[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 44 (Wednesday, April 20, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: April 20, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
               NARCOTICS TRAFFICKING, THE KGB--AND CASTRO

  Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, most Americans are understandably outraged 
by reports that Aldrich Ames--a former high-ranking CIA official--sold 
vital national security information to Russia and the former Soviet 
Union. Such treasonous activities may very well have cost the lives of 
many courageous people who helped the United States in the struggle to 
win the cold war.
  We may never know the full extent of the damage to U.S. national 
security interests Aldrich Ames may have caused. But we can safely 
assume that one of the vital interests harmed by the Ames espionage is 
the U.S. ability to stop the flow of illegal drugs into the United 
States.
  Bear in mind: Not only did Ames have access to the most sensitive CIA 
information concerning Russia and the former Soviet Union--he also had 
access to some of the most sensitive information concerning the war on 
drugs. At the time of his arrest, Ames was a top official in the CIA's 
office of narcotics intelligence.
  The possibility that Ames passed sensitive information to the KGB 
concerning the war on drugs prompted the Wall Street Journal to publish 
on March 10 an interesting article headed, ``The KGB and America's War 
on Drugs.'' The article stated what many of us have contended for 
years--that the KGB used moles like Aldrich Ames to sabotage the U.S. 
battle against the international narcotics trade.
  It will surprise no one that the KGB sought to undermine the U.S. war 
on drugs. The KGB was institutionally dedicated to the destruction of 
the United States of America; therefore, the KGB's involvement in 
narcotics trafficking makes perfectly good sense. Drugs have been an 
increasingly destructive force in our society for decades, poisoning 
our youth and fanning the flames of violence in our cities.
  Yet, for some reason, Mr. President, the State Department has been 
less than aggressive in addressing the role that the KGB--and Soviet 
allies such as Cuba--have played in the tidal wave of illegal narcotics 
pouring into the United States.
  This, I submit, has been a bipartisan folly. As long ago as January 
1987, I pleaded with the administration to investigate this matter. Two 
years later--on July 26, 1989--the Foreign Relations Committee held 
hearings on Cuba's involvement in narcotics trafficking. To my 
knowledge, however, a serious investigation was never undertaken 
despite the pleadings by me and others.
  The pattern of ignoring clear evidence that the KGB and Cuba were 
linked to illegal drugs is reminiscent of the way the bureaucrats 
stonewalled congressional investigations into Manuel Noriega's 
activities. Only after pressure from Congress and an indictment by a 
Miami prosecutor did the State Department address the serious 
allegations against Manuel Antonio Noriega. Sadly, the bureaucrats have 
been not one bit more interested in probing the KGB and the Cuban 
connection with narcotics trafficking. The Wall Street Journal sensibly 
put it this way: ``Rumors in the 1980s about KGB or Cuban involvement 
in the drug trade were routinely pooh-poohed by State Department and 
CIA types.''

  Well, Mr. President, the bureaucrats were forced to face the facts 
about Manuel Noriega, but I see no evidence that they learned anything 
regarding KGB and Cuban involvement in drug trafficking.
  I confess that I do not know the extent of the KGB's involvement in 
narcotics trafficking under Boris Yeltsin. I like President Yeltsin; 
I've met with him every time he has visited Washington. But, the fact 
remains, as the Aldrich Ames case shows, that Boris Yeltsin has not 
stopped the KGB from spending untold millions to spy on the United 
States. This may or may not be entirely his fault. I'm not sure anyone 
knows how much control President Yeltsin has over the KGB.
  But the question begs to be asked, Mr. President: Where is Russia now 
getting the money to finance its KGB operations--which are as vigorous 
as ever? The Soviet Union financed some KGB operations with hard 
currency earned from narcotics trafficking in years past. Russia--with 
its devastated economy--seems more likely than the Soviets to rely upon 
narcotics trafficking to pay some intelligence bills. It is certainly 
to be hoped that the Russians are not siphoning off U.S. foreign aid to 
pay its KGB bills.
  It is well known that the KGB and Cuba did work hand in glove with 
Colombian drug traffickers, and Fidel Castro and the Soviets got quite 
a return on their ``investments.'' They helped poison America's youth 
while raking in millions in profits--some of which, without doubt--went 
to finance intelligence operations aimed at the United States and our 
allies.
  The established fact that Aldrich Ames was on the KGB's payroll while 
a top official in the CIA's narcotics intelligence unit--combined with 
the fact that the KGB has a history of involvement with international 
narcotics trafficking--underscores the conclusion that there is a 
serious need to look into the KGB's connection with narcotics 
trafficking.
  But incredibly, Mr. President, the United States Government actually 
shares narcotics intelligence with Russian allies involved in the drug 
trade--and, yes, that includes Cuba. The U.S. State Department's 
``International Narcotics Control Strategy Report'' for fiscal year 
1993 confirms that the United States Government exchanged law 
enforcement information with the Cubans. That report does grudgingly 
admit that Cuba plays a role in the illicit drug trade. And the fiscal 
year 1994 report--just delivered to Congress--gives a glowing account 
of Cuba's efforts to combat the drug trade, but admitting that there is 
little evidence to support or refute Cuba's claim that it neither 
produces nor consumes illicit drugs.

