or illegal, most current drug use occurs with processed derivatives such as heroin rather than with pure and untouched opium.

Wikipedia
And yes.. there is a global shortage of medicinal opium..

Poppies as medicine

In both India and Turkey, opium production is used for medicinal purposes, making poppy-based drugs, such as morphine or codeine, for domestic use or exporting raw poppy materials to other countries. The United States buys 80 percent of its medicinal opium from these two countries. However, there is an acute global shortage of opium poppy-based medicines some of which (morphine) are on the World Health Organisation's list of essential drugs as they are the most effective way of relieving severe pain. A recent initiative to extend opium production for medicinal purposes called Poppy for Medicine was launched by The Senlis Council which thinks that Afghanistan could produce medicinal opium under a scheme similar to that operating in Turkey and India

wikipedia
And of course where there is demand there must inevitably be supply (and profit).

The "sinister conspiracy" you see is that it was the West intention to do this from the get go, but you've no evidence to support this.

....

See your conspiracy doesn't make sense. The INB governs the growth and control of opium, but as you point out it is a lucrative trade. Now for your sinister conspiracy to work someone has to want to grow more opium, but does not control the International Narcotics Board (who could simply allow the countries who already legally grow opium to grow more), right? But at the same time this conspiracy has to be powerful enough to control both the US Army and Nato forces.

Plenty of countries grow illegal drugs for America and Europe. Cultivating medicinal drugs is a little more delicate. The regulation has to seem to be in the best interests of the consumer, and a rapid change in Afghanistan which leads to a massive spike in illegal production of opium applies pressure to all governments involved. It creates unanimous consensus. This is largely how the system of control woks in my opinion. It was the same when the coalition went after Iraq. They have the bomb and we must act now.. deal with the consequences later. Often who deals with the consequences has been decided months in advance of anything actually happening.. and there are always profit projections and insurance policies.

Diogenes

Offalycool wrote: »

Wikipedia
This highlights the panic the powers that be must have felt on the run up to 9/11.

Wikipedia
The military industrial complex was and is a huge part of the American economy, there is every reason to think this economic model would be implemented to reinvigorate the US. Weather or not it has been successfully does not mean it was not policy.

You're referring to economy policy from sixty years ago, the world was a different place.

You're essentially suggesting that because it was successful 60 years ago, it's what the US government did post 911, you've no evidence aside from the fact that you think it might.

Tell me Offaly, was there a drive for War Bonds? Were people asked to donate scrap metal? The Draft? An Enlisted Reserve Corp? Massive population migration? Has the US economy turned from a manufacturing economy in the 40s to a service industry? Was there mass globalisation in the 40s?

You've absolutely no evidence to support your assertion.

Wikipedia
Another big industry left in America is pharmaceuticals. Considering we are now in a situation where production of opium in Afghanistan is higher than its ever been the only "right" thing to do is to refine Afghani opium into medicines and sell them to the third world (largely because up till now six nations received most of it). I can only guess what multinationals will be doing this but you can bet there will be a profit considering the largest market for them now is the US and that market is growing.

edit to address this.

The real money in pharmacy is in R&D and patenting new drugs, it's why you see the pharmaceutical industry fight tooth and nail over things like generic AIDs drugs.

The production of opiates, and morphine has been around for over a century, and poppies can be refined into opiates in the most primitive labs, which can be further refined into morphine or heroin, in cheap simple labs. There's no huge profit in marketing something abroad that can be made just a cheaply by the third world country once they have their own supply. From your own wikipedia link it says that shortages of morphine are due to an unwarranted fear of addiction and abuse.

Wikipedia
And yes.. there is a global shortage of medicinal opium..

wikipedia
And of course where there is demand there must inevitably be supply (and profit).

.... Plenty of countries grow illegal drugs for America and Europe. Cultivating medicinal drugs is a little more delicate. The regulation has to seem to be in the best interests of the consumer, and a rapid change in Afghanistan which leads to a massive spike in illegal production of opium applies pressure to all governments involved. It creates unanimous consensus. This is largely how the system of control woks in my opinion. It was the same when the coalition went after Iraq. They have the bomb and we must act now.. deal with the consequences later. Often who deals with the consequences has been decided months in advance of anything actually happening.. and there are always profit projections and insurance policies.

