Pullout From Panama Hampering Drug War

The closure of U.S. military bases in Panama last year has opened a “window of opportunity” in western Colombia for drug smugglers, this country’s defense minister told a small group of foreign reporters Friday.

Meanwhile, U.S. military officials reluctantly acknowledged that agreements permitting them to use airfields in Ecuador and the Dutch Caribbean islands of Curacao and Aruba have not yet compensated for the loss of Howard Air Force Base, which ceased air operations as part of the treaty relinquishing control of the Panama Canal. Talks are still underway for the use of a fourth airfield in Central America, probably in Honduras or El Salvador, Steve Lucas, spokesman for the U.S. Southern Command, said in a telephone interview from Miami. The Southern Command oversees U.S. security interests in Latin America.

“They will eventually substitute” for Howard, Lucas said, adding, “There is still work to be done to bring [the foreign airfields] up to conditions that we can safely operate.”

In Colombia, Defense Minister Luis Fernando Ramirez said the loss of air support from bases that once operated in Panama has hampered anti-narcotics efforts.

“There’s a window of opportunity for a lot of people to leave through the west,” he said, referring to drug traffickers transporting cocaine and heroin.

U.S. planes once based in Panama are now in Miami, and they take so long to get to Colombia--several hours--that drug smuggling aircraft can escape, Ramirez said.

Colombia supplies three-quarters of the cocaine and a growing share of the heroin consumed in the United States.

Ramirez spoke shortly after the national police took reporters to an opium poppy fumigation demonstration that showcased three new Black Hawk helicopters donated by the United States. Colombia would receive 30 additional Black Hawks and 32 Huey helicopters for anti-narcotics work if Congress approves a proposed $1.6-billion aid package.

Other anti-drug aircraft include sophisticated spy planes such as the De Havilland RC-7, which crashed in the jungle last July, killing five Americans and two Colombian pilots.

Those planes are among the aircraft that cannot safely take off and land on the Ecuador airfield, Lucas said. However, he added, “Those planes are still operating in the area, and I believe the Colombian defense minister knows that.”

Lucas would not specify where the planes operate from, but he said the U.S. military flies joint missions with the Colombian armed forces from Colombian air bases.

U.S. officials have estimated that it will cost $122 million to widen and otherwise improve foreign airfields so that a wide variety of aircraft can safely use them. Most of that investment will go to the airfield in Manta, Ecuador, where two or three types of aircraft can operate safely now, Lucas said.

However, he noted that, once the improvements are made, the annual cost to the United States of operations at all four airfields is expected to be $14 million to $18 million. In the last full year that Howard Air Force Base functioned, the operations cost there totaled $75.8 million, Lucas said.