MILITARY IS EASING ITS WAR ON DRUGS

The Pentagon Wants To Scale Back The $1-billion Program And Focus More On
Combating Terrorism. Such A Move Could Meet Strong Opposition In Congress.

WASHINGTON -- Citing the need to redirect resources to the war on
terrorism, the Pentagon has quietly decided to scale back its effort to
combat international drug trafficking, a central element of the national
"war on drugs" for 14 years.

Officials are still weighing how exactly to pare the $1-billion-a-year
program, but they want to reduce deployment of special operations troops on
counter-narcotics missions and cut back the military's training of
anti-drug police and soldiers in the U.S. and abroad. And they want to use
intelligence-gathering equipment now devoted to counter-drug work for
counter-terrorism as well.

But the military's counter-narcotics effort is highly popular among some on
Capitol Hill, where the retrenchment plans could run into trouble. The
plans have not yet been spelled out for lawmakers; however, Defense
Department memos and interviews with current and former officials make the
Pentagon's intentions clear.

Congress ordered a reluctant Pentagon to enter the drug war in 1988, when
surging cocaine traffic from South America sparked a sense of crisis in the
U.S. and set off calls for stronger measures to fight drugs.

"We should not be relaxing our efforts in the war on drugs," said Rep.
Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.), chairman of the House Select Committee on
Intelligence and an advocate for the effort. "Terrorism is the highest
priority, but drugs are still insidious.... Every time [military officials]
bleed off assets, it just opens up the drug corridors again."

Perhaps because of such sensitivities, the Pentagon's plans have been
couched in indirect terms. They were signaled this summer in a memo from
Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz and distributed to senior
uniformed and civilian officials.

He said the department had "carefully reviewed its existing
counter-narcotics policy" because of "the changed national security
environment, the corresponding shift in the department's budget and other
priorities, and evolving support requirements." The Pentagon will now focus
its counter-narcotics activities on programs that, among other things,
"contribute to the war on terrorism," he added.

But even before the Sept. 11 attacks, senior officials including Defense
Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld had bluntly stated their lack of enthusiasm
for the anti-drug mission, which they contend is better handled by civilian
agencies.

Before becoming secretary, Rumsfeld described military efforts to stop
drugs as "nonsense" and said during his Senate confirmation hearing in
January 2001 that drugs were "overwhelmingly a demand problem," meaning the
problem can only be solved when Americans quit using them.

Thus, some experts believe that the Defense Department may be taking
advantage of the war on terrorism to scale back a mission they never wanted.

Lawmakers who support the Pentagon's anti-drug mission have been worried
for some time by what they view as signs that the Rumsfeld team intends to
scale back the effort.

Early last year, top defense officials asked the Pentagon comptroller to
study whether to continue the counter-narcotics work and other
"nontraditional" missions. The study recommended paring the program, former
defense officials say. And some observers note that Rumsfeld has not named
a permanent assistant defense secretary for special operations and low
intensity conflict, who is supposed to oversee the anti-drug program.

In an interview, Pentagon counter-drug chief Andre Hollis emphasized that
the Pentagon wants to retain parts of the program that have worked well but
that all the pieces are being examined to determine whether each "is still
a priority mission.... The top priorities now are to defend the homeland
and to win the war on terrorism."

Programs Multiplied

Over the years, Hollis said, the counter-narcotics mission has multiplied
into 179 separate sub-programs, a number he called "surreal." He said his
first assignment when he came to the job in August 2001 was to conduct a
"bottom-up review" that would distinguish what the Pentagon does well in
counter-narcotics from "what we shouldn't be doing, or that didn't need to
be done any more."

In particular, Hollis said, the Defense Department wants to reduce the
burden on special operations forces, which are relatively few in number and
in heavy demand for terrorism-related missions.

And when possible, he said, the department wants to double up on the use of
intelligence gathering equipment. If, for instance, a National Guard
helicopter is flying along the California-Mexico border "looking for drug
activity, there's no reason why they can't also be looking for terrorists,"
he said.

But a former senior defense official, who requested anonymity, said the
counter-drug operations would inevitably get short shrift if forced to
share equipment with anti-terrorism operations.

