COUNTERNARCOTICS

Overview of U.S. 

Efforts in the Western 

Hemisphere

Report to the Ranking Member,

Committee on Foreign Affairs, 

House of Representatives

October 2017

GAO-18-10

United States Government Accountability Office
United States Government Accountability Office

Highlights of GAO-18-10, a report to the 

Ranking Member, Committee on Foreign 

Affairs, House of Representatives

October 2017

COUNTERNARCOTICS 

Overview of U.S. Efforts in the Western Hemisphere

What GAO Found

U.S. agencies implementing the National Drug Control Strategy identified billions

in spending for Western Hemisphere counternarcotics efforts in fiscal years 2010 

through 2015. Agencies that track their counternarcotics spending regionally—

the Department of Defense (DOD), the Department of Homeland Security’s 

(DHS) Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Department of State, and the 

U.S. Agency for International Development—reported spending nearly $5 billion 

for such activities in the region during this period. Agencies that do not track 

counternarcotics spending regionally—DHS’s Customs and Border Protection 

and Coast Guard; and the Department of Justice’s Drug Enforcement 

Administration and Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces—reported 

spending about $34 billion for counternarcotics activities in fiscal years 2010 

through 2015. According to officials of these four agencies, most of their 

counternarcotics activities are in the Western Hemisphere. We are not reporting 

Federal Bureau of Investigation counternarcotics spending separately, since it is 

included as part of Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces.

The Drug Interdiction Cycle

The Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), which coordinates the 

National Drug Control Program, facilitates the sharing of best practices and 

lessons learned at meetings such as the North American Drug Dialogue 

workshop, including Canada, Mexico, and the United States. In addition, 7 of the 

10 agencies GAO reviewed described processes they have in place for 

identifying and collecting best practices or lessons learned from counternarcotics 

efforts in the Western Hemisphere. For example, DOD reported using a process, 

known as the Joint Lessons Learned Program, that consists of five phases: 

discovery, validation, resolution, evaluation, and dissemination.

U.S. agencies use a variety of mechanisms to address changing narcotics 

conditions in the Western Hemisphere. ONDCP collaborates with agencies 

working directly on regional counternarcotics efforts to address emerging threats,

as reflected in the annually updated National Drug Control Strategy and the 

Southwest Border Counternarcotics Strategy. In addition, documentary evidence 

GAO reviewed showed that a variety of interagency groups, task forces, and 

committees have been created to coordinate the U.S. government’s responses 

to counternarcotics threats. For example, the National Heroin Coordination 

Group was established to provide guidance aimed at reducing the growing 

supply of heroin and illicit fentanyl in the U.S. market.

View GAO-18-10. For more information, 

contact Jessica Farb at (202) 512-6991, or 

farbj@gao.gov. 

Why GAO Did This Study

Western Hemisphere nations such as 

Mexico and Colombia are major 

sources of illicit drugs such as cocaine, 

heroin, methamphetamine, and 

marijuana. Precursor chemicals used 

in the production of illicit fentanyl and 

other dangerous synthetic drugs often 

originate in China but typically enter 

the United States through Canada and 

Mexico. U.S. agencies implementing 

the National Drug Control Strategy

conduct several activities to disrupt the 

flow of illicit drugs and dismantle the 

organizations that control them (see 

fig.). In December 2016, Congress 

established the Western Hemisphere 

Drug Policy Commission to, among 

other things, evaluate the U.S.-funded 

counternarcotics programs in the 

Western Hemisphere.

In this context, GAO was asked to 

review key issues related to U.S. 

counternarcotics efforts in the Western 

Hemisphere. This report examines (1) 

U.S. agencies’ spending for 

counternarcotic efforts in the Western 

Hemisphere during fiscal years 2010-

2015, the most recent data available;

(2) how agencies are gathering and 

sharing best practices and lessons 

learned from their counternarcotics 

efforts domestically and internationally;

and (3) mechanisms U.S. agencies 

have used to address changing drug 

threats. GAO analyzed agencies’ data 

and documents, interviewed agency 

officials, and conducted fieldwork at 

the U.S. Southern Command and Joint 

Interagency Task Force South in 

Florida.

GAO is not making any 

recommendations in this report.

Several agencies provided technical 

comments on a draft of this report 

which we incorporated as appropriate.
Page i GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Letter 1

Background 4

U.S. Agencies Identified Billions of Dollars in Spending Primarily 

or Partially for Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics Efforts for 

2010 through 2015 9

Agencies Reported Collecting and Disseminating Best Practices 

and Lessons Learned Related to Counternarcotics Efforts 18

U.S. Agencies Use Various Mechanisms to Address Changing 

Counternarcotics Conditions in the Western Hemisphere 23

Agency Comments 32

Appendix I Objectives, Scope, and Methodology 34

Appendix II U.S. Agencies That Conduct Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics 

Activities 40

Appendix III Selected Agencies’ Obligations for Counternarcotics Activities in 

Fiscal Years 2010-2015 43

Appendix IV U.S. Agencies’ Planning for Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics 

Efforts 51

Appendix V U.S. Agencies’ Cooperation with Foreign Partners to Reduce Drug 

Trafficking in the Western Hemisphere 55

Appendix VI GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments 62

Tables

Table 1: U.S. Agencies That Report Allocated Resources for 

Counternarcotics Intelligence, Interdiction, International, 

and Investigations Program Areas to ONDCP 9

Contents
Page ii GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Table 2: Spending Identified for Western Hemisphere 

Counternarcotics Activities by Agencies That Track Funds 

by Region, Fiscal Years 2010-2015 10

Table 3: Counternarcotics Obligations for Agencies That Do Not 

Track Spending by Region, Fiscal Years 2010-2015 14

Table 4: Department of Defense (DOD) Obligations for Drug 

Resources in the Western Hemisphere, by Geographic 

Command, Fiscal Years 2010-2015 43

Table 5: Department of Defense (DOD) Obligations for CountrySpecific Train-and-Equip Counternarcotics Activities in the 

Western Hemisphere, Fiscal Years 2013-2015 44

Table 6: Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) 

Expenditures for Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics 

Investigations and Intelligence Activities, by Country, 

Fiscal Years 2010-2015 45

Table 7: Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Obligations for 

Personnel Stationed in Countries in the Western 

Hemisphere, Fiscal Years 2010-2015 46

Table 8: Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Expenditures for 

Organized Crimine Drug Enforcement Task Forces 

Program Drug-Related Investigations of Transnational 

Crime Organizations in the Western Hemisphere, Fiscal 

Years 2010-2015 48

Table 9: Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement 

Affairs (INL) Obligations for Counternarcotics Activities in 

the Western Hemisphere, Fiscal Years 2010-2015 49

Table 10: U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) 

Obligations for Alternative Development Programs in the 

Western Hemisphere, Fiscal Years 2010-2015 49

Figure

Figure 1: Map of Major Drug-Producing and Drug-Transit 

Countries in the Western Hemisphere 5
Page iii GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Abbreviations

CBP Customs and Border Protection

DEA Drug Enforcement Administration

DHS Department of Homeland Security

DOD Department of Defense

DOJ Department of Justice

FARC Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia

FBI Federal Bureau of Investigation

HIDTA High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas

HSI Homeland Security Investigations

ICE Immigration and Customs Enforcement

INL Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement 

Affairs

OCDETF Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces

ONDCP Office of National Drug Control Policy

State Department of State

USAID U.S. Agency for International Development

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Page 1 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

441 G St. N.W.

Washington, DC 20548

October 13, 2017

The Honorable Eliot Engel

Ranking Member

Committee on Foreign Affairs

House of Representatives

Dear Mr. Engel:

Most of the illicit drugs consumed in the United States originate in other 

Western Hemisphere nations. For example, Mexico is the primary 

supplier of heroin and a major source of methamphetamine smuggled into 

this country. Similarly, Colombia is the leading producer of cocaine for the 

U.S. market. Moreover, illicit drugs or components manufactured in other 

parts of the world are smuggled into the United States through Western 

Hemisphere countries. For example, according to the Drug Enforcement 

Administration (DEA), precursor chemicals used in the production of illicit 

fentanyl often originate in China but typically enter the United States 

through Canada and Mexico.

U.S. government efforts to reduce the trafficking of illicit drugs from other 

Western Hemisphere countries have included the establishment of the 

Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP). ONDCP is responsible 

for, among other things, developing the National Drug Control Strategy (in 

this report, “the Strategy”) and coordinating the efforts of National Drug 

Control Program agencies implementing any aspect of the Strategy.1 In 

addition, to bring attention to these and other challenges posed by illicit 

drug production and trafficking in the Western Hemisphere and to identify 

options for strengthening U.S. counternarcotics efforts in the region, 

Congress mandated the establishment of the Western Hemisphere Drug 

Policy Commission in December 2016.2 The commission is directed to, 

 1

“The National Drug Control Program” means programs, policies, and activities 

undertaken by National Drug Control Program agencies related to their responsibilities 

under the National Drug Control Strategy, including activities involving demand and supply 

reduction or state, local, and tribal affairs. “National Drug Control Program agency” means 

any agency that is responsible for implementing any aspect of the National Drug Control 

Strategy, subject to certain exceptions regarding intelligence agencies. See 21 U.S.C. § 

1701. 

2

Department of State Authorities Act, Fiscal Year 2017, Pub. L. No. 114-323, § 601 et 

seq. 

Letter
Page 2 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

among other things, evaluate U.S.-funded international counternarcotics 

programs in the Western Hemisphere, including drug interdiction, crop 

eradication, alternative development, drug production surveys, police and 

justice sector training, demand reduction, and strategies to target drug 

kingpins.

You asked us to review key issues related to U.S. counternarcotics efforts 

in the Western Hemisphere. This report describes (1) U.S. agencies’

spending for counternarcotics efforts in the Western Hemisphere in fiscal 

years 2010 through 2015, (2) agencies’ efforts to gather and share best 

practices and lessons learned from their counternarcotics efforts both 

domestically and internationally, and (3) mechanisms that agencies have 

used to address changing drug threats.

To examine U.S. agencies’ counternarcotics spending in the Western 

Hemisphere, we obtained obligations data from eight U.S. departments, 

agencies, and components that implement the National Drug Control 

Strategy (collectively in this report, “agencies”): (1) the Department of 

Defense (DOD); the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) (2) 

Customs and Border Protection (CBP), (3) Immigration and Customs 

Enforcement (ICE), and (4) Coast Guard; the Department of Justice’s 

(DOJ) (5) DEA and (6) Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces 

(OCDETF); the Department of State’s (State) (7) Bureau of International 

Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL); and (8) the U.S. Agency for 

International Development (USAID). We selected these eight agencies 

because each conducts international counternarcotics efforts in one or 

more program areas that the Western Hemisphere Drug Policy 

Commission has been asked to review3 and because each agency 

allocated a combined total of $50 million for counternarcotics efforts in the

four ONDCP-defined program areas—intelligence, interdiction, 

international, and investigations—in fiscal year 2015. We worked with 

agency officials to determine the amounts obligated (i.e., spent) for 

counternarcotics activities in the Western Hemisphere in fiscal years 2010 

through 2015, the most recent data available at the time of our analysis. 

 3

In December 2016, Congress passed legislation (Pub. L. No. 114-323) to establish an 

independent drug commission, called the Western Hemisphere Drug Policy Commission, 

to conduct a comprehensive review of U.S. foreign policy in the Western Hemisphere and 

to identify policy and program options to improve existing international counternarcotics 

policy. The legislation directs the commission to review U.S.-funded international illicit 

drug control programs in the Western Hemisphere, including drug interdiction, crop 

eradication, alternative development, drug production surveys, police and justice sector 

training, demand reduction, and strategies to target drug kingpins. 
Page 3 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

We excluded ONDCP from this analysis because it plays a supporting 

role as the agency that coordinates the National Drug Control Program

and does not conduct counternarcotics activities in the Western 

Hemisphere. In addition, although the Federal Bureau of Investigation 

(FBI) conducts counternarcotics-related investigations of transnational 

criminal organizations4 in the Western Hemisphere, we are not reporting 

the FBI’s counternarcotics spending separately because the FBI is 

reimbursed by OCDETF for its support of drug-related investigations; 

therefore, we are including the FBI’s counternarcotics spending in 

OCDETF spending. Because some agencies do not track their 

counternarcotics spending by region, we were unable to identify 

obligations specific to these agencies’ counternarcotics activities in the 

Western Hemisphere. Also, to the extent possible, we excluded spending 

for activities primarily related to domestically focused U.S. 

counternarcotics activities. On the basis of our review of the data, our 

review of each agency’s annual accounting of its drug budget,5 and 

interviews with agency officials, we determined that the data were 

sufficiently reliable to present obligations that were primarily or partially 

spent on counternarcotic activities in the Western Hemisphere.

To examine agencies’ efforts to gather and share best practices and 

lessons learned, we sent a standard set of questions to, and interviewed, 

officials of the eight selected agencies as well as ONDCP and the FBI 

regarding any processes they use to identify, collect, disseminate, and 

share best practices and lessons learned with partner nations and 

regarding U.S. government–wide efforts to share best practices and 

lessons learned.

To identify the mechanisms that the eight agencies, ONDCP, and the FBI 

have used to address changing drug threats, we interviewed agency 

officials about the mechanisms in place to address these threats. We also 

reviewed key national documents directing U.S. counternarcotics efforts 

as well as documents related to various coordination efforts. In addition, 

 4

Transnational criminal organizations are a major threat to national and international 

security, and these networks are involved in a wide range of illicit activities, including drug 

trafficking. Proceeds from the sale of illicit narcotics are also a core enabler of the most 

dangerous transnational organized crime networks that threaten U.S. security interests. 

5

All drug control program agencies are required to submit to the Director of ONDCP a 

detailed accounting, which has been authenticated by the Inspector General of each 

agency prior to submission, of all funds expended by the agency for their counternarcotics 

activities during the previous fiscal year. See 21 U.S.C. § 1704(d).
Page 4 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

we conducted fieldwork at DOD’s U.S. Southern Command and the Joint 

Interagency Task Force South in Florida. For a more detailed discussion 

of our scope and methodology, see appendix I.

We conducted this performance audit from August 2016 to October 2017 

in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. 

Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain 

sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our 

findings and based on our audit objectives. We believe that the evidence 

obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions 

based on our audit objectives.

The majority of illicit drugs consumed in the United States is produced in 

Mexico and South America and enters the United States across the 

southwest border or through the Caribbean. Among countries in the 

Western Hemisphere, Colombia and Peru are major producers of illicit 

drugs, while Bolivia, Jamaica, and Mexico are both major producers and 

major transit countries,6 according to State (see fig. 1).

 6

The Foreign Assistance Act defines a major illicit drug-producing country as one in which

1,000 hectares or more of illicit opium poppy are cultivated or harvested during a year; 

1,000 hectares or more of illicit coca are cultivated or harvested during a year; or 5,000 

hectares or more of illicit cannabis are cultivated or harvested during a year, unless the 

President determines that such illicit cannabis production does not significantly affect the 

United States (See 22 U.S.C. § 2291(e)(1)). A major drug-transit country is one that is a 

significant, direct source of illicit narcotic or psychotropic drugs or other controlled 

substances significantly affecting the United States or through which such drugs or 

substances are transported (See 22 U.S.C. § 2291(e)(5)). 

Background

Major Drug-Producing and 

Drug-Transit Countries in 

the Western Hemisphere
Page 5 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Figure 1: Map of Major Drug-Producing and Drug-Transit Countries in the Western Hemisphere
Page 6 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Mexico is a major source and transit country for heroin, 

methamphetamine, and marijuana destined for the U.S. market. Jamaica 

is likewise the largest Caribbean supplier of marijuana for the U.S. 

market. Colombia is the world’s top producer of cocaine and is the major 

provider of cocaine available in the United States. While Bolivia and Peru 

are also major producers of cocaine, cocaine from these countries is 

generally smuggled into other South American countries for domestic 

consumption or for shipment to Europe, East Asia, and beyond, according 

to State.

