From: [m--eg--n] at [ix.netcom.com](Marnie Regen )
Newsgroups: alt.drugs.culture,talk.politics.drugs,rec.drugs.cannabis,alt.drugs.pot,alt.crime,alt.law-enforcement
Subject: NBC: US-South America campaign to kill smugglers
Date: 6 Jan 1996 22:15:22 GMT

WASHINGTON (Reuter) - The United States is quietly directing Peru and 
Colombia in a campaign to shoot down planes operated by South American 
drug cartels, NBC News reported Friday. 
 
Quoting unidentified sources, the network said the Pentagon, the 
Customs Service and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) were involved
in directing tracking and intelligence gathering outposts in Peru and 
Colombia.  

With U.S. guidance, according to the report, Peru and Colombia have 
machine-gunned two dozen planes in flight and destroyed or confiscated 
70 others on the ground.  

NBC said each of the tracking stations was staffed with about 40 U.S. 
Army and Air Force troops who operate the surveillance gear. 
Officially, they work as advisers only.  

When a radar operator detects a suspicious aircraft, an American 
pursuit plane is called in. When the Americans are satisfied that they 
have locked on to a drug plane, the Peruvians scramble in lightly armed
attack planes for an aerial confrontation, NBC said.  

The Peruvian pilots first try to talk the suspect planes down, and if 
that fails, they fire a machine-gun burst as a warning. As a last 
resort, they fire on the aircraft, according to the report.  

NBC said the Pentagon was spending $120 million on the project. It 
added that, based on information provided by the Defense Intelligence 
Agency, the National Security Agency and the CIA, Peru and Colombia 
often bombed drug airfields and raided hideouts.