• Military
• WMD
• Intelligence

• Security Menu                     

• Systems
• Industry
• Operations
• Hot Documents
• News
• Reports
• Policy
• Budget
• Congress
• Links

• Space

Chairman McCollum, it is a pleasure for me to appear before you one last time. It is, as always, a pleasure to appear before you and the other members of the Subcommittee. We in DEA deeply appreciate your support for our fight against international drug trafficking over the years. Indeed we look forward to continuing our work with the Subcommittee on Crime in the next Congress. I appear before you today to testify on the threat posed by the convergence of organized crime, drug trafficking, and terrorism. The international drug trafficking organizations that smuggle their poison into our country, and that use terrorist violence to further their criminal activities are, indeed, a threat to the national security of the United States.

DEA's mission is to target the powerful international drug organizations that operate around the world, supplying drugs to American communities, employing thousands of individuals to transport and distribute drugs. Historically as well as today, some of these groups do not hesitate to use violence and terror to advance their interests at the expense of law-abiding citizens. We see in these groups today a merger of international organized crime, drugs, and terror. While DEA does not specifically target terrorists, per se, we can and will target drug traffickers involved in terrorist acts, wherever in the world we can find them and track them down.

As a law enforcement agency, DEA aims to gather evidence sufficient to arrest, indict, and convict criminals. When DEA operates in foreign posts, we work within the legal systems of our host nations, and of course within the structures of the U.S. legal system and in cooperation with our host nation police agency counterparts. Our evidence must be usable in a court of law, and must withstand severe scrutiny at every level of the criminal justice process. With that in mind, my testimony will be limited to presenting DEA's view from a law enforcement perspective of the evil union of drug trafficking, organized crime, and terrorism. I will also briefly describe some of the steps we are taking to counter this threat.

The traffickers also have the financial resources necessary to corrupt enough law enforcement, military, and political officials to create a relatively safe haven for themselves in the countries in which they make their headquarters. The cell or compartmentalized structure of the organizations necessitates a complex system of communications to enable the organizations' leaders to know where their stores of illegal drugs are located, how much profit is being made, and where and when deliveries will take place. These organizations have the resources to take whatever measures they feel necessary to protect their investments through bribery, corruption, intimidation, violence, and terrorism.

As complex as these communications arrangements of organized crime groups are, U.S. law enforcement agencies have been able to pierce their communications by using court-approved interceptions. With some of the top leadership of these organizations in hiding beyond the immediate reach of U.S. law enforcement, we have directed our resources at their organizational structure, and their transportation and distribution elements in the United States. By targeting these traffickers' communications, we can disrupt their operations and minimize the violence they are able to perpetrate on innocent citizens.

Attacking Colombian organizations must be the centerpiece of any coordinated strategy aimed at the union of organized crime, drugs and terrorism. Colombian traffickers control the manufacture of the vast majority of cocaine in South America and their fingerprints are on virtually every kilogram of cocaine sold in U.S. cities and towns.

Colombia continues, as it has for a number of years, as the key South American coca source country. Colombia has always been-and remains-the world's number one producer of finished cocaine HCl, producing more than 70 percent of the world's cocaine HCl. The U.S. government estimates the Colombian potential cocaine production from that country's 1999 domestic coca crop at 520 metric tons. This is an increase of 85 metric tons over the 1998 crop.

In addition to its central role in coca production, Colombia is now also the world's largest producer of cocaine base (the intermediate coca product that must be further refined into finished cocaine HCl). As recently as 1995, however, Colombia only produced about one-quarter of the world's cocaine base. Each year, hundreds of tons of cocaine base were imported via aircraft into Colombia from Peru or Bolivia. Since 1995, net coca cultivation in Colombia has more than doubled (from 50,000 hectares in 1995 to 122,900 hectares in 1999). In 1999, Colombia produced approximately 68 percent of the world's cocaine base. Accordingly, Colombian traffickers are far less dependent on Peruvian or Bolivian cocaine base sources of supply.

Most of Colombia's new coca cultivation, and much of its cocaine processing, occurs in the eastern lowlands and southern rain forest-areas where the national government exerts limited authority. This geographic fact poses a significant challenge to U.S. and Colombian counterdrug policy. It is difficult for the Colombian government to assert any kind of authority in the area, making it possible for Colombian cocaine trafficking organizations with bases of operations in these areas to continue to dominate the international cocaine trade.

Notwithstanding the recent dramatic increase in Colombia's potential cocaine production, total Andean Region cocaine production has actually declined in recent years, due to unprecedented reductions in Peruvian and Bolivian cocaine production. Potential cocaine production in Bolivia decreased from 150 metric tons in 1998 to 70 metric tons in 1999, largely due to the Bolivian Government's unprecedented coca eradicatio n program. In 1999, the Bolivian Government eradicated 16,999 hectares of coca. Potential cocaine production in Peru has decreased from 240 metric tons in 1998 to 175 metric tons in 1999. As a result of coca field abandonment and eradication, net coca cultivation in Peru has decreased from 51,000 hectares in 1998 to 38,700 hectares in 1999.