According to U.S. government estimates, illicit drugs originating in Mexico 

enter the United States directly through the southwest border, but virtually 

all cocaine from South America and marijuana from Jamaica are 

trafficked to the United States through the “Transit Zone”—a 7-millionsquare-mile area that encompasses Central America, Mexico, the eastern 

Pacific Ocean, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Caribbean Sea. The Transit 

Zone has four principal maritime trafficking routes: the Eastern Pacific, 

Western Caribbean, Central Caribbean, and Eastern Caribbean. The 

Transit Zone land route is funneled north through Central America into 

Mexico, where it splits in several directions up to the U.S. southwest 

border. Although Canada is not within the Transit Zone, various drugs, 

including fentanyl, transit through it before entering the United States, 

according to the Department of State.

In recent years, the production, trafficking, and marketing of various illicit 

substances consumed in the United States have undergone significant 

shifts. For example, according to the 2016 National Drug Control 

Strategy, over the previous 8 years, opioid abuse emerged as the 

greatest drug threat to the nation. This development was complicated by 

a spike in the supply and purity of heroin, primarily from Mexico, resulting 

in a combined epidemic of heroin-opioid overdose deaths. According to 

the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, heroin overdose deaths 

more than tripled between 2010 and 2015, as powerful synthetic opioids, 

notably illicit fentanyl, were often mixed with heroin without the user’s 

knowledge. Similarly, in its 2017 International Narcotics Control Strategy 

Report, State reported various indicators suggesting a significant increase 

in cocaine production and trafficking from Colombia. For example, 

according to this report, coca cultivation in Colombia increased by 39 

percent in 2014 and by 42 percent in 2015, and the amount of cocaine 

Illicit Drug-Trafficking 

Shifts and Related 

Challenges
Page 7 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

trafficked out of Colombia has reached record levels.7 Consistent with 

these reported trends in cocaine production and trafficking, Centers for 

Disease Control and Prevention data indicate that, after falling sharply in 

the middle of the past decade, overdose deaths related to cocaine have 

been gradually rising in the United States. Finally, while a significant 

portion of the marijuana consumed in the United States continues to be 

smuggled from Western Hemisphere countries, including Canada, 

Jamaica, and Mexico, the domestic production and marketing of 

marijuana are undergoing important shifts, as several states and the 

District of Columbia have passed measures that legalize possession of 

limited amounts of the drug and provide for regulation of its production, 

processing, and sales. These shifting trends pose challenges for 

agencies’ counternarcotics efforts in the Western Hemisphere and 

domestically, as they strive to respond to changing conditions.

ONDCP coordinates the National Drug Control Program and develops a 

5-year National Drug Control Strategy, which it updates annually, as well 

as a number of companion strategies that focus on various geographical 

areas and emerging threats, to articulate the administration’s drug control 

policy. ONDCP was established by the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988 to, 

among other things, enhance national drug control planning and 

coordination and represent the drug policies of the executive branch 

before Congress. In this role, ONDCP is responsible for (1) developing a 

national drug control policy, (2) developing and applying specific goals 

and performance measurements to evaluate the effectiveness of national 

drug control policy and National Drug Control Program agencies’

programs, (3) overseeing and coordinating the implementation of the 

national drug control policy, and (4) assessing and certifying the 

adequacy of the budget for national drug control programs.

ONDCP requires National Drug Control Program agencies to submit an 

annual drug control budget, categorized into 10 federal drug control 

program areas.8 One program area is international efforts, which ONDCP 

defines as activities focused on regions outside the United States that are 

 7

According to State’s 2017 International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, such 

significant growth in coca cultivation is, at least in part, related to the Colombian 

government scaling back coca eradication in order to lower the risk of armed conflict in 

coca-producing areas controlled by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), 

with which the government was negotiating a peace agreement. 

8

ONDCP refers to these program areas as “drug control functions.”

Role of ONDCP in U.S. 

Counternarcotics Efforts in 

the Western Hemisphere
Page 8 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

intended to reduce illegal drug availability in the United States or abroad. 

Three additional ONDCP drug control program areas—intelligence, 

interdiction, and investigations—include domestic as well as international 

efforts, as interdictions may occur at or outside U.S. borders, and 

intelligence and investigative efforts may target drug organizations 

operating outside the United States.9

In addition to ONDCP, eight agencies are involved in the four program 

areas that support counternarcotics efforts in the Western Hemisphere to 

stop the production and transshipment of illicit drugs or their precursors 

destined for the United States. These activities include the following:

• interdictions at U.S. borders;

• maritime drug interdictions in international waters and in international 

interdictions in concert with partner nations in international and 

territorial waters;

• intelligence gathering to support drug interdictions, investigations, and 

international activities;

• investigations of drug organizations based in countries outside the 

United States;

• eradication support and efforts; and

• building foreign partner capacity to conduct counternarcotics activities.

Table 1 shows the eight U.S. government agencies that allocate 

resources in one or more of the four ONDCP program areas—

counternarcotics intelligence, interdiction, international activities, and 

investigations—that we included in our review. For a detailed description 

of ONDCP’s program areas, more information on the roles of these 

agencies, and the countries in which they operate, see appendixes I, II, 

and III, respectively.

 9

ONDCP’s six other program priority areas are corrections; prevention; prosecution; 

research and development; state, local, and tribal law enforcement assistance; and 

treatment.

Key Agencies Involved in 

International Efforts to 

Combat Illicit Drugs 

Entering the United States
Page 9 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Table 1: U.S. Agencies That Report Allocated Resources for Counternarcotics Intelligence, Interdiction, International, and 

Investigations Program Areas to ONDCP

Program areas DOD CBP ICE

Coast 

Guard DEA OCDETF INL USAID

Intelligence ✓ ✓ ✓ — ✓ — — —

Interdiction ✓ ✓ — ✓ — — — —

International ✓ — — — ✓ — ✓ ✓

Investigations ✓ — ✓ — ✓ ✓ — —

Legend: DOD = Department of Defense

CBP = U.S. Customs and Border Protection

ICE = Immigration and Customs Enforcement

DEA = Drug Enforcement Administration

OCDETF = Organized Crime and Drug Enforcement Task Forces

INL = Department of State’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs

USAID = U.S. Agency for International Development

“—” = no resources allocated

Source: Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP). | GAO-18-10

Note: The information shown reflects data that the eight agencies reported to ONDCP in 2016. 

ONDCP requires National Drug Control Program agencies to submit an annual drug control budget to 

be included in a consolidated National Drug Control Budget by program area. The 4 program areas 

shown are among 10 program areas for which ONDCP requires this submission. Some agencies’ 

annual reports to ONDCP may not reflect all aspects of their drug control activities by program area; 

for example, CBP, DEA, ICE, and the Coast Guard conduct international activities that they report 

under other program areas, such as Interdiction or Investigations. In addition, while other U.S. 

agencies that report annually to ONDCP may have responsibility for one or more of the 4 program 

areas, the information shown represents only those agencies we determined support Western 

Hemisphere counternarcotics efforts. See GAO-18-10, appendix I, for a detailed description of our 

methodology.

U.S. Agencies 

Identified Billions of 

Dollars in Spending 

Primarily or Partially 

for Western 

Hemisphere 

Counternarcotics 

Efforts for 2010 

through 2015
Page 10 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Of the agencies included in our review, DOD, ICE, INL, and USAID track 

counternarcotics spending on a regional basis and provided data on 

funds obligated for counternarcotics activities in the Western 

Hemisphere.10 As table 2 shows, these agencies obligated more than $5 

billion for counternarcotics activities in the Western Hemisphere during 

fiscal years 2010 through 2015. (See app. III for the agencies’ regional or 

country-level counternarcotics obligations, as available).

Table 2: Spending Identified for Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics Activities by Agencies That Track Funds by Region, 

Fiscal Years 2010-2015

Dollars in millions

Agency 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

2010-2015 

Total

Department of Defensea 486 483 483 474 454 451 2,832

Immigration and Customs Enforcementb 19 31 40 38 41 43 212

Department of State’s Bureau of International 

Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs

485 278 266 217 155 136 1,536

U.S. Agency for International Development 154 124 106 105 76 73 638

Total 1,144 916 895 834 726 703 5,218

Source: GAO analysis of agency data. | GAO-18-10

Note: Because of rounding, numbers in columns and rows may not sum to totals shown.

a

These data do not include the Department of Defense’s (DOD) obligations levels for counternarcotics 

intelligence activities conducted by U.S. Northern and Southern Commands. DOD was not able to 

provide obligations data for these activities for certain fiscal years.

b

We asked agencies to provide obligations levels because with the variations of funding data across 

all agencies, we determined that we could provide the most consistent information with obligations 

levels, which capture each agency’s financial commitments for its counternarcotics activities. 

However, the amounts shown for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) represent 

expenditures rather than obligations because ICE’s financial system converts obligations into 

expenditures once payment has been made, according to agency officials. Therefore, ICE was 

unable to provide us with obligations data. Expenditures are the issuance of checks, disbursement of 

cash, or electronic transfer of funds made to liquidate a federal obligation.

 10Of the agencies in our review, the Coast Guard, CBP, and ICE do not receive 

appropriations specifically for counternarcotics activities. All DEA and OCDETF funds are 

counted as part of the National Drug Control Program. DEA receives funds appropriated 

to the DEA salaries and expenses account as well as from the agency’s Diversion Control 

Fee Account. OCDETF’s funds are appropriated through the Interagency Crime and Drug 

Enforcement appropriation within annual appropriations measures for the Departments of 

Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies. DOD’s counternarcotics activities, 

with the exception of health programs that fund substance abuse treatment for military 

personnel, are appropriated through the Drug Interdiction and Counter Drug Activities 

appropriation. INL’s counternarcotics funds are appropriated to the International Narcotics 

Control and Law Enforcement account. USAID’s funds are appropriated to the Economic 

Support Funds and Development Assistance accounts. 

Some Agencies Track 

Counternarcotics 

Spending by Region and 

Identified $5 Billion in 

Obligations for Activities in 

the Western Hemisphere
Page 11 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

DOD obligated a total of more than $2.8 billion for counternarcotics 

activities in the Western Hemisphere for fiscal years 2010 through 2015. 

According to DOD documents, these activities support U.S. domestic and 

foreign government efforts to combat drug trafficking and drug-related 

terrorist activities through detection and monitoring of illicit drug 

smuggling, information and intelligence sharing, and capacity building. 

DOD generally tracks its counternarcotics spending by geographic 

combatant command and various functional areas. A significant portion of 

DOD’s counternarcotics activities in the Western Hemisphere are 

conducted by U.S. Northern Command and U.S. Southern Command.11

These resources fund DOD’s training and equipment provided to foreign 

partners conducting counternarcotics activities, surveillance and 

communications systems, aircraft patrolling the transit zone, and costs 

associated with operating DOD’s Joint Interagency Task Force South.12

However, the obligations for counternarcotics activities that DOD reported 

for fiscal years 2010 through 2015 underrepresent its overall obligations 

for such activities because the reported amounts do not include U.S. 

Northern Command’s and U.S. Southern Command’s salaries and 

expenses of its personnel and counternarcotics-related intelligence 

activities. It also does not include DOD’s agency-wide intelligence 

gathering and training, as well as aircraft flight hours and ship days in 

support of counternarcotics activities.13

ICE expended a total of about $212 million for salaries and expenses of 

Homeland Security Investigations’ (HSI) agents and analysts working on 

drug cases in various countries in the Western Hemisphere during fiscal 

 11U.S. Northern Command’s area of responsibility covers Canada, Mexico, and the 

surrounding waters, to include The Bahamas, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. 

U.S. Southern Command’s area of responsibility includes the land mass of Latin America 

south of Mexico, the waters adjacent to Central and South America, and the Caribbean 

Sea. 

12Section 1009 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013 (Pub. L. 

No. 112-239) required DOD to submit biannual reports to Congress on the use of 

counternarcotics funds in support of counternarcotics activities of foreign governments. 

DOD started tracking these figures in 2013. The reporting requirement ceased beginning 

in fiscal year 2017.

13Although DOD tracks most of its counternarcotics obligations by geographic combatant 

command and functional area, DOD data also showed spending for agency-wide 

counternarcotics activities that are not region specific. Because DOD does not track this 

spending by region, we did not include them in DOD’s obligations.

DOD

ICE
Page 12 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

years 2010 through 2015.14 ICE made these expenditures for the 

following three HSI programs:

• The Domestic Investigations program covers enforcement efforts to 

disrupt cross-border criminal activity related to contraband smuggling 

and the dismantling of the transnational criminal organizations 

responsible for these activities.

• International Operations covers HSI’s international investigations 

involving transnational criminal organizations and serves as ICE’s 

liaison to foreign law enforcement counterparts overseas.

• The Office of Intelligence provides intelligence services for Domestic 

Investigations and International Operations to support criminal 

investigations to disrupt and dismantle criminal organizations involved

in the transnational drug trade and associated money-laundering 

crimes.

INL obligated a total of more than $1.5 billion for counternarcotics 

activities in the Western Hemisphere in fiscal years 2010 through 2015. 

During this period, INL funded projects that were designed to improve 

foreign law enforcement and intelligence-gathering capabilities; enhance 

the effectiveness of criminal justice sectors to allow foreign governments 

to increase drug shipment interdictions; investigate, prosecute, and 

convict narcotics criminals; and break up major drug-trafficking 

organizations. INL also used U.S. federal law enforcement entities to 

provide technical assistance to its counterparts overseas. Examples of 

INL’s technical assistance include the following:

• In Mexico, INL’s efforts focused on enhancing the Mexican 

government’s capacity to interdict illegal narcotics while not impeding 

the flow of legitimate goods. This included providing detection dogs, 

equipment, and training to the Mexican Federal Police, Customs,

Army, and Navy.

 14While we report on agencies’ counternarcotics obligations in this report, for ICE, we 

report on expenditures levels because ICE’s financial system converts obligations into 

expenditures once payment has been made. Expenditures are the issuance of checks, 

disbursement of cash, or electronic transfer of funds made to liquidate a federal obligation. 

INL
Page 13 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

• In Colombia, INL’s program focused on aerial eradication of coca 

plants, land and maritime interdictions, and capacity building for 

counternarcotics forces.

15

• In Peru, INL programs included support for manual eradication of 

coca plants, interdiction efforts, and drug demand reduction activities.

• In Central America, INL efforts included building interdiction capacities 

such as funding vetted units sponsored by federal law enforcement 

partners and providing technical assistance and equipment for air and 

maritime interdiction.16

• In the Caribbean, INL efforts focused on building partner nation 

interdiction capacity, providing support for vetted units, and enhancing 

information sharing among partner nations.

USAID obligated a total of about $638 million for Western Hemisphere 

counternarcotics activities in fiscal years 2010 through 2015, supporting 

alternative development projects in Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, and 

Peru.17 According to agency officials, the USAID mission in Colombia is 

working to create licit alternatives to coca production, including holistic 

support to viable and lucrative agricultural value chains, such as cacao, 

specialty coffee, and other products that can be sold on domestic and 

export markets; provision of rural financial services and credits for licit 

opportunities; efforts to attract private sector investment into rural regions; 

and, to a lesser degree, helping communities build infrastructure, such as 

roads, to help licit products reach markets. USAID’s alternative 

development program in Peru aims to promote licit incomes and improved 

governance to sustain coca reductions achieved through forced 

eradication. In partnership with the Peruvian national drug commission, 

the USAID mission in Peru facilitates the implementation of alternative 

development programs in the country, including improving the drug 

commission’s ability to monitor and evaluate these programs. The 

mission has also partnered with the private sector to improve processes 

involved in preparing cacao crops for the market.

 15The Colombian government suspended its aerial eradication program on October 1, 

2015, primarily due to the perceived health risks associated with the herbicide used in 

aerial spraying. 

16Vetted units are groups of partner country law enforcement officials who undergo 

background checks, including polygraph examinations. 

17USAID obligated funds for alternative development programs in Colombia and Peru for 

fiscal years 2010 through 2015, in Bolivia for fiscal year 2010, and in Ecuador for fiscal 

years 2010 through 2012. 

USAID
Page 14 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

While the other agencies in our review—CBP, Coast Guard, DEA, and 

OCDETF—do not track spending specific to their counternarcotics 

activities in the Western Hemisphere, they conduct most of their 

counternarcotics activities in the Western Hemisphere or target threats 

originating in Western Hemisphere countries, according to agency 

officials. Thus, while the agencies’ overall counternarcotics obligations 

overstate spending for such activities in the Western Hemisphere, these 

obligations approximate the Coast Guard’s, CBP’s, and OCDETF’s 

spending on activities that were primarily for these purposes in the region. 

