SEAPOWER Magazine Online: The U.S. Coast Guard says it’s not enough to seize thousands of pounds of cocaine at sea or even arrest the people transporting illegal drugs by boat. Instead, it’s crucial to defeat the transnational organized crime (TOC) networks behind the illicit commerce in narcotics and people, according to the Coast Guard’s Western Hemisphere Strategy.
“Last year alone. the Coast Guard took 91 metric tons of cocaine out of the [trafficking] stream,” Lt. Cmdr. Devon Brennan told a briefing on the first day of the Navy League’s Sea-Air-Space Exposition. He noted that is three times the amount of drugs seized by all U.S. law enforcement agencies “including along the southwestern border.”
But Brennan, from the Office of Law Enforcement at Coast Guard headquarters in Washington, noted “it’s not the end of the game.”
The Western Hemisphere Strategy, released by Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Paul Zukunft in September, focuses on three broadly defined priorities for safeguarding the Western Hemisphere: combating criminal networks, securing borders and safeguarding commerce.
Focusing on the first priority in his briefing Monday/April 13, Brennan said just getting the drugs before they hit American streets “is not the main goal.”
Instead, the Hemisphere Strategy calls for better intelligence and better communication with U.S. law enforcement as well as international partners to attack transnational organized crime on many fronts.
