http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/mexico/tijuana/20050731-9999-1n31drugwar. html In terror's shadow
Anti-drug efforts have taken a hit as the fight against terrorism has siphoned away money and personnel By Kelly Thornton UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER July 31, 2005 California law enforcement was shutting down 1,750 meth labs a year, from elaborate operations that could produce $80,000 worth of the drug daily to modest ventures that cooked it up in mobile homes, apartments, hotel rooms and even cars. <http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20040731/images/news_drugwar280.jpg > PEGGY PEATTIE / Union-Tribune Vince Bond of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency looked out over the San Ysidro Port of Entry, where efforts to discover terrorists entering the United States have taken priority over detecting smuggled drugs or illegal immigration. Then came the Sept. 11 attacks. The U.S. government abruptly shifted priorities to fund the war on terror. As a result, the state where the methamphetamine frenzy began lost an $18 million-a-year federal grant that paid for its campaign against the drug. The number of clandestine labs that police dismantle these days is less than half what it was. At the same time, the state spent $6 million to start an anti-terrorism task force, and dozens of agents from the state's Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement were transferred there. The bureau has lost almost one-fifth of its work force 70 of 400 employees since Sept. 11, 2001. "In the '80s, it was communism. In the '90s, it was drugs. In the 2000s, it's terrorism," said Eric Hackett, a Calexico drug investigator assigned to the federal Drug Enforcement Administration and a member of an Imperial County narcotics task force. Terrorism has overshadowed most, if not all law enforcement priorities, particularly the decades-old drug war, siphoning everything from funding and manpower to sound bites and headlines. Politicians talk about capturing terrorists and funding homeland security, but few speak of drug lords and overdoses. The public's attention has been diverted to what many see as a far more pressing and troubling matter. "The nation as a whole doesn't really see drugs as the major threat anymore," said Martin Iguchi, a professor of public health at UCLA and director of the Drug Policy Research Center at the RAND Corp. think tank. "I think there's been a real change in perspective on what the national priority should be, and drugs just don't appear to fit into that anymore." Although many officials insist that drugs are still a high national priority, budgets and cutbacks suggest otherwise. "The added new burden that's been placed on law enforcement to care about terrorism at a domestic level here has had an impact on our ability to fund all of the (other) important law enforcement needs, including drugs," said Nathan Barankin, a spokesman for state Attorney General Bill Lockyer. "But for the anti-terrorism efforts, more money would be available." Funding for the FBI, the lead agency in preventing terrorism in the U.S., has increased 44 percent since the Sept. 11 attacks, while DEA funding is up about half that percentage. The federal government's entire drug-control budget shows a 2 percent increase in 2005, and the same is proposed for 2006. Meanwhile, the Department of Homeland Security's budget has increased 109 percent since its inception, from $19.5 billion in 2002 to $40.7 billion in 2005, according to government statistics. In addition, President Bush's proposed 2006 budget includes severe cuts to one major drug-enforcement program and the elimination of a grant for another. <http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20040731/images/news_border3.jpg> PEGGY PEATTIE / Union-Tribune Yellow boxes at the San Ysidro Port of Entry are designed to detect radioactive materials that could be used to make bombs. Agents still patrol to intercept drug smugglers or illegal immigrants. The High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas program, which funds task forces and intelligence centers in San Diego and across the nation, is facing a 56 percent cut that organizers say would be devastating. And the Byrne Justice Assistance Grant, which helps state and local authorities fight traffickers and fund drug-abuse education programs, is being allowed to expire. Anti-drug activists say these cuts underscore what they see as the federal government's post-Sept. 11 tendency to shift the burden for drug enforcement to already strapped state and local governments. "You take away this money, drug fighters are going to go away," said Richard Sloan, executive director of the National Narcotic Officers' Associations' Coalition. Even hard-line drug-war advocates concede that preventing terrorism should be the nation's top priority. In fact, some officials say the drug and terror wars complement each other because the hunt for terrorists makes it harder to smuggle drugs into the country. But some drug-enforcement advocates said the nation's drug problems continue to take a heavy toll and must not be bumped too far down the list of priorities. "Drug abuse costs America over 19,000 lives and $160 billion annually," the narcotic officers coalition Web site says. "While resources are shifting to the War on Terror, the sheer magnitude and impact of the drug problem means that we must not fight terrorism at the expense of drug enforcement. Drug trafficking is a daily chemical attack on American soil." The toll of drugs As funding for drug enforcement fails to keep pace with anti-terror budgets, drug-related arrests are flat and drug seizures