However, DEA was not able to identify spending levels for 

counternarcotics activities in the Western Hemisphere, and the 

obligations it provided included spending for some domestic and other 

international counternarcotics activities. These four agencies had total 

obligations of nearly $34 billion for their overall counternarcotics activities 

during fiscal years 2010 through 2015 (see table 3).18

Table 3: Counternarcotics Obligations for Agencies That Do Not Track Spending by Region, Fiscal Years 2010-2015

Dollars in millions

Agency 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

2010-2015 

Total

Coast Guarda —b —b 1,296 1,313 1,424 1,250 5,283

Customs and Border Protectiona 2,038 2,200 2,249 2,216 2,405 2,451 13,559

Drug Enforcement Administrationc 2,240 2,178 2,128 1,965 2,098 2,113 12,722

Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task 

Forcesd 326 357 361 326 354 339 2,063

Total 4,604 4,736 6,038 5,820 6,280 6,154 33,616

Source: GAO analysis of agency data. | GAO-18-10

Notes: Because of rounding, numbers in columns and rows may not sum to totals shown.

 18Where feasible, we excluded funds we determined to have been used primarily for 

domestic counternarcotics efforts. To further refine our analysis of agencies’ spending on 

counternarcotics activities in the Western Hemisphere outside the United States, when 

possible, we excluded counternarcotics activities that targeted U.S.-based organizations—

specifically, DEA’s Diversion Control Program, which enforces regulations pertaining to 

pharmaceutical controlled substances and listed chemicals; spending on the expansion 

and renovation of the El Paso Intelligence Center, a multiagency facility that serves as a 

clearinghouse for tactical intelligence and collects, analyzes, and disseminates information 

related to worldwide drug movement and alien smuggling; and support provided to state 

and local law enforcement. We also excluded OCDETF’s reimbursements to the DOJ’s 

Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the U.S. Marshals Service, and the 

International Organized Crime Intelligence and Operations Center because we determined 

that these agencies’ activities were primarily focused on domestic efforts. For a detailed 

discussion of our agency selection process, see app. I.

Agencies That Do Not 

Track Counternarcotics 

Spending by Region 

Reported About $34 Billion 

for Activities Focused on 

the Western Hemisphere
Page 15 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

a

According to Coast Guard and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials, these agencies’

counternarcotics activities occur primarily at U.S. land and sea borders and should be considered 

specific to the Western Hemisphere; obligations for these activities therefore reflect the agencies’

entire counternarcotics budget. However, these obligations also include these agencies’ interdiction 

and investigations activities for drugs coming into the United States from outside the Western 

Hemisphere. In addition, CBP obligations include salaries and expenses for officers preclearing

entrants into the United States at airports in countries outside the Western Hemisphere.

b

The Coast Guard reported obligating $836 million and $1,406 million for counternarcotics activities in 

fiscal years 2010 and 2011, respectively, but was unable to provide reasonable assurance that 

internal controls over all financial reporting processes were operating effectively and could not 

provide assurances of the reliability of its data for these years.

c

Obligations shown reflect the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) counternarcotics obligations 

for the agency’s domestic and international enforcement activities and exclude other strictly domestic 

activities (i.e., enforcement of pharmaceutical drugs, construction, and assistance to state and local 

law enforcement). We included obligations for domestic enforcement because these obligations 

funded DEA’s investigations of drug organizations located outside the United States.

d

The Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETF) reimburses a number of agencies 

for drug-related investigations they conduct. We excluded OCDETF’s reimbursements to agencies 

whose counternarcotics activities are primarily domestic in nature.

The Coast Guard obligated a total of almost $5.3 billion for its druginterdiction activities for fiscal years 2010 through 2015.19 As the nation’s 

principal federal agency for maritime safety, security, and stewardship, 

the Coast Guard has a drug interdiction objective to reduce the flow of 

illegal drugs entering the United States by denying smugglers access to 

maritime routes. The Coast Guard’s counternarcotics obligations in fiscal 

years 2010 through 2015 covered the agency’s operating expenses, 

which include costs associated with operating Coast Guard facilities, 

maintaining capital equipment, improving management effectiveness, and 

maintaining an active duty military and civilian workforce. These funds 

also supported reserve training and acquisition, construction, and 

improvement of capital assets and facilities. The Coast Guard does not 

maintain data on the portion of the agency’s drug resources that are used 

for the interdiction of drugs trafficked to or from countries outside the 

Western Hemisphere. However, according to Coast Guard officials, 

because the agency’s counternarcotics efforts take place around U.S. 

maritime borders and in transit zones in the Western Hemisphere, the 

 19This figure was derived from the Coast Guard’s submission of its annual accounting of 

drug control funds to ONDCP. The Office of the Inspector General, in its annual review of 

the Coast Guard’s obligations of counternarcotics funds, found that the Coast Guard was 

unable to provide reasonable assurance that internal controls over all financial reporting 

processes were operating effectively in fiscal years 2010 and 2011. The Coast Guard 

acknowledged that pervasive material weaknesses existed in some key financial 

processes. Consequently, the Coast Guard could not be reasonably certain that its 

financial statements are reliable or complete. Although the Coast Guard had implemented 

several improvements to their financial systems, officials were unable to provide accurate 

and reliable data for these years. 

Coast Guard
Page 16 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

agency’s drug resources are generally expended in the Western 

Hemisphere.

CBP obligated a total of more than $13 billion for its counternarcotics 

activities in fiscal years 2010 through 2015. According to the agency’s 

budget documents, CBP used its counternarcotics spending to carry out 

its border security mission at and between all ports of entry and to 

conduct air and marine operations in source, transit, and arrival zones in 

the Western Hemisphere. The agency also obligated funds to invest in 

border security technology and infrastructure to detect and monitor 

suspicious air, maritime, and land traffic. CBP’s counternarcotics funds 

also were used for training and information technology to support its 

activities. CBP officials indicated that, because CBP’s mission is to 

protect U.S. borders, the agency’s counternarcotics spending should 

generally be considered resources spent in the Western Hemisphere. 

However, CBP’s reported obligations also include resources dedicated to 

border protection measures to interdict shipments of drugs and precursor 

chemicals from countries outside the Western Hemisphere.20

DEA obligated a total of almost $13 billion for its domestic and 

international enforcement activities in fiscal years 2010 through 2015. 

DEA is the lead U.S. agency responsible for the development of the 

overall federal drug enforcement strategy, programs, planning, and 

evaluation. DEA’s budget includes categories for domestic enforcement, 

international enforcement, and state and local support. While domestic 

enforcement accounts for the majority of DEA’s resources, DEA 

coordinates its domestic and international enforcement activities (i.e., 

DEA’s foreign offices) to pursue, at the highest level, multinational drug 

organizations and, at the lowest level, independent drug cells, according 

to documents.21 With regard to international enforcement, DEA tracks 

 20For example, this includes the cost of CBP officers posted in Ireland and the United 

Arab Emirates to preclear entrants into the United States. 

21Because DEA’s domestic enforcement activities include efforts to target drug 

organizations outside the United States, we included domestic enforcement in our 

calculations of DEA obligations. Therefore, this amount overestimates the agency’s 

counternarcotics enforcement activities targeted toward non-U.S. drug organizations in the 

Western Hemisphere. We excluded from our calculation DEA’s obligation for three 

counternarcotics activities that we considered to be primarily focused on domestic issues: 

enforcement of regulations pertaining to pharmaceutical controlled substances and listed 

chemicals, construction costs associated with the expansion and renovation of an 

interagency intelligence center in Texas and support provided to state and local law 

enforcement. 

CBP

DEA
Page 17 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

regional spending for salaries and expenses associated with agents and 

intelligence analysts posted in countries overseas.22 DEA’s international 

enforcement includes more than $1 billion in obligations for salaries and 

expenses for personnel posted in Western Hemisphere countries in fiscal 

years 2010 through 2015.

OCDETF obligated a total of about $2.1 billion for counternarcoticsrelated efforts in fiscal years 2010 through 2015. According to OCDETF 

reports, this funding supported investigations targeting the highest priority 

drug-related transnational crime organizations. OCDETF’s funds were 

used to reimburse a number of DOJ components—DEA, the FBI, and the 

OCDETF Fusion Center, a multiagency intelligence center23—for their 

support of OCDETF investigations of high-priority targets.24 According to 

a senior OCDETF official, although the agency’s financial system does 

not contain information that would allow us to ascertain the amounts 

obligated for investigations of international targets located in the Western 

Hemisphere, very few OCDETF cases involve drugs coming into the 

United States from outside the Western Hemisphere. Most OCDETF 

investigations target drugs coming into the United States from other 

Western Hemisphere countries.

 22As of September 2016, DEA had 92 offices in 70 countries. 

23The OCDETF Fusion Center was designed to provide intelligence information for 

investigations and prosecutions focused on disrupting and dismantling drug-trafficking and 

money-laundering organizations and helps coordinate these efforts. 

24Of the DOJ components that receive OCDETF reimbursements, the FBI reported on its 

expenditures of OCDETF reimbursements for drug-related investigations of Central 

American, South American, Mexican, and Caribbean transnational crime organizations, as 

well as drug- and money-laundering and alien-smuggling organizations and public 

corruption cases in the Western Hemisphere during fiscal years 2010 through 2015 (see 

app. III). 

OCDETF
Page 18 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

ONDCP facilitates the sharing of best practices and lessons learned with 

interagency and foreign partners by including the topic on the agendas of 

key meetings, according to ONDCP officials.25 For example, ONDCP 

officials described the sharing of best practices and lessons learned with 

stakeholders from Canada, Mexico, and the United States at technical 

workshops of the North American Drug Dialogue held in March 2017. At 

these workshops, the Department of State shared with its Mexican 

partners lessons learned pertaining to Colombia and Peru, including the 

following:

• Eradication of coca alone is not sufficient. A whole-of-government 

approach that provides security, the incentive of alternative 

development, the disincentive of eradication, and intelligence-led 

interdiction efforts that deny harvesters or traffickers the ability to 

profit from the product is essential.

• Results take time. For example, the 90-percent reduction in coca 

production in San Martin, Peru, took 12 years.

• Efforts should be geographically targeted and driven by information 

and intelligence, given scarce resources. For example, data can be 

used to allow for planning targeted eradication operations, based on 

intelligence or other information, and for the planning of 

complementary interventions, such as rural development or target 

eradication goals.

 25There is no formal requirement for ONDCP to collect lesson learned or best practices.

Agencies Reported 

Collecting and 

Disseminating Best 

Practices and 

Lessons Learned 

Related to 

Counternarcotics 

Efforts

ONDCP Facilitates 

Sharing of 

Counternarcotics Best 

Practices and Lessons 

Learned
Page 19 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

According to ONDCP officials, best practices and lessons learned are 

also described in the National Drug Control Strategy as well as 

companion strategies such as the Southwest Border and Caribbean 

Counternarcotics strategies. For example, according to the 2010 National 

Drug Control Strategy, lessons learned such as the following can be 

drawn from Colombia’s experience that might be useful elsewhere:

• Host-government ownership. For example, although Plan Colombia 

required extensive U.S. financial support, the Colombian government 

demonstrated that it was fully committed to the initiative under 

consecutive administrations.26

• Government-wide approach. Eradication can be an effective deterrent 

to illicit cultivation and can provide an incentive to move to licit crops. 

However, eradication must be accompanied by a government 

presence in rural areas; alternative development to preclude 

replanting or dispersal of plots; and a focus on rule of law and human 

rights, humanitarian needs, and social and economic reform to reduce 

the incentive to revert to illicit crops.

• Security. Security is a precondition for the successful expansion of 

social services and developmental assistance. Security must be 

maintained to allow the expansion of legal economic activities and the 

delivery of civilian services, including justice, education, and health, to 

a population unaccustomed to a significant government presence.

• Flexibility. Programs must adapt to changing circumstances, including 

adjusting programs that are not working as expected and adding new 

initiatives, if necessary.

• Long-term approach. Major counternarcotics programs designed to 

address complex and long-standing challenges require a multiyear 

investment in terms of financial resources and political commitment.

 26Plan Colombia was the Colombian government’s 1999 strategy to address security and 

development issues associated with ending the country’s decades-long armed conflict to 

eliminate drug trafficking and promote economic and social development. The plan aimed 

to curb trafficking activity and reduce coca cultivation in Colombia by 50 percent over 6 

years. In support of Plan Colombia, the United States provided more than $8 billion in 

assistance from fiscal years 2000 through 2011 and provided additional funding through 

the U.S.-Colombia Strategic Initiative, which incorporated traditional counternarcotics, 

alternative development, and capacity-building assistance, according to the Congressional 

Research Service.
Page 20 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

ONDCP has also promoted best practices through other efforts. For 

example, the 2015 National Drug Control Strategy included an action item 

to work with the Organization of American States’ Inter-American Drug 

Abuse Control Commission to strengthen counterdrug Institutions in the 

Western Hemisphere. As part of this effort, ONDCP and the Department 

of State participated in the Demand Reduction and the Alternatives to 

Incarceration meetings, which focused on promoting best practices and 

expanding host-nation capacity.27 Reflecting this effort, Organization of 

American States’ officials cited as a best practice the training of 300 

Colombian and Argentinian judges and chief justices, who learned about 

the Alternatives to Incarceration model, in November 2016.

Officials at 7 of the 10 agencies included in our review reported having 

processes for identifying and collecting best practices and lessons 

learned from counternarcotics efforts in the Western Hemisphere. 

Officials at each of these seven agencies also reported having 

mechanisms to share best practices and lessons learned, including 

through web-enabled systems, and sharing these best practices and 

lessons learned with other U.S. agencies and foreign partners. In 

addition, officials at six of the seven agencies reported having a formal 

review process for determining best practices and lessons learned.

USAID and DOD guidance and officials described comprehensive 

processes for collecting and sharing information about best practices and 

lessons learned. For example, according to USAID guidance, its Country 

Development Cooperation Strategy “should include a summary of lessons 

learned from the implementation of the previous Country Development 

Cooperation Strategy or other strategic plans (if applicable) and from 

previous experiences (e.g., projects and activities).”28 The guidance 

states that at least once during the course of implementing the Country 

Development Cooperation Strategy, USAID missions must collect 

information by conducting reviews of ongoing efforts and of options for 

better aligning their programs with changes in the context, agency 

direction, and lessons learned. In addition, according to USAID officials, 

other levels of program planning incorporate lessons learned and good 

 27J. Parsons et al., End of an Era? The Impact of Drug Law Reform in New York City

(New York, NY: Vera Institute of Justice, 2015). 

28U.S. Agency for International Development, Automated Directives System, “Chapter 

201, Program Cycle Operational Policy” (Washington, D.C.; Mar. 23, 2017).

Most Agencies Reported 

Collecting Best Practices 

and Lessons Learned from 

Counternarcotics Efforts
Page 21 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

programming, such as portfolio reviews and other processes involving the 

periodic assessment of a particular aspect of a mission or a Washington 

operating unit’s strategy, projects, or activities. USAID evaluations of its 

alternative development projects in Colombia include examples of best 

practices and lessons learned, such as the following:

• The success of a project depends on reducing the appeal of coca by 

improving the social and economic value of legal alternatives.

• Robust licit economies fueled by productive associations, local and 

regional market integration, and improved transportation networks can 

reduce coca cultivation.

• A necessary precondition for successful alternative development is 

the allocation of resources and personnel to rural areas where coca is 

cultivated.

• Only those strategies that can be accomplished within predetermined 

time frames and resource parameters and that have a proven track 

record of reducing coca cultivation should be implemented.

• Reinforcing local community institutions and providing youth-focused 

programming can help insulate vulnerable communities against the 

allure of drug trafficking and coca cultivation.29

DOD reported using a formal process for identifying and collecting best 

practices and lessons learned through its Joint Lessons Learned 

Program, which consists of five phases: discovery, validation, resolution, 

evaluation, and dissemination. According to DOD officials, the collection 

of best practices and lessons learned relating to counternarcotics in the 

Western Hemisphere through this program is intended to enhance 

readiness and effectiveness. DOD officials noted that the effort to collect 

best practices and lessons learned is routine and helps inform policy and 

budget proceedings. Annual conferences, such as the Counternarcotics 

and Global Threats Coordination Conference and the Program Objective 

Memoranda Conference, also offer an opportunity to identify, collect, and 

disseminate best practices and lessons learned as they relate to DOD’s 

counterdrug and counter-transnational-organized-crime operations. 

