I’m not sure bin Laden is dead, but even if he is the ideas promulgated by Al Quaeda are still very much alive. Mythical figures have as muct potency in terms of inspiring copycats as the living figure. As for funding, the practice of individuals carrying cash or gold across borders is still very much alive.

Laugher is correct: the Taliban once opposed opium production, but Laugher is wrong to assume the Taliban is not using opium production to finance their current operations. As in any religious tome, the Quran sometimes contradicts itself and sometimes justifies certain otherwise prohibited behaviors when the are in service of waging jihad against the infidels. Of course the Taliban is not buying Afghan palaces; they are using the money to buy arms and other necessary support for their war.

Under Bill Clinton’s presidency, it was reported (and I tend to believe it, though without any prooof) that at one point the Taliban suggested they would be willing to make some sort of deal to turn bin Laden over to the U.S. Whether President Clinton was distracted by the effort to impeach him or other fallout from the Lewinsky scandal, the failure to pursue and conclude that deal has too be the worst missed opportunity in American history, and perhaps the costliest in terms of lives and treasure, not just for Americans but for everyone in the world affected by the post-9/11 wars.

That’s not quite true, thecrow. What money the Taliban makes in the drug trade is on the short end of the stick. The real money comes after opium is processed into heroin and transported across borders; connections that the Taliban does not have are needed to facilitate border crossings.

Most of the income of the Taliban is derived from taxation or old fashioned racketeering of reconstruction funds. And it doesn’t take much money to run a local insurgency.

The Taliban-drug trade connection is one that DC likes to paint so that it can be narco war to protect the West from the evils of free choice.

Sure they are having financial problems, it is global economic crises remember!? How does Mr. Cohen know that, where the fuck this information comes from? Oh, yeah, they fucked up an entire country of Afghanistan trying to find the guy and they didn’t, but they are sure Al-Qaida is having problems balancing their budget.

hello. let me write him a check. where do i mail it to? the Taliban are competing with our DEA for the drug profits, so let’s concentrate on defeating the Taliban. the Taliban are the enemy threatening the nukes in Pakistan, so let’s go into Pakistan and defeat the Taliban. the Taliban are everywhere, they are all evil, and they must be stopped over there before they come over here. world peace. let’s kill all the Taliban and we will have world peace. the Taliban are not a beer club alike the Shriners, they have pickup trucks. they must be stopped. kill all the Taliban. nuke ‘em. nuke ‘em all.

I am sure the Military Industrial Complex is considering a bailout! Where would we be without the Al-Qaida Boogeymen? Think of it - no excuse for the endless invasions/wars?

We have seen the enemy and it is US!

“the Taliban apparently enjoys good funding these days, thanks in part to drug money”

Deja vu

http://michaelfury.wordpress.com/2008/10/21/coke-or-pepsi/

Maybe Osama should have invested this money in oil or gold:

http://michaelfury.wordpress.com/2008/08/20/the-ghost-in-the-machines-the-mystery-of-the-wtc-hard-drive-recoveries/

Could a “terrorist financing” expert like Mr. Cohen track down this $100 million? The FBI seems to be at an impasse.

you got that right, Jackpine.

also, without the Taliban, what in the world are we fighting for? (we need an enemy).

It should be noted that recent Senate report on opium in Afghanistan concluded that Al Qaeda is not involved in the Afghan opium trade.

Bin Laden is dead, Al Qaeda was never very big and it’s tiny now. Besides, the planning for 9/11 happened in Germany and a few other places…not Afghanistan.

Americans are afraid of bogeymen.

Laugher, you’re correct in the assumption that the Taliban does not make a great deal from opium. They collect a tax on it at the farm gate (as they do with all agricultural products for market), but the overproduction of opium since the US/UN invasion has pushed the price of opium in South Asia down to at low as $48/kg (for comparison, Burmese opium is about $300/kg). They may control some refining labs, which are more profitable.

The huge money in the opium trade is in the trafficking of it. Would you be surprised to learn that seizures in/leaving Afghanistan only account for 2% of global opiate seizures? It appears that we’re not working very hard to fight drugs in South Asia.

“terrorist financing official”

Does his business card actually say that?

Does he give you a free toaster if you finance the explosives for your suicide bomb through him?

The thing is, that phrase sounds like pure US government bureaucracy speak.  Would any normal person create a title like that?  But, to the guy who invented the phrase “improvised explosive device”, I’m sure it just rolls off the tongue.

Al Queda is an incredibly small group.
They have no significant weapons.  They have no armored vehicles.  No air force of any kind.  And Lastly no significant army.
So its plainly obvious that they don’t have lots of money.  Never have. My understanding is that they were bankrolled almost entirely by Osama’s relatively small family fortune and construction dealings, which was only really a few million dollars because he has literally dozens of siblings to split the pie with.  I would suspect that Al Queda never has had more than a few million dollars total.  911 only cost a few thousand dollars.  Plane tickets, pilot lessons and box cutters.

The Taliban is not particularly rich either, despite the implication of the article.  Low grade explosives, machine guns, and some rocket propelled grenades are all the weapons they ever have.

Its not even clear to me that the Taliban really make a lot of money from opium.  I realize they are claimed to by the media, but if that’s the case where does the money go?  There are no Afghan palaces that I’m aware of.  No Taliban aristocracy of any prominence.  I do know that when the Taliban ran the country Opium production was down, because of course the Taliban are anti-drug for religious reasons.  Only after we took the Taliban out of power did opium production rise.  So I’m afraid I would have to call BS on that claim
My suspicion would be that the US backed tribal warlords are the ones making the money off the spiked opium production.