BUST SINKS DRUG SUBMARINE EFFORT

BOGOTA, Colombia - They have smuggled cocaine in high-speed boats,
low-flying planes and even in the centers of lollipops. But on
Thursday, Colombia's audacious drug traffickers astounded even the
country's seasoned police.

A narco-submarine was discovered in a mountain workshop just 18 miles
west of Bogota, Colombia's capital, police announced. Aided by
intelligence from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, stunned
Colombian police found Russian-language manuals along with the partly
constructed submarine. If completed, the vessel could have transported
11 tons of cargo, Colombian naval officials said.

``Never in my life, in 32 years working with the police, have I seen
anything like this,'' said Leo Arreguin, DEA director for Colombia,
speaking to reporters at the improvised dry dock.

The submarine is an ambitious leap for the traffickers from fast boats
and radar-dodging planes to the sort of technological tool that only a
sovereign naval force usually commands.

Its appearance strengthens the position of anti-narcotics warriors,
such as U.S. drug czar Gen. Barry McCaffrey, who supported a recently
approved $1.3-billion aid package with the argument that Colombia
desperately needs help to stand up to well-connected drug rings with
virtually unlimited budgets.

``It was shocking to me to see how much technology illicit money can
buy,'' said Capt. Ismael Idrobo, projects director for Colombian Naval
Academy.

The workshop's location high in the Andean Mountains led police to
deduce that the traffickers planned to transport the 100-foot vessel
to the coast piece by piece in containers.

The Russian instruction manuals with Spanish translations that police
found in the warehouse suggested that Russians may have been helping
to build the sub, officials said, and also seemed to implicate two
Americans.

Asked about involvement of Americans, Arreguin said, ``We're going to
continue with intelligence efforts to find out who they are.''

There was no one at the site when police raided it, and no arrests
were made.

Arreguin would not elaborate further on why Americans were suspected
of involvement.

Still, such loose ends were overshadowed by the discovery of the
submarine itself.

Customs authorities have found cocaine and heroin sewn into wigs,
inserted under animals' skin, hidden in breast implants and taped
inside musical instruments. Earlier this year, authorities came across
several hundred tropical-flavored lollipops with cocaine centers.

Employing human carriers to swallow dozens of tightly packed cocaine
capsules for transport to foreign countries has become such a common
smuggling method that it only raises eyebrows when the carriers are
children.

Even by Colombian standards, though, the submarine was in a league of
its own.

Police chief Ernesto Gilibert emphasized the sophisticated workmanship
on display at the submarine construction site. Police had to overcome
a televised security surveillance system when they raided it late Wednesday.

Once inside, they found a watertight hatchway, already completed,
along with the submarine's casing, stabilizers and a propeller.

``The material all appears to be imported,'' Gilibert told reporters.
``The technology is advanced, and the workmanship is high quality.''

A naval spokesman said traffickers have used smaller, relatively
unsophisticated ``mini-subs'' to transport drugs in the past. But the
vessel under construction was three times the size of the largest
mini-sub, which was found five years ago, naval authorities said.

``This is a huge leap,'' Idrobo said. The sub had hydraulic tubing, a
protected propeller, a double hull and diving rudders that would allow
it to descend to 325 feet, he said.

Colombia has two coastlines, one on the Pacific Ocean and one on the
Caribbean, making it an ideal shipping point for some of the world's
most powerful drug trafficking cartels.

According to U.S. officials in Washington, traffickers transported
more than 260 tons of Colombian cocaine to consumer countries last
year, and production is thought to be rising rapidly.