According to DOD officials, such conferences provide a forum for 

participants to learn how other relevant DOD components working on 

counternarcotics efforts are approaching counterdrug, transnational 

organized crime, and related issues. DOD officials also noted that they 

 29U.S. Agency for International Development, Sustainable Development Alternative 

Strategies (Arlington, VA: Management Systems International, February 2017).
Page 22 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

intend to use an interagency-agency-task-forces approach to 

counternarcotics interdiction that the U.S. Southern Command developed 

in Guatemala as a model for sharing best practices and lessons learned 

in the region. According to DOD officials, the U.S. Southern Command’s

support included training in interdiction tactics, techniques, and 

procedures, and maintenance of provided equipment such as intercept 

boats, tactical vehicles, communications gear, and night vision devices. 

DOD officials reported that lessons learned include establishing the 

interagency legal framework early, clearly defining interagency 

relationships, developing the task force’s intelligence capability, 

implementing police authority and leadership, identifying measures of 

success, communicating the task force’s purpose and success to the 

public, and maintaining equipment. DOD officials said that they plan to 

use the Guatemalan interagency task force as a model with other foreign 

partners and new counterdrug units in Guatemala and in the region.

State’s report, “Lessons Learned from the Mérida Initiative and Plan 

Colombia with Regard to Judicial Reform Efforts,” provides specific 

examples of operational and tactical lessons, as follows:

• Political will is critical. According to State, one of the clearest symbols 

of political will was Mexico’s and Colombia’s dedication of additional 

resources (to initiatives under the Mérida Initiative and Plan 

Colombia). In addition, according to State, the governments of El 

Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras created a joint regional plan, the 

Plan of Alliance for Prosperity, underscoring their political will and 

significant commitment to improve economic opportunities, 

governance, and public safety. For example, these governments 

identified $2.6 billion in their 2016 budgets to, among other things, 

target criminal networks, tackle corruption, and strengthen 

government institutions.

• No lasting security without enhanced access to justice. The 

governments of Colombia and Mexico have undertaken efforts to 

expand access to justice in their countries. Since 2008, the 

government of Mexico has been working to improve the transparency 

and efficiency of its judicial system by implementing an oral-based 

accusatorial system.30

 30According to DOJ, in an inquisitorial system, a judge generally is actively involved in 

investigating the facts of a case. In the typical accusatorial model, parties are entitled to 

be present and to retain attorneys who appear before a judge, who moderates the 

proceedings, to present evidence and arguments in a case. 
Page 23 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

• Partnership across agencies is critical. Plan Colombia represented a 

whole-of-government approach, with a broad U.S. interagency 

presence to work across the breadth of the Colombian government. 

This U.S. interagency presence built linkages at all levels and ensured 

continuity of vision through leadership transitions in the U.S. and 

Colombian governments.

ONDCP works with agencies to coordinate responses to changing 

conditions in a variety of ways. ONDCP is responsible for developing (1) 

the National Drug Control Strategy,31 which sets forth a comprehensive 

plan to reduce illicit drug use through programs intended to prevent or 

treat drug use or reduce the availability of illegal drugs; and (2) several 

associated companion strategies, which target government efforts to 

respond to emerging counternarcotics threats for key geographic areas.32

The Strategy issued in 2010 laid out the administration’s 5-year blueprint 

for combatting drug use and included a section on counternarcotics 

efforts in the Western Hemisphere. The 2010 Strategy described an 

approach that reflected two core focus areas: (1) disrupting domestic drug 

trafficking and production and (2) strengthening international partnerships 

to reduce the availability of foreign-produced drugs in the United States. 

The Strategy, including the portions associated with counternarcotics 

 31The President is required to submit annually a National Drug Control Strategy, setting 

forth a comprehensive plan to reduce illicit drug use and the consequences of such illicit 

drug use in the United States by reducing the supply of, and demand for, illegal drugs. 

See 21 U.S.C. § 1705. The Director of ONDCP is responsible for promulgating the 

Strategy. See 21 U.S.C. § 1703(b). 

32The agencies we reviewed provided various documents that contained their planning for 

Western Hemisphere counternarcotics efforts. See app. IV for descriptions of these 

documents.

U.S. Agencies Use 

Various Mechanisms 

to Address Changing 

Counternarcotics 

Conditions in the 

Western Hemisphere

ONDCP Strategies Lay 

Out Key Efforts to 

Respond to Emerging 

Counternarcotics Threats
Page 24 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

efforts in the Western Hemisphere, is updated annually to reflect current 

priorities and conditions.33 According to ONDCP officials, an example of a 

key change since 2010 is the developing focus on the opioid crisis. In 

2010, the President’s first National Drug Control Strategy emphasized the 

need for action to address opioid use disorders and overdose, while 

ensuring that individuals with pain receive safe, effective treatment. On 

April 19, 2011, the White House released its national Prescription Drug 

Abuse Prevention Plan, which outlined its goals for addressing 

prescription drug abuse and overdose.34

The 2016 Strategy continued the previous administration’s focus on the 

opioid crisis but recognized the growing threats from drug-trafficking 

organizations involved in manufacturing and distributing cocaine and 

synthetic drugs, including novel psychoactive substances such as 

synthetic cannabinoids. To address these efforts, the Strategy described 

U.S. agencies’ interdiction activities, and DEA led efforts to disrupt 

synthetic drug production and trafficking. The 2016 Strategy also noted 

U.S. collaboration with China to limit the export of precursor chemicals 

associated with the production of psychoactive substances.

ONDCP also develops companion strategies with a geographic focus, 

such as the National Southwest Border Counternarcotics Strategy, the 

Northern Border Counternarcotics Strategy, and the Caribbean Border 

Counternarcotics Strategy. The 2015 Strategy acknowledges the 

companion strategies and indicates that the efforts they describe will be 

carried out. These strategies include objectives such as enhancing 

intelligence, interdicting drugs and drug proceeds, ensuring prosecution, 

disrupting and dismantling drug-trafficking organizations, and improving 

cooperation with international partners. 

The companion strategies have provided opportunities for more targeted 

responses to address emerging threats in specific geographic areas, 

which include the following:

 33The key chapters addressing counternarcotics in the Western Hemisphere are chapter 

5, Disrupt Domestic Drug Trafficking and Production, and chapter 6, Strengthen Law 

Enforcement and International Partnerships to Reduce the Availability of ForeignProduced Drugs in the United States. 

34Most recently, in March 2017, the current administration established a commission to 

address drug addiction and the opioid crisis. The commission’s mission is to study the 

scope and effectiveness of the federal response to drug addiction and the opioid crisis and 

to make recommendations to the President for improving that response.
Page 25 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

• National Southwest Border Counternarcotics Strategy. The 2009 

National Southwest Border Counternarcotics Strategy focused 

primarily on U.S. government efforts to prevent the trafficking of illicit 

drugs—heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine, and foreign-produced 

marijuana—across the U.S.-Mexican border. The strategy also 

addressed the illegal outbound movement of weapons and bulk 

currency from the United States, both of which are associated with 

activities of narcotics traffickers. As an example of the growing threat 

posed by the trafficking of heroin from Mexico, the quantity seized on 

the southwest border nearly tripled, from 1,080 kilograms in 2010 to 

3,158 kilograms in 2015.35 To address these threats, ONDCP 

expanded the focus of the 2011 National Southwest Border 

Counternarcotics Strategy to provide border communities with 

enhanced prevention and drug treatment assistance, in the context of 

maintaining strong and resilient communities. The 2013 strategy 

stressed the same basic goals and objectives: substantially reduce 

the flow of illicit drugs, drug proceeds, and associated instruments of 

violence across the southwest border as well as maintain strong and 

resilient communities. This strategy also included indicators related to 

seizures of drugs at the border. The 2016 strategy differed slightly 

from the 2013 strategy by elaborating on the threats of various illicit 

drugs. It also noted that “anything that affects one part of the border 

affects the entire border” and noted that, for this reason, the National 

Southwest Border Counternarcotics Strategy must be synchronized 

with the other companion strategies, and the Heroin Availability 

Reduction Plan.

• National Northern Border Counternarcotics Strategy. The 2012 

National Northern Border Counternarcotics Strategy, which ONDCP 

first issued that year, parallels the National Southwest 

Counternarcotics Border Strategy and focuses on ongoing efforts to 

reduce transnational organized crime threats on both sides of the 

border between the United States and Canada, specifically the 

movement of illicit drugs such as marijuana, ecstasy, 

methamphetamine, and cocaine, and the proceeds from the sale of 

those drugs. The 2014 strategy emphasizes enhanced federal 

collaboration with state, local, and tribal law enforcement agencies. 

The legislation mandating that ONDCP publish the National Northern 

Border Counternarcotics Strategy requires that this document be

 35National Seizure System Extract, Feb. 19, 2016. Footnote 2 in ONDCP’s Southwest 

Border Counternarcotics Strategy (Washington, D.C: Executive Office of the President of 

the United States, May 2016).
Page 26 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

released biannually;36 as of June 2017, the 2016 version had not 

been released.37

• Caribbean Border Counternarcotics Strategy. The Caribbean Border 

Counternarcotics Strategy, issued in January 2015, is substantially 

equivalent to the national counternarcotics strategies for the 

southwest and northern borders, according to ONDCP. The strategy 

identifies cocaine as the principal drug threat and a source of 

associated violence in the Caribbean region and notes that the 

documented cocaine flow via the Caribbean to the United States more 

than doubled from 2011 to 2013, rising from 38 metric tons to 91 

metric tons.38 According to DEA, over 90 metric tons of cocaine was 

trafficked from South America using sea routes through the Caribbean 

corridor, primarily toward the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, in 

2014.39

ONDCP facilitates a number of interagency working groups to address 

emerging threats. According to ONDCP’s 2016 National Southwest 

Border Counternarcotics Strategy, interagency working groups relevant to 

counternarcotics efforts allow agencies with different authorities and 

resources to address common concerns, create a common operating 

picture, identify resource and capability gaps, and leverage resources. 

ONCDP has created working groups, such as groups focused on heroin 

and cocaine, to develop actions, goals, and measures to reduce the 

 36Northern Border Counternarcotics Strategy Act of 2010. Pub. L. No. 111-356, § 2. 

37According to an ONDCP official, the report was not completed prior to the change in 

administrations. This official told us that ONDCP typically does not submit a new strategy 

in the first year of an administration, as the strategy would essentially be the work product 

of the previous administration.

38Consolidated Counterdrug Database, June 6, 2014. 

39U.S. Department of Justice, Drug Enforcement Administration, “2015 National Drug 

Threat Assessment Summary,” DEA-DCT-DIR-008-16 (October 2015). 

Interagency Groups, Task 

Forces, and Committees 

Coordinate Government 

Response to Emerging 

Counternarcotics Threats

Interagency Working Groups
Page 27 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

supply of those drugs in the U.S. market as a part of the overall effort to 

address treatment and demand, as noted in the following examples:

• In November 2015, ONDCP established the National Heroin 

Coordination Group in coordination with the National Security 

Council40 to provide guidance on interagency activities aimed at 

reducing the supply of heroin and illicit fentanyl in the U.S market.41

The working group includes agencies with federal law enforcement 

responsibilities and their components, select High Intensity Drug 

Trafficking Areas (HIDTA),42 the U.S. embassy in Mexico, and other 

federal agencies and state entities. In June 2016, the group produced 

the 5-year Heroin Availability Reduction Plan as part of the 

administration’s effort to prevent and treat heroin abuse.43

• In January 2016, ONDCP created an internal working group on 

methamphetamine and synthetic drugs to coordinate efforts across 

drug control agencies. The group’s priorities included working in 

 40The National Security Council is the President’s principal forum for considering national 

security and foreign policy matters with his senior national security advisors and cabinet 

officials and disseminates national security directives. The National Security Council also 

serves as the President’s principal arm for coordinating these policies among various 

government agencies.

41According to ONDCP officials, the plan deliberately conflates heroin and fentanyl into a 

single problem as (1) traffickers who add fentanyl as an adulterant to boost the effect of 

heroin, or who mix it with dilutents to create and sell as synthetic heroin, and use the 

same supply chain and distribution mechanisms for both drugs; (2) both heroin and 

fentanyl can be manufactured by the same drug-trafficking organizations, and those 

traffickers can bring drugs into the country using the same trafficking routes; and (3) 

addressing these drugs as a single problem provides the ability to address the heroin 

crisis without inadvertently compounding the fentanyl crisis.

42The HIDTA program was established in 1988 and is a federally funded program 

administered by ONDCP that brings together federal, state, and local law enforcement 

agencies into task forces that conduct investigations of drug-trafficking organizations in 

designated areas. The HIDTA program is mainly focused on counternarcotics; however, 

HIDTA resources may be used to assist law enforcement agency investigations and 

activities related to terrorism and the prevention of terrorism. 

43In February 2016, the administration announced that it would provide $1.1 billion to 

prevent and treat heroin abuse. The Heroin Availability Reduction Plan (HARP) is focused 

on reducing the number of heroin-involved deaths in the United States; a disruption in the 

heroin and fentanyl supply chains; a decrease in the availability of those drugs in the U.S. 

market; and the effects of international engagement, law enforcement, and public health 

efforts. According to the HARP, it synchronizes multiagency, multijurisdictional actions, 

including investigations and prosecutions, against the organizations manufacturing and 

distributing heroin and illicit fentanyl. The HARP does not have new authorities, new 

actions, or new funding but rather coordinates existing strategies, according to ONDCP 

officials. 
Page 28 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

concert with federal partners, with source and transit countries to 

reduce the availability of illicit methamphetamine in the United States, 

and multilaterally to reduce the global trafficking of illicit 

methamphetamine and precursor chemicals coming primarily from 

Mexico.

• In September 2016, ONDCP created a National Cocaine Coordination 

Group to address emerging threats from cocaine brought on by the 

spike in coca cultivation and production as well as the associated 

increase in its trafficking and use in the United States. In addition to 

employing three permanent staff, the interagency group draws from 

expertise in intelligence, public health, and international demand 

reduction at DOJ, the FBI, other federal partners, and various parts of 

ONDCP.

Agencies use task forces to enhance the interagency coordination 

needed to respond to emerging threats, according to officials.44 For 

example, to address the smuggling of illicit drugs over the southwest 

border, in May 2014 DHS established three new joint task forces—Joint 

Task Force–East, Joint Task Force–West, and the Joint Task Force for 

Investigations—in support of its Southern Border and Approaches 

Campaign. The task forces coordinate operations to combat transnational 

criminal organizations and counter illegal drug flows at maritime 

approaches and in between ports of entry.45 All three joint task forces 

incorporate elements of the Coast Guard, CBP, and ICE as well as DHS’s 

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Joint Task Force–East is 

responsible for the southern maritime border and approaches, Joint Task 

Force–West is responsible for the southern land border and the West 

Coast, and the Joint Task Force for Investigations focuses on 

investigations in support of the geographic task forces.

 44DHS has Border Enforcement Security Task Forces, which were created in 2006 in 

response to cross-border crime. These task forces leverage federal, state, local, tribal, 

and international law enforcement resources in an intelligence-driven effort to identify, 

disrupt, and dismantle transnational criminal organizations.

45Task forces typically consist of prosecutor and law enforcement personnel from a variety 

of agencies who work together in the same location. 

Interagency Task Forces
Page 29 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Task forces also enhance coordination, deconfliction,46 and information 

sharing by colocating representatives from different entities, which 

facilitates interaction and enables information sharing, as we previously 

reported.47 For example, Joint Interagency Task Force South includes 26 

agencies and 20 foreign partners that work together to detect and monitor 

illicit trafficking in the air and maritime domains, facilitating international 

and interagency interdiction and apprehension.48 Information sharing is a 

critical aspect of the Joint Interagency Task Force South’s strategic 

approach in supporting national and foreign partner nation law 

enforcement and promoting regional stability in the Western Hemisphere.

