"The ads by the President's Office of National Drug Control Policy aired during last night's Super Bowl marked an escalation in the selling of the administration's war on drugs -- for the first time, the illegal narcotics trade is linked to terrorism.

Previously, government anti-drug messages focused on how users harm themselves. The two Super Bowl ads, which cost nearly $3.5 million to place during the widely watched Fox television broadcast, claim that money to purchase drugs likely ends up in the hands of terrorists and narco-criminals.

'Where do terrorists get their money?' asks one of the ads, which portrays a terrorist buying explosives, weapons and fake passports. 'If you buy drugs, some of it might come from you.'

About half of the 28 organizations identified as terrorist by the State Department are funded by sales of illegal drugs, according to the drug office.

The ads are targeted at teens and aim to tap the same sense of international awareness seen in young protesters of globalization and the lending practices of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. 'Young people are interested in and motivated by larger concerns in society, such as environmentalism' and the World Trade Organization, said John Walters, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy. 'They're looking for ways to make the world better and against things that make the world worse.'

The two 30-second ads (which aired a total of three times before and during the game) were funded by the drug office's $180 million advertising budget, the largest of any government agency. They were created by New York advertising giant Ogilvy & Mather. By law, Ogilvy receives expense reimbursement from the government for making the ads, but they are 'essentially pro bono work,' said Chris Wall, Ogilvy executive creative director.

In addition to the paid Super Bowl ads, Fox is required to provide the drug office with three additional free prime-time airings of the commercials.

The ads kick off a four-to-six-week nationwide campaign, which also includes ads on radio and in 293 newspapers (including The Washington Post), an augmented Web site (www.theantidrug.com) and teaching materials to be distributed to middle and high school students. Walters estimated the campaign's cost at $10 million.

'Considering that Americans spend over $60 billion on [illegal] drugs a year, this is a pretty well-leveraged investment,' said Walters, who was the drug office's chief of staff under William J. Bennett.

Even before they aired, the ads drew criticism from groups that favor drug decriminalization and treatment programs instead of harsh criminal penalties. 'There is something very disturbing about the fact the federal government is spending almost $3.5 million to blame nonviolent Americans for funding terrorism when . . . people who need drug treatment can't get it,' said Matthew Briggs, an assistant director of the Drug Policy Alliance, which advocates changes in drug laws.

'We're not blaming Americans for terrorism, we're blaming terrorists for terrorism,' Walters said. 'We're telling Americans that if they use drugs, they should be aware that some of that money is being used to support terrorism in many cases.'

The drug office spent about $50,000 to make its Web site hacker-proof, said Alan Levitt, chief of the drug office's education division. The office also bought about two dozen Internet addresses with names similar to the official site, in an attempt to prevent parodies.

Shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks, the drug office contacted Ogilvy, an agency it had worked with before, asking for ideas on how to link the war on drugs to terrorism in an ad campaign. The drug office knew that the Taliban was partially funded by sales of opium, which can be refined into heroin.

What followed, said British film and commercial director Tony Kaye, who produced the ads, was 'unprecedented' fact-checking between the drug office and government agencies, including the FBI, DEA, CIA, and the departments of Defense and State. Details down to the price of AK-47 assault rifles, featured in one of the ads, were debated. 'The FBI said, 'Is the price retail or black market?' ' Levitt said.

Each line of dialogue in the ads is explained by a story on the agency's Web page. For instance, in one of the ads, a teen actor says: 'I helped kill a judge.' On the Web page, that line is linked to a drug-related killing in South America.

Before airing, the ads were shown to teens in focus groups. The teenagers showed 'a strong decline in intention to use' drugs after seeing the ads, Levitt said. And, he said, parents called them a 'powerful way to initiate conversations' with their children." (Frank Ahrens, The Washington Post, February 4, 2002)