ON TRIAL: FIGHTING DRUGS VS. FIGHTING DICTATORS

WASHINGTON, Aug. 26 - When the competing foreign policy objectives of
federal agencies collide overseas, internal struggles often roil the
cramped confines of an American embassy. But rarely do those testy
little fights take on the bitterness, suspicion and prolonged legal
wrangling that have marked the case of Richard Horn, a former agent
of the Drug Enforcement Administration.

Mr. Horn, the drug agency's attache in Myanmar during the early
1990's, says his home was illegally wiretapped in 1993, probably by
the Central Intelligence Agency. A 54- year-old career D.E.A. agent
who retired in December, Mr. Horn has sued both the C.I.A. station
chief for Myanmar and the State Department's chief of mission at the
embassy when he was there, seeking monetary damages for violations of
his civil rights.

The government is defending both officials and has sought to dismiss
his lawsuit, which the federal court, in the District of Columbia,
has placed under seal. The suit has been stuck in court for seven
years.

The facts are hotly disputed, and Mr. Horn's opponents say the
wiretapping never happened. "There is absolutely nothing to it," said
Franklin Huddle, Jr., who was the embassy chief of mission at the
time.

Even so, the government has invoked a provision of the national
security law known as the state-secrets privilege to prevent the
disclosure of classified information in a civil lawsuit. A federal
judge has approved the use of such privilege, and asked Mr. Horn's
attorneys to explain how they can proceed without access to
classified material.

Because the case is under seal, officials at the agencies involved
say they are limited in what they can say about it. A drug agency
spokesman declined comment. A State Department spokesman said, "It
has always been our steadfast position that there is no merit" to the
case. A spokeswoman for Central Intelligence said, "It's not the
mission or part of its operations for the C.I.A. to surveil other
U.S. officials or U.S. citizens at home or abroad."

The government's tactics have frustrated Mr. Horn and his lawyers.

"The extraordinary efforts they have taken to conceal the records and
prevent discovery make their claims that no unlawful actions were
taken against Mr. Horn very, very suspicious," said Janine Brookner,
a former C.I.A. officer who represents Mr. Horn.

By the time Mr. Horn arrived in Myanmar in 1992, the United States
had already become harshly critical of the government's record on
democracy and human rights. Under pressure from Congress, American
officials kept their distance.

But Myanmar, formerly Burma, was a leading producer of heroin, and
the D.E.A. wanted to stem the flow of drugs. Mr. Horn says he felt
that the only way he could do his job was to try to gain the
cooperation of the government and tribal leaders involved in the drug
trade.

But State Department officials felt that Mr. Horn, in his eagerness
to do his job, was flouting policy guidelines. "You had foreign
policy obligations running up against law enforcement obligations,"
said a former Clinton administration official who was involved in
antidrug policy then. "You had human rights running up against
counternarcotics."

In an August 1993 cable to the State Department, Mr. Huddle
recommended a "nonpunitive" recall of Mr. Horn, though he sympathized
with the difficulties Mr. Horn faced. "Rick is a hard-charging cop
who just wants to get the job done as quickly and efficiently as
possible," Mr. Huddle wrote.

Mr. Horn's complaint centers on an incident in August 1993, just as
he was forced to leave Myanmar.

Late one night, Mr. Horn was talking to another drug agent, David B.
Sikorra, about how Mr. Horn was being pushed out of the country. The
next day, part of their conversation was quoted in a cable Mr. Huddle
sent to Washington, which read: "Horn shows increasing signs of
evident strain. Late last night, for example, he telephoned his
junior agent to say that `I am bringing the whole D.E.A. operation
down here. You will be leaving with me. . . . We'll all leave
together.' "

Mr. Horn says the quotation is evidence that his phone was bugged.

Mr. Huddle denies that Mr. Horn was ever wiretapped. "The reality is
that I heard about it from his own people, not by wiretapping him,"
Mr. Huddle said.

The former Clinton antidrug official said that as the United States
has expanded its law enforcement presence overseas, there have been a
number of problem cases pitting American law enforcement officials
against diplomats.

Even as Mr. Horn's lawsuit sits idling in federal court here, the
United States has finally concluded that it can deal in a limited way
with Myanmar in fighting drugs.

"In the last two or three years, there has been a shift in thinking,"
said Derek Mitchell, an Asia specialist at the Pentagon during the
Clinton administration. "They have been willing to work with us to
some degree, and there is a feeling that we can do some antinarcotics
work with them."