:rolleyes:

Once again it appears you've taken the Naomi Klein theories, and run wild again, you've no evidence such complex control over the world exists, in order for this to work, your sinister NWO, have to be able to control Nato and the US government and army, and know that they can increase illegal heroin production among the Afghans.


If there is such profit in increased opium production why not make the INB allow more countries to produce more opium legally rather than invade another country, and go through a costly war, spendings years, and billions of dollars in order to grow a drug that you can grow elsewhere without the hassle.



Simple question Offaly, and one you are studiously avoiding.

Offalycool

You're referring to economy policy from sixty years ago, the world was a different place.

You're essentially suggesting that because it was successful 60 years ago, it's what the US government did post 911, you've no evidence aside from the fact that you think it might.

Tell me Offaly, was there a drive for War Bonds? Were people asked to donate scrap metal? The Draft? An Enlisted Reserve Corp? Massive population migration? Has the US economy turned from a manufacturing economy in the 40s to a service industry? Was there mass globalisation in the 40s?

You've absolutely no evidence to support your assertion.

The economic policy was implemented and developed over many years right through the cold war. The dotcom inflation bubble that threatened the us economy at the end of the 90's was the result of a service economy.

Given the changes that had taken place, there was little need for war bonds as many employees have shares in there companies, companies that produce weapons. There is little need for a draft as much of the war machine is now privatised.. with companies such as Hallyburton and Blackwater the war effort has become privatised and thirsty for contracts.

The real money in pharmacy is in R&D and patenting new drugs, it's why you see the pharmaceutical industry fight tooth and nail over things like generic AIDs drugs.

The production of opiates, and morphine has been around for over a century, and poppies can be refined into opiates in the most primitive labs, which can be further refined into morphine or heroin, in cheap simple labs. There's no huge profit in marketing something abroad that can be made just a cheaply by the third world country once they have their own supply. From your own wikipedia link it says that shortages of morphine are due to an unwarranted fear of addiction and abuse.

Its all very well and good patenting drugs now, but if there is little demand for them currently and all the promise lies in some disaster like bird flu (God forbid) the massive profits remain mostly out of reach... convincing Governments to stockpile them is as far as it goes today. Opium has a massive and growing user base and medicinal addicts live longer. Furthermore the lack of a patient means the supply of raw materials is more important from a profit point of view than anything else.

And the above misses the point again. If there is such profit in increased opium production why not make the INB allow more countries to produce more opium legally rather than invade another country, and go through a costly war, spendings years, and billions of dollars in order to grow a drug that you can grow elsewhere without the hassle.

Simple question Offaly, and one you are studiously avoiding.

If the entirety of my argument cannot be taken as a whole.. the need to develop new markets while aggressively expanding the military industrial complex; then it doesn't make sense. In such a situation it would be ludicrous to pour money into a war effort with no foreseeable profit.. and separately to conquer a country to grow opium when it could be grown anywhere.

However if one can suppose the American administration wished to expand the military industrial complex in such a way as to completely privatise Government bodies.. a goal that has largely materialised; while at the same time secure global industries that hold huge profit promise, a strategy of aggressive economical expansion seems quite serious. It is not enough to leave the keys to these profit springs in the hands of the indigenous people, America must own them through puppet regimes. The expansion of US business is the expansion of the American way.. and the ultimate goal is to privatise the world. War and Drugs greatly forward that agenda.

Diogenes

Offalycool wrote: »

The economic policy was implemented and developed over many years right through the cold war. The dotcom inflation bubble that threatened the us economy at the end of the 90's was the result of a service economy.

And you're missing the entire decade of the 90s there. The dotcom bubble started in the late 90s, the cold war ended in the late 80s.

The US has been a service economy for decades now, it has not been on a war footing for the last decade.

Saying it was won't make it so.

Given the changes that had taken place, there was little need for war bonds as many employees have shares in there companies, companies that produce weapons. There is little need for a draft as much of the war machine is now privatised.. with companies such as Hallyburton and Blackwater the war effort has become privatised and thirsty for contracts.

:rolleyes:

Its all very well and good patenting drugs now, but if there is little demand for them currently and all the promise lies in some disaster like bird flu (God forbid) the massive profits remain mostly out of reach...

You're sailing so far off tangent here it isn't even funny. The pharmaceutical companies aren't spending millions researching vaccines for bird flu, they're spending billions working on drugs that lower cholesterol, fight heart disease, battle cancer, and diseases like Parkinson's and alhemeriers, because thats where the money is Keeping rich white people alive for as long as possible.

convincing Governments to stockpile them is as far as it goes today.

