WASHINGTON - Two Republican members of Congress plan to introduce a bill Wednesday to spend $2.6 billion over the next three years to reduce the amount of illegal drugs coming into the country by 80%.

The bill, by Sen.  Mike DeWine, R-Ohio, and Rep.  Bill McCollum, R-Fla., includes $430 million for 10 radar aircraft to monitor airspace over the three major cocaine-producing countries - Peru, Bolivia and Colombia.

The Western Hemisphere Drug Elimination Act also would set aside $300 million for a new U.S.  airbase to support counternarcotics efforts in the Caribbean, northern South America and the Pacific coast of Central and South America.  No site has been chosen for the proposed facility.

The money, if approved by Congress, would be added to $51 billion to be spent on the drug war over the next three years.

"Our objective is not to take away from other areas," DeWine said.  "We're not here saying we should do less in treatment and education."

The USA will also buy equipment and aircraft for other countries.  For example: $72 million for six helicopters for the Colombian National Police, and $7 million for X-ray machines to scan for vehicles carrying drugs on the main highway out of Bolivia's cocaine-producing region.

McCollum and DeWine say financing is needed because lower priority has been given to stopping drugs from leaving producing countries and the destruction of crops.

While the amount of money spent for eradication and interdiction has remained steady, it has fallen as a percentage of total anti-drug spending.

DeWine said interdiction efforts throughout the years "have been off and on."

As part of the drug war, the U.S.  Defense Department earmarked $504.5 million for interdiction in 1992, but that fell to $214.7 million in 1995.

That cut led to a reduction in flying hours by AWACS aircraft from 38,100 hours in 1992, to 17,713 in 1996, DeWine said.

At the same time, "there's not a ship, there's not a plane" patrolling the Pacific coast of Central and South America, McCollum said.  The Drug Enforcement Administration says that 57% of the estimated 291 metric tons of cocaine smuggled into the USA each year comes from that area.

Bob Weiner, spokesman for the Office of Drug Control Policy, said, "The administration strongly supports interdiction and that's why there's a 9% increase in the budget for interdiction this year." President Clinton has asked for a 12% increase in interdiction funding next year.

Weiner said a second issue is "where is the money coming from for this proposal.  We haven't seen a specific answer on that and we need to find out. .  .  .  In addition, we have to be sure we're getting the biggest bang for the buck."

By The Associated Press

HILL GROUP OFFERS PLAN
TO STANCH DRUG FLOW

Newshawk: Patrick Henry (resist_tyranny@mapinc.org)
Pubdate: Wed, 22 Jul 1998
Source: Washington Post
Contact: http://washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/edit/letters/letterform.htm
Author: Douglas Farah

HILL GROUP OFFERS PLANTO STANCH DRUG FLOW

$2.6 Billion Sought For Aircraft, Vessels

Accusing the Clinton administration of doing too little to stem the flow of cocaine and heroin to the United States from Latin America, congressional Republicans yesterday proposed a $2.6 billion effort that they claim would reduce the traffic by 80 percent in three years.

The plan, unveiled by Sen.  Mike DeWine (R-Ohio) and Rep.  Bill McCollum (R-Fla.), calls for the money to be spent on strengthening interdiction efforts in the Caribbean region as well as along the Pacific coast of Central America and Mexico.  Bills that would implement the proposal will be submitted in both the House and Senate today.

"The great untold story in recent years is the decline in interdiction efforts," DeWine said, noting that spending on drug-use prevention programs and anti-trafficking efforts in the United States has tripled since 1987, while funding for interdiction has risen less than 20 percent.

Part of the reason for that, law enforcement officials say, is that the Clinton administration chose to focus on blocking the transshipment of drugs across the Mexican border and on expanding efforts to reduce the demand for drugs at home rather than concentrating on reducing the supply from drug-producing regions.

The Republican lawmakers, who have been joined in the Senate by Democrat Bob Graham of Florida, say that funding for the effort would not come at the expense of domestic prevention programs or law enforcement.  Beyond saying that House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) had promised to include funding for the plan in a supplemental appropriations bill later this year, however, they did not specify where the money would come from.

McCollum said the expenditure is necessary to intercept drugs before they reach the United States and that the plan would greatly enhance the capabilities of the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Coast Guard and the Customs Service to track and interdict illegal drug shipments.  While most of the money would be spent on equipment, some would be targeted at improving intelligence-gathering functions, he said.

McCollum said law enforcement officials in the United States and across Latin America had told him they could reduce the flow of drugs to the United States by more than 50 percent within two years if they are given the necessary resources.  "The Clinton administration calls for a 50 percent reduction in 10 years," McCollum said.  "That is unacceptable; we are calling for an 80 percent reduction in three years and think that is very feasible."

Robert Weiner, spokesman for the Office of National Drug Control Policy, said the administration "supports interdiction as part of a comprehensive strategy to fight drug trafficking, but let's see where the money comes from." Weiner said the plan's sponsors had yet to say how they would fund the program and that the proposed allocation did not take into account that the administration had increased funding for interdiction by 9 percent in the past year.

DeWine said a large, quick infusion of money is necessary because Pentagon funding for interdiction operations dropped by 57 percent from 1992 to 1995 - -- $505 million to $215 million.  During the same time, he said, the Coast Guard's interdiction budget shrank from $444 million to $301 million.  As a result, DeWine and McCollum said, there are no radar systems to monitor planes carrying cargoes of illegal drugs and no interdiction capabilities along the Pacific coast from Peru to California.

"There is not a ship, not a plane out there," McCollum said.

Of the proposed expenditures, $580 million would be used to buy 20 P-3B early-warning aircraft, and $300 million would be allocated to build a U.S. military base at a site in Latin America that has not yet been selected. The new outpost would replace U.S.  bases that are being closed in Panama as a result of the Panama Canal Treaty, which calls for all U.S.  property there to be turned over to Panama by the end of next year.  An additional $289 million would pay for six new Coast Guard patrol vessels.