As part of this effort, Joint Interagency Task Force South uses a tool 

known as the Cooperative Situational Information Integration system to 

share strategic communications and information with foreign partner 

nations, according to Joint Interagency Task Force South officials. In 

addition, U.S. Tactical Analysis Teams, which are posted at U.S. missions 

overseas, and liaison officers from foreign partner nations, provide for a 

high level of integrated information, according to officials at Joint 

Interagency Task Force South. Officials indicated that Tactical Analysis 

Teams and liaison officers provide the information that results in 60 to 70 

percent of all task force cases, directly contributing to 50 to 60 percent of 

all Joint Interagency Task Force South drug seizures. The task force 

reported that its efforts resulted in 80 percent of total U.S. cocaine 

seizures (282 of 338 metric tons) in fiscal year 2016.

According to Joint Interagency Task Force South, the advantages of 

working as a task force include the ability to use the participants’ various 

legal authorities (see the text box for an example):

• DOD brings detection and monitoring authorities.

 46Deconfliction is the act of searching available data to determine whether multiple law 

enforcement agencies are investigating the same target individual, organization, 

communications device, or other uniquely identifiable entity. If so, the interested parties 

coordinate to prevent duplicative work or “blue on blue” situations (i.e., where personnel 

from two or more law enforcement agencies unwittingly encounter each other during a law 

enforcement operation, such as an undercover situation). 

47See GAO, Combatting Illicit Drugs: DEA and ICE Interagency Agreement Has Helped to 

Ensure Better Coordination, GAO-11-763 (Washington, D.C.; July 28, 2011). 

48Cocaine is a key maritime threat, as is transnational crime; in calendar year 2016, 

cocaine accounted for 99 percent of drug movement in the task force area of 

responsibility. See app. V for additional information about efforts by U.S. agencies to work 

with their counterparts in other countries to reduce drug trafficking in the Western 

Hemisphere. 
Page 30 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

• DOJ and DHS bring anticrime authorities.

• The Coast Guard brings its maritime law enforcement authorities.

• DEA, the FBI, and HSI bring drug and finance laws enforcement 

authorities.

• CBP and HSI bring customs and immigration authorities.

• Partner nations bring multiple authorities from their countries.

A typical case that illustrates how the various authorities of component agencies 

work together in the Joint Interagency Task Force South could start with receipt 

of actionable law enforcement information from the Drug Enforcement 

Administration. This information prompts the deployment of a Customs and 

Border Protection or Coast Guard plane that subsequently detects and monitors 

a suspect vessel until Joint Interagency Task Force South can deploy a Coast 

Guard, U.S. Navy, or allied government’s ship with an on-board law enforcement 

detachment to investigate. When the deployed ship arrives at the vessel’s 

location, the Coast Guard assumes control of the investigation. If the suspect 

vessel is not registered in the United States, the Coast Guard commander 

implements a bilateral agreement with the vessel’s country of registration to 

confirm the vessel’s nationality and to stop, board, and search the vessel for 

drugs. If drugs are found, the State Department, Department of Justice, and the 

vessel’s country of registry coordinate jurisdiction over, and disposition of, the 

vessel, drugs, and crew.

Source: Department of Homeland Security, Overview of Coast Guard Drug and Migrant Interdiction, testimony of Rear Admiral Wayne 

E. Justice, Assistant Commander for Capabilities, before the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, Subcommittee on 

Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation, March 18 2009.

OCDETF has also established multiagency Strike Forces (i.e., a type of 

task force) in 12 key cities around the country. According to OCDETF’s 

fiscal year 2017 report to Congress, the Strike Forces aggressively target 

the highest-level trafficking organizations and function as central points of 

contact for OCDETF agents and federal prosecutors nationwide, 

gathering intelligence and disseminating investigative leads throughout 

neighboring areas.49 The report states that Strike Force members are 

colocated in offices separate from their parent agencies and interact with 

each other on a daily basis using the resources and support of their 

parent agencies. According to OCEDTF’s report, Strike Force efforts help 

further counternarcotics investigations by combining the resources and 

expertise of all OCDETF participating investigators and prosecutors. The 

report also states that, in recognition of the nationwide heroin threat, 

OCDETF adjusted its resources to target heroin investigations and that 

 49Department of Justice, Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces, FY 2017 

Interagency Crime and Drug Enforcement Congressional Submission.
Page 31 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

when heroin use was rising in 2014 and 2015, the percentage of 

indictments with heroin charges likewise increased over the same time 

frame. According to OCDETF’s report, Strike Force effectiveness is 

reflected in the caseload of active investigations linked to OCDETF’s 

Consolidated Priority Organization Targets. OCDETF reported that, in 

fiscal year 2015, 45 percent of Strike Forces’ active investigations were 

linked to OCDETF Consolidated Priority Organization Targets; in contrast, 

22 percent of all OCDETF investigations addressing transnational 

organized crime were linked to these targets.

The National Security Council has a number of interagency policy 

committees that prioritize counternarcotics, including changing conditions, 

in the Western Hemisphere. National Security interagency policy 

committees are the primary day-to-day forums for interagency 

coordination of national security policy, according to Presidential Decision 

Directive 1.50 National Security Presidential Directive 25 directs U.S. 

government agencies to attack the vulnerabilities of drug-trafficking 

organizations and disrupt key business sectors and weaken the economic 

basis of the drug trade. For example, the Transborder Security and 

Western Hemisphere Directorates interagency policy committee on 

Mexico Security Priorities directed ONDCP to establish the National 

Heroin Coordination Group. The agencies represented on the interagency 

policy committees vary, but the core group involved in addressing heroin 

and fentanyl include ONDCP, State, DOJ, DOD, DHS, the Department of 

Health and Human Services, the Office of the Director of National 

Intelligence, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service (as appropriate), and the 

Office of Management and Budget.

Several interagency policy committees related to addressing heroin 

include (1) Transborder Security and Western Hemisphere, (2) Fentanyl 

Surge, and (3) the Heroin Availability Reduction Plan. Among the topics 

discussed at the committee meetings were the formation of the National 

Heroin Coordination Group, which created the Heroin Availability 

Reduction Plan, as well as approval of the plan, and deliberate and 

tangible actions the interagency policy committees could take under the 

Heroin Availability Reduction Plan to visibly disrupt the fentanyl supply 

chain coming into the United States. There were also various efforts set 

up to address common issues related to illicit opioids among the United 

 50The White House, Presidential Policy Directive 1: Organization of the National Security 

Council System (Washington, D.C.; Feb.13, 2009).

Interagency Policy Committees
Page 32 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

States, Mexico, and Canada, which were addressed in forums such as 

the North American Drug Dialogue or the U.S.-Mexico Security 

Cooperation Group. Subinteragency policy committees include the U.S.-

Mexico Security Group; North American Drug Dialogue; and FentanylAsia, Fentanyl-Cyber, Fentanyl Screening, and Fentanyl Sub-Interagency 

Policy Committees. Among the topics discussed were the fentanyl threat 

and sources of supply into the United States, tangible actions to disrupt 

the fentanyl supply chain, Asia’s role in the fentanyl supply and actions 

that could be taken to address it, and an examination of the purchase and 

sale of fentanyl over the Internet for shipment through the mail services 

and actions taken to detect such shipments. The interagency policy 

committees that address cocaine and methamphetamine generally 

involve the same agencies that are involved in the interagency policy 

committees addressing heroin.

We are not making recommendations in this report. We provided a draft 

of this report to the DOD, DHS, DOJ, ONDCP, State, and USAID for 

review and comment. We received technical comments from DHS, DOJ, 

ONDCP, and State, which we incorporated as appropriate.

As agreed with your office, unless you publicly announce the contents of 

this report earlier, we plan no further distribution until 12 days from the 

report date. At that time, we will send copies to the appropriate 

congressional committees; the Secretaries of Defense, Homeland 

Security, and State; the Attorney General of the United States; and the 

Director, Office of National Drug Control Policy. In addition, the report will 

be available at no charge on the GAO website at http://www.gao.gov.

Agency Comments 
Page 33 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

If you or your staff members have any questions about this report, please 

contact me at (202) 512-6991 or farbj@gao.gov. Contact points for our 

Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on 

the last page of this report. GAO staff who made key contributions to this 

report are listed in appendix VI.

Jessica Farb

Director, International Affairs and Trade
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology

Page 34 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

This report examines (1) U.S. agencies’ spending for counternarcotics 

efforts in the Western Hemisphere in fiscal years 2010 through 2015, (2) 

agencies’ efforts to gather and share best practices and lessons learned 

from their counternarcotics efforts both domestically and internationally, 

and (3) mechanisms that agencies have used to address changing drug 

threats.

To examine U.S. agencies’ spending for counternarcotics efforts in the 

Western Hemisphere in fiscal years 2010 through 2015—our first 

objective—we selected eight U.S. departments and components 

(collectively, in this report, “agencies”) that implement aspects of the 

National Drug Control Strategy and conduct counternarcotics activities in 

the Western Hemisphere: (1) the Department of Defense (DOD); the 

Department of Homeland Security’s (2) Customs and Border Protection 

(CBP), (3) Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and (4) Coast 

Guard; the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) (5) Drug Enforcement 

Administration (DEA) and (6) Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task 

Forces (OCDETF); the Department of State’s (7) Bureau of International 

Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL); and (8) the U.S. Agency for 

International Development (USAID).1 To select these eight agencies, we 

used the following two criteria:

1. Agencies that have international counternarcotics efforts in one or 

more of the areas that the Western Hemisphere Drug Policy 

Commission has been asked to review.

2 The Office of National Drug 

Control Policy (ONDCP), which coordinates the National Drug Control 

Program, requires all National Drug Control Program agencies to 

 1

“The National Drug Control Program” means programs, policies, and activities 

undertaken by National Drug Control Program agencies related to their responsibilities 

under the National Drug Control Strategy, including activities involving demand and supply 

reduction, or state, local, and tribal affairs. “National Drug Control Program agency”

means any agency that is responsible for implementing any aspect of the National Drug 

Control Strategy, subject to certain exceptions regarding intelligence agencies. See 21 

U.S.C. § 1701. 

2

In December 2016, Congress passed legislation, establishing an independent drug 

commission, called the Western Hemisphere Drug Policy Commission, to conduct a 

comprehensive review of U.S. foreign policy in the Western Hemisphere and to identify 

policy and program options to improve existing international counternarcotics policy. The 

legislation directs the commission to review U.S.-funded international illicit drug control 

programs in the Western Hemisphere, including drug interdiction, crop eradication, 

alternative development, drug production surveys, police and justice sector training, 

demand reduction, and strategies to target drug kingpins. See Pub. L. No. 114-323, §§ 

601 et seq.

Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology

Page 35 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

submit an annual drug budget identifying the amounts the agencies 

plan to spend on counternarcotics efforts for the upcoming fiscal year. 

The agencies report spending for such efforts in 10 program areas: 

Corrections, Intelligence, Interdiction, International, Investigations, 

Prevention, Prosecution, Research and Development, State and Local 

and Tribal Law Enforcement Assistance, and Treatment. On the basis 

of ONDCP’s definitions of these program areas, we determined that

four of these areas—Intelligence, Interdiction, International, and 

Investigations—were relevant to the areas that the Western 

Hemisphere Drug Policy Commission has been directed to examine.3

2. Agencies that allocated a combined total of at least $50 million for 

their counternarcotics efforts for the Intelligence, Interdiction, 

International, and Investigations program areas in fiscal year 2015. 

The following summarizes ONDCP’s definitions of these four program 

areas:

• Intelligence. Intelligence efforts encompass several drug control 

areas. Such efforts include providing strategic drug‐related 

intelligence support, including the collection, analysis, and 

dissemination of drug‐related information regarding structure, 

membership, finances, communications, and activities of drugtrafficking organizations and the identification of drug‐related threats. 

Other activities facilitate the sharing among U.S. agencies of domestic 

and foreign intelligence information on the production and trafficking 

of drugs in the United States and foreign countries; analysis of the 

willingness and ability of partner nation governments to carry out drug 

control programs; federal, state, local, and tribal law enforcement 

initiatives to gather, analyze, and disseminate information among 

domestic law enforcement agencies; and all other activities that 

provide intelligence and other information for use by national policy 

makers, strategic planners, and local law enforcement.

• Interdiction. Interdiction activities are intended to reduce the 

availability of illegal drugs in the United States or abroad by targeting 

transportation links. Interdiction efforts encompass the interception of 

shipments of illegal drugs and their precursors and the disruption of 

trafficking networks and their proceeds; such efforts may include air 

and maritime seizures and deterring transport via air, sea, and land 

routes. Other efforts involve accurate assessment and monitoring of 

 3

Three of these program areas—Intelligence, Interdiction, and Investigations—also 

include domestic efforts. However, we eliminated agencies whose counternarcotics 

activities in these areas had a primarily domestic focus.
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology

Page 36 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

interdiction programs; enhancing the ability of nations that are drug 

sources to interdict drugs; interdicting the flow of drugs, weapons, and 

bulk currency along borders; and other air and maritime activities that 

disrupt illegal drug-trafficking operations.

• International. International activities are primarily focused on areas 

outside the United States and are intended to reduce illegal drug 

availability in the United States or abroad. Activities may include 

source-country programs designed to help international partners 

manage the consequences of drug production, trafficking, and 

consumption in their own societies, including programs to train and 

equip security forces; efforts to raise awareness of science-based 

practices and programs to prevent, treat, and provide recovery from 

substance abuse; and support for economic development programs to 

help reduce the production or trafficking of illicit drugs. These efforts 

may also include assessment and monitoring of international drug 

production programs and policies; coordination and promotion of 

compliance with international treaties, including those directed at the 

eradication of illegal drugs and the production and transportation of 

illegal drugs; involvement of other nations in international law 

enforcement programs and policies to reduce the supply of drugs; and 

all other overseas drug law enforcement efforts to disrupt the flow of 

illicit drugs into the United States.

• Investigations. Investigations activities are designed to develop a 

prosecutable case against individuals and organizations responsible 

for the production and distribution of illegal drugs, including identifying 

profits and assets from drug‐related criminal enterprises in order to 

seize them; identifying the leaders of illegal drug and other criminal 

organizations; gathering information about drug‐related criminal 

activity; ensuring that legitimate controlled substances are handled, 

manufactured, and distributed in accordance with federal laws and 

regulations; and all other drug law investigative efforts to identify, 

disrupt, and dismantle drug smuggling in the United States.

We requested and obtained data on spending for counternarcotics 

activities from these eight agencies and the Federal Bureau of 

Investigation (FBI), which OCDETF reimburses for international 
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology

Page 37 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

counternarcotics investigations.4 We also reviewed each agency’s annual 

accounting for its counternarcotics budget. In addition, we interviewed 

agency officials to understand their counternarcotics budgets as they are 

reported in the annual ONDCP budget and performance summary reports 

and to determine the extent to which the agencies could identify the 

funding they had obligated for counternarcotics activities in the Western 

Hemisphere.5 Our methodology for identifying counternarcotics spending 

varied by agency, since some of the agencies—DOD, ICE, INL, and 

USAID—track such spending by region, while other agencies—the Coast 

Guard, CBP, OCDETF, and DEA—do not.6 Moreover, with the exception 

of DEA’s and OCDETF’s counternarcotics activities, the agencies’

counternarcotics activities represent only one aspect of their larger 

missions. On the basis of our review of the data, our review of each 

agency’s annual accounting of its drug budget,7 and interviews with 

agency officials, we determined that the data were sufficiently reliable for 

our reporting purposes. The following summarizes the Western 

Hemisphere counternarcotics activities reflected in the funding data we 

present for each agency. (The data we present for OCDETF include its 

reimbursements to the FBI.)

• DOD. All DOD counternarcotics activities under U.S. Northern 

Command and U.S. Southern Command.

• CBP. All CBP counternarcotics spending. Given that the agency’s 

jurisdiction is triggered by the illegal movement of criminal goods 

across national borders, the agency considers all of its efforts to be 

 4

The FBI is not a National Drug Control Program agency component and therefore does 

not submit a counternarcotics budget to ONDCP. However, we included the FBI in our 

review because it receives reimbursements for its investigations of cases with a drug 

nexus. We excluded ONDCP, because, as the agency that coordinates the U.S. drug 

control program, it plays a supporting, rather than an active, role in counternarcotics 

activities in the Western Hemisphere. 