I think you'll find more money is being spent on new kinds of viagaria that on bird flu vaccines.

Opium has a massive and growing user base and medicinal addicts live longer.

Wait are you suggesting that the pharmacetial industry wants us all bombed on legal smack?

Furthermore the lack of a patient means the supply of raw materials is more important from a profit point of view than anything else.

What? I don't understand this sentence, are you suggesting that there is a lack of demand from patients for morphine. How is that an argument that the US and NATO need to capture afghanistan to keep a supply for a drug there is no demand?

If the entirety of my argument cannot be taken as a whole.. the need to develop new markets while aggressively expanding the military industrial complex; then it doesn't make sense. In such a situation it would be ludicrous to pour money into a war effort with no foreseeable profit.. and separately to conquer a country to grow opium when it could be grown anywhere.

SNIP

Everything that follows this is pure speculation and has no basis in actual facts.

Offalycool

"What? I don't understand this sentence, are you suggesting that there is a lack of demand from patients for morphine. How is that an argument that the US and NATO need to capture afghanistan to keep a supply for a drug there is no demand?"

I meant "patent" not "patient"

It would be more fair to say the military industrial complex has turned into a service industry. This doesn't change the fact that a war service economy needs a purpose... War.

"Wait are you suggesting that the pharmacetial industry wants us all bombed on legal smack?" yes I am.

You may not be willing to speculate as to way the world is the way it is. You may prefer to believe in bumbling reactions that aim to make best of any situation for all. I simply don't see it that way.

Diogenes

Offalycool wrote: »

I meant "patent" not "patient"

Yes but as I pointed out the patent pharmacetuial companies are most interested not for drugs that for diseases that are sympthons of the Western Lifestyle. Longevity of the rich sick and elderly, there is little money in morphine or opiates.

It would be more fair to say the military industrial complex has turned into a service industry. This doesn't change the fact that a war service economy needs a purpose... War.

What? Do you even understand what a service industry is?

"Wait are you suggesting that the pharmacetial industry wants us all bombed on legal smack?" yes I am.

And your evidence is where?

You may not be willing to speculate as to way the world is the way it is. You may prefer to believe in bumbling reactions that aim to make best of any situation for all. I simply don't see it that way.

Okay lets you at the two scenarios.

1. An evil globalist agenda, invades Afghanistan, in order to gain control of it's natural resources. It fights a doggedly losing battle with a tactically superior force in order to justify creating a illegal heroin trade, and it does all this intentionally. Then, after spending billions on this war, and spent all the political capital of the neo conservative movement, claim it is now forced to by all the opium it's opposition is growing, which then (and you've not even sketched out this bit) they plan to legally to give to their own population (for some apparent reason)

2. The US government invades Afghanistan with no real strategy or overall plan. It quickly gets bogged down in the messy unwinable war that the Soviets found themselves in 25 years ago. They are forced to destroy the crop that is the livelyhood of local farmers and their enemy, thereby embolding the Taliban in the local community. Someone in the EU comes up with the idea, that this morphine could be bought and used in the third world, where there is a stigma over opiates because they are addictive.

Offaly are you aware of the concept of Hanlon's Razor

If your NWO wanted everyone on opiates, why don't they let the INB let the countries already producing opiates to increase production. Also, why do the NWO want everyone to be junkies? Have you ever met a productive smack addict.

This makes less and less sense the digger you deep.

Offalycool

The American economy is inseparable from the military industrial complex. At the end of the Dot com bubble American business wanted a radical restructuring of the economy. Do you really believe America could afford not to go to war and sustain the mired of weapon contracts many of its biggest industries depend on. Even Ireland has links to this lucrative business as has been shown in a recent Prime Time report.

Pharmaceutical companies wish to profit from the market. If opium addiction is a market they will capitalise on this.. both at home and abroad.

I find it easer to believe there was a plan going into Afghanistan, even if that plan has not paned out. The fact remains that the opium problem that has manifested itself in Afghanistan, it is not going to go away and will have to be dealt with in a profitable way by the international community. It's really not that implausible to see many strategic ends to the occupation of Afghanistan. If you think Americans has not learned anything from history you give them less credit than I do. If you attribute all humanities failures to stupidity you are grossly simplifying the situation. Today we have a conflict of interest, and that is the way it has always been.

meglome

Offalycool (love the name btw) the big problem with all your assertions is they really lack hard evidence. You or I can believe anything we like but to express it as fact to others I believe there should be evidence to back it up. Most of your evidence appears to be your own gut feeling that it is happening, which to be honest isn't going to make me a believer.

Diogenes

Offalycool wrote: »

The American economy is inseparable from the military industrial complex.

Again another unsupported "factual" claim.

At the end of the Dot com bubble American business wanted a radical restructuring of the economy. Do you really believe America could afford not to go to war and sustain the mired of weapon contracts many of its biggest industries depend on.

When you say biggest industries in America, what do you mean.

Most employees?

Revenue?

Or just Overall?

Because in all three categories, a company who's primary business is defense, isn't in the top ten.

Even Ireland has links to this lucrative business as has been shown in a recent Prime Time report.

Yeah er it's called globalisation, I thought you'd read a book about this? Large companies go where there is the right workforce, Raytheon has a small plant here, that's because we have a skilled english speaking workforce.

But thats a tangent, because it's irrelevant to your erroneous claim that the entire US economy is based on a war footing.

Pharmaceutical companies wish to profit from the market. If opium addiction is a market they will capitalise on this.. both at home and abroad.

Thats an empathetic absolute statement, not supported by anything even approximating a fact.

I find it easer to believe there was a plan going into Afghanistan, even if that plan has not paned out.

Yes it may be easier for you to believe it doesn't make it any more real.

The fact remains that the opium problem that has manifested itself in Afghanistan,

You mean the opium problem that has existed in Afghanistan for decades, and was supressed for a few years by the Taliban? You make it sound like this problem manifested itself out of thin air since the US forces arrived.

it is not going to go away and will have to be dealt with in a profitable way by the international community.

But you've failed to demonstrate how it will be profitable furthermore you've failed to prove how this scheme which is simply an EU proposal has any real legs in the international community.

It's really not that implausible to see many strategic ends to the occupation of Afghanistan. If you think Americans has not learned anything from history you give them less credit than I do.

I think they have and they haven't. The clearly didn't read or understand any prior accounts of the behaviour of Afghan Mullah during both the British and Soviet occupations. They failed to grasp the shifting loyalities and priorities of local warlords, and they failed to win the hearts and minds of locals with indiscriminate bombing.

Look six years in what strategic success has america have? A natural gas pipeline? Nope. Stability outside of major population centers? Nope. A strong Afghan army? An end to Taliban rule in remote regions? Nope.

Now you're inventing some flight of fancy that one of the goals of the operation was to force the US to be in position to have to buy vast quantities of opium in order for the pharmaceutical industry to get us all addicted to legal smack?

Have you any idea how absurdly tenuous this all sounds?

PS. I noticed you never explained how the US is a military industrial service industry, I'd still love a definition of what exactly that is...

Offalycool

In my opinion the military industrial service industry is the evolution of the military industrial complex in line with globalisation. It develops and supply's weapons on a global scale, often to opposing sides. I believe this global market is artificially influenced by elements of this organisation through developed wars. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arms_trade

Offalycool

Afghanistan
Just who is buying all that Afghan opium?
Recent gyrations in supply of opium from Afghanistan, with no corresponding difference in supply of illicit heroin on our streets, suggest an unknown customer snapping up the bulk of it
By Kevin Potvin

In 1999, Afghan poppy farmers accounted for 75% of global opium production, producing about 4,000 tons. In 2000, the Taliban government, four years consolidating their power after dispatching the last of the exhausted warlords in 1996, clamped down and reduced Afghan production to nearly nothing. They had eradicated poppy production completely in the nine-tenths of the country they effectively governed and vowed to never allow poppy growing again.

The following year, the Taliban were ousted by invading American forces. Poppy production rebounded strongly. In the division of duties among NATO members who inherited the occupation of Afghanistan from American forces, responsibility for another round of poppy eradication was acquired by the British military. But under their watch, unlike under the very effective Taliban watch, Afghan poppy production has reached new heights and Afghanistan is today the source of over 90% of opium in the world. All the Taliban did to eradicate opium was to simply jail farmers who kept growing poppies and it took them only a few months. Opium production figures for other countries like Burma and Colombia do show some corresponding heights and dips during these wild swings in Afghan production, but not nearly enough increases to make up for lost Afghan production, nor do their figures show sufficient downsizing to balance rapidly increased Afghan production.

No sign of change

It would therefore stand to reason that total global production of opium itself declined steeply and rose steeply over these years. Health and police authorities in cities like Vancouver, with significant populations of heroin users, braced themselves for turbulence as addicts, deprived of heroin, switched to other drugs that might be more expensive on the street and that produce different health results, and then switched en masse back to heroin when its oversupply made it much cheaper again. But none of the expected wild fluctuations in global opium production showed up on city streets as increased or decreased heroin availability. Local prices for heroin on Vancouver streets, as in most cities in the West, have remained largely stable through all these years, indicating that supply of illicit street heroin had in fact remained stable too.

Three big questions suggest themselves: When global production of opium declined severely, who lost their supply? And when, in the years following the American toppling of the Taliban, when Afghan production increased massively, who got those supplies? The prices fetched by the sale of opium from poppies grown by Afghan farmers is widely believed to pay for the armaments and personnel of the lethal insurgency confronting British, American, and Canadian soldiers occupying Afghanistan today. The question about who is buying the massively increased supply of opium is tied intimately to the third big question: Who is selling all the arms to the Afghan insurgents? All three questions may have the same answer.

In May of this year, Purdue Pharma, based in New Jersey, and its executives plead guilty to charges of pushing over $3 billion worth of an excessively potent opium-based drug called OxyContin. In their plea, which cost the company a fine of nearly $600 million, and the executives between $20 million and $30 million each personally, the company admitted that even before the drug was marketed, they knew OxyContin was far more potent than other competitors’ drugs. The US General Accounting Office, in its investigation, found OxyContin to be twice as potent as pure morphine. The company was charged with knowingly orchestrating a false advertising and physician-oriented education campaign to mislead doctors and the public into believing OxyContin was far less potent. The company produced faulty graphs and other false scientific documentation to convince doctors to over-prescribe the drug. To promote the drug, the company gave away coffee mugs and plush toys branded with the name OxyContin. The company has been forced to put aside tens of millions of dollars to cover many pending wrongful death lawsuits stemming from over-prescribed levels of the drug.

Hillbilly heroin

The opiate, based on a formula using oxy-codeine, was first introduced in 1996. “By 2000, parts of the United States, particularly rural areas, began to see soaring rates of addiction and crime related to use of the drug,” reported the New York Times. Purdue Pharma was by then selling over $1 billion worth of OxyContin annually. Dr Sidney Wolfe of Public Citizen was quoted in the New York Times saying of Purdue Pharma’s OxyContin, “The damage to the public from these white-collared drug pushers surely exceeds the collective damage done by traditional street drug pushers.” In the Appalachian region of the US where the drug proved very popular on the street, it is known as “hillbilly heroin.” The US Attorney for West Virginia said “The results of Purdue’s crimes were staggering.” The drug remains in circulation today, generating about $2 billion in annual sales. The lead lawyer defending Purdue Pharma in this case, and still representing the company as late as last summer, was none other than Rudolph Guiliani, former mayor of New York and currently front-running Republican candidate for President in next year’s elections running on a platform largely built around his role responding to 9/11, the event that precipitated and justified the US invasion and occupation of Afghanistan.

Purdue Pharma, though active only in the United States, is the leading partner in a consortium it founded in 1957 called Mundipharma (literally, world drugs), a licensing and distribution company with offices and activities worldwide, including in Germany, Switzerland, Israel, Brazil, China, and India. It’s head office is in Cambridge, England and it reports annual sales approaching $2 billion worldwide.

No names, please

Purdue Pharma, as well as Mundipharma, are privately held companies and verifiable information about who the executives and members of the boards of directors are is notoriously difficult to establish. Certainly none of the companies’ websites divulge this information even though it is routinely a part of any company’s website. Other information regarding investors, capitalization, and profitability is also impossible to learn from these secretive companies.

But Purdue Pharma’s website claims the company’s main focus is opiate-based pain reliever innovations, and pioneering work in distribution channels around the world, in addition to work with criminal narcotics agents to stem the illicit abuse of pharmaceuticals and to crackdown on substitutes and counterfeits. “We also work with distribution channels and law enforcement agencies to assist in reducing diversion and illegal use of controlled substances,” says the website. For example, the company is the first to use radio frequency identification tags on bottles, boxes, and pallets of its shipments, tags that communicate with global positioning satellites to let company officials know at any instant exactly where in the world each bottle of Oxycontin is.

Congressional investigations into the Iran-Contra scandal in the 1980s revealed a network run by White House appointees and CIA officials involving illicit drugs, in this case cocaine-based narcotics from suppliers in South America, sold in American cities to raise money used to buy guns for Contra rebels fighting the leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua. Arms were also sold to Iran, a sworn enemy of America, to raise money for the Contras. President George Bush’s father was heavily implicated in that investigation as head of the CIA and as vice president, but charges were never pursued.

The relevance of the Iran-Contra affair to the possible Afghan-Purdue affair is the establishment of a pattern of behavior involving heads of state in the US and Britain, drug operations both licit and illicit, and arms transfers.

Further questions

What needs to be investigated is whether Purdue Pharma, Mundipharma, or other British-American drug companies are secretly and illegally buying Afghan opium with arms transfers to Afghan warlords and using the opium to produce heavily opium-laced pharmaceutical products like OxyContin that they push in excessive volumes on both licit and illicit markets in America and other Western nations to generate high and unreported profits. The source of the arms used by insurgents in Afghanistan needs to be established, and then possible connections between those suppliers and pharmaceutical companies involved in the production and distribution of opiate-based drugs need to be investigated.

Such a drug-money-arms loop would not be unprecedented, and nor would it be unprecedented to find US and British military figures playing a role in facilitating the flow of both drugs and arms over international borders. Oliver North, the indicted official partially in charge of the Iran-Contra scheme, was all along a US marine corporal whose court defense was always that he was operating on military orders from above.

While many members of NATO are involved in Afghanistan militarily, it is US and British forces who are by far the most prominent and in the greatest numbers, particularly in the provinces where most opium is produced. And it is US and British pharmaceutical companies that seem to sell the most opium-based drugs around the world—a narcotic whose global supply went through massive gyrations even while causing no discernable difference to supplies of heroin on streets of Western cities. The question we must ask is, are companies like Mundipharma illegally trading guns for Afghan opium with the complicity of American and British armed forces, and making enormous profit margins by selling the opium in excessive amounts to Western nation’s citizens?

Source
Seems I'm not the only crackpot.

Diogenes

Offalycool wrote: »

In my opinion the military industrial service industry is the evolution of the military industrial complex in line with globalisation. It develops and supply's weapons on a global scale, often to opposing sides. I believe this global market is artificially influenced by elements of this organisation through developed wars. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arms_trade

Examples? You still don't seem to understand the concept of service industry, which is where the majority of the US is employed and not in arms manufacturing.

Offalycool

meglome wrote: »

Offalycool (love the name btw) the big problem with all your assertions is they really lack hard evidence. You or I can believe anything we like but to express it as fact to others I believe there should be evidence to back it up. Most of your evidence appears to be your own gut feeling that it is happening, which to be honest isn't going to make me a believer.

Lol "It's Offaly cold" Cant say I can place the inspiration for ur identity, even though I played the Game. They sure don't make em like they use to. I Googled Diogenes also.. was an interesting character.

Diogenes

Offalycool wrote: »

Source
Seems I'm not the only crackpot.

So you've got one company, being prosecuted for it's hillybilly heroin. this would be at odds to your claim that there is one unifying global NWO who decide what is acceptable and not.

Offalycool

That company is a leading partner of Mundipharma, "a licensing and distribution company with offices and activities worldwide, including in Germany, Switzerland, Israel, Brazil, China, and India. It’s head office is in Cambridge, England."

Also I don't believe the NWO have complete control over every human affairs. They haven't exactly implanted chips in our heads yet. However they are a significant influence in economic politics. Economic politics has largely replaced ideological politics in the west today, it is hard to find idealogical differences in any political figure running in the US elections. It is interesting in the sense that American Democrats are being asked whether they wish to have a black or female candidate, both of which have similar mandates. However American voters are not asked to choose between say a socialist or neo-liberal, something that would provide more balance in a just society. It is this lack of political choice that gives the NWO there influence.

Diogenes

Offalycool wrote: »

That company is a leading partner of Mundipharma, "a licensing and distribution company with offices and activities worldwide, including in Germany, Switzerland, Israel, Brazil, China, and India. It’s head office is in Cambridge, England."