  Mr. President, let us not forget that Cuba is the country that 
Presidential candidate Clinton called an ``island of tyranny.'' He 
described Fidel Castro as one of the world's ``most ruthless 
dictators.'' The State Department routinely certifies Cuba as a state 
sponsor of terrorism; and it is no secret that Castro has been 
profiting from the drug trade for decades.
  Notwithstanding the tough campaign rhetoric, the Clinton 
administration has turned a blind eye to Cuba's continued links with 
narcotics trafficking. At a November 4, 1993 Foreign Relations 
Committee hearing, I asked Secretary Christopher whether the United 
States shares intelligence or law enforcement information with Cuba, 
and the Secretary said ``we do share [drug] enforcement information 
with the Cubans * * *. Cuba occupies a strategic location astride drug 
routes into the United States.'' He went on to say that ``such 
exchanges are clearly in the national interests of the United States.''
  That may be, Mr. President, but the Secretary of State needs to 
ponder the serious allegations that Fidel Castro has been involved in 
narcotics trafficking for more than 20 years, charges which must be 
taken just as seriously as those against Manuel Noriega. It is 
inexcusable for the administration to ignore allegations against Castro 
just as past administrations ignored allegations against Noriega.
  President Clinton did Fidel Castro a favor by not including Cuba in 
the list of major illicit narcotics producing and transit countries 
submitted to Congress on April 1 of this year. The President identified 
26 countries as being major narcotics-producing and transit countries. 
Western Hemisphere nations on that list include: Brazil, the Bahamas, 
Belize, Colombia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Jamaica, Mexico, Paraguay, 
Venezuela, Bolivia, Panama, and Peru.
  Mr. President, this is deja vu all over again. The Secretary of State 
told Congress with a straight face that sharing intelligence with 
Manual Noriega is in the U.S. national interests. Exchanging narcotics 
trafficking intelligence with Fidel Castro makes no more sense than 
sharing intelligence with Noriega. The administration might as well 
share drug enforcement information with the Colombian drug cartels.
  The simple truth is that all of this is not in the best interest of 
the United States. More likely, Castro uses U.S. intelligence to tip 
off his business partners and to knock off his competitors. If Castro 
were serious about the international drug problem--and of course he is 
not--he is serious about raking in the countless millions in blood 
money.
  If Fidel Castro really wants to be helpful, the first thing he could 
do would be to hand over to U.S. authorities all of those Cubans who 
have been indicted for narcotics trafficking. He could shout down the 
air corridors over Cuba that continue to be used extensively by 
drug smugglers. He could order the Cuban Navy to seize boats 
trafficking drugs through Cuban waters. He could crack down on his 
closest advisors--including his brother--who are profiting from drug 
trafficking.

  But, Mr. President, don't hold your breath until Castro does any of 
the above. He and his cronies are into the drug trade up to their ears, 
and the administration knows it. Even the Washington Post reported in 
February that files and a videotape belonging to slain drug lord Pablo 
Escobar implicated Raul Castro in narcotics trafficking--Raul Castro, 
Fidel's brother, and his Minister of Defense. There was plenty of 
evidence prior to this discovery to indict Raul Castro, but he has yet 
to be indicted.
  Castro's Chief of Staff of the Cuban Navy, Admiral Aldo Santa-Maria 
has been indicted in the United States. The Cuban Ambassador to 
Nicaragua has also been indicted. By the way, this criminal also stole 
a house in Nicaragua from an American citizen with the Sandinista's 
blessings. Many other top Cuban officials have been indicted in the 
United States for drug trafficking in the past 10 or 15 years.
  And yet, Mr. President, some at the Organization of American States 
want to welcome Cuba into the club. I cannot imagine that the President 
will agree to allow this. Cuba was kicked out for good reason, and no 
thought should be given to allowing Cuba back into the OAS before Cuba 
is rid of Fidel Castro. Castro and his gang should know that the United 
States Ambassador to the OAS, Harriet Babbitt, told the Foreign 
Relations Committee that the United States ``strongly opposes Cuba's 
reinstatement into the OAS.''
  Despite billions of dollars in foreign aid that the United States is 
giving Russia, Russia is still spying on us, and still aiding Fidel 
Castro. On April 1, Secretary Christopher certified that Russia was not 
giving assistance to Cuba, as required by the Cuban Democracy Act. The 
Secretary's justification for the certification said that Russia did 
not make available to Cuba concessional credit. But then the Secretary 
contradicted himself in the same report by saying that Russia made 
available to Cuba $380 million in low interest rate loans in 1993.
  Russia refuses to rein in her Cuban ally, Mr. President. Russia 
stands by Fidel Castro, and the reason is simple: Cuba is an important 
intelligence asset to Russia. The KGB continues to operate an important 
intelligence listening post in Cuba which allows it to eavesdrop on 
much of the eastern seaboard of the United States. It wouldn't be 
surprising if this listening post is funded, at least in part, by drug 
money. Perhaps Aldrich Ames can shed some light on all of this.
  Sharing any kind of intelligence with Fidel Castro is absurd on its 
face. Castro must be laughing at the State Department all the way to 
the bank.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that an article from the March 
10, 1994, Wall Street Journal be printed in the Record at this point.
  There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