are down nationwide in almost all major drug categories since the terrorist attacks, in some cases by 50 percent, according to the Office of National Drug Control Policy. Authorities attribute the drops to heightened border security rather than a lack of funding and manpower. But statistics indicate that drug usage during the same period has not abated. If drug seizures are down but drug usage is unchanged, the logical conclusion is that enforcement has been undermined, some experts said. In San Diego County, drug seizures by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the three-year period after Sept. 11 were down 43 percent from the three-year period before the attacks. Drug-smuggling arrests at the six California ports of entry were down 52 percent during the same span, from 11,301 in the three years before the attacks to 5,446 in the three years after. Nationwide, arrests for drug-related offenses remained almost unchanged, from 940,129 in 2001 to 941,842 the following year, the most recent statistics available. The nation's drug problem has changed very little in recent years, statistics show. Nationally, an estimated 19.5 million Americans more than 8 percent of the population used illicit drugs in 2003, about the same number as in 2002, according to a survey by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Drug experts note that the number of drug-induced deaths in the United States far surpasses the number of terrorism-related deaths. In 2002, there were 26,018 drug-induced deaths, a 24 percent increase over the 21,000 deaths the year before, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. <http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20040731/images/news_border2.jpg> Joe Misenhelter (left), assistant port director, and Vince Bond, spokesman for the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency, observed northbound traffic at the San Ysidro Port of Entry. "9/11 certainly contributed to the notion (that drug abuse) is not as big a problem," said Iguchi. "The reality is far more people die of drug and alcohol abuse each day than we'll probably ever see through terrorist acts, and our failure to address this optimally really is resulting in more lives and productivity lost." In San Diego, the number of drug-related deaths rose from 312 in 2001 to 376 in 2002, a 21 percent increase, according to the Drug Abuse Warning Network, a public health surveillance system under the Department of Health and Human Services. "Drugs are killing people every day. Al-Qaeda's not killing people every day. It's common sense," said retired Marine Corps Maj. Gil Macklin, a former congressional staffer with more than a decade of experience on drug issues, particularly in regard to Colombia. "(The) last time al-Qaeda killed somebody in the United States was 2001. It's 2005. Start checking the emergency rooms. Eighteen-, 19-, sometimes even 14-year-old kids are dying of heroin, cocaine or crystal-meth overdoses. "In all my time in Congress handling the drug portfolio and terrorism portfolio, drugs is the constant. It's always there. You can go out and wipe out an entire terrorism cell al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, whatever and they will stop operating for about two or three years. The drug trade isn't like that. They're far more flexible and resilient." The magic word In February, federal agents near Calexico discovered a cross-border tunnel equipped with electricity and ventilation, the sophisticated type of passageway traditionally built by drug-trafficking groups. It was the 12th tunnel found in that area in the three years since the Sept. 11 attacks, and drug experts see the trend as a clear signal that drug lords, and probably human smugglers, are determined to circumvent tighter security at border crossings. Oddly, the government's news release about the discovery made no mention of drugs. It said only that officials are working to prevent "terrorism and terrorist weapons from entering our country." A few days later, the Defense Intelligence Agency tested the tunnel for biological and chemical agents. "In the past, everyone thought of tunnels as a way to smuggle drugs," said Michael Unzueta, head of the Homeland Security Department's Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in San Diego. "Now we see tunnels specifically as a vulnerability to national security." Drug investigators say they are amused, and sometimes annoyed, by the pervasiveness of the word "terrorism." It's in news releases, in congressional budget hearings, in government meetings, in the newspaper, on television. "We have more to fear from drug cartels than we do someone coming across and bombing us here," said Hackett, the Calexico drug investigator assigned to the DEA. "We're a drug corridor here. That's our terrorism. I'm more worried about drugs than terrorism." To compete for funds, headlines and a piece of the counterterrorism action, agencies have been forced to tout all the ways they are helping in the war on terror. "I don't find it annoying because I know that terrorism is the buzzword to get us money," Hackett said. "It's a game. I have to use the right wording to get the right money in the right places." Invoking terrorism to get attention and funding is understandable, if not entirely credible, said Asa Hutchinson, the former head of the DEA who resigned in January as No.2 at the Department of Homeland Security. "First of all, the tunnels are being used for bringing drugs across, and they're being used for smuggling illegals across," Hutchinson said. "And I would quibble with news releases that simply focus on the terrorism aspect. I think that one causes more alarm than