5

We asked agencies to provide obligations levels because, with the variations of spending 

data across nine agencies, we determined that we could provide the most consistent 

information with obligations levels, which capture each agency’s financial commitments for 

its counternarcotics activities. 

6

DEA tracks some of its counternarcotics spending by region, while the FBI tracks its 

counternarcotics spending by type of drug organization, which sometimes identifies the 

region. 

7

Pursuant to 21 U.S.C. § 1704(d), all drug control program agencies are required to 

submit to the Director of ONDCP a detailed accounting, which has been authenticated by 

the Inspector General of each agency prior to submission, of all funds expended by the 

agency for counternarcotics activities during the previous fiscal year.
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology

Page 38 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

specific to the Western Hemisphere. However, the agency’s spending 

also includes interdictions and intelligence gathering to support these 

interdictions of drugs coming from all locations outside the United 

States.

• ICE. The portion of ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations’ spending 

for investigation of Western Hemisphere drug organizations.

• Coast Guard. All Coast Guard counternarcotics spending. Given that 

the Coast Guard’s interdictions occur in Western Hemisphere waters, 

the agency considers all of its counternarcotics efforts to be specific to 

the Western Hemisphere.

• DEA. DEA obligations for Investigations, Intelligence, and 

International program areas for domestic and international 

enforcement activities. DEA was also able to provide its obligations for 

salaries and expenses for investigations and intelligence-gathering 

activities conducted by agents posted in overseas locations in the 

Western Hemisphere (see app. III).

• OCDETF. OCDETF reimbursements for drug investigations 

conducted by DEA, the FBI, and ICE as well as OCDETF 

contributions to the OCDETF fusion center.

• FBI. OCDETF reimbursements for investigations of transnational 

crime organizations with a drug nexus. (App. III details the FBI’s 

expenditure of OCDETF funds).

• INL. International Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement funds for 

counternarcotics activities for Western Hemisphere countries.

• USAID. Economic Support Funds and Development Assistance funds 

for alternative development activities in Western Hemisphere 

countries.

To examine how agencies gather and share best practices and lessons 

learned from their counternarcotics efforts both domestically and 

internationally—our second objective—we reviewed the National Drug 

Control Strategy and companion strategies for examples of best practices 

as well as other agency documents that identify best practices and 

lessons learned. We also sent the eight selected agencies, the FBI, and 

ONDCP a standard set of questions. These questions addressed how the 

agencies collected and identified best practices and lessons, whether 

they had formal definitions of best practices and lessons learned, whether 

their efforts to identify and collect this information were routine, whether 

they had review processes to assess the information, and whether they 

shared these practices with other agencies and with international 

partners. In addition, we asked the agencies to identify best practices 
Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and 

Methodology

Page 39 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

related to counternarcotics efforts in the Western Hemisphere. Further, 

we conducted interviews with agency officials, seeking clarification to 

written responses as appropriate and asking whether the agencies had 

any policies or strategies regarding best practices, and we reviewed the 

documents that were provided to us in response.

To identify the mechanisms U.S. agencies have used to address 

changing drug threats—our third objective—we reviewed key U.S. 

government-wide and agency-specific documents pertaining to U.S. 

counternarcotics efforts in the Western Hemisphere, including those that 

encompass counternarcotics efforts as part of broader national security 

areas. These documents include the National Drug Control Strategies, 

Southwest Border Counternarcotics Strategies, Northern Border 

Counternarcotics Strategies, the Caribbean Border Counternarcotics 

Strategy, the Strategy to Combat Transnational Organized Crime, and the 

National Interdiction Command and Control Plan. Agency-specific 

strategic plans included CBP’s Vision and Strategy 2020, Homeland 

Security Investigations’ Strategic Plan, ICE’s Strategic Plan, DOJ’s 

Strategic Plan, DEA’s Strategic Plan, OCDETF’s Strategic Plan, the 

Department of State’s Functional Bureau Strategies and the Western 

Hemisphere Affairs and Latin America and the Caribbean Joint Regional 

Strategy, and USAID’s Country Development Cooperation Strategies for 

Colombia and Peru. We also interviewed ONDCP and agency officials 

about the development of these strategies. We interviewed ONDCP 

officials about, and obtained documentation describing, the roles of the 

National Heroin Coordination Group and the Cocaine Coordination 

Group, and we identified the roles of other working groups through 

agency interviews and documents. To understand how agencies 

coordinated efforts and cooperate with foreign partners, we visited the 

U.S. Southern Command and the Joint Interagency Task Force South in 

Miami and Key West, Florida, and interviewed officials at both locations. 

Additionally, in discussions with officials from the other agencies we 

reviewed, we asked whether the agencies cooperated with foreign 

partners.

We conducted this performance audit from August 2016 to October 2017 

in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. 

Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain 

sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our 

findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that 

the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings based 

on our audit objectives.
Appendix II: U.S. Agencies That Conduct 

Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics 

Activities

Page 40 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

The Office of National Drug Control Policy coordinates the National Drug 

Control Program and develops the National Drug Control Strategy, which 

is implemented by a number of U.S. government agencies. The following 

summarizes the Western Hemisphere counternarcotics activities of key 

National Drug Control Program agencies and their components as well as 

the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

• The Department of Defense (DOD) maintains the lead role in 

detecting and monitoring aerial and maritime transit of illegal drugs 

into the United States and plays a key role in collecting, analyzing, 

and sharing intelligence on illegal drugs with U.S. law enforcement 

and international security counterparts. DOD supports other 

interdiction activities with the use of its assets. DOD also provides 

counternarcotics foreign assistance to train, equip, and improve the 

counternarcotics capabilities of relevant agencies of foreign 

governments.

• The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is responsible for 

U.S. policies related to interdiction of illegal drugs entering the United 

States from abroad. Key agencies within DHS that participate in 

counterdrug activities include the following:

• Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is the lead agency for 

border security and is responsible for, among other things, 

keeping terrorists and their weapons; criminals and their 

contraband, including drugs; and inadmissible aliens out of the 

country. CBP is responsible for border security at ports of entry; 

the 6,000 miles of land borders between ports of entry; and nearly 

2,700 miles of coastal waters surrounding the Florida Peninsula 

and Puerto Rico.

• Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) primary mission 

is to promote homeland security and public safety through the 

enforcement of federal laws governing border control, customs, 

trade, and immigration. ICE’s office of Homeland Security 

Investigations investigates immigration crime; human rights 

violations and human smuggling; smuggling of narcotics, 

weapons, and other types of contraband; financial crimes; 

cybercrime; and export enforcement issues.

Appendix II: U.S. Agencies That Conduct 

Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics 

Activities
Appendix II: U.S. Agencies That Conduct 

Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics 

Activities

Page 41 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

• The Coast Guard is the lead federal agency for maritime drug 

interdiction in the Transit Zone.1 The Coast Guard provides 

resources to the Joint Interagency Task Force South, generally 

including major cutters, maritime patrol aircraft, and helicopters 

capable of deploying airborne use of force.

• The Department of Justice (DOJ) is responsible for federal law 

enforcement and to ensure public safety against foreign and domestic 

threats, including illegal drug trafficking. The following are DOJ’s 

primary agencies that focus on international drug control activities:

• The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is the nation’s 

federal agency dedicated to drug law enforcement and, 

accordingly, works to disrupt and dismantle the leadership, 

command, control, and financial infrastructure of major drugtrafficking organizations. DEA operates around the world to disrupt 

drug-trafficking operations; dismantle criminal organizations; 

enforce the drug-related laws of the United States; and bring to 

justice those organizations and individuals involved in the growing, 

manufacture, or distribution of illicit drugs destined for the United 

States.

• The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) conducts its 

counternarcotics activities under the agency’s broader strategy to 

counter transnational criminal organizations by targeting their 

command-and-control structures as well as the support networks 

that facilitate the smuggling of illicit goods, including drugs, into 

the United States.2

• The Organized Crime and Drug Enforcement Task Forces’ 

(OCDETF) primary goal is to identify, investigate, and prosecute 

the transnational, national, and regional criminal organizations 

most responsible for the illegal drug supply in the United States, 

the diversion of pharmaceutical drugs, and the violence 

 1

According to the Office of National Drug Control Policy, illicit drugs coming to the United 

States from South America pass through a 7-million-square-mile area called the Transit 

Zone, roughly twice the size of the continental United States. The Transit Zone includes 

the Caribbean Sea, the Gulf of Mexico, and the eastern Pacific Ocean.

2

The FBI is not a National Drug Control Program agency component but receives 

reimbursements from the Organized Crime and Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) 

for conducting drug-related investigations.
Appendix II: U.S. Agencies That Conduct 

Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics 

Activities

Page 42 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

associated with the drug trade. It effectively leverages the 

resources and expertise of its seven federal agency members.3

• The Department of State’s Bureau of International Narcotics and 

Law Enforcement Affairs develops, funds, and manages 

counternarcotics and law enforcement assistance programs to help 

reduce the entry of illicit drugs into the United States and minimize the 

impact of international crime on the United States. 

• The U.S. Agency for International Development supports the U.S. 

counternarcotics effort through alternative development programs that 

help farmers find legal sources of income through licit crops such as 

cacao and coffee and that provide technical assistance, such as 

training in modern farming techniques and access to capital for 

investment in equipment.

 3

OCDETF’s seven member agencies are DEA; the FBI; the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, 

Firearms and Explosives; the U.S. Marshals Service; the Internal Revenue Service, 

Criminal Investigation Division; ICE; and the Coast Guard. OCDETF works in cooperation 

with DOJ’s Criminal Division, the 94 U.S. Attorneys’ offices, and state and local law 

enforcement.
Appendix III: Selected Agencies’ Obligations 

for Counternarcotics Activities in Fiscal Years 

2010-2015

Page 43 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

The Department of Defense (DOD), the Department of Homeland 

Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the Department 

of Justice’s Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Department of 

State’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs 

(INL), and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) 

provided data showing their obligations for counternarcotics activities in 

the Western Hemisphere. The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) 

provided data showing a portion of its counternarcotics obligations for

salaries and expenses associated with DEA agents posted overseas.

DOD data show obligations for counternarcotics activities by the U.S. 

Northern Command and the U.S. Southern Command, which have 

responsibility over the Western Hemisphere. Table 4 contains the 

commands’ counternarcotics obligations for fiscal years 2010 through 

2015.

Table 4: Department of Defense (DOD) Obligations for Drug Resources in the Western Hemisphere, by Geographic Command, 

Fiscal Years 2010-2015

Dollars in millions

Geographic command 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

2010-2015 

Total

U.S. Northern Command 97 105 125 115 64 69 575

U.S. Southern Command 390 378 359 359 390 382 2,257

Total 486 483 483 474 454 451 2,832

Source: GAO analysis of DOD data. | GAO-18-10

Note: Because of rounding, numbers in columns and rows may not sum to totals shown. These data 

do not include DOD obligations levels for counternarcotics intelligence activities conducted by the 

U.S. Northern and Southern Commands. DOD was not able to provide obligations data for these 

activities for certain fiscal years.

Table 5 shows the U.S Northern Command’s and U.S. Southern 

Command’s counternarcotics obligations in support of foreign partners in 

the Western Hemisphere, by country, for fiscal years 2013 through 2015.1

 1

Section 1009 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013 (Pub. L. No. 

112-239) requires DOD to submit biannual reports to Congress on the use of 

counternarcotics funds in support of counternarcotics activities of foreign governments. 

DOD started tracking these figures in 2013. This reporting requirement ceased in fiscal 

year 2017.

Appendix III: Selected Agencies’ Obligations 

for Counternarcotics Activities in Fiscal Years 

2010-2015

DOD
Appendix III: Selected Agencies’ Obligations 

for Counternarcotics Activities in Fiscal Years 

2010-2015

Page 44 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Table 5: Department of Defense (DOD) Obligations for Country-Specific Train-and-Equip Counternarcotics Activities in the 

Western Hemisphere, Fiscal Years 2013-2015

Dollars in thousands

Geographic command/country 2013 2014 2015 2013-2015 Total

U.S. Northern Command

Bahamas 644 670 697 2,011 

Mexico 66,038 44,643 45,787 156,468 

U.S. Southern Command

Barbados 227 483 2,805 3,515 

Belize 3,264 5,893 4,815 13,972 

Brazil — 92 20 112 

Chile — — 5 5 

Colombia 69,316 55,639 54,551 179,506 

Costa Rica 2,069 384 2,522 4,975 

Curacao 26,130 — — 26,130 

Dominican Republic 632 3,296 2,754 6,682 

Ecuador 3,541 494 119 4,154 

El Salvador 11,973 2,156 6,240 20,369 

Guatemala 8,971 13,792 23,148 45,911 

Honduras 5,359 5,683 18,996 30,038 

Jamaica 3 1,865 3,938 5,806 

Nicaragua 736 3,265 7,479 11,480 

Panama 1,358 2,143 6,304 9,805 

Peru 6,452 5,039 7,567 19,058 

St. Kitts & Nevis — — 76 76 

Trinidad & Tobago — — 5 5 

Western Hemisphere total 206,713 145,537 187,828 540,078 

Legend: “—” denotes zero obligations for the corresponding country and fiscal year.

Source: GAO analysis of DOD documents. | GAO-18-10

Note: Because of rounding, numbers in columns and rows may not sum to totals shown.
Appendix III: Selected Agencies’ Obligations 

for Counternarcotics Activities in Fiscal Years 

2010-2015

Page 45 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Table 6 shows ICE expenditures for counternarcotics investigations and 

intelligence activities conducted by ICE agents for Western Hemisphere 

drug cases, by country, during fiscal years 2010 through 2015.2

Table 6: Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Expenditures for Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics Investigations 

and Intelligence Activities, by Country, Fiscal Years 2010-2015

Dollars

Country 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

2010-2015 

Total

Anguilla — 5,389 — — — — 5,389

Antigua & 

Barbados 24,993 11,840 — — — — 36,833

Antilles 

(Netherlands) 106,995 134,939 455,926 134,885 4,679 3,676 841,100

Argentina 99,499 886,900 485,885 369,854 1,197,454 756,931 3,796,523

Aruba 69,737 131,102 173,753 142,486 396,312 387,536 1,300,926

Bahamas 320,613 594,455 407,497 322,528 124,794 170,079 1,939,966

Barbados 29,880 60,090 27,765 100,561 77,469 36,758 332,523

Belize 2,918 6,737 567 20,365 22,877 2,262 55,726

Bermuda 31,296 313,345 450,184 456,102 322,180 331,953 1,905,060

Bolivia 42,686 83,204 9,349 70,294 49,691 10,179 265,403

Brazil 110,878 111,619 50,167 61,741 155,799 221,143 711,347

British Virgin 

Islands 24,510 120,718 103,417 9,663 23,917 75,008 357,233

Canada 1,132,999 2,128,543 1,942,907 2,954,308 2,686,760 2,085,915 12,931,432

Chile 4,669 — — 20,344 26,516 74,930 126,459

Colombia 2,715,276 4,650,577 6,314,050 5,926,659 7,774,886 6,759,895 34,141,343

Costa Rica 392,864 331,421 327,035 193,752 286,956 528,791 2,060,819

Cuba — 1,281 2,985 31,236 33,233 38,288 107,023

Dominica — 5,120 107,371 137,839 24,146 18,125 292,601

Dominican 

Republic 841,063 1,483,994 1,962,119 1,898,868 2,270,755 2,344,754 10,801,553

Ecuador 347,988 311,966 791,131 1,175,754 1,409,841 496,669 4,533,349

El Salvador 47,768 97,557 34,281 11,078 31,103 11,869 233,656

Guatemala 352,497 532,023 715,527 1,022,471 1,938,022 794,784 5,355,324

 2

We are reporting ICE expenditures rather than obligations, because ICE’s financial 

system converts obligations into expenditures once payments have been made, according 

to agency officials. 

