SOVIET SOLDIERS IN AFGHANISTAN USING MORE HEROIN, US OFFICIALS SAY

The use of heroin among Soviet troops in Afghanistan is increasing, according to US officials.

Officials in the Drug Enforcement Administration and the State Department said recent intelligence reports suggest that the increase in heroin use is linked to morale problems among Soviet troops.

The officials said some supporters of Afghan rebels fighting the Soviet forces claimed that they were selling heroin to the soldiers to weaken the Russian war effort.

On Thursday, a spokesman for the Afghan Embassy in Washington called the reports of increased heroin use among Soviet troops "not true." He declined further comment.

Repeated efforts to reach officials at the Soviet Embassy in Washington for comment were unsuccessful.

US officials stressed that not all the Afghans who are trading drugs are doing it to support the resistance efforts. Some, they said, are doing it primarily for money.

Since the Soviet Union intervened militarily in Afghanistan in 1979, hashish use among Soviet troops has been commonplace, officials said. But they said the use of much stronger and addictive opiates, mostly heroin, has increased dramatically in the past year.

Guns, belts, clothing and especially Soviet fur caps, which have in the past been traded by soldiers for hashish, more frequently are being traded for heroin, US officials say.

"Afghanistan is becoming their Vietnam," said Douglas Wankeo, senior staff coordinator for international programs at the DEA, referring to a similar pattern of drug use among American troops stationed in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War.

The reported increase of heroin use comes as Soviet officials have admitted that a drug problem exists in the Soviet Union and as the Soviet leader, Mikhail S. Gorbachev, hints he wants to withdraw troops from Afghanistan.

Olin Robison, president of Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vt., who this week returned from a visit to the Soviet Union, said Gorbachev candidly spoke about "drunkenness and drug use" among Soviet citizens during a six-hour speech on Tuesday at a plenary session of the Communist Party's Central Committee.

"You can assume that if Gorbachev has gone public, it's a serious problem," said Robison. "The Soviets in the past have steadfastly refused to acknowledge" drug abuse among citizens.

The intelligence reports also come amid a marked increase of seizures of Afghan-grown drugs bound for the Soviet Union. Last month, Soviet officials in Moscow seized a ton of Afghan hashish in a train bound for Europe. In August, 220 kilograms of heroin hidden in a shipment of Afghan raisins were seized in a Soviet ship in the Netherlands.

"This is all starting a bit of a trade in the Soviet Union," said one DEA agent.

Afghanistan is a major source of opium, of which heroin is a derivative, and marijuana-based products, including hashish. DEA and State Department officials say heroin production in Afghanistan, slowed greatly by the Soviet military intervention and subsequent fighting, has increased steadily since late 1984.

A DEA official said Soviet military leaders did not actively discourage hashish use among troops "because it placated them. Heroin is a different story. They are trying to control it."

Rebel commanders and Russian defectors living with Afghan rebels have told Western diplomats that rebel forces have captured Russian soldiers who were under the influence of drugs, US officials say.

A State Department official said that in recent months, Western diplomats in Kabul, the Afghan capital, heard of plans to teach Afghan health officials about drug rehabilitation methods in Moscow. There are also unconfirmed reports that a facility to treat drug-dependent Russians has been opened in Kabul.

"Hash is a problem in its own sense, probably less a problem than vodka," said one DEA agent who was stationed in Afghanistan before the Soviets intervened, then moved to Pakistan, which borders Afghanistan. "Heroin poses a new and much more serious threat. Heroin is extremely addictive and it can kill you."

Habibullah Mayar, chairman of an organization called the Afghan Community in America, a group of Afghan exiles that supports the Afghan rebels, said that some Afghans are purposely supplying Soviet soldiers with drugs in an effort to demoralize and weaken the troops.

"There are different ways of fighting," said Mayar, in a telephone interview from New York. "You don't have to pick up a gun. Any way to hurt the Russians -- by drug, by heroin, by hashish."

However, Mayar said he did not believe that any rebels were supplying drugs to the Soviets.

He said the drug suppliers are "not the resistance leaders, not the freedom fighters, but those who support the freedom fighters," he said. "These are villagers. Any way you can support the freedom fighters, you do."

Rebel leaders have consistently denied involvement in the drug trade, saying that Islamic teachings spelled out in the Koran are against both drugs and alcohol.

A DEA official who asked not to be identified said US agents have investigated allegations that rebel forces were trading drugs for guns.

"Our assessment is we don't find it, even though it would seem logical," said the official. "With the money the rebels get from the Saudis, Egypt and other Western countries, I think they realize while they've got international sympathy, if they get tagged as drug dealers they would lose some commitment in the form of money."

However, a DEA agent who was once stationed in Afghanistan said he believes that some rebels are involved in drug trafficking, especially in the northern provinces, where government forces do not venture and the lines between nomad, drug dealer and rebel often blur.

"You can be a freedom fighter today, a drug trafficker tomorrow, a loyalist the next day," said the agent. "I do think there's a conscious effort on the part of freedom fighters to cause havoc among the Russians by causing drug addiction. I don't think it's a formal policy of the rebels. Knowing how they operate, they can't get along with each other, let alone agree" on a policy that would violate Islamic teachings.

A State Department official who asked not to be identified said the main reasons Soviet soldiers are apparently graduating from hashish to heroin use are similar to why American troops went from marijuana to heroin in Vietnam: boredom and despair.

"It's hard to put numbers on this, but the drug use is going up as morale tends to go down," the official said. "The morale is going down because a military solution seems farther and farther away. We estimate there are about 115,000 Soviet troops in Afghanistan. A little more than half of them are in the category you might call twiddling their thumbs. They are not in the air force, not on maneuvers, just guarding installations and roadways. It seems they're moving on to heroin."

Mayar said the Soviets' burgeoning drug problem "is their own fault."

"The only way trucks can go from one town to the next is to give hashish to the Russian soldiers," he said.

Mayar said he saw no moral dilemma in supplying drugs to Soviet troops. "They have destroyed our villages; they have killed our people," he said.

Besides, Mayar said, the tactic of destroying the Soviet troops from within seems to be working.

"Russia is admitting it has a drug problem," he said.