necessary. It points out a vulnerability, but I think we also have to address the problem that they're actually being used for. "It reflects and I think it's natural for an agency to do this they are going to be emphasizing their contributions to the problems of the greatest national concern, and right now it is terrorism. Congress responds to that; that's what they're funding and that's what the American people respond to." Dan Dzwilewski, chief of the FBI office in San Diego, said his office is working drug cases as aggressively as before Sept. 11. He also noted that the FBI has made terrorism prevention its first priority. "We're considered a priority drug area," Dzwilewski said. "From the San Diego perspective of it, we did not lose resources in the drug program at all pre-and post-9/11. Because we're an area bordering Mexico, we realize the drug-abuse problem still remains a major crime problem in United States." In an irony not lost on agents, the San Diego FBI office recently was criticized for focusing too much on drug investigations before the Sept. 11 attacks. According to a report released last month by the Justice Department's inspector general, the FBI office in San Diego erred by devoting "little to no investigative activity on al-Qaeda prior to Sept. 11." Two of the hijackers, Nawaf Alhazmi and Khalid al-Midhar, lived with an FBI informant in San Diego County in 2000, and they were befriended by a man who had been the subject of an FBI investigation. "Despite the fact that FBI headquarters had established counterterrorism as a top priority of the FBI in 1998, the San Diego field office was continuing to pursue drug trafficking as its top priority in 2001," the report stated. William Gore, then head of the San Diego FBI, said he made drugs a priority because San Diego is just miles from the home base of a ruthless drug cartel, the Arellano Félix organization. And, he said, the FBI permitted each office to set its priorities, and counterterrorism was one of them. Some Mexican officials also believe the cross-border drug war has taken a back seat to terrorism. Rosendo Cervantes, who is part of a Baja California public-security committee composed of citizens and officials, said he would like to see greater emphasis on breaking up drug cartels and on measures to prevent drug abuse. Mexican society is deeply affected by the drug trade, Cervantes said. Drug traffickers have killed police, journalists and ordinary citizens. "I don't believe that combating drug trafficking is getting the same attention as attacking terrorism," he said. Drugs and terror But drug agents aren't complaining. Although they acknowledge that their budgets have suffered while those for the FBI and Homeland Security are on the rise, they press on. In testimony before a congressional committee six months after the Sept. 11 attacks, Hutchinson had sought increased funding for the DEA by emphasizing the relationship between drug traffickers and terrorism. "While the DEA does not specifically target terrorists, we will target and track down drug traffickers and drug-trafficking organizations involved in terrorist acts," Hutchinson told the committee, noting that terrorists often fund their activities with drug profits. Hutchinson said during a recent interview that he was trying to recapture attention for the drug war after the Sept. 11 attacks by going on a 40-state methamphetamine-awareness tour and by speaking to Congress about the connection between drugs and terrorism. "I was drawing attention to the problem of drugs," Hutchinson said. "Shortly after 9/11, I was really the first one to make the connection between the flow of illegal drugs internationally and the proceeds being used to support terrorism the drugs-terrorism nexus. It was really to elevate the fight against drugs. Drugs aren't just hurting people through a consumption problem, but (their) profits are many times used to fund violent and terroristic groups." He said the hiring of 1,000 new Border Patrol agents to protect the border from terrorists also provides more vigilance for drug shipments. Adding more radiation and bomb detection devices gives the added bonus of more drug interdiction, he said. Heightened security measures at airports also have made it very difficult for drug couriers, he added. "I think that in terms of the rankings and public agenda, the war on terror has overtaken and replaced the fight against illegal drugs," Hutchinson said. "But underneath that is, substantively they're very complementary, and the fight against illegal drugs has been strengthened by our fight against terrorism." The drug war goes on without the headlines, said Unzueta, the head of San Diego's Immigration and Customs Enforcement office. "It may be getting less attention, but it hasn't been abandoned," he said. Before Sept. 11, when there was no Department of Homeland Security, immigration and customs agents focused almost exclusively on drug and human smuggling and money laundering. "Now, it's a whole new ballgame," Unzueta said. _____ <http://www.signonsandiego.com/images/utbullets/utbullet.gif> Staff writer Anna Cearley contributed to this report. <http://images.clickability.com/pti/spacer.gif> Find this article at: http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/mexico/tijuana/20050731-9999-1n31drugwar. html [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> <font face=arial size=-1><a href="http://us.ard.yahoo.com/SIG=12hvrac5v/M=362329.6886306.7839369.3040540/D=groups/S=1705323667:TM/Y=YAHOO/EXP=1122911914/A=2894321/R=0/SIG=11dvsfulr/*http://youthnoise.com/page.php?page_id=1992 ">Fair play? Video games influencing politics. 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