Striking At the Source

By John S. DeMott

Word leaked out almost as soon as the giant U.S. Air Force C-5A transport plane touched down in the Bolivian city of Santa Cruz. As U.S. embassy spokesmen in the capital city of La Paz and Defense Department officials in Washington tried to downplay the matter, headlines in Bolivia and the U.S. were blaring the news: in the first use of a U.S. military operation on foreign soil to fight drugs, Army Black Hawk helicopters, armed with .30-cal. machine guns and escorted by about 160 U.S. soldiers, had been flown into the South American jungle to assist Bolivian authorities in wiping out that country's production of cocaine.

Although the mission had a ferocious code name, "Operation Blast Furnace," it was apparently carried out under unwritten rules similar to those observed when federal revenue agents chased down Appalachian bootleggers: the etiquette dictated that no one on either side would really shoot to kill. U.S. troops, though armed with M-16 rifles, were under orders not to fire unless fired upon. Besides, the splash of unwanted publicity removed the surprise, ensuring that most of the big drug traffickers would be out of the country before the forces arrived. Said Bolivian Ambassador to the U.S. Fernando Illanes: "With all the advance advice, I think everybody is scampering." At the outset, the mission had a comicopera quality to it. The planned arrival from the U.S. Southern Command in Panama of the C-5A transport ferrying the helicopters, to be followed by C-130 troop planes, had to be delayed three days because a wildcat gasoline strike prevented refueling at Santa Cruz airport. While the huge C-5A sat at the airport in full view of TV cameras, reporters and, presumably, drug merchants, U.S. troops needed four days to transport supplies to a base camp north of Trinidad, in Bolivia's lush northeastern Beni region, where most of the coca leaves are processed. "This thing has turned into a bad dream," confessed one Pentagon official.

In La Paz, meanwhile, opposition parties complained that President Victor Paz Estenssoro should have consulted his Congress before calling in the U.S. military. Even some high-placed Bolivians were dismayed by the turn of events. Said Jacobo Libermann, one of Paz Estenssoro's advisers: "We would have liked assistance of another nature, entirely run by Bolivians and carried out discreetly. Instead, we got the invasion of Normandy."

By week's end the operation was at last under way, as U.S. pilots flew Leopards (as the special police of Bolivia's antidrug unit are known) on four raids. In the first one, 30 of the troops jumped out of two choppers near a 15-tent drug complex just as a Cessna aircraft was landing nearby. The pilot fled into the jungle, but his 17-year-old helper was seized. The raiders destroyed a log-frame laboratory where coca leaves were converted into coca paste.

In the second assault, the Leopards found no cocaine lab in their landing area; their intelligence had been faulty. Two more strikes at week's end suffered from similar information failures. The choppers roared into the * sites, the invaders leaped out, but they failed to find either any cocaine handlers or their equipment.

Although small in scope and results, the operation represented a significant escalation in the Reagan Administration's open-ended commitment to use the military against cocaine, the addictive white powder that is now the fastest-growing segment of the approximately $125 billion illicit U.S. drug market. American soldiers will remain in Bolivia for at least two months, transporting the Leopards on search-and-destroy missions into the countryside. U.S. officials are said to be reviewing similar requests for military assistance from Peru, Ecuador and Colombia -- countries that, along with Bolivia, produce almost all the cocaine sold in the U.S. and Western Europe. Moreover, the day after U.S. forces landed in Bolivia, President Reagan's senior aides met in the White House to discuss steps to curb America's demand for drugs.

The Administration was under pressure to act as national concern about drugs seemed to be reaching new heights. "Crack," the powerful form of coke that can be purchased for as little as $10 and is smoked in a glass pipe, is seducing younger Americans who could never afford the drug in its more expensive powdered form. One study reported that cocaine has spread to as many as one-third of America's college students. Since 1980, cocaine-related deaths have tripled. The deaths last month of University of Maryland Basketball Player Len Bias, 22, and Cleveland Browns Defensive Back Don Rogers, 23, added to the sense of urgency.

According to Defense sources, the Bolivian mission had been planned for some time. Since 1982, when the Administration stepped up the Federal Government's war on drugs, the U.S. military, with some effectiveness, has assisted civilian authorities in seizing incoming shipments of cocaine and other drugs. Partly at the urging of Vice President George Bush, the Army, Air Force and Navy have provided about $21 million worth of operational and maintenance support, including high-tech electronic detection equipment on loan to the Bahamian government as part of "Operation Bat." This was a three-year-old effort to intercept drug smugglers on ships and in aircraft. U.S. military maneuvers in the Caribbean are often used to target suspected drug smugglers, tracking them until civilian police or the Coast Guard can make an arrest. In one such sweep, the 1985 "Hat Trick I" operation, some $27 million worth of drugs was confiscated.

Operation Blast Furnace, however, is the first product of a National Security Decision directive signed April 8 by President Reagan. The directive declared drug traffic into the U.S. to be a national security risk and authorized the use of military force against it. Before then, operations by the armed forces could be authorized only on a case-by-case basis through an emergency decree signed by the Secretary of Defense and the Attorney General.

