[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 155 (Friday, November 7, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Page S11947]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          NATIONAL DRUG POLICY

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I rise this afternoon to commend and 
strongly support Gen. Barry McCaffrey, Director of the Office of 
National Drug Policy Control, in his call for increased funds for the 
drug interdiction effort. I have been one who has been most critical 
over the low priority effort that has been made to stop the flow of 
drugs into this country. The recent series in the Washington Post--I 
think it was five articles--pointed out that anywhere from 5 to 7 tons 
a day of heavy narcotics is flowing into our country.
  General McCaffrey reports that he has been visiting at least four 
Cabinet Secretaries, including the Cabinet Secretary representing 
Defense, to really ask for moneys to increase the interdiction efforts 
with respect to hard narcotics.
  I, who have criticized, must also be one who stands and supports 
this. Later today, Senator Coverdell and I, and I hope the 
distinguished Senator from Iowa, Senator Grassley, who has just come to 
the floor, will be joining in a letter to the Secretary, also 
indicating our support.
  General McCaffrey insists that he cannot certify the Pentagon's 
requested budget for fiscal 1999 unless it includes $141 million in 
additional drug interdiction funding. I believe the general is right in 
taking this action. I urge the administration to support him.
  While highlighting the fact that other Federal agencies have 
increased their counternarcotics spending at a faster rate, the general 
has asked that the Defense Department increase the amount it spends for 
the drug fight in four key areas.
  The first is Andean coca reduction. He is asking for an increase of 
$75 million to carry on the drug fight in the Andes region, where 
American and local officials are working in cooperation to disrupt the 
cocaine export industry.
  National Guard counterdrug operations--he is asking for an increase 
of $30 million to support antidrug activities of the National Guard 
that partially restores reductions incurred since 1993 in State plans 
funding, which include support for counterdrug activities along the 
border.
  Third, he is asking for an increase of $12 million for a program to 
intercept traffickers in the Caribbean Basin, including southern 
Florida, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the eastern 
Caribbean. This would implement commitments made by the President 
during the Caribbean summit in Barbados.
  And he is asking for money for Mexican initiatives, an increase of 
$24 million to provide additional resources to reduce the flow of 
illicit drugs from Mexico and for a drug training program for Mexican 
officials so that they can locate and arrest drug traffickers and money 
launderers at the border.
  The point that General McCaffrey makes, that I think is so important, 
is although the domestic funding of domestic agencies to fight drugs 
has gone up, the Defense Department funding, which is really the 
interdiction funding--the air surveillance, the radar, the trafficking, 
those thing that is going into really cutting off the flow of 
narcotics--has gone down by 2 percent this year. If you look at a chart 
of its decline over a period of years you will see where it went up to 
a high in 1992, came dramatically down by 1994, and has remained 
virtually flat, even declining some more, between 1995 and 1999. So the 
current DOD budget is only 1.3 percent higher than fiscal year 1990.
  We were told we have 5 to 7 tons of cocaine and hard narcotics coming 
in over our border a day. And yet, the DOD budget is only 1.3 percent 
higher in these areas than it was in 1990. That is less than a single 
year of inflation.

  So, I think the head of this Office of Drug Control has a very, very 
good point in asking for this money and, frankly, for really putting 
his foot down. Many of us in the Senate have been after him to be more 
vigorous to stop the flow of narcotics: ``Why don't you do something 
about it? Why don't you see that the air and sea and land interdiction 
is beefed up?'' He can't do that without the resources to do it.
  Mr. President, I happen to believe in terms of the appropriateness of 
it being in the Defense Department budget, that there is no threat to 
America's national security equal to the threat of drugs. Tens of 
thousands of people are killed in this country from drugs. Hundreds of 
thousands of lives in this country are ruined by drugs. It is largely 
responsible today for the crime rate in virtually every community 
throughout this Nation. It is a driving force and a central drawing 
card for the gang movement in the United States and its spread across 
State lines.
  The cartels have flourished because of it, and with it has come some 
of the most violent actions which anyone can possibly conceive: 
prosecutors killed, attorneys threatened. Just today, if you pick up 
the newspaper, you will see one of the cartel leaders, Amado Carrillo 
Fuentes, who underwent plastic surgery. The doctors who performed that 
surgery disappeared. Their bodies were just found. Their fingernails 
had been pulled out. Their bodies were covered with burns. The garrote 
still remained around their neck. And this is everyday action 
surrounding drugs, the movement of drugs and the activities of the five 
big Mexican cartels.
  All of this has created increased and, I think, unnecessary tensions 
between two countries, neighboring countries--the United States and 
Mexico--who should be good friends and working together. We can't work 
together without the resources to carry out the job well. No Nation 
today, again, presents the threat to this Nation's national security as 
does the heavy flow of narcotics into this country.
  So I am very proud, and Senator Coverdell and I will be issuing a 
joint press statement indicating our strong support for this action. We 
want a standup drug czar. We want him to call it as he sees it. We want 
him to take forceful action wherever that action is needed.
  I am proud to stand here representing one of the States that is 
impacted in a major way by drugs, to say both to the Secretary of 
Defense and to the President of the United States, ``Please support the 
drug czar in his request for these additional moneys. They are 
necessary for him to do the job.''
  I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.
  Mr. GRASSLEY addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.

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