WASHINGTON, Feb. 12 (UPI) -- GOP lawmakers are calling on the Bush administration to tackle turf problems dogging U.S. counter-narcotics operations in Afghanistan.
In a bluntly worded letter released Wednesday, Republican members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee told new Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that current U.S. policy was allowing Afghanistan to slide into "failed narco-state status" and risked it becoming, "once again, a safe haven for al-Qaida."
"It is time for some new thinking ... new initiatives and a unified inter-agency campaign," write the four Republicans, led by Foreign Affairs Committee ranking member Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, of Florida.
"The open and public dispute with our British allies on opium eradiation methods, along with the many different and often conflicting views of NATO, our Department of Defense, the Drug Enforcement Agency, and other U.S. agencies on how best to handle the narcotics challenge does not bode well for success," they write.
The letter, also signed by Mike Pence of Indiana, and Elton Gallegly and Dana Rohrabacher, both of California, calls for the appointment of "a high-level coordinator for Afghan narco-terrorism policy" charged to "develop a campaign against drugs and terror" based on the one the United States has run in Colombia.
The four also call for a stepping up of U.S. efforts to develop "safe micro-herbicides" for use on opium fields in Afghanistan.
A spokeswoman for Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Tom Lantos, D-Calif., told United Press International he had not been approached to sign the letter, and had not yet had time to study its proposals. "The Chairman is very engaged on the issue," said Lynne Weil, "He agrees (with the GOP signatories) that we have to do better in our counter-narcotics effort there."
A committee staffer told UPI there was some skepticism about the validity of Colombia as a model. The historic roots of the conflict in Afghanistan, and the fractured character of political and military power there mean that "the situation is very different in the two countries," the staffer said, adding, "there is also no consensus that (U.S. policy in) Colombia has been so successful."
