The military government of Burma most adamantly claims that it is doing all it can to curb production of the drug in this most fertile Southeast Asian region. International pressure aside, the government has its own reasons for clamping down on the industry; ethnic insurgent organizations that have been fighting the Rangoon regime for forty years represent the trade's biggest local traffickers. Within the last five years the SPDC (the ruling junta) has signed cease-fire agreements with almost all of these ethnic minority groups, under the conditions that the minority areas be granted a high level of autonomy; that economic assistance be granted minority areas and; that minority areas be opium-free by certain deadlines.

As a result, the MNDAA, Kachin Defense Army, and the Mong Ko Defense Army promised to make their respective areas opium-free by 2001, and even the United Wa State Army - over 20,000 strong and "the world's biggest armed narcotics-trafficking organization" according to the US State Department - pledged the same for 2005. Since 2000, opium production has steadily decreased.

But opposition groups that make pledges to rid their territories of narcotics are nothing new. In fact, it is at least a decades-old practice. When remnants of the defeated Guomindang fled into Burma in 1949, for example, they began trafficking in illegal drugs. In 1972, they demonstrated their willingness to consider other business options when they allowed the United States to buy and destroy 26 tons of opium. Others began following suit. Just three years later, opium warlord Lo Hsing-han attempted to sell an entire years worth of opium to the United States and replace the poppy with other cash crops, though his plans never came through. In 1989, rival warlord Khun Sa claimed to have submitted a six-point opium-replacement plan to President Bush. Then in 1991, the warlord received a United Nations Fund for Drug Abuse Control team "with happiness" and promised to support the Fund's efforts to eradicate poppy seed cultivation.

In the end, however, the pledges of the opium barons have been found desperately wanting. Khun Sa, for instance, continued to fight the Rangoon junta until 1996, when he surrendered to Burmese authorities in a probable attempt to escape extradition to the United States on drug trafficking charges. He is now under a form of house arrest in Rangoon and, despite having headed the largest opium-producing organization in the Golden Triangle, has been allowed to pursue other business opportunities - as long as they don't include buying, selling, or trading in narcotics.

True to history, the UWSA on 7 July, 2003, announced that the 2005 deadline would be moved back to 2007. Bao Youhua, Commander of the Headquarters Security force and youngest brother of Wa supreme leader Bao Youxiang, addressed an "emergency meeting" of some 200 commanders and officials in Panghsang and explained that it would be impossible for the Wa to meet the 2005 deadline "given the current political and economic situation."

The situation he was referring to, of course, was the "30 May debacle" in which a pro-junta clashed with Aung San Suu Kyi's supporters in the northern town of Ye U while the democracy leader was on political tour. The fight left four dead and over fifty wounded. Subsequently, Suu Kyi was put under house arrest - again.

The event drew international condemnation on Burma's military government, and was enough to convince the minority groups to the north that, in light of new developments, the opium-free deadlines must be postponed. In reality, however, the deferment of the deadline may be a wry business move motivated by a sudden rush in the region to harvest as much opium as possible before the inevitable post-deadline "dry years."

Indeed, according to an article posted in the Shan Herald Agency for News, farmers and their families are spending as much time in the fields as possible. "Families that used to work only one field each are now working 2-3 fields this year," the article reported a Buddhist monk who had talked to the farmers as saying. "At harvest time, there were only lame elders in the villages. The rest, together with their children, you would find only in the poppy fields." The real "current political and economic situation" indicated by the UWSA might actually be the one described by the Buddhist monk and not, as the junta was surely led to believe, the incident of 30 May.

Meanwhile, the Myanmar Times reported on 6 July that Rangoon authorities were urging the United States, Britain, and other European countries "to put aside politics" and work with the junta in combating the country's drug scourge. The real impact of the 30 May incident, however, was already being felt when the report appeared; one million dollars for the UN-supervised Wa Alternative Development Program in Bao Youhua's Hotao area for the 2003-2004 fiscal year had been withdrawn by the United States just days before the report was published.