             [From the Wall Street Journal, Mar. 10, 1994]

                   The KGB and America's War on Drugs

                            (By Mark Almond)

       In all the fuss following the arrest of top CIA agent and 
     alleged Moscow mole Aldrich Ames, some key questions have 
     gone unasked. Media attention has focused on Mr. Ames's 
     activities as CIA head of Soviet counterintelligence, where 
     he allegedly betrayed to their deaths some 10 Soviets working 
     for America. But what Mr. Ames was doing after he left this 
     post has been largely ignored.
       Aldrich Ames was a key figure in the new American effort to 
     thwart the inflow of narcotics into the U.S. and impede the 
     corrupting influence of the drug barons. If his work in the 
     CIA's operations against drug trafficking was as controlled 
     by KGB agents as his earlier service, then the explosive 
     power of the Ames case doubles its force.
       During the late 1980s, the U.S. intelligence community 
     increasingly shifted its emphasis from classic espionage 
     against the Cold War rival to a new role in the war againt 
     drugs and organized crime. (Western European intelligence 
     agencies redeployed their resource, too.) In the happy dawn 
     of the New World Order, George Bush thought the CIA should 
     cooperate with its ex-rivals against common foes: organized 
     crime, terrorism and drug trafficking. Mr. Ames became head 
     of the CIA's narcotics intelligence department for the Black 
     Sea countries in 1990 after his service as 
     counterintelligence chief for Eastern Europe and the Soviet 
     Union.
       Yet all the while Mr. Ames was allegedly working for is old 
     KGB handlers.
       Could one explanation for America's sorry record in the war 
     on drugs be that its key intelligence was going to the other 
     side? Rumors in the 1980s about KGB or Cuban Involvement in 
     the drug trade were routinely pooh-poohed by State Department 
     and CIA types who could not imagine that their rivals were 
     anything other than sincere champions of another cause. Now 
     that the routine cynicism and corruption of the former Soviet 
     Union is widely acknowledged, it is time to ask whether some 
     of the cash to fund expensive KGB operations might come from 
     the world's most lucrative milk cow--the narco-business.
       Espionage experts have expressed surprise at the amount of 
     cash the KGB is alleged to have paid Mr. Ames, far more than 
     in most treason-for-money cases, in which the amounts are 
     often amazingly trivial. Fewer questions seem to have been 
     asked about whether the KGB was the only source of Mr. Ames's 
     affluence. It seems reasonable to ask whether his visits to 
     his second wife Maria's native Columbia might have given him 
     access to another source of income in return for information 
     about the CIA's antinarcotics drive.
       Another question suggests itself: Did Mr. Ames betray 
     anyone to the KGB in his new posting, as he allegedly did 
     while counterintelligence chief?
       Last August, in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, the 
     CIA's Fred Woodruff was shot dead while riding in the car of 
     the chief of the Georgian security service. A terrible 
     accident was the improbable verdict. But a week earlier, Mr. 
     Ames had been in Georgia. In addition to his mission to 
     provide U.S. training to Georgian security forces, Mr. 
     Woodruff was allegedly investigating Georgia's role as a 
     conduit of heroin from other ex-Soviet republics to the West.
       Some informed Georgians think that Mr. Woodruff had come to 
     believe that the men Washington had sent him to cooperate 
     with were in fact involved in the heroin shipments. Had Mr. 
     Woodruff reported this, Mr. Ames would have been the first 
     man in the CIA to receive his report.
       It is public knowledge in Georgia that the security forces 
     of Edward Shevardnadze's regime are involved in the 
     republic's rampant drug business. So severe has the problem 
     become that even Mr. Shevardnadze recently felt obliged to 
     undergo a heroin test to prove his credibility.
       As an ex-KGB general-turned-reformer who returned to his 
     native Georgia, Mr. Shevardnadze ought to be able to help the 
     Clinton administration clear up any connection between Mr. 
     Ames's visit to Georgia last year and the murder of CIA 
     station chief Woodruff. If Mr. Ames was betraying America's 
     war on drugs to the KGB, then the Clinton administration and 
     the West are starting into a deep and dark abyss.
       The venality of Aldrich Ames contrasts sharply with the 
     intense, if twisted, ideological treason of a Kim Philby. How 
     many other unhappily salaried Western intelligence officials 
     cooperating with the ex-KGB in the war on drugs have also 
     been tempted by the rich pickings of betrayal in the 
     postideological age?

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