Study Assails ‘Fragmented’ War on Drugs

WASHINGTON —  Federal officials are intercepting only a small percentage of narcotics being smuggled into the United States at least in part because the responsibilities for detection are fragmented and poorly organized among the Customs Service, the Coast Guard and other agencies, a new congressional study says.

The study by the Office of Technology Assessment, to be presented this morning to the Senate Governmental Affairs permanent subcommittee on investigations, concludes that Customs Service and Coast Guard officers “have seized increasing quantities of drugs over the past five years”--spending nearly $800 million on interdiction efforts in the last year alone.

Drug Imports Rising

However, the report notes that “illegal drug imports appear to be increasing” as federal agencies mount “fragmented and overlapping” attacks on drug traffickers, who usually outwit them.

Illegal sales of cocaine, heroin and marijuana totaled about $50 billion in this country in 1985, the last year for which estimates were available, the study said. It provided no estimate on the share of shipments intercepted, saying only that it was “a small percentage.”

The evaluation, a copy of which was obtained by The Times, was commissioned by Congress last year in conjunction with the federal government’s intensified crackdown on drug smuggling and drug abuse.

Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), the subcommittee chairman, has summoned Customs Commissioner William von Raab to a hearing this morning to receive his response to the criticism. The Customs Service was allotted $25 million in the Anti-Drug Abuse Act approved by Congress last fall to set up a “command, control, communications and intelligence system” to direct federal interdiction efforts.

Despite the Customs Service’s efforts to establish this system, “no central authority addresses important strategic questions on priorities and resource allocation,” the study said.

Problems Occur

In addition, “problems with interagency coordination and cooperation occur” among the Customs Service, the Coast Guard and the Defense Department, which understands the proper use of radar and surveillance aircraft better than the other agencies, the report said.

The study did not specify examples of the hampered efforts, but said that some enforcement programs have not been effective and that resources and manpower have been wasted.

Meanwhile, Reps. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) and Benjamin A. Gilman (R-N.Y.) charged Tuesday that the Administration is not doing enough to combat Latin American drug smuggling and called on President Reagan to convene a “regional summit” on the problem.

Confer With Leaders

The congressmen made their remarks after returning from a trip in which they conferred with the leaders of five South American nations.

“I’m convinced this Administration has to be shaken by listening to these leaders to see how helpless they are,” said Rangel, chairman of the House Select Committee on Narcotics Abuse and Control. “We were meeting with people whose whole system is held hostage by narcotics. We must respond to this clear and present danger presented by the traffickers to the national security of the nations of the Western Hemisphere.”

Rangel and Gilman, ranking minority member on the House Committee on Drug Abuse and Control, represented House Speaker Jim Wright (D-Tex.) at a meeting of the Andean Parliament last weekend in Bogota, Colombia. The parliament is made up of legislators from Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela. The congressmen also met with Colombian President Virgilio Barco.

Staff writer Victor Hull contributed to this story.