Nothing gives profits like a drug monopoly. Al Qaeda shut down the poppies, so they did 9/11 to they could restart production. The Opium Wars were a similar story.

A dollar of heroin in Afghanistan goes for $1k+ in the states. The money ends up in the pockets of the elites.

i burned marijuana fields and fought in poppy fields. our lts even had cash to pay farmers to not grow marijuana with the promise of us providing wheat to grow instead (which we never did, due to we were an army...) when the wheat never showed up, the farmers planted poppy to make up for their losses.

if the farmers wouldn't comply, the course of action was to take that money and contract out some local to just bull doze his fields anyway.

it was dumb, and its all a joke MAN.