Some friendly fire in the war on drugs?

The Pentagon has long sought to steer clear of counter narcotics operations, recognizing that to get involved would compromise its core goals of stability, force protection, and counter-terrorism. The responsibility to fight the spread of opium thus fell to Afghan authorities (who, even if they weren't co-opted by the industry, hardly have the capacity to take on well-funded drug networks) and the British (who were overwhelmed by the magnitude of the problem.)

Enter Congress. The L.A. Times reports that eight weeks ago, after reports that Afghanistan's cultivation had spiraled further out of control, two Illinois Republicans--Henry Hyde (who chairs the Intl. Rel Com) and  Mark Steven Kirk-- called for a larger Pentagon role in counternarcotics.

After receiving virtually no response since October, Rep. Hyde apparently went to the press:

Hyde, U.S. and U.N. counter-narcotics experts and Afghan officials told The Times that the Defense Department needed to target major drug traffickers, well-known labs that process opium into heroin, bazaars where drugs are sold openly and convoys that carry the drugs out of Afghanistan for shipment to Europe, elsewhere in Asia and, increasingly, the United States.

In response Undersecretary of Defense Eric S. Edelman, who had been tasked to the issue in October by Rumsfeld, sent a conciliatory letter to Hyde on Wednesday:

[Edelman] said Rumsfeld had authorized troops more than a year ago to embed DEA agents and other nonmilitary counter-narcotics personnel on missions in areas of known or suspected drug-related activity. And he said U.S. troops have been instructed to notify the DEA "regarding the disposition of significant drug caches discovered during operations."

It appears, however, that this "authorization" hasn't meant much in terms of a real policy shift.

"They had an ad hoc policy where the guys on the ground, a colonel here or there, would occasionally bring DEA along. What we've been pushing for is a more formal institutional policy," said a senior staff member with the House Committee on International Relations. "Right now, the DEA are like puppy dogs, scratching on the DOD door saying, 'I want a ride.' " He quoted a recent e-mail from a U.S. counter-narcotics official in Afghanistan who said he had seen virtually no cooperation between the Pentagon and the DEA on tactical operations. If Rumsfeld had ordered troops to work with drug agents, the official wrote, "it was not well known, understood or accepted."

Stay tuned: a classified briefing on the military's counter-narcotics efforts in Afghanistan is set for today. This will be one of the more openly contentious areas of Afghanistan policy issues for both the new Secretary of Defense and the new Congress this year...

Photo: A U.S. Army humvee passes an opium poppy field near Lashkar Gah in southern Afghanistan