ICE
Appendix III: Selected Agencies’ Obligations 

for Counternarcotics Activities in Fiscal Years 

2010-2015

Page 46 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Country 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

2010-2015 

Total

Guyana 45,925 23,297 98,797 9,966 231,531 535,281 944,797

Haiti 71,771 244,472 254,374 251,376 81,930 180,859 1,084,782

Honduras 52,802 383,615 734,836 405,548 1,241,291 392,733 3,210,825

Jamaica 285,518 401,501 544,651 390,244 318,096 870,253 2,810,263

Mexico 9,729,648 14,850,975 20,767,941 19,329,062 17,662,683 22,873,849 105,214,158

Montserrat — — — 14,900 10,865 10,582 36,347

Nicaragua 42,102 18,555 15,522 3,018 37,496 7,628 124,321

Panama 792,463 1,579,499 1,477,901 1,080,178 874,209 1,333,304 7,137,554

Paraguay — 65,748 50,147 90,529 54,593 — 261,017

Peru 194,695 121,119 275,080 373,412 185,678 257,025 1,407,009

St. ChristopherNevis— 2,562 5,100 — — — 7,662

St. Lucia 62,428 7,006 23,232 — — 8,483 101,149

St. Vincent & the 

Grenadines

28,873 49,850 84,779 19,835 1,560 — 184,897

Suriname 9,337 35,569 27,654 22,653 26,314 38,081 159,608

Trinidad & 

Tobago

44,413 148,515 478,883 149,286 264,186 270,263 1,355,546

Turks and Caicos — — — 23,649 260 4,524 28,433

Uruguay 98,915 167,065 100,577 85,189 92,287 40,717 584,750

Total 18,624,197 30,732,345 40,018,068 38,097,208 40,962,804 43,296,843 211,731,465

Legend: “—” denotes zero obligations for the corresponding country and fiscal year.

Source: Department of Homeland Security ICE. | GAO-18-10

Table 7 shows DEA obligations for salaries, expenses, and administrative 

costs for DEA personnel located in 30 Western Hemisphere countries 

during fiscal years 2010 through 2015.

Table 7: Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Obligations for Personnel Stationed in Countries in the Western 

Hemisphere, Fiscal Years 2010-2015

Dollars in thousands

Country 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

2010-2015 

Total

Argentina 3,855 3,934 3,443 2,213 2,794 2,925 19,165

Bahamas 10,172 9,019 10,433 10,456 10,693 10,073 60,847

Barbados 2,598 2,630 2,816 2,924 3,019 3,608 17.595

Belize 2,379 2,402 1,682 1,968 2,082 2,257 12,769

Bolivia 683 -83 — — — — 600

DEA
Appendix III: Selected Agencies’ Obligations 

for Counternarcotics Activities in Fiscal Years 

2010-2015

Page 47 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Country 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

2010-2015 

Total

Brazil 9,695 10,714 11,494 10,481 11,079 12,603 66,066

Canada 2,550 2,638 2,840 2,834 2,882 3,408 17,151

Chile 1,855 1,830 1,736 2,027 1,832 2,632 11,911

Colombia 40,782 45,145 45,711 52,032 44,379 52,822 280,871

Costa Rica 2,885 3,219 3,168 2,650 2,999 3,068 17,987

Dominican Republic 4,694 4,731 4,960 5,860 6,389 7,526 34,159

Ecuador 7,392 8,455 8,496 8,317 9,712 12,224 54,595

El Salvador 2,006 2,051 1,942 1,937 2,055 2,178 12,170

Guatemala 3,281 3,128 3,387 4,147 4,000 5,232 23,176

Haiti 2,434 2,086 2,084 1,754 2,227 2,410 19,994

Honduras 1,801 2,044 1,913 3,101 2,257 3,436 14,552

Jamaica 3,093 2,797 3,292 3,230 3,164 3,536 19,111

Mexico 28,205 31,223 31,276 31,510 32,710 38,390 193,314

Netherland Antilles 1,917 2,037 2,035 2,015 2,339 2,402 12,746

Nicaragua 2,078 2,106 2,172 1,945 2,470 2,596 13,367

Panama 3,961 4,581 5,790 5,978 6,512 8,872 35,694

Paraguay 4,251 4,127 4,567 3,678 3,322 3,550 23,496

Peru 18,941 19,362 19,902 23,654 18,620 24,936 125,415

Puerto Rico 2,751 3,098 3,047 2,844 2,625 2,568 16,933

St. Croix 109 152 087 40 52 96 536

St. Thomas 147 143 135 122 37 31 615

Suriname 1,476 1,355 1,508 1,514 1,293 — 7,147

Trinidad/Tobago 2,921 2,754 2,291 2,621 1,998 — 12,585

Uruguay — — 0,522 1,454 1,976 2,255 6,207

Venezuela 2,378 1,546 1,934 1,730 1,988 2,272 11,847

Total 171,290 179,225 184,665 195,035 187,503 217,904 1,135,621

Legend: “—” denotes zero obligations for the corresponding country and fiscal year.

Source: DEA. | GAO-18-10

Note: Because of rounding, numbers in columns and rows may not sum to totals shown.

Table 8 shows OCDETF reimbursements to the FBI for expenditures 

related to its investigations of transnational Central American, South 

American, Mexican, and Caribbean crime organizations; drug-smuggling 

and money-laundering organizations; alien-smuggling organizations; and 

drug-related public corruption cases in the Western Hemisphere, as well 

FBI
Appendix III: Selected Agencies’ Obligations 

for Counternarcotics Activities in Fiscal Years 

2010-2015

Page 48 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

as headquarters administration expenses, for fiscal years 2010 through 

2015.3

Table 8: Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Expenditures for Organized Crimine Drug Enforcement Task Forces Program 

Drug-Related Investigations of Transnational Crime Organizations in the Western Hemisphere, Fiscal Years 2010-2015

Dollars in thousands

Expenditure category 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

2010-2015 

Total

Central/South American 

organizations 14,407 13,749 16,822 15,083 14,805 12,825 87,691

Mexican criminal 

enterprises 47,638 55,545 60,496 58,387 65,357 63,864 351,288

Caribbean organizations 4,473 5,703 5,246 6,998 7,067 6,047 35,534

Alien-smuggling 

organizations 29 381 261 198 187 103 1,159

Drug-smuggling/moneylaundering organizations 1,978 2,077 1,714 1,949 1,347 1,139 10,204

Other organizations 6,898 5,886 8,827 7,224 5,436 4,191 38,461

Headquarters 

administration 8,393 8,386 9,238 9,602 9,754 10,390 55,764

Total 83,817 91,727 102,603 99,440 103,953 98,560 580,101

Source: GAO analysis of FBI data. | GAO-18-10

Note: Because of rounding, numbers in columns and rows may not sum to totals shown.

Table 9 shows INL obligations for counternarcotics activities in 13 

Western Hemisphere countries and for two regional programs in the 

Western Hemisphere, the Central America Regional Security Initiative, 

and the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative, during fiscal years 2010 

through 2015.

 3

The FBI has a law enforcement and intelligence mission, and its counternarcotics efforts 

fall under its broader strategy to counter transnational organized crime. The Western 

Hemisphere transnational criminal organization threat encompasses a range of U.S. 

activities, including drug-trafficking, money-laundering, human-trafficking, alien-smuggling, 

public corruption, weapons-trafficking, extortion, kidnapping, theft of natural resources and 

cultural property such as art and antiquities, insurance fraud, and health care fraud. All 

OCDETF investigations and accompanying funding are investigations of transnational 

criminal organizations and must have a drug nexus. Therefore, all OCDETF funding 

supports counternarcotics efforts, though the respective investigation frequently involves 

criminal offenses beyond narcotics possession and distribution. 

INL
Appendix III: Selected Agencies’ Obligations 

for Counternarcotics Activities in Fiscal Years 

2010-2015

Page 49 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Table 9: Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) Obligations for Counternarcotics Activities in 

the Western Hemisphere, Fiscal Years 2010-2015

Dollars in thousands

Country 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

2010-2015 

Total

Argentina 230 6 — — — — 236

Bolivia 18,092 10,670 4,317 3,320 — — 36,399

Brazil 1,408 1,000 2,801 1,567 — — 6,776

Chile 181 — — — — — 181

Colombia 196,676 165,632 134,006 107,835 80,156 69,442 753,747

Dominican Republic 2,142 — — — — — 2,142

Ecuador 1,273 3,929 3,414 2,187 — — 10,803

Guatemala 1,133 — — — — — 1,133

Haiti 17,101 2,889 2,567 1,256 942 — 24,755

Mexico 165,087 20,588 58,183 32,838 18,042 30,433 325,171

Paraguay 987 295 73 293 — — 1,648

Peru 31,100 34,773 30,096 37,857 21,380 13,676 168,882

Venezuela 92 — — — — — 92

Western Hemisphere regional 

programs (Central America 

Regional Security Initiative, 

Caribbean Basin Security 

Initiative) 49,321 37,722 30,126 30,270 34,324 22,434 204,197

Total 484,823 277,504 265,583 217,423 154,844 135,985 1,536,162

Legend: “—” denotes zero obligations for the corresponding country and fiscal year.

Source: INL. | GAO-18-10

Note: Because of rounding, numbers in columns and rows may not sum to totals shown.

Table 10 lists USAID’s obligations for alternative development projects in 

four countries in the Western Hemisphere during fiscal years 2010 

through 2015.

Table 10: U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Obligations for Alternative Development Programs in the 

Western Hemisphere, Fiscal Years 2010-2015

Dollars in thousands

Mission 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

2010-2015 

Total

Bolivia 17,419 — — — — — 17,419

Colombia 101,021 96,431 85,245 77,738 52,980 52,400 465,815

Ecuador 12,334 4,114 1,138 — — — 17,586

USAID
Appendix III: Selected Agencies’ Obligations 

for Counternarcotics Activities in Fiscal Years 

2010-2015

Page 50 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Dollars in thousands

Mission 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

2010-2015 

Total

Peru 22,943 23,455 19,872 27,125 23,425 20,830 137,650

Total 153,717 124,000 106,255 104,863 76,405 73,230 638,470

Legend: “—” denotes zero obligations for the corresponding country and fiscal year.

Source: USAID. | GAO-18-10

Note: Because of rounding, numbers in columns and rows may not sum to totals shown.
Appendix IV: U.S. Agencies’ Planning for 

Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics Efforts

Page 51 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

National Drug Control Program agencies’ planning for counternarcotics 

efforts in the Western Hemisphere is represented in a variety of strategic 

documents, which may be broad or targeted, depending on their mission. 

For example, the Department of Defense’s (DOD) 2011 Counternarcotics 

and Global Threats Strategy focuses primarily on the department’s efforts 

to combat narcotics trafficking and transnational organized crime. DOD 

officials indicated that they are currently updating the strategy. Similarly, 

the Coast Guard’s 2014 Western Hemisphere Strategy includes 

counternarcotics as part of the agency’s broader regional mission. 

According to Coast Guard officials, the Coast Guard does not plan to 

update its strategy.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has several strategic 

documents that relate to its components’ counternarcotics activities, as 

described below:

• Customs and Border Protection’s Vision and Strategy 2020

incorporates counternarcotics efforts as part of its mission to facilitate 

legitimate trade and safeguard land, air, and maritime borders.1

• Immigration and Customs Enforcement also has a specific goal, 

protecting the homeland against illicit trade, travel, and finance, 

including an objective targeting drug-trafficking organizations in its 

Homeland Security Investigations’ Strategic Plan Fiscal Years 2012-

2016.2

The Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Fiscal Years 2014-2018 Strategic 

Plan includes the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) goal of 

disrupting and dismantling major drug-trafficking organizations within a 

much broader set of law enforcement missions.3

• DEA’s Fiscal Years 2009-2014 Strategic Plan indicates the agency 

has focused on international and domestic drug-trafficking and 

money-laundering organizations identified as having the most 

significant impacts internationally and domestically, known as 

“Consolidated Priority Organization Targets” and “Priority Targeted 

 1

Department of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection, Vision and Strategy 

2020 (Washington, D.C.: March 2015).

2

Department of Homeland Security, Homeland Security Investigations, Forging a New 

Legacy: Strategic Plan Fiscal Years 2012-2016 (Washington, D.C.: Feb. 28, 2012).

3

Department of Justice, Fiscal Years 2014-2018 Strategic Plan.

Appendix IV: U.S. Agencies’ Planning for 

Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics 

Efforts
Appendix IV: U.S. Agencies’ Planning for 

Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics Efforts

Page 52 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Organizations.”4 In addition, DEA’s Drug Flow Attack Strategy, 

developed in 2009, identifies vulnerable chokepoints to disrupt the 

flow of drugs. DEA officials indicated they are updating the strategy.

• DOJ also released a Strategy for Combating the Mexican Cartels in 

January 2010, which was designed to be consistent with the National 

Drug Control Strategy and the National Southwest Border 

Counternarcotics Strategy. The DOJ strategy’s 10 objectives include 

(1) reduce the flow of narcotics and other contraband entering the 

United States, (2) strengthen Mexico’s operational capacities and 

enhance its law enforcement institutions, (3) increase bilateral 

cooperation between Mexico and the United States on fugitive capture 

and extradition activities, and (4) increase intelligence and information 

sharing among law enforcement agencies in the United States and 

Mexico to achieve focused targeting of the most significant criminal 

organizations.

• DOJ’s Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces (OCDETF) 

has a long-term drug enforcement strategy for using its prosecutorled, multiagency task forces in the field to conduct intelligence-driven, 

coordinated, multijurisdictional prosecutions and investigations.5

Specifically, OCDETF member agencies focus on Consolidated 

Priority Organization Targets—that is, “command and control”

organizations representing the most significant drug-trafficking and 

money-laundering organizations threatening the United States. 

OCDETF member agencies also pursue organizations identified as 

regional priorities because they have a significant impact on the illicit 

drug supply within a specific region.6

Officials in the Department of State’s (State) Bureau of International 

Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) stated that the bureau uses 

 4

Department of Justice, Drug Enforcement Administration, Fiscal Years 2009-2014 

Strategic Plan.

5

Department of Justice, Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces, Fiscal Years 

2016-2018 Organized Crime Drug and Enforcement Task Forces Strategic Plan (Draft). 

OCDETF officials indicated that, owing to the change in the administration, the plan had 

not been finalized. 

6

OCDETF issued new program guidelines in January 2017 expanding its investigative and 

prosecutorial efforts to include the highest-priority transnational criminal organizations that 

the OCDETF agencies agreed pose the greatest threat to public safety and national 

security. The updated guidelines also expanded the OCDETF member agencies to 

include representatives from the Attorney General’s Organized Crime Council agencies 

that were not already OCDETF member agencies. 
Appendix IV: U.S. Agencies’ Planning for 

Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics Efforts

Page 53 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

a variety of strategic planning documents in its efforts to address 

counternarcotics in the Western Hemisphere.7

• INL’s Functional Bureau Strategy includes the broad objective of 

reducing illicit drug production and drug demand, along with other 

activities such as working with the United Nations Office of Drug and 

Crime.8

• The Western Hemisphere Affairs and Latin America and the 

Caribbean Joint Regional Strategy, which focuses on a goal of a 

secure and democratic future for all citizens in Latin America and the 

Caribbean, includes interdiction goals for specific drugs such as 

opium gum (used for producing heroin) and cocaine.

• Integrated Country Strategies at posts and INL Country Plans are 

focused strategies, targeting, for example, the eradication of a specific 

number of hectares of coca or the seizure of a certain number of 

metric tons of illicit drugs and precursor chemicals.

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) does not have a 

specific strategy related to counternarcotics and instead relies on the 

Office of National Drug Control Policy’s National Drug Control Strategy to 

help guide its alternative development activities in countries confronting 

illicit drug production and trafficking, according to USAID officials. 

USAID’s targeted efforts are described in its Country Development 

Cooperation Strategies for Colombia and Peru, where alternative 

development efforts are currently underway. The Colombia strategy 

describes the U.S. government’s development assistance in support of 

Colombian efforts to continue its transition out of conflict. According to the 

Colombia strategy, investments under several of its development 

objectives would help create conditions for alternative livelihoods and 

legal behaviors, contributing to broader U.S. and Colombian efforts to 

address drug trafficking.9 The Peru strategy includes alternatives to illicit 

coca cultivation as a development objective in specific regions, supporting 

 7

State also listed its U.S. Strategy for Engagement in Central America, developed in 

September 2014, as related to its counternarcotics efforts. This strategy focuses on 

addressing the violence and migration associated with illicit drugs.

8

The most recent INL functional bureau strategy is the U.S. Department of State, 

Functional Bureau Strategy, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement 

Affairs: Calendar Year 2015-2018. 

