Pubdate: Wed, 27 Aug 2003 Source: Sacramento Bee (CA) Copyright: 2003 The Sacramento Bee Contact: http://www.sacbee.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/376 Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?172 (Peruvian Aircraft Shooting) DON'T SHOOT FIRST Drug Interdiction Should Avoid Deadly Force An American Baptist missionary and her infant daughter were killed 2 1/2 years ago when a Peruvian air force pilot shot down a small plane -- even after U.S. intelligence monitors expressed doubts that the craft might not be engaged in drug-running, as first suspected. That led to a suspension of such flights, in Peru and in Colombia, and an admonition by a Senate committee that they not resume until strict safeguards were in place to avoid a tragic recurrence, and even then that the shoot-down policy be reconsidered. That's still good advice. But now Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld says the Bush administration supports a Colombian plan to resume drug interdiction flights employing deadly force, and the New York Times quotes officials as saying a resumption is also likely in Peru. Congress must demand a thorough briefing on exactly what's planned. That's especially important in light of an apparent shift of virtually all responsibility for interdiction to Colombia, thus effectively immunizing the U.S. government against lawsuits in the case of any future harm to U.S. citizens. The enduring question remains: Why is it necessary to shoot down a plane based on assumptions that any plane fitting the profile of drug-runners must be guilty? Forcing a plane to land, which in some cases is done, is preferable when innocent lives may be at stake and there's no imminent danger to anyone. The anti-drug war can be fought without resorting to shoot-first, ask-questions-afterward tactics. A recent United Nations report says that during a period roughly coinciding with the suspension of drug interdiction flights, plantings of coca -- the raw material for cocaine -- in Colombia have fallen by 30 percent while seizures of processed cocaine have increased by a comparable figure. That's encouraging, and reinforces the principle that taking deadly action on the basis of profiling and suspicions is not justified. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom