IVAW needs to address the occupation of Afghanistan. It is a ruinous war that costs lives for our service members, the people of Afghanistan, and the lives of people at home who are barley conscious that a war is taking place there. I should be upfront and say that I have never been to Afghanistan. I do feel that we need to address the issue as it effects our daily lives in ways that we might not be fully aware of. We suffer the symptoms of a heroin problem that stems directly from our conflict there.

When the British needed tea from China they found that it was much more profitable to addict a significant portion of the Chinese people to opium and trade opium for tea rather than silver. Towards the end of the Vietnam War the United States, through the Civil Air Transport program, moved heroin from Indochina to markets all around the world. When we invaded Afghanistan our allies, the Northern Alliance, produced opium to fund their struggle against the Taliban.

As a result heroin use is rampant in the United States, especially amongst the poorest or our neighborhoods. When I was a kid one had to have a robust trust fund to maintain a sustainable heroin addiction. Around 2002 that changed. Heroin got purer, cheaper, and more plentiful than it ever has been.

I work as a security guard in several very low-rent housing complexes in Downtown Tacoma, Washington. One used to be cold water flats but was converted to accommodate a slightly more discerning group of wage slaves. Another was a hospital administration building that they threw toilets and showers into to make the rooms habitable to week-to-week renters. Generally, if you are transitioning into or out of homelessness in Downtown Tacoma you will pass through my buildings at one time or another.

The halls are filled with hard core drug users and and prostitutes. These are amazing people who's motivation, ingenuity and creative abilities rival those same qualities in the best of our nation's CEO ranks. These people live by their wits every day. If they were to apply themselves to legitimate business endeavors they would be captains of industry. However, since they devote themselves entirely to acquiring and using drugs, they are are relegated to walking the streets, hustling and selling whatever they can to sustain themselves.

One of the most fascinating people that I have dealt with is named Sunshine. (None of these people have real names, rather they go by what ever handle they acquired in jail, prison, or the shelter.) Sunshine is a middle aged prostitute who is addicted to heroin. At one time she was married to a fairly successful man. However, after developing her addiction she slipped into our criminal justice system and became a fixture on our Tacoma streets. She is short and skinny with spongy skin that makes her appear about ten years older than she really is. She has long blond/graying hair. One of her breasts is slightly larger than the other as the implant in it became infected while she was in prison and had to be removed. She is intelligent, quick witted and very conscious of the fact that her choice to start shooting is responsible for her current station in life.

However, it isn't that simple. Addiction to heroin is strong, strong enough that withdrawal symptoms can cause heart failure if a person attempts to quit cold turkey. Rather, the only effective way to kick a significant need for smack is through the use of methadone. At present, methadone costs $13 per dose in our downtown clinic. Heroin costs $10 per hit for 70% pure product on the streets of Tacoma. It is cheaper to shoot heroin than to get clean, reliable methadone.

Many long-time users aren't getting high any more when they shoot up. Their veins have long since collapsed or sunk down so far that they are unreachable. When these old timers (some in their twenties) use, they shoot into muscle which delays the release of the drug and negates the possibility of a noticeable high. It does serve to keep dope sickness (withdrawal symptoms) at bay for a few more hours.

Sunshine is one of these users. When she can't score she wanders around aimlessly, stumbling into walls and desperately trying to find drugs or money for drugs. She will vomit in the bushes and start yelling at anyone that she sees.

This is Sunshine's arithmetic of addiction: Sunshine needs seven hits of smack per day to stay straight. At ten dollars a hit she must make $70 to keep from getting the shakes and chills. Sunshine preforms fellatio on random men in their cars for $10. This means that she must put her mouth around the penises of seven strange men per day to stay straight. That doesn't include the small amount of food that she will need to sustain herself. She will have to service a couple more customers for that.

Right now the United States is protecting the drug trade in Afghanistan so that it can protect and expand its energy policy. At home that equates out to a cheap and plentiful drug supply that we incarcerate people for utilizing. In this way the war serves to build the wealth and security of oil companies while ensuring that there is no upward mobility in the lowest of our classes domestically.

There is a sick parallel between the War on Terror and the War on Drugs. In the 1980s we supplied the Mujahideen with arms and training to fight the Soviet invaders. Now we are fighting them in their current manifestation- the Taliban. We aided the drug producers in northern Afghanistan and we are arresting people for drugs at home. Both cases contain some twisted Hegelian model of creating a problem and then providing an equally horrible solution that benefits a few people. In both cases we will feel the aftershocks of our actions today for decades to come.