The real issue here seems to be one of control. While the junta in Rangoon claims forward progress, the fact is that the northern minority areas - particularly the Shan, Kachin, Chin, and Kayah states - are virtually self-governing. Minority ethnic groups have their own armies, some of them sizable, which have been able to hold the Burmese army at bay for decades. Some of these states even have their own currency.

These regions are difficult to access for any sizable group and such isolation has led to the development of almost completely independent local governments that operate autonomously and without "official" approval. Since these semi-lawless regions are home to the major poppy-growing areas, the Rangoon junta faces more than just simple drug enforcement if it wants to rid Burma of its endless poppy fields.

But how hard is the junta really trying? I interviewed a government source who wishes to remain unnamed and who spent significant time in Burma conducting drug surveys alongside the DEA in minority-controlled areas. He wrote to me of his experiences there - and helped shed light on the junta's alleged drug eradication efforts.

"The [Burmese] government there has been willing to take our folks around into the mountains," he said, "and into the poppy-growing areas where the opium/heroin is produced. This gives our experts a chance to estimate the åharvest.' It also gives the Burmese a chance to show how 'well' they are doing at eradication.

"Sad experience has shown that a significant number of the poppy fields 'eradicated' (knocked down with sticks, etc) had already been harvested. That would be like trying to eradicate corn by cutting down all of the corn fields ... after the reapers had already been through! Who are they fooling? Thousands of acres (probably a drop in the bucket) get cut down, but few show poppies that haven't already been drained of their milk or sap (a gooey/sticky substance from which the drug is extracted)."

The source describes the countryside as

"spectacularly beautiful" and "incredibly inaccessible" (only by helicopter)," underscoring the government's dilemma when it comes to moving forces of sufficient size to do anything of significance. As mentioned earlier, such an area is ideal for the movement of drugs across the border and along the frontiers, because policing the region is all but impossible.

"It is also very clear that the drug trade is big business. Little mountain-top villages will be surrounded by acres and acres of poppies (not vegetables, etc.). The mountains are covered in the beautiful flowers, none bound for the florist! Talking with villagers it was obvious that selling the precursor to refined opium collected painstakingly from the poppy bulb was WAY more lucrative than any other cash crop (despite getting comparatively very little from the middle man!) he could be growing. There was also always the hint of fear as well ... .that switching to tomatoes this year might not be so good for the health of the village! Speculation, but likely true! Who is going to protect them? The Burmese? Forget it! The only time they get close to some of these areas is on a survey trip! And even then they often must position troops in the areas days in advance as a security measure for the teams. Little control of the situation. Until we [Americans] stop buying there will be few changes in the foothills of Burma!"

While it is true that a majority of the opium harvested in the hills of Burma ends up in the United States and other international destinations, the DEA found in 2001 that 25 percent of it was consumed by the villagers themselves.

And the Burmese cultivators aren't the only ones keeping the substance in the countryside. Recently, a new market has opened up in China's Yunnan province, where villagers in isolated mountain regions smoke opium. Brokers for the UWSA and the Burma National Democratic Alliance Army bring large quantities of heroin across the Sino-Burmese border into Yunnan, where it is then transported by boat, rail, truck, or plane to warehouses in the southeastern provinces of Guangdong or Fujian. From there it is smuggled into Hong Kong or Taiwan where it is made available on the international market. American government officials attribute this increase in opium trade with China to a swelling of ethnic Chinese involved in heroin trafficking; less restrictions on travel; heightened commerce between China and her Southeast Asian neighbors; as well as the maturing, in the last decade-and-a-half, of "a more consumer-oriented society.

