We have obtained and posted a report, required by this year's Defense Authorization law and released in March, detailing some of the Defense Department's counter-drug aid to Latin America and the rest of the world. The report [5.4 megabyte PDF download] covers aid provided in 2007.
The law (Section 1024 of the 2007 National Defense Authorization Act) requires the Defense Department to provide Congress with a country-by-country accounting of all counter-drug military and police assistance it provides overseas. This would mean all aid authorized by the "Section 1004" counter-drug assistance program and the related "Section 1033" program - two authorities that were created on a temporary basis in the 1990s and continue to be renewed regularly.
What was submitted to Congress, however, is far from an accounting of all Defense Department aid. This report, like the 2005 report available here [PDF], only covers Defense Department aid for construction projects. While this is certainly interesting, construction aid is only a fraction of what the Defense Department offers Latin American and Caribbean militaries and police forces for counter-drug purposes.
The Defense Department may use its budget to provide the following kinds of military and police aid:
1. Maintenance, repair and upgrading of loaned Defense Department equipment;
2. Maintenance, repair and upgrading of other equipment;
3. Transportation of personnel, supplies and equipment within or outside the United States;
4. Establishment and operation of bases of operation or training facilities within or outside the United States;
5. Training of law enforcement personnel, both foreign and domestic;
6. Detection and monitoring of narcotics related traffic coming into the United States;
7. Construction of roads and fences and installation of lighting to block drug smuggling across U.S. borders;
8. Establishment of command, control, communication and computer networks for improved integration of law enforcement, active military, and National Guard activities;
9. Linguistics and intelligence; and
10. Aerial and ground reconnaissance.
The newly acquired report only captures aid authorized by numbers 4 and 7 above. As a result, it lists only $4.855 million in Defense Department aid to Colombia in 2007, via seven construction projects. Yet a different document, acquired via a FOIA request issued by the Fellowship of Reconciliation, shows Colombia receiving Defense Department assistance totaling $107.332 million in 2007.
The report, while incomplete, nonetheless provides an interesting picture of U.S.-funded military construction projects in the region, including at the three Forward Operating Locations (Manta, Ecuador; Comalapa, El Salvador; and Aruba and Curacao, Netherlands Antilles.) Excerpted below is the section of the report detailing aid to Latin America and the Caribbean.
