Afghanistan used to be a major heroin producer. So much so that in the 90s, the Taliban gained a lot of local goodwill and support by driving out the poppy plantations and replacing them with wheat. When the US invaded, a lot of those former drug lords became officials in the occupational government, and heroin production skyrocketed again.

The reductive take was that we invaded for oil. But we didn’t, it was so we could move crazy amounts of narcotics through Fort Bragg.