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Why these facts have been kept from the public!

We disclose here how the world's drug problems really began and why!
You will be shocked.

 

Chiang Mai, Thailand

LAST NOVEMBER concerned law enforcement officials from all over the world gathered in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

It was a momentous meeting. Delegates from Interpol to Thailand's Office of Narcotics Control Board were alarmed by the ominous projections that this year 1981 — would see bumper harvests of opium from Southeast Asia's infamous Golden Triangle.

 

. . .and the Bumper Harvests Came

Their concern was well-founded. Favorable weather conditions and the cultivation of much larger crop areas this year have more than compensated for poor yields of the previous two years. More than 300 tons of raw opium have already been harvested by the ethnic hill tribes who live in these rugged mountain fast lands I see out of my window as I write. That's where the colorful red and white poppies are grown.

Massive quantities of opium — and their more refined forms of morphine and heroin — are even now threading their way along the various drug-smuggling routes, known as "connections," on their way to factories of greed in the mass population centers of the world.

International drug suppression forces are being marshaled to counter this unwanted addition to an already insurmountable worldwide problem. An official United Nations report, released in early February this year, concluded that the worldwide drug problem "has never been more serious or complex."

Drug enforcement officials, especially those of the affluent nations, are especially concerned that this year's bumper harvest will lead to a rejuvenation of dormant connections. They also fear the development of new connections that may lead to the reestablishment of the Golden Triangle as the major source of heroin for the world markets.

Before World War II, opium products in this little-known and sparsely populated area of the world held virtually no significance to the international drug trade. But at the height of this area's opium production during the Vietnam War, the Golden Triangle region held the dubious distinction of being the world's major source of illicit opium and its deadly children, morphine and heroin.

How did this rugged mountainous area formed by the conjunction of the three countries of Thailand, Laos and Burma become a major center of illicit opium cultivation? Who is responsible?

Strangely enough, in a macabre twist of circumstances, the governments of the Western world, motivated by the selfish way of life we call the get way — as opposed to the way of giving — carry historical responsibility for the sordid growth of opium poppy cultivation in Asia. After you read this story you will see why the incriminating facts of history have been kept from the general public.

 

Britain Plants

In 1600 the British East India Co. was formed in order to expand trade contacts with the past.

In the three centuries to follow, this goal was pursued with much vigor. The stalwart merchant mariners of the East India Co. fought their way into the highly competitive markets of the Orient, followed by the armies of Britain's ever expanding colonial empire.

China, with her teeming millions, held the greatest attraction to the traders. Not only as a potential market for the products of the growing empire, but mainly as a supplier of luxury goods for the insatiable appetites of the growing mercantile empire, especially that indispensable item — tea.

But Britain faced a monumental problem in its trade relations with China. The Chinese wanted little of what the British had to offer in exchange for China's coveted products.

For the first two centuries of Britain's contact with China, the balance of trade was always unfavorable to the British. This put a great strain on the economics of the Empire, as the only item of exchange acceptable to the Chinese was silver. In fact, nine-tenths of the cargo of every ship sailing for Canton was silver bullion.

Motivated by the spirit of getting, a solution had to be found to stop this flood of silver specie from the Empire's treasury into the coffers of Imperial China.

GOLDEN TRIANGLE — Hill country
on the border of four nations,
in shaded area, has optimum climate for
the cultivation of opium poppies.

That solution was eventually found in a little-known trade product of India — opium.

The Chinese had long considered opium ingested whole as useful for medicinal purposes. Then in the 17th century, Dutch traders on the island of Formosa taught them the habit of smoking the drug mixed with tobacco. The Chinese gradually omitted the tobacco and began smoking only the opium in their pipes.

In the early years of the 19th century, mainly young men of wealthy families indulged in opium smoking. But as the drug became more readily available, people from all walks of life began to acquire the habit. Mandarins, soldiers, merchants, laborers, women and even Taoist priests took up the pipe. More and more people were being seduced from productive careers in the society. Opium became an increasingly malignant cancer in an already diseased society.

Opium was cultivated in small amounts in parts of China at this time but the Chinese population was kept supplied by Portuguese traders who brought the drug to China from Mogul India, the chief producer of opium as a cash crop for export. Opium remained a relatively unimportant trade item, even when the British took control of the coasts of India, until it became the answer to the Empire's trade problem with China.

British colonial powers in India soon organized the drug trade into a large-scale, directly administered government monopoly that actively encouraged foreign sales and fostered new markets, mainly in China.

Opium replaced silver as the currency of trade with the Chinese. The flow of silver specie into China was effectively halted and after the middle of the 19th century the flow had completely reversed direction.

The answer to Britain's balance of trade problem became the curse of China. The opium trade became so lucrative that others soon joined Britain in opening China to foreign trade. While the British controlled the production, transport and sale of Indian opium, the United States held a monopoly on the import of Turkish opium to China.

The influx of opium on such an organized scale had a devastating effect on the Chinese population.

While the British were openly pursuing the expansion of the opium trade with China, the Chinese Imperial government began an active drive to suppress it. As early as 1729, the domestic sale and consumption had been prohibited by Imperial edict. In 1800, the importation of opium was specifically banned. But the Ching dynasty of China was too weak to enforce its suppression policies.

Opium smuggling was so lucrative that corrupt officials and merchants greedily became involved in the drug traffic.

The Emperor's last attempt to seriously stop the flow of opium in, and the drain of specie out, resulted in the infamous "Opium War" of 1839 to 1842.

The results of the Opium War were twofold. First, the Chinese had to pay the victorious British millions in war indemnity. Second, it broke the back of any effective resistance by the Chinese government to the importation of the drug. Opium continued to flow in and silver out of China, and in 1856, another war was fought with the British. The results were the same. The Chinese were forced to legalize the import of opium.

All effective opposition to Britain's control of the trade relations with China was ended.

 

China Grows Its Own

Finally, the Chinese decided that if they couldn't beat them, then they should join them. A small tax was levied on imported opium and domestic production encouraged. Poppy soon became a valuable cash crop for the peasants as it brought two to four times as much as wheat grown on the same amount of land.

The territory most suited for the growing of the opium poppy was the provinces of Szechwan and Yunnan, which bordered the Southeast Asian states of Tonkin (Vietnam), Laos and Burma.

This mountainous region had a high enough elevation for the growth of the delicate poppy. In addition it has traditionally been the home of scattered hill tribes ethnically distinct from both the Han Chinese to the north and the lowland races of Southeast Asia. These nomadic hill peoples harbored no consideration for border demarcations. So the growing of the opium poppy soon spilled over into Southeast Asia, chiefly into the Shan states of Burma and the mountains of northern Laos, Vietnam and Thailand.

Eventually, missionaries and a growing group of people concerned with the spread of opium smoking to Europe brought pressure to bear on the English government. In 1915 the exportation of British opium to China was effectively banned. But not before multiple millions in profits had been made at the expense of the lives of so many Chinese. And not before the seeds of a future plague of opium had been planted in the remote highlands of Southeast Asia's Golden Triangle.