Main Inter-Regional Aviation Page

The State Department's Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) carries out an "air wing" program in Central and South America, which maintains aircraft used for drug eradication and interdiction. These planes and helicopters, which remain under State Department ownership, are used for transportation of counterdrug forces, interdiction of drug smugglers, surveillance of drug cultivation, and eradication (fumigation) of illicit crops.

"Aerial eradication represents the most cost-effective method of illicit drug crop control, affording opportunities for large scale, fast moving campaigns," the 2000 INL Congressional Presentation indicates. "In those countries that have not yet initiated aerial eradication, aircraft are essential for transporting manual eradicators to otherwise inaccessible and/or unsecure drug growing areas."¹

The Interregional Aviation program, the Congressional Presentation explains, is focused on “Colombia, Bolivia and Peru, with temporary deployments of aircraft and personnel…elsewhere in the Andean region and Central America."²

The spray-plane pilots, as well as several trainers and maintenance workers, are employed by Dyncorp, a Virginia-based private defense contractor. The presence of contractors is being reduced in Bolivia and Peru, where contractors handle maintenance and logistics but do not fly the aircraft.

Contractors' role is increasing in Colombia, however, where they are responsible for flying planes, instructing Colombian pilots, maintenance, quality control, and procuring repair parts. Between eighty and ninety contract personnel are stationed in Colombia either temporarily or permanenly.³ The State Department estimates that the aerial eradication program in Colombia may cost as much as $68 million in 1999, an increase of about 350 percent over the $19.6 million spent in 1996.⁴U.S. contractor pilots flying State Department-owned T-65 and OV-10 “Bronco” spray planes fumigated over 65,000 hectares (160,618 acres) of coca in Colombia in 1998, and more acreage is expected in 1999.⁵ 

A-10 "Warthog" attack aircraft may be enlisted in the aerial spray operation in the year 2000. According to the conference committee report accompanying the 2000 Defense Department Appropriations bill, the chief counternarcotics officials at the Departments of State and Defense are to submit a report to Congress on the cost-effectiveness of transferring refurbished A-10s "for the Department of State's coca eradication mission in Colombia." The A-10, according to a U.S. Air Force fact sheet, is "specially designed for close air support of ground forces."⁶ If the officials' report recommends the transfer of A-10s, the committee directs them to use $5 million of Defense Department counter-drug funds for this purpose. The report is due thirty days after the appropriations bill's enactment, or November 24, 1999.

The spray program involves some risk, as Colombian guerrilla groups are present in most of the areas being fumigated. Aircraft on spray operations were hit by hostile fire, most of it small-arms fire, fifty-one times in 1997 and forty-eight times in 1998.⁷ For their protection, U.S.-funded Colombian police planes and helicopters escort the contract pilots on their spray sorties.

Critics of the program contend that glyphosate fumigation frequently destroys legal crops, may cause health and environmental problems, causes displacement of local populations, and has little effect on the amount of land under illicit cultivation. Many propose a greater emphasis on crop substitution programs.

Sources:

¹United States, Department of State, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, Fiscal Year 2000 Budget Congressional Presentation (Washington: Department of State: March 1999): 79 <http://www.state.gov/www/global/narcotics_law/fy2000_budget/latin_america.html>.

² Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, Fiscal Year 2000 Budget Congressional Presentation 81.

³United States, General Accounting Office, “Drug Control: Narcotics Threat From Colombia Continues to Grow,”  Report to Congressional Requesters no. GAO/NSIAD-99-136, Washington, June 1999 <http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/useftp.cgi?IPaddress=162.140.64.21&filename=ns99136.txt&directory=/diskb/wais/data/gao> Adobe Acrobat (pdf) version <http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/useftp.cgi?IPaddress=162.140.64.21&filename=ns99136.pdf&directory=/diskb/wais/data/gao>.

⁴General Accounting Office.

⁵United States Air Force, "A-10/OA-10 Thunderbolt II - Fact Sheet" <http://www.af.mil/news/factsheets/A_10_OA_10_Thunderbolt_II.html>.

⁶United States, Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, Department of State, International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, 1997, Washington, March 1998, March 2, 1998 <http://www.state.gov/www/global/narcotics_law/1997_narc_report/index.html>.

“The Evolving Drug Threat in Colombia And Other South American Source Zone Nations,” Statement by General Barry R. McCaffrey, Director, Office of National Drug Control Policy, before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Washington, October 6, 1999 <http://www.usia.gov/regional/ar/colombia/mcaf06.htm>.

⁷General Accounting Office.