Not everyone applauded the move. Capitol Hill accepted the Administration's assurances that since Bolivia was not a combat zone, the President need not consult with Congress under the provisions of the War Powers Act of 1973. But a few critics were uneasy about the possibility that someday American soldiers could find themselves in a shoot-out with drug gangs. Others expressed concern about the increasing use of the military in civilian law-enforcement procedures. While finding "no serious problem" with the Bolivia operation, Allan Adler, legal counsel for the A.C.L.U., was worried that "if drug smuggling can be declared a national security matter, it's difficult to imagine what might not be." Using the security blanket so broadly, he complained, could erode congressional authority and the Constitution's checks and balances.

In launching their dramatic operation, the Reagan Administration and the Bolivian government tackled a complex problem that seems to be beyond the reach of standard diplomatic or administrative efforts. Dissatisfied with earlier Bolivian attempts to eradicate coca fields, the U.S. State Department in June decided to cut Bolivia's $14.4 million economic support in half. Bolivian officials were hoping last week's raid would prevent any similar slashes in aid next year.

Technically, the procedure for U.S. military assistance called for Bolivian authorities to request the help. In practice, said a Defense Department official, "we sort of told 'em what to ask for." Even so, many Bolivian officials apparently expected to receive reconnaissance planes and helicopters similar to those provided outright to Mexico and Colombia. The spectacular arrival of troops, transport vehicles, trucks, tents and other supplies -- followed by reporters and camera crews trying to charter planes to follow the action -- left the country nonplussed. "All the publicity has been a little rough," said one official. "The operation is a little too Reagan- style, too Wild West."

The U.S. made it a bit easier for Bolivia to support the raid by promising to wipe out only the cocaine-processing labs, leaving the coca fields undisturbed. Raising coca is legal in Bolivia -- although processing it into cocaine is not -- and the fields produce the nation's only important cash crop. Bolivia's cocaine exports are worth at least $600 million a year, more than a third of its $1.5 billion in total annual exports. The cocaine trade provides a livelihood for up to 400,000 peasants, who have no other means of support.

Bolivia has tried disincentives. Last December the Paz Estenssoro government offered peasants $250 for every hectare of coca they did not harvest. It was all the government thought it could afford. But peasants, who can earn up to $10,000 a hectare by selling coca, were not enthusiastic. The joint U.S.-Bolivian operation against drug processing has a similar purpose: it is intended to force down the value of the leaves, making the crops much less profitable.

No one in La Paz or Washington truly expects the military foray to do much to curb the U.S.'s drug problem. In March 1984, a huge raid in Colombia on the remote drug-processing locality known as Tranquilandia yielded a record haul: ten tons of cocaine. Yet within six months, the supply was back to normal. Other cartels took over the business broken up by the raid, and some of the processing moved to Peru and Bolivia, bringing about the current operation in part.

Nevertheless, last week's raid gave both governments an opportunity to congratulate themselves. Said William Alden, chief of congressional and public affairs at the Drug Enforcement Administration: "We're going to gain a lot from this. We're going to know how to conduct operations at this scale, and we'll be able to determine just how effective our intelligence is." Said Ambassador Illanes: "We will have shown the world that the Bolivian government has taken a courageous decision to fight narcotics."

Despite the showiness of the Bolivia raid, there is a growing belief in the U.S., shared by many governments in Latin America, that the only way to get at the nation's drug infestation is by discouraging its domestic demand, not by nibbling away at suppliers in Latin America. It is believed that only 25% or so of the supply is blocked by such actions. Meanwhile, cocaine consumption in the U.S. keeps going up at a frightening pace. Last week a House Select Committee on Narcotics Abuse and Control heard testimony from expert witnesses on how crack is spreading into even the fifth and sixth grades in some urban schools. Said New Jersey Democratic Representative Peter Rodino: Crack is "on the verge of becoming the new Pied Piper of American youth."

In the White House, Reagan aides met in one of several senior-level discussions on new proposals to curb drug use. Among the ideas discussed: legislation that would require pre-employment drug screening for all new federal employees, from the Postal Service to the National Security Council. In June, Reagan directed White House Chief of Staff Donald Regan to make the fight against drugs a top concern. "It's a problem that has great priority with the President," a senior staff aide confided last week. It has long been a personal crusade of Nancy Reagan's as well.

The action in Bolivia was the apogee of steps already taken by the Administration on the supply side of the drug problem. The deliberations of the President's aides last week reflected a growing consensus in the Government -- and perhaps in society at large -- that the time may be ripe for placing greater responsibility on the users of illicit drugs for the consequences of their actions. That campaign could be far more effective than sending U.S. troops crashing through remote jungles.

CHART: TEXT NOT AVAILABLE

With reporting by Barrett Seaman/Washington and Alessandra Stanley/La Paz