Pubdate: Mon, 31 Jan 2011
Source: Lookout (CN BC)
Copyright: 2011 The Lookout
Contact:  http://www.lookoutnewspaper.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1178
Author: Ashley Milburn
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)

MARITIME DRUG TRAFFICKING

How Changes in Technology Are Making It Harder to Nab the Bad Guys

In 2010, the U.S. Coast Guard seized just over 90 tons of cocaine 
destined for U.S. shores, a haul valued at more than USD $3.5 billion.

However, in the multibillion-a-year U.S. cocaine industry, the Coast 
Guard's interdiction rate accounts for only 26 per cent of the 
estimated 350 tons of cocaine arriving in the U.S. each year; the 
sale of which supports both criminal and terrorist groups in Latin 
America and abroad.

The remaining supply, shipped from the Andean nations of Colombia, 
Peru and Bolivia through an intricate trafficking network that spans 
South, Central, and North America, is able to be delivered unhindered 
as a result of the traffickers' efforts to continually seek out more 
efficient and anonymous ways of transporting their product.

With large operating budgets, traffickers have proven their ability 
to develop and adopt new techniques that allow them to elude 
international maritime forces. However, while the evolution of their 
technology is a hallmark of the cat-and-mouse game of maritime drug 
trafficking, the discovery of a fully submersible submarine in a 
clandestine jungle shipyard in Ecuador last July was deemed a game changer.

In the past

Over the last 30 years, seafaring cocaine traffickers, who transport 
over 80 per cent of the cocaine arriving in the U.S., have made a 
living of finding ways to elude authorities. In the late 1990s 
"go-fast" boats began to replace airplanes as the main means for 
moving cocaine through the Caribbean, the primary trans-shipment zone 
of the day.

At the time, the favoured mode of transportation, the twin-engine 
light plane, could only carry up to 700 kilograms of cocaine, while 
go-fast boats provided an opportunity to move at least three times 
that amount. In addition, the fiberglass watercraft was capable of 
travelling up to 130 kilometres per hour and offered smugglers a 
speed advantage over the authorities.

Furthermore, with a price tag of $25,000, the boats were cheaper to 
acquire and operate than airplanes, and were considered to be a more 
disposable platform, an important characteristic given the fact that 
operators often scuttle their vessel after the shipment has been delivered.

However, the boats' large wakes made them easy to spot, and anti-drug 
agents, using helicopters and their own high-speed vessels - such as 
the Midnight Express speedboats that the U.S. supplied to the 
Colombian Navy in 2005 - became far more adept at spotting and 
intercepting the traffickers' vessels.

By the year 2000

By the turn of the century, Plan Colombia, the U.S. effort to fight 
the illegal drug trade in the number one cocaine producing country, 
was introduced, leading to a shift in trafficking routes from the 
Caribbean to the lightly patrolled Pacific.

In addition to the geographic shift, less conspicuous vessels, such 
as cargo ships and fishing vessels, became increasingly common means 
of transporting cocaine. Fishing vessels, usually equipped with 
sophisticated navigation and communication instruments, were popular 
as they did not require the type of refit work that would give away 
the vessel's role in smuggling operations, and allowed traffickers to 
transit long distances without attracting suspicion from authorities.

At the time, traffickers also became increasingly skilled at 
concealing their illicit cargo, hiding cocaine in compartments within 
fuel or ballast tanks, making it nearly impossible to locate the 
cache of drugs without emptying the fuel tanks - a move that violates 
U.S. environmental laws - or dismantling the vessel in question.

Also, traffickers using non-commercial vessels, such as pleasure 
yachts, opted to make their voyages during peak times, such as civic 
holidays, allowing them to better blend in with legal maritime traffic.

In addition, the use of multiple at-sea transfers, decoy vessels and 
logistics supply ships increased during the early 2000s, adding more 
complexity to maritime trafficking routes and challenging interdiction forces.