Historians know, for example, that the drug was banned by Mon and Burma kings in the 1300s at the counsel of their Buddhist advisors. It was certainly consumed in Thailand since at least the fourteenth century. But it was the Chinese, probably Muslim Chinese, who first introduced the idea of cultivating the poppy seed as a cash crop. From Yunnan Province in China they moved into Burma and began setting up operations. By the early 1700s, opium cultivation along the Burma-Yunnan border was probably common and by the 1830s it had grown immensely in response to the British policy of opium trade with China.

The British East India Company began concentrating on the opium trade with China in the late 18th century and after the British won the Opium War (1839-1842) the trade flourished more than ever. Following the Chinese defeat in the Arrow War (1856-1858), China finally submitted to legalizing opium. The trade grew quickly and peaked in the late 19th century. At that time, British traders held a virtual monopoly on the opium trade with China and profits from the industry played a major role in financing Britain's Indian empire. The British would not change their stance on narcotics until the 20th century, when Britain included itself as a signatory in agreements made during the Shanghai International Opium Conference (1909) and the Hague Opium Convention (1912). Still, Britain's actions during the 1800s acted as a catalyst to a problem that persists to this day.

Cannabis, too, was used in Burma medicinally, though to a lesser degree. Its history goes back thousands of years, perhaps as far as 1000 B.C., when Indian sources began making references to the plant's remedial attributes. Indian groups in Burma used cannabis in religious rituals and many of the hill tribes used it to add flavor to curries and other foods. Certain minority groups, like the Wa and Kachin, grew cannabis for its hemp fiber. Others, such as the Danu and the Shan, cultivated it merely for its narcotic power.

In sum, both opium and cannabis were consumed within the borders of modern-day Burma/Myanmar centuries before they were to enter the European or American arenas. Even cocaine, at one time, might be found in Burma, manufactured in Japan and transported to Rangoon by Chinese merchants, though its use was far less significant.

The plant can be cultivated in numerous areas of the world but grows best in tropical regions between one and two thousand feet in elevation. Of course, Burma's hilly border region with Thailand and Laos fits such a description perfectly. It is here on hillside fields that the painstaking task of cultivation occurs. Farmers wait for the poppy's white flowers to fall then proceed to meticulously cut shallow incisions into the seed pods. The "milk" that subsequently oozes out of the pods, described earlier as a "gooey, sticky substance," is finally collected on a spatula-like tool. This is raw opium, and it can be harvested only once a year.

Ecologically speaking, the cultivation of the poppy seed is taking its toll. A document published on the Internet by the United Nations/Burma Programme for Drug Abuse Control describes the process in detail. First, an area of jungle is cleared using simple hand tools as well as traditional burning techniques. A few consecutive years of harvests causes the land to become unproductive by exhausting the soil of the nutrients needed to sustain the poppy seeds. These fields are abandoned, and a new area is found, cleared, and readied for planting. The UN document dubs this process "shifting cultivation," and describes it as having "serious ecological and social disadvantages."

... the spent soil in the abandoned poppy fields tends to be washed down the hillsides by heavy rain, thus causing soil erosion. Where the slopes are steep, as is often the case in the poppy growing regions, the results can be quite serious.

Cultivation of opium also affects the inhabitants of these farming communities socially. With "shifting cultivation," a lifestyle not unlike that of nomads develops among the hill peoples. Entire villages are relocated in order to be near the fields.

The houses were lifted up above the ground by bamboo sticks, great dirty pigs making their quarters beneath them, and even the small clearing where the village was located could not keep the trees around it from leaning inwards and blocking out the sky above us. These were simple people, the people who cultivate the poppy seed. These were simple tribesmen, the ones who carry bricks of heroin on their backs from refineries to prearranged trading spots. Are they aware that the bricks they are paid $100 to carry are worth $280,000 in any major East Coast city? The thought makes me suddenly aware that these are not evil people, exploiting the West for all it's worth. In actual fact, these are the truly exploited, just like the man on the street who hands over $10 for a dime-bag of heroin. It is the men in the middle who get rich, not these hut-dwellers who live with the pigs.