The same facts of geography that make it difficult for the Colombia government to exert authority over the traffickers operating in remote areas of the country also make it difficult for the Colombians to confront various terrorist or insurgent groups operating in the same region. There is, naturally, considerable interest in the extent to which the two problems - drug trafficking and terrorism - are intertwined in the region. As I have already stated, DEA does not have a counter-terrorism or counter-insurgency mission. When DEA does, however, acquire relevant information from its active drug investigations and drug intelligence collection programs, we share that information with the appropriate U.S. agencies - ones that do have counter-terrorism responsibilities. DEA passes specific threat information on to the FBI in domestic cases and to the foreign intelligence community in overseas cases.

It is well known that two major insurgent groups are active in Colombia. They are the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), with some 7,000 to 11,000 active combatants, and the National Liberation Army (ELN), with some 3,000 to 6,000 active combatants. It is also known that the presence of the FARC in Colombia=s eastern lowlands and southern rainforest-the country's primary coca cultivation and cocaine processing regions-hinders the Colombian Government's ability to conduct counterdrug operations. The presence of the ELN in the northeast, central, and northwestern parts of Colombia impacts on the security of oil pipelines, and hinders eradication operations against opium poppy and marijuana growing areas.

Beyond the FARC's and ELN's well-established presence in the drug crop cultivation and processing areas, there do appear to be some links between the traffickers and the terrorists. To be sure, there are differences of view in the United States on just how involved the FARC and ELN are in drug trafficking. DEA reporting and analysis demonstrated several areas of just such involvement. Some insurgent units raise funds through extortion or by protecting laboratory operations. In return for cash payments, or possibly in exchange for weapons, the insurgents protect cocaine laboratories in southern Colombia. Some FARC and ELN units are probably independently involved in limited cocaine laboratory operations. Some insurgent units apparently have assisted drug trafficking groups in transporting and storing cocaine and marijuana within Colombia. In particular, some insurgent units protect clandestine airstrips in southern Colombia.

The revenues provided by the drug trade have apparently become increasingly important to many insurgent fronts. In fact, some insurgent fronts have become little more than bands of well-armed thugs that sell their services to drug traffickers. Moreover, DEA has no way to assess the total amount or even the gross proportion of the terrorists' revenues represented by drug proceeds.

Colombia's paramilitary groups do not appear to be directly involved in any significant coca, opium poppy, or marijuana cultivation. However, according to press reporting, certain of the paramilitary leaders have admitted to receiving payments from coca growers in southern Colombia to protect them from guerrillas. Several paramilitary groups may also raise funds through extortion, or by protecting laboratory operations in northern and central Colombia.

The terrorists are not the glue that holds the drug trade together. DEA does not believe that the FARC should be considered another drug trafficking cartel. It is, however, certainly true that the "cash cow" represented by the drug trade has taken on a big, and probably growing role in financing the terrorists.

While Russian Organized Crime is clearly involved in drug trafficking, especially as transportation specialists, links between their drug operations and terrorist activities are less than well established. On September 7, 2000, the Colombian National Police (CNP) seized a partially constructed, steel-hulled submarine from a warehouse outside Bogota, Colombia. All available information suggests the submarine-if completed-could have been used to transport up to ten metric tons of illicit drugs from Colombia to remote off-load sites in Latin America and the Caribbean. It could well be that Russian International Organized crime was involved in this submarine project.

The U.S. Embassy's Information Analysis/Operations Center (IAOC) is being increasingly utilized to coordinate and analyze tactical information regarding the activities of drug trafficking groups active in the Colombian territories south and east of the Andes Mountains. The IAOC is comprised of Embassy personnel from the DEA Bogota Country Office and U.S. Military's Tactical Analysis Team. The Defense Attaché Office and the State Department also provide support and staffing. This organization serves as a central clearinghouse for counterdrug law enforcement cooperation in Colombia.

There have been several cutting-edge, sophisticated investigations, such as OPERATION MILLENIUM last year, which benefit from the closest possible cooperation between the DEA and CNP. MILLENIUM resulted in the demolition of the "Juvenal" organization, one of the most significant groupings of drug traffickers in Colombia. This type of investigation will lead to the dismantling of even more of the most significant drug trafficking organizations operating in Colombia today.

There is funding under "Plan Colombia" for a Bilateral Case Initiative and for creation of new vetted units. These new resources will improve the U.S. government's capability to target trafficking organizations in Colombia.