The Pentagon spent about $1 billion on drug-related operations in fiscal
2002, out of a total federal counter-narcotics outlay of $19 billion. The
Pentagon has a bigger anti-drug budget than the Coast Guard, Customs
Service or the Immigration and Naturalization Service, and accounts for a
significant share of federal money spent to fight drugs abroad.

Most of the Pentagon's anti-drug efforts are in the Western Hemisphere,
notably the Andean region, Central America and the Caribbean. Its efforts
in Mexico are more limited. The military also offers training and gathers
intelligence in Southeast Asia, notably Thailand.

In addition to facing trouble in Congress, the cutbacks could be unpopular
with some Latin American governments. Most countries in the hemisphere have
taken advantage of training programs the Pentagon has offered.

Colombia: Special Case

While it retrenches elsewhere, the Pentagon intends to continue its growing
effort in Colombia, where U.S. military trainers and intelligence personnel
have been helping a weak government wage a four-decade war with
drug-dealing rebels. The Bush administration regards Colombia as a special
case where danger from guerrilla groups involved in drug trafficking could
destabilize the region and threaten the United States.

In its drug interdiction role, the military acts as the lead U.S. agency
for gathering intelligence on drug trafficking, and uses an array of
aircraft, ships, radar and other eavesdropping tools.

Although barred from conducting drug raids directly, troops provide some
real-time technical help -- such as communications and intelligence
analysis -- during anti-narcotics operations being carried out by law
enforcement and foreign military organizations.

Highly skilled special operations troops and other military personnel also
train foreign police and soldiers, as well as U.S. law enforcement
personnel. They teach everything from basic infantry skills to languages,
first aid, boat handling, swimming and horsemanship.

Hollis said these duties could be scaled back. For example, he said, if
Special Forces are training U.S. customs officials in horseback riding,
customs should now turn to local ranchers for that. And if the Border
Patrol is learning swimming from Special Forces, "they'll have to go to the
local YMCA."

One high-profile anti-drug operation that may see changes is Joint Task
Force 6, based at Fort Bliss, Texas.

The task force conducts counter-drug reconnaissance missions on the Mexican
border and provides military training and technical services for local,
state and federal civilian agencies. It has provided training and other
help for 430 civilian agencies, in such areas as intelligence analysis,
language, canine training and marksmanship.

The task force has been asked to review its programs in light of
Wolfowitz's memo. Hollis said reports that the task force "is going to go
away ... are just rumors," but he added that although "people are generally
anxious about change, 9/11 changed everything for us. We need to look at
the collective good."

The military's counter-narcotics efforts have not exactly "won" the drug
war, some experts note. The price and supply of cocaine, for example, have
been relatively stable since 1989.

"They're certainly working at the margins in making a difference," said
Peter Reuter, a University of Maryland economist and former director of
Rand Corp.'s Drug Policy Research Center.

Liberal critics have argued that by training foreign police and soldiers,
the U.S. military has in some cases given new tools to brutal regimes that
often abuse human rights.

Yet the Pentagon's work has led to important drug seizures and arrests, and
has helped build U.S. ties and open doors for American military access in
many countries. Advocates maintain that it has also helped spread U.S.
values overseas, by teaching foreign militaries the idea of civilian control.

The former defense official said that easing the counter-drug duties of the
Special Forces "sort of makes sense." But he said the benefit would be
small, because only 200 to 250 Special Forces personnel are used in Latin
American counter-drug operations at any one time.

The ex-official said 7th Special Forces Group soldiers used in Latin
America are regional specialists who are well-suited to the assignment and
would have limited value if transferred to the Middle East or South Asia.

Changes in 2004 Budget

The key unanswered question about the shift in plans, the ex-official
added, is how much the administration intends to trim from Pentagon
anti-drug spending in the upcoming fiscal 2004 budget, and whether
officials plan to shift to other areas the intelligence-gathering ships and
planes that have been the backbone of the mission.

Pentagon counter-drug officials have had to struggle to hang on to
intelligence-gathering planes, such as Navy P-3s and AWACS surveillance
aircraft, which the Joint Chiefs have frequently diverted to missions
considered priorities.

Officials of Southern Command, which oversees the Latin American mission,
acknowledge that they are able to monitor only 15% of the drug trafficking
corridors about 15% of the time.

Top defense officials are expected to work out the details of the shift in
counter-drug priorities in the next few weeks.