Old Soldier Looks Back on Drug War

WASHINGTON (AP) â€” Barry McCaffrey says his experience at West Point did nothing to prepare him for the misery and human destruction that he's seen in his five years as the nation's anti-drug

Tuesday, December 19th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

WASHINGTON (AP) â€” Barry McCaffrey says his experience at West Point did nothing to prepare him for the misery and human destruction that he's seen in his five years as the nation's anti-drug chief.

``I never knew anybody who used cocaine or marijuana,'' he said. That goes for his high school and college days, too.

With his drug policy under fire from Republicans, President Clinton recruited McCaffrey as his drug-war point man 10 months before the 1996 election. At the time, McCaffrey was the youngest four-star general, and he retired from the Army to take the job.

``I've seen more misery in this job, more human destruction than I did in combat,'' said McCaffrey, who saw fighting in the Vietnam and Persian Gulf wars.

``There are 5 million chronically addicted Americans,'' he said. ``Each year, probably on the order of 52,000 die from some cause related to drug abuse.''

After McCaffrey's appointment, Congress promptly increased the drug-control budget. The result, McCaffrey says, was a 21 percent drop by narcotics use by 12- to 17-year olds.

``None of this would have happened without a 55 percent increase in drug prevention education funding,'' he said.

Statistics showing forward movement in the drug war â€” some predating his arrival â€” roll off McCaffrey's tongue.

``Casual cocaine use down by 70 percent in a decade,'' he said. ``Overall drug use down by 50 percent, drug-related murders down by 50 percent.''

The federal government reported earlier this month that teen-age drug use held steady in 2000, the fourth straight year it has either fallen or stayed the same. Smoking dropped significantly but use of the club drug ecstasy among eighth-, 10th- and 12th-graders climbed for the second year in a row.

The report also found the number of high school seniors using heroin hit its highest point since the survey began in 1975, and more 10th-graders are using steroids.

In an interview last week, the 58-year-old McCaffrey emphasized that the drug war must be waged across a broad front â€” at home, through education and treatment, and abroad through eradication and interdiction programs.

Perhaps the most controversial aspect of McCaffrey's tenure has been his support for a significant increase in U.S. help for the counterdrug effort in Colombia, the world's No. 1 producer and distributor of cocaine. The bulk of the $1.3 billion package is earmarked for the Colombian military.

Doubts about the program seem to be on the rise. To some, the Colombian military is too prone to human rights abuses to qualify for U.S. help. Others say the assistance could get the United States involved in Colombia's war with leftist insurgents.

And some skeptics worry that European donors and Colombia's South American neighbors have not been supportive enough.

McCaffrey has an answer: Just wait. When the Colombians receive U.S. spray aircraft next year, the equation will change, he says, particularly for the leftist FARC guerrillas who now make hundreds of millions off the narcotics trade each year.

These aircraft ``are going to descend on areas and knock out 10,000 hectares at a whack,'' McCaffrey said. ``It takes you 18 months of hard work with chain saws and sweat, living like an animal, to get a coca crop into production.

``Once you're persuaded that the government is going to intervene on month 15 and wreck your investment, you got to go to some other course of action.''

Perhaps the most difficult moment for McCaffrey occurred in February 1997 when Mexican Gen. Jesus Gutierrez Rebollo was ousted as Mexican drug czar on corruption charges just three months after he was appointed.

McCaffrey had seen the appointment as a breakthrough in the effort to reduce Mexico's role as a transit point for U.S.-bound cocaine. When Gutierrez was named to the job, McCaffrey praised him as a ``man of impeccable integrity.''

Myles Frechette, a former U.S. ambassador to Colombia, said that praise was one of several ``spectacular mistakes'' McCaffrey made in assessing Latin Americans.

``He absolutely never listened to good advice from people who understood the region much better than him,'' Frechette said. ``He never had more than, at best, a naive understanding of Latin America.''

But Frechette credits McCaffrey for emphasizing the important roles of treatment and education in the struggle against addiction, and for winning multiyear financing from Congress for counterdrug programs.

For these advances, he said, ``We all have to take our hats off to McCaffrey.''

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On the Net:

Drug Policy Office: http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/