We'll Get The Insurgent-Dudes Later. Sergeant, Pass The Cheetos!

I never heard Afghanistan had impenetrable jungles full of 10-foot high pot. It's what the chief of Canadian defense staff claims, I have no reason to disbelieve the man, and the title of the news story he's quoted in says it all: Troops Battle 10-foot Marijuana Plants.

If so, it's yet another reason to intensify the attack on Afghanistan. Poor people should not be allowed to grow, smoke, or otherwise consume pot because they'll just stay poor and not become fully functional producers/consumers, and besides, when Afghans grow fields full of pot they're violating the terms of their opiate production license. They must be stopped. The trouble is, the insurgents keep dodging into the impenetrable pot forests, which are too wet to easily burn and where soldiers can't follow. The Canadians tried burning a section of plants, and took out a patrol of their own men from the fumes. Apparently they didn't put their gas masks on.

Now, let's think about this from another angle. If you're an Afghan pot farmer, how do you get your crop out and convert it into cash? I'm not as up on my smuggling skills as I used to be, but in terms of Euros, it would probably take an eighteen-wheeler full of baled ganja to equal a briefcase-sized amount of heroin base. That would mean I'd have to worry about securing a transport system. A very good, secure transport system to take my babies to lucrative markets. It would be very difficult to truck the stuff all the way to, say, Germany or England. Now, let's think about NATO and US forces, flying all those cargo planes full of military supplies in, and flying back out...empty?