http://pjmedia.com/blog/coast-guard-warns-budget-shift-opens-u-s-to-more-smugglers/?print=1
WASHINGTON – The commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard warned a Senate panel on Tuesday that shifting the focus of the U.S. Navy from the Western Hemisphere to the Pacific region will lead to an uptick in drug smuggling.
Admiral Robert J. Papp, appearing before the Senate Subcommittee on Oceans, Atmosphere, Fisheries and Coast Guard to discuss the service’s 2014 budget request, said the service branch has worked cooperatively with the Navy on interdiction operations along Central American smuggling routes.
The Coast Guard, in fact, maintains law enforcement detachments on many Navy ships to strengthen efforts against transnational criminal organizations that “are financed by narcotics that arrive by way of the sea, leaving behind a wave of crime and instability in their wake.”
Drug smugglers, Papp said, are “growing smarter, bolder and they’re taking greater risk and increasing danger to our homeland.” But the Obama administration’s proposal to shift the focus of naval operations contained in the 2014 budget request means the Coast Guard won’t be able to rely to as great an extent on their detection and monitoring assistance in the Caribbean.
“Unfortunately, with the reduction of resources, my highest focus is for the Western Hemisphere – the arctic, closer to our shores and most notably in the Caribbean and the Eastern Pacific where we have the drug trafficking routes,” Papp said, adding that in past years the availability of Navy personnel and vessels “has been a force multiplier for us.”
“So the loss of the Navy ships in the Caribbean ultimately is just going to result in more drugs that are making it through,” Papp said.