TNAG-0415-FCO40-461-Review-of-narcotics-problem-in-Hong-Kong-1973 — Page 50

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CONCLUSIONS

(1) The Cabinet Committee on International Narcotics Control, which is responsible for the formulation and coordination of all policies and programs relating to the fight against the illegal entry of narcotics into the United States, is both inefficient and ineffec- tive. Comprised of autonomous departments, bureaus, and agen- cies of the Federal Government, the Committee conducts its busi- ness on a person-to-person level rather than institutionally, U.S. anti-narcotics programs, therefore, are often forraulated in an ad hoc fashion rather than upon a well conceived, well thought out, well coordinated manner. As a result the following question. able decisions and programs have emerged:

(a) Yet another intelligence group, the Office of National Narcotics Intelligence (ONNI) has been formed in spite of the fact that the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs' Office of Strategic Intelligence (OSI) was already in existence and possessed the necessary intelligence capabilities which must be developed by the new group before it can operate at all.

(b) Twenty-five Custors agents have been sent overseas to collect narcotics intelligence. This program will result in a duplication of effort. The Central Intelligence Agency, the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs (BNDD), the De- partment of State, and other U.S. Government agencies are already collecting such intelligence. The problem in the past was not a lack of intelligence but an inability to exploit it properly.

(c) BNDD and Customs agents in foreign posts are involved in intelligence collection efforts although many of them do not speak the language of the country in which they operate.

(d) The decision to`make a preemptive purchase of opium from the Chinese Irregular Forces in northern Thailand set a bad precedent which could encourage increased production in the Golden Triangle.

(2) In Southeast Asia, where most of the world's illicit opiates are produced, all U.S. Mission components have been mobilized in the fight to suppress the narcotics traffic, Coordination both within the missions and between the missions and most host gov. ernments has improved over the past several months. There is no evidence that any U.S. Government agency is implicated in the narcotics traffic in Southeast Asia.

(3) The use of opium has been accepted and tolerated in many Southeast Asian countries. These attitudes are beginning to change as a result of the increasing use of heroin among the area's youth and there is a growing willingness to cooperate with the United States and the U.N. in international efforts to control the production of and trafficking in opiates.

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