In the last five years

However, new rules implemented in 2007 that required fishing boats 
operating off of Colombia and Ecuador to carry GPS devices allowed 
police to better track vessel movements, and helped curb the number 
of commercial vessels being used by traffickers. Additionally, the 
Container Control Program (CCP), a joint initiative by the UN Office 
on Drugs and Crime and the World Customs Organization, that minimize 
the risk of maritime containers being commandeered by traffickers 
began to achieve measurable results: in the first three years since 
CCP operations began at the port of Guayaquil, Ecuador, almost 25 
tons of cocaine were seized.

The increased surveillance of commercial vessels is what authorities 
believe led traffickers to change course yet again, this time heading 
below the surface.

The arrival of semi-submersibles

In 2006, a U.S. Coast Guard cutter spotted the first semi-submersible 
boat, nicknamed "Bigfoot", off the coast of Costa Rica. Powered by a 
300-horsepower diesel motor and travelling 18 inches below the 
surface at about 12 kilometres an hour, Bigfoot was a sign that 
traffickers were opting for stealth over speed to evade authorities.

The 60-foot fiberglass vessels, painted in various shades of blue to 
blend into the ocean, can travel undetected by the human eye or 
surveillance systems for up to 2,000 nautical miles. The boat's tiny 
wake creates a negligible radar footprint, and because the exhaust is 
released through tubing below the surface and the boat has an upper 
lead shielding to minimize its heat signature, patrol aircraft are 
unable to rely on their heat-sensing equipment to locate the vessels.

Additionally, the boats, which are primarily built in jungle 
shipyards along the estuaries of Colombia's Pacific coast for 
approximately half a million dollars each, are capable of carrying up 
to 10 tons of cocaine. This is a haul that garners a street value of 
up to $550 million, more than 1,000 times the cost of the vessel, 
making it a highly lucrative conveyance method.

As a result of their stealth and return on investment, authorities 
believed that up to 70 percent of the 480 tons of cocaine leaving 
Colombia's Pacific coast in 2008 was packed aboard semi-submersibles.

With the UN estimating an interdiction success rate of only 14 
percent, Joint Interagency Task Force (JIATF) South, the Pentagon's 
anti-narcotics command centre, compared the task of patrolling for 
semi-submersibles to policing the entire United States with only 
three squad cars.

Policy changes

In addition, authorities also faced legal challenges in stopping the 
vessels as crews were able to avoid prosecution by simply scuttling 
the craft and sinking the drugs if spotted. However, in October 2008, 
a law passed by the U.S. Congress outlawing the use of 
semi-submersibles in international waters unless registered with a 
state, made it possible for authorities to convict a boat's crew on 
the basis of visual evidence that they were manning the subs.

The following year, SOUTHCOM, the command responsible for all U.S. 
military activity in South and Central America, reported a 46 percent 
decrease in the detection rate of semi-submersibles transiting the 
area, and the Colombian Navy only detected one semi-submersible in 
2010, down drastically from 22 seizures in 2009.

The lower detection rate was seen by SOUTHCOM and other agencies as 
an indication that traffickers were adapting yet again. However, it 
wasn't until July 2010, when the first fully functional, completely 
submersible "narco-sub" was discovered in an Ecuadorian jungle 
shipyard, that authorities' suspicions were confirmed.

Fully submerged

A proper diesel-electric submarine like the one discovered in Ecuador 
has the option of shutting down its engines and submerging fully to 
run on batteries, at which time it becomes completely invisible on 
radar and infrared. Such a capability means that interdiction forces 
can then only locate the sub by using sonar, which has a shorter 
range, is far less reliable, and requires the use of a greater number 
of assets.

In many ways, the move towards fully submersible submarines was an 
inevitable transition in the evolution of maritime drug trafficking 
technology. The technology is not overly advanced but its advanced 
covert qualities follow the trend of traffickers opting for stealth over speed.

Given that most Western navies still maintain significant 
anti-submarine forces, drug traffickers may find themselves forced to 
adapt their maritime strategy once again. While the Director of the 
U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency for the Andean Region, Jay Bergman, 
described the narco-sub as the "final frontier" for the maritime drug 
smugglers, historical trends indicate nothing is impossible in the 
multi-billion dollar cocaine trafficking industry.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom