Maybe Afghanistan needs a police academy

The Afghanistan military force is doing well for a young army, according to commander of the Combined Security transition command - Afghanistan (CSTCA) Major General Robert W. Cone.

Cone discussed some of the progress made by CSTCA in Afghanistan. According to Cone, CSTCA’s goal is to organize, train, equip and employ security forces to defeat insurgencies. He said that increasing the rule of law and gaining internal security will lay the foundation for economic stability. Cone said that CSTA accomplishes this through embedded training teams, police mentor teams and operational mentor liaison teams to teach, equip and mentor the Afghan army and community.

When asked how many Americans were under his command, Cone said that in CSTCA there are 3,000 civilians and 5,000 soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines. Cone acknowledged the increased attacks in Afghanistan and noted that the Afghan army has stepped up to address that problem. According to Cone, half of the forces dealing with the attacks are Afghan military forces. Cone pointed out that the Afghan military forces also lead 66 percent of operations which he said was impressive for such a young army. Military forces improve at combat by participating and the Afghan military ‘learns by doing,’ according to Cone.

Cone addressed the fact that Afghan police are several years behind the army in terms of development. Cone said changes such as pay reform and rank reform are required to ensure greater accountability. CSTCA is currently short of 2,300 NATO police trainers but Cone also noted that countries such as the U.K. and Canada are contributing police trainers. Cone emphasized that he is ‘very optimistic’ of the future of Afghan security and said that he believes the Afghans in the army and police force are patriots.

Comments

[walton cook]

Dear Think Radio:

Perhaps you remember the late Mancur Olson’s famous paper, Big Bills Left on the Sidewalk…? Olson presents an economist, who when seeing a hundred-dollar bill on the sidewalk, says he is not picking it up because if it were real, someone else would already have picked it up.

Is it possible that rich nations as well as poor leave big bills on the sidewalk?

As a much bigger $ incentive, now imagine $300 billion in U.S. currency, laying about in plain sight, free each year for the taking, and that the money once belonged to terrorists, criminals, corrupt officials and rich nation drug-users. What better group of donors? In a sense, this is like economist Paul Romer's 'non-rival good,’ also free for the taking, but first, someone has to pick up the money so that all can benefit—a public good—a mutually advantageous transaction. Are price differentials real enough to be picked up, big bills to be capitalized?

Capitalizing Price Differentials: Strategic Economic Diplomacy

STATE COLLEGE, PA In a recent address, Walton Cook explained the title concept. Here are some key excerpts from his talk:

“Just as U.S. or EU farmers receive financial incentives not to cultivate certain legal crops, short-term benefits not to cultivate illicit crops are now in order. Present U.S. and EU farm support exceeds $100 billion annually. We can employ dollar incentives creatively, and at a huge profit.”

“How?”

“Capitalize price differentials! It is worth $300 billion annually. Poor nation farmers are paid pennies at the ‘farm door’ for drugs that create expensive world societal problems of great magnitude, particularly in richer, drug consuming nations, like OECD or G-8 members. Illicit drugs represent an average 1.5% of GDP ‘societal’ cost to user nations. Based on a world GDP of $66 Trillion, the composite ‘societal cost’ is $990 billions annually. The OECD share of that GDP, $33 Trillion, represents a ‘societal cost’ of $495 billions annually, just for 30 richer nations. Only two drug plants, the opium poppy and the coca shrub (cocaine) make up approximately 65% of that total, over $300 billion every year. Don’t cultivate these two drug plants--save the money!”

“Stripped down to the basics, this ‘strategic economic diplomacy’ offers to pay farmers the same ‘farm door’ prices they received to cultivate illicit plants, but now for not cultivating those same plants. Since poor farmers suffer no economic loss, they are emotionally and financially prepared to support non-conflict diplomatic solutions. We propose that the subsidy will continue for a decade. This extended period permits former drug farmers to prepare for either new occupations or alternative cultivations. There is also no need to wait until alternate crops or occupations are already in place because there is no break or reduction in farmer income and future cultivation is officially criminalized. Further funding is provided to build educational facilities, construct information resources, build health clinics, provide transportation infrastructures, improve water quality and supply, create local police forces and improve judicial systems and government services. This is what we call ‘winning hearts and minds.”

“When we think of resources, we are likely to think of physical or human resources, assets such as oil or minerals in the ground or a well-educated populace. Some very poor nations have no such assets. It takes a more creative imagination to consider any illegal activity as a potential economic resource and, if even though temporarily—a usable asset. But lest we forget, whether it’s North Korea, Iran, Bosnia, or Sudan, market states already pay large sums to curtail activities that are illegal. When you are poor, but also a world production leader of illicit resources expensive to rich nations, richer nations can realize the huge ‘societal cost’ savings only when the problem is solved. It’s no different than a cure for any societal problem--the costs previously spent become savings--available now for alternate uses. “

“If a cure to drug cultivation were considered in the same vein as a cure to cancer or diabetes or AIDS, the money previously spent on all aspects of those diseases, the ‘societal cost,’ would be saved, and thus available to address other societal needs. This is the essence of my proposal.”
How much savings? According to official ONDCP figures (last covering 2002) of $120-130 billions annually, Mr. Cook then extrapolated 2008 U.S. social costs for just two drugs, opiates and cocaine/crack to be $150 billions annually; money now representing potential savings. An added windfall of perhaps $160-80 billion annually would benefit other rich OECD nations,

“Beyond that, it is important to consider that another 9/11 type terrorism act, funded by drugs, but avoided, would represent a far greater savings, perhaps in the hundreds of billions! Contrasted against the potential savings, we have proposed an agricultural subsidy of $5.6 billion to Afghanistan and $5.4 billion to the Andean region. For all the OECD nations, including the U.S., this represents an approximate annual return of $300 billion on an $11 billion subsidy investment. That’s about 500 times better than a normal 5% annual return. On a personal basis, let me add there isn’t one of us here that wouldn’t fight to be in line to invest.”

“Because of the vast margin between ‘farm door’ prices and rich nation ‘societal costs’, a very poor nation, Afghanistan for example, or even only a rurally poor one like Colombia, can benefit from the cessation of its cultivation of drug producing plants, much more so than from actually producing them, because rich nations can now invest a portion of the savings gained through leveraging the cost differentials toward financing “Transformational Drug Diplomacy.”
In the Q & A, Cook was asked about landowners, not always the actual farmers, but those ‘drug rent-seekers,’ who through ownership or control of lands can extract income, whether or not they are the actual farmers. “Yours is a good future for farmers, but what about ‘rent-seekers’”?

“Since oil or minerals in many lands are there by pure accident of geography, those in control of such resources can tap into the profits of extraction, often without much effort of their own, provided they can maintain control of the resource. Even the presence of a legal source of wealth is too often accompanied by a lack of democracy. You can fill in your own examples. I suggest that the ownership of land in a nation that allows drug cultivation on that land, no matter how poor the nation is otherwise, is positioning drug rent-seeking against rule-of-law. So long as terrorists, warlords, tribal rulers or other landlords control land upon which drugs can be cultivated, that represents their version of an oil well or a diamond mine. It is a treasure vein that they do not want severed. Yours is a good question because the answer is that ‘drug rent seeking’ and democracy do not mix. Those who control the land must use it otherwise. Rent-seeking through an illicit resource must be eliminated!”

“Two developing nations: Colombia and Afghanistan, fit this description. Afghanistan is at the very bottom range of the bottom-billion in rural poverty, yet it produces 92-95% of one illicit resource--heroin. Rural Colombia is another poverty area, also the world’s largest supplier of cocaine and its derivatives. Colombia also produces the bulk of all heroin consumed in the United States. (Although Afghan heroin is now 20% of U.S. usage) We are trying to support democracy in both nations by capitalizing existing price differentials.”

“As you are aware, the direct linkage between drugs and terrorism is becoming more manifest with each passing year and it is my hope that this diplomacy will offer a means to reduce the threat. As I noted in my general comments, those concerned with potential nuclear terrorism against the U.S. are convinced that the likely source of funding would be from Afghan drug trade. Some of those I interview in Homeland Security regularly advance this fearful vision.”

“People seek enduring relationships and a powerful sense of place. Afghans and Colombians are no different in this desire to settle down—to have life provide more smiles and fewer fears. Americans are the same in wanting some sense of social control of our future. Is this desire universal? Yes, I think it is. Here are some other advantages of such a policy.”

…Reduction of military personnel needed
…More effective use of military and civilian personnel
…Reduction in loss of lives, military and civilian
…Reduction in costs related to NATO and U.S. military presence
…Reduction in conflict levels (Improved border controls)
…Reduction in terrorism levels
…Reduction in revenues (Taliban alone get over $400M) to finance terrorism and insurgencies
…Reduction in regional tensions (Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq)
…Reduction in terrorist abilities to recruit among disenchanted youth
…Reduction in terrorist ability to finance a nuclear event
…Increase of recipient ‘budget-support,’ better general economics.
…Increase of recipient nation education
…Increase of qualified expatriate returns to recipients
…Increase in nutrition, health care and life expectancy to recipients
…Increase in needed infrastructures for recipients
…Reductions in tensions between EU and U.S
…Improved relations with recipient nations
…Superior returns-on-investment to investor nations
…Reasons for hope, winning hearts and minds--for all of us

Walton Cook is the author of Buzzword, in which biocontrol organisms. ‘mycoherbicides,’ are used to restrict the cultivation of drug plants through soil-inoculation, the study of which is now mandated by Public Law 109-469, Section 1111. Contact by email at waltoncook@yahoo.com