TORONTO'S HIGH-SEAS DRUG BUST 'UNBELIEVABLE'

As sailors from HMCS Toronto busily gathered their bags Monday, the ships
commanding officer, Ian Paterson, recalled some of the highlights of the
deployment.

One memorable moment, he said, was busting a boat with $40 million US worth
of Afghani hashish.

Unbelievable. Have you ever seen $40 million go up in smoke? he asked.

The Toronto was inspecting fishing boats off the coast of Pakistan when
crew members noticed two men take off in a speed boat. They saw smoke
coming from the back of the larger boat, so they circled it for an hour.

We thought, Is this some sort of booby trap? Paterson explained.

When they finally realized it was just something burning on a stove, they
boarded and found 100 blue bags, each with about 20 packages of hash the
size of a VHS cassette with the words Freedom for Afghanistan stamped in
gold letters, in the boats holds.

The Toronto towed the boat while waiting for U.S. Navy backup.

The next morning, when the USS Lady Gulf came over the horizon at 30 knots,
they hoisted the Canadian flag at the masthead, he said. In 23 years, Id
never seen an American ship hoist anybodys flag. We were pretty choked up.

The United States claims profits from drug sales have helped finance
international terrorism.

The American warship hammered at the empty fishing boat for an hour with
heavy machine guns, Paterson said.

It was like Arnold Swartzenegger in Die Hard 2 ... the sea was boiling,
there was smoke coming off, he said. We were just howling. They blew it to
pieces.