And your point is? Oh and Offaly could you please explain what the military industrial service industry is?

Also I don't believe the NWO have complete control over every human affairs. They haven't exactly implanted chips in our heads yet. However they are a significant influence in economic politics. Economic politics has largely replaced ideological politics in the west today, it is hard to find idealogical differences in any political figure running in the US elections. It is interesting in the sense that American Democrats are being asked whether they wish to have a black or female candidate, both of which have similar mandates. However American voters are not asked to choose between say a socialist or neo-liberal,

But they are. Ron Paul is what you'd describe as a Libertarian. He's a very distance third place in the republican nominations.

something that would provide more balance in a just society. It is this lack of political choice that gives the NWO there influence.

There is an alternatively explanation which you are going to dislike. Get this, socialist and libertarian idealogy, might just not appeal to the majority of, say democratic voters. Obama and Clinton have the same broad ideology as each other, because, and brace yourself, this ideology is the same as the ideology of the majority of democratic voters. I know, mindboggling, they're like competing for the minds of a group of people who all believe the same things. The middle ground is the middle ground because broadly it's where the majority of society live.

While you might like to see a mainstream socialist candidate perhaps it's because there isn't mainstream support for a socialist candidate, and it's not the NWO's fault?

Offalycool

It is a service industry because it supplies weapons AND the necessity to use them.. Kinda like business solutions.

They are all neo-liberal in a free-market economic sense, I was only suggesting a healthy balance, in a democratic election. Obviously you see nothing that would concern you so no harm done I suppose; if that's what you want. You are kidding yourself if you think a majority of Americans wouldn't elect a socialist candidate if one was available. Far to many people get a raw deal in the most affluent nation ever. TBH I cant see this going anywhere so I respectfully withdraw from our duel. Peace.

Diogenes

Offalycool wrote: »

It is a service industry because it supplies weapons AND the necessity to use them.. Kinda like business solutions.

:rolleyes:

The majority of Americans work in the Service Industry they have nothing to do with the military industrial complex. The American economy is not entirely based on a war footing as you erroneously claim. There is also not such thing as a military industrial service industry.

They are all neo-liberal in a free-market economic sense, I was only suggesting a healthy balance, in a democratic election. Obviously you see nothing that would concern you so no harm done I suppose; if that's what you want. You are kidding yourself if you think a majority of Americans wouldn't elect a socialist candidate if one was available.

I humbling suggest you are projecting your own political ideology, onto the majority of the population of America.

On what basis do you think that the majority of Americans would vote Socialist?

Offalycool

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_economy

I doubt the people of New Orleans are likely to trust Neo-liberals any time soon.

Diogenes

Offalycool wrote: »

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Service_economy

I doubt the people of New Orleans are likely to trust Neo-liberals any time soon.

Non sequitur much?

What does one have to do with the other?

And what on earth is a military industrial service industry.

And where's your evidence that the people of the US would vote socialist if they could?

minidazzler

I dont believe there is a true "War on Drugs". The real war is on who produces and Benefits from the drugs.
If the US government wanted to keep Drugs out of certain Neighbourhoods they can. But it benefits them. They Produce the Drugs, then they send people after everyone else who is in the Business.
The US government have always loved Monopolies. They sold Guns to Iraq so noone else could and Iraq would Depend on them.
They sell Drugs to the Scum at the bottom of society so they can keep society in a Balance that they like.

Diogenes

minidazzler wrote: »

I dont believe there is a true "War on Drugs". The real war is on who produces and Benefits from the drugs.
If the US government wanted to keep Drugs out of certain Neighbourhoods they can. But it benefits them. They Produce the Drugs, then they send people after everyone else who is in the Business.

Yes thats the reason why Bel Air Manhattan and Salt Lake city aren't crack dens, because the US government protects them.

The US government have always loved Monopolies. They sold Guns to Iraq so noone else could and Iraq would Depend on them.

Wrong, wrong, and wrong. France sold 13% of Iraq's weapons to them, Russia, China, Germany and Great Britain also sold weapons to iraq.

They sell Drugs to the Scum at the bottom of society so they can keep society in a Balance that they like.

Don't suppose you have any evidence for this?

thiarfearr

Trailer for Breaking the Taboo, a film speaking out the War on Drugs, featuring Morgan Freeman, Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter among others

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2vqpNT1kV4