9

U.S. Agency for International Development, USAID/Colombia Country Development 

Cooperation Strategy 2014-2018: A Path to Peace (June 13, 2014).
Appendix IV: U.S. Agencies’ Planning for 

Western Hemisphere Counternarcotics Efforts

Page 54 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

the overall goal of strengthening stability and democracy through 

increased social and economic inclusion, reductions in illicit coca 

cultivation, and the illegal exploitation of natural resources.10 USAID 

conducted operations focused on alternative development in Bolivia until 

May 2013, when the mission closed.

 10U.S. Agency for International Development, USAID/Peru Country Development 

Cooperation Strategy 2012-2016 (Lima, Peru: 2012).
Appendix V: U.S. Agencies’ Cooperation with 

Foreign Partners to Reduce Drug Trafficking in 

the Western Hemisphere

Page 55 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Cooperation with foreign partners is a crucial element in addressing 

changing narcotics conditions in the Western Hemisphere. For example, 

the Department of State’s (State) Bureau of International Narcotics and 

Law Enforcement Affairs (INL), the U.S. Agency for International 

Development (USAID); the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) 

Coast Guard and Customs and Border Protection (CBP); and the 

Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) 

and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) work with host nation 

counterparts on a variety of counternarcotics efforts.

U.S. assistance programs to disrupt the flow of cocaine and other harmful 

products are designed to build capacity of judicial, law enforcement, and 

treatment institutions in partner countries, according to INL’s 2017 

International Narcotics Control Strategy Report.

1 These programs are 

carried out through the Central America Regional Security Initiative,2 the 

Caribbean Basin Security Initiative,3 and the Mérida Initiative.4 Key 

activities of these programs include drug interdiction cooperation, 

especially maritime-based efforts in Central America and the Caribbean; 

law enforcement capacity building; anticorruption initiatives and support; 

and enhanced prosecution and judicial reform strengthening efforts. For 

example:

 1

Department of State, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, 

International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, Vol. I: Drug and Chemical Control (March 

2017).

2

The Central America Regional Security Initiative (CARSI) was designed as a partnership 

between the United States and the region. From fiscal years 2008 through 2016, the U.S. 

government appropriated at least $1.2 billion to Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, 

Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama for CARSI and its predecessor. The 

initiative seeks to address the impact of narcotics and weapons-trafficking, gangs, 

organized crime, porous borders, public safety, and rule of law issues that exist in many 

Central American countries. 

3

The United States created the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative in 2009 with the goals 

of reducing illicit trafficking, advancing public safety and security, and promoting social 

justice and by strengthening Caribbean partner nations’ capabilities in maritime security, 

law enforcement, information sharing, border and migration control, transnational crime, 

and criminal justice. An estimated $444 million in funding has been provided for the 

program in fiscal years 2010 through 2016. 

4

The Mérida Initiative is a bilateral security cooperation agreement between Mexico and 

the United States aimed at supporting Mexico’s law enforcement and judicial institutions, 

helping to counteract the illegal trade in narcotics, and strengthening border security. 

From 2008 through 2016, the Mérida Initiative provided $1.9 billion in International 

Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement funding for equipment, training, and capacitybuilding assistance to the government of Mexico, according to State.

Appendix V: U.S. Agencies’ Cooperation with 

Foreign Partners to Reduce Drug Trafficking 

in the Western Hemisphere
Appendix V: U.S. Agencies’ Cooperation with 

Foreign Partners to Reduce Drug Trafficking in 

the Western Hemisphere

Page 56 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

• In Mexico, as of September 2016, Mérida Initiative funding had 

supported 238,000 federal, state, and municipal police officers’ 

standardized training in their role as first responders in the country’s 

new criminal justice system, according to INL’s report. The report also 

stated that as of 2016, Mexico had seized over 230 metric tons of 

illegal drugs and over $50 million in illegal currency with Méridafunded equipment and training. 

• In Central America, State has provided targeted assistance to help 

enhance the ability of local partners to interdict drug shipments, 

disrupt trafficking networks, and control domestic production, 

according to State officials. For example, State officials reported that 

State had partnered with DEA to support local vetted police units to 

interdict drug shipments and investigate traffickers. According to the 

officials, the 20-officer Maritime Interdiction Vetted Unit in Costa Rica 

interdicted 1,151 kilograms of cocaine in April 2017, and similar units 

in Guatemala seized 2,532 kilograms of cocaine in June 2017. In 

addition, according to State officials, INL assisted the Guatemalan 

counternarcotics police in developing an opium poppy eradication 

program that resulted in the destruction of 1,000 acres of poppy 

cultivation in a 2-month period in the spring of 2017. Moreover, State 

officials reported that a State-provided wiretapping system and 

associated training allowed Costa Rican prosecutors to convict seven 

Sinaloa cartel members in May 2017, shutting down an operation that, 

according to State officials, had been sending 14 metric tons of 

cocaine per year to the United States.

USAID also relies on international partnerships to implement its 

alternative development activities. For example, USAID reported that it 

plans to continue its mitigation of drug-related security threats in Peru by 

replicating successes it had in the country’s San Martin region and in 

other coca-growing regions in collaboration with the government of Peru 

and other U.S. government agencies, in its Peru Country Development 

Cooperation Strategy for 2012 through 2016.5 Results from the Monzon 

Valley in Peru also demonstrate how foreign partnerships can impact the 

illicit drugs trade. USAID focused its alternative development assistance 

on the coca stronghold of the Monzon Valley, which once supported 

about 10,000 hectares of coca, from 2013 to 2015. The average income 

was about $1.89 per day per person, well below the national extreme 

 5

The U. S. Agency for International Development/Peru Country Development Cooperation 

Strategy 2012-2016 (Lima, Peru: 2012). 
Appendix V: U.S. Agencies’ Cooperation with 

Foreign Partners to Reduce Drug Trafficking in 

the Western Hemisphere

Page 57 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

poverty line of $2.20 per day per person in 2013. Households that 

remained under assistance during the strategy period saw a 53-percent 

increase in income. Moreover, the percentage of assisted families in 

extreme poverty dropped by 25 percent, from 55 percent to 30 percent. 

Coca cultivation dropped by more than 91 percent in all areas where 

recent coca eradication was followed by sustained alternative 

development assistance, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs 

and Crime. The Central Intelligence Agency’s Crime and Narcotics Center 

recorded a less robust, but still impressive, reduction of 64 percent over 

the same period, according to USAID officials. Furthermore, USAID 

officials noted that while its resources for alternative development in Peru 

diminished, the budget for the National Commission for Development and 

Life without Drugs, Peru’s development organization, grew from $15 

million in 2011 to $38 million during 2014 and 2015.

In Colombia, USAID reported in its 2014-2018 Country Development 

Cooperation Strategy that it is trying to address the need for licit 

economic opportunities by supporting cocoa, specialty coffee, rubber, and 

dairy sectors in former coca-growing areas, which would help create the 

conditions for alternative livelihoods and legal behaviors for small 

producers in areas vulnerable to coca cultivation and drug production, 

contributing to broad U.S. government and Colombian efforts to address 

drug trafficking.6 This alternative development work increased under Plan 

Colombia, with USAID and the government of Colombia working together 

on several large-scale rural development projects. Three programs 

evolved that incorporate public and private partnerships to facilitate 

economic growth from 2006 to 2017.7 The first program reportedly 

generated 250,000 new jobs by investing in agricultural sectors such as 

rubber, cacao, and African palm enterprises as well as hotels and 

tourism. The second program supported the provision of grant subsidies 

to agricultural value-chains, linking small farmer associations with national 

 6

U.S. Agency for International Development, USAID/Colombia Country Development 

Cooperation Strategy 2014-2018: A Path to Peace (June 13, 2014). 

7

The programs were (1) More Investment in Sustainable Alternative Development project, 

2006-2010, to develop licit economic options through hands-on, implementer-delivered 

technical assistance, credit, market alliances, and cooperative support; (2) Consolidated 

and Enhanced Livelihoods Initiative, 2012-2015, to extend and solidify a state presence in 

marginalized rural municipalities through small-scale, community-driven economic projects 

designed to build the capacity of local governments; and (3) Rural Economic Growth 

program, 2014-2017, to provide sustainable, inclusive rural economic growth by 

encouraging private-sector investment in target areas by reducing and mitigating costs 

and risks.
Appendix V: U.S. Agencies’ Cooperation with 

Foreign Partners to Reduce Drug Trafficking in 

the Western Hemisphere

Page 58 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

and international private-sector buyers. In the 2013 selection round, for 

example, more than 30 selected projects included crops and products 

such as cacao, rubber, fruits, dairy, and meat. In the third program, 

USAID carried sustainable development by encouraging private-sector 

investment in target areas. For example, USAID focused on developing 

alliances with key private-sector leaders in the coffee and cacao sectors 

in the former sector by raising yields and quality and addressing 

infrastructure needs especially in conflict-prone zones. Today, Colombia 

is the world’s largest producer of premium-quality Arabica beans, 

according to USAID. Likewise, fine cocoa is a successful crop in 

Colombia, with a growing world demand, according to USAID. The 

Colombian cocoa industry is relatively small, with 25,000 farmers 

producing about 42,000 tons, or 0.2 percent of the global market. 

However, about 85 percent of Colombian cocoa is from “fine” species, 

giving Colombia a 3-percent share of global fine cocoa exports. USAID 

also developed a private investment equity fund, providing capital to 

small- and medium-sized enterprises in Colombia. The fund is now an 

independent, for-profit enterprise providing small- and medium-sized 

Colombian enterprises with capital and operational support.

The Coast Guard’s efforts to support foreign partners include its 

Multilateral Maritime Counter Drug Summits, where U.S. and foreign 

partners meet to discuss operational and legal issues. The summits are 

attended by U.S. agencies including, among others, DEA, CBP, the 

Department of Defense’s Joint Interagency Task Force South, State, and 

DOJ. Representatives from Western Hemisphere countries, including 

Belize, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El 

Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, 

and Peru, among others, also attend the summits. For example, at a 

summit held in May 2016, Mexico briefed about its judicial system’s 

transition to an adversarial system, and Honduras briefed about its 

successes using increased penalties for money-laundering violations, 

when it is proven that the money is from drug trafficking, according to a 

Coast Guard document. On the operational side, Panama made 

presentations on regional operations, and the U.S. Coast Guard 

presented on capacity building for counterdrug operations, among other 

efforts. Other issues—such as how to leverage increased maritime 

awareness regionally resulting from investments by partner nations in 

radar and the linking of vessel-tracking technologies along their coastlines 

with the Joint Interagency Task Force South’s Cooperative Situational 

Information Integration system—are discussed at these meetings.
Appendix V: U.S. Agencies’ Cooperation with 

Foreign Partners to Reduce Drug Trafficking in 

the Western Hemisphere

Page 59 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

DHS cooperates with foreign partners in variety of ways to target 

emerging counternarcotics threats, as follows:

• ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations works with foreign partners to 

(1) coordinate criminal investigations, including those related to 

counternarcotics; (2) disrupt criminal efforts to smuggle people and 

material, including drugs into the United States; and (3) build 

international partnerships through outreach and training. In ONDCP’s 

fiscal year 2017 Budget and Performance Summary report, ICE 

established a target of 29 percent of transnational drug investigations 

resulting in the disruption or dismantlement of high-threat, 

transnational drug-trafficking organizations or individuals for fiscal 

year 2015. According to the report, ICE fell short at 15 percent but 

indicated there were several reasons, including a methodology that 

allowed double counting; as a result, the methodology was revised.8

• CBP also has a network of attachés and advisors, who serve in U.S. 

diplomatic missions9 and act as liaisons between law enforcement 

components such as DEA; the FBI; and DOJ’s Bureau of Alcohol, 

Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Attachés and advisors also work

with foreign partners building capacity and provide training, technical 

assistance, and mentoring on border security, according to CBP 

officials. For example, CBP has trained over 1,000 Panamanian 

customs and law enforcement officers since 2014. Also, since 

February 2017, CBP helped vet, train, and mentor a unit of Peruvian 

intelligence analysts. Twenty tons of cocaine have been seized since 

the unit was created, according to CBP officials.

• CBP’s National Targeting Center hosts representatives from 

participating foreign agencies and works with these international 

liaisons and other U.S. government agencies to detect and disrupt 

narcotic-smuggling operations, drug-trafficking organizations, and 

their associates. According to agency officials, in fiscal years 2015 

and 2016, the center’s efforts with foreign partners led to results in the 

Western Hemisphere such as

• discovery and seizure of over 100 kilograms of cocaine,

 8

Executive Office of the President of the United States, FY 2017 Budget and Performance 

Summary.

9

Attachés are located in Argentina, Belize, Brazil, Canada, Dominican Republic, El 

Salvador, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Panama, Peru, and Trinidad and 

Tobago.
Appendix V: U.S. Agencies’ Cooperation with 

Foreign Partners to Reduce Drug Trafficking in 

the Western Hemisphere

Page 60 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

• identification of a previously unknown foreign company suspected 

of narcotics involvement, and

• seizure of counterfeit identification documents destined to the 

United States with links for possible bank fraud and the illicit 

money laundering.

DOJ works with foreign country counterparts to conduct bilateral 

investigations and support joint counterdrug operations, among other 

things, such as the following:

• DEA’s special agents, who work at embassies or consulates 

overseas, conduct bilateral investigations with their foreign 

counterparts. These special agents also carry out institution-building 

activities with their counterparts.

• DEA reported that it provides investigative equipment and training, in 

large part through its Sensitive Investigative Units in selected 

countries, including Mexico and Colombia. The Sensitive Investigative 

Units seek to create focused, well-trained, and vetted drug 

investigative and intelligence units, targeting the most significant drugtrafficking organizations affecting the United States. DEA sees the 

program’s impact as building international cooperation, facilitating 

institution building and professional development, and improving 

judicial processes.

• DEA’s International Drug Enforcement Conference is another venue 

for cooperation with foreign partners. The conference brings senior 

international drug law enforcement officials together, in regional and 

bilateral meetings where, according to DEA, topics such as crossborder coordination of operations, intelligence sharing, and joint 

training activities are addressed.10 According to INL’s 2017 

International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, at a meeting in Peru, 

in April 2016, geographical regional and multiregional working groups 

identified collective targets, agreed upon multilateral counterdrug

enforcement and interdiction operations, and assessed the progress 

and evaluated intelligence on existing and emerging targets.11 The 

 10Established in 1983, the International Drug Enforcement Conference was originally 

focused on the Western Hemisphere and acted as a liaison and policy forum. It has 

expanded to a global conference and is now an operational and strategic planning 

platform. 

11Department of State, Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, 

International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, Vol. I: Drug and Chemical Control

(Washington, D.C.: March 2017).
Appendix V: U.S. Agencies’ Cooperation with 

Foreign Partners to Reduce Drug Trafficking in 

the Western Hemisphere

Page 61 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

2015 Caribbean Border Counternarcotics Strategy noted that the 

DEA-led International Drug Enforcement Conference is a forum for 

building coalitions between U.S. federal law enforcement and foreign 

counterparts and that within the Caribbean, law enforcement officials 

from over 20 nations participate in the annual meetings to discuss 

regional investigative targeting efforts.

• One measure DEA tracks as contributing to ONDCP’s National Drug 

Strategy is the number of international, domestic, and diversion 

priority targets linked to consolidated priority organization targets it 

disrupts or dismantles.12 In ONDCP’s fiscal year 2017 Budget and 

Performance Summary, DEA reported that in fiscal year 2015, it set a 

goal of disrupting or dismantling 440 targets linked to consolidated 

priority organization targets and achieved 356 of these targets.13 DEA 

indicated that it did not achieve its goal due to budgetary constraints.

• FBI legal attachés carry out capacity-building programs, providing 

equipment and training to enhance foreign partners’ ability to combat 

criminal activity connected to transnational criminal organizations, 

according to FBI officials. These officials stated that FBI-trained and -

vetted investigative units in Colombia and the Dominican Republic 

target the most significant criminal organizations affecting the United 

States.

• The FBI conducts multiple trainings with Mexican law enforcement as 

a means of developing contacts and fostering cooperative 

relationships with its law enforcement counterparts in Mexico, 

according to FBI officials. These officials noted that the FBI’s ability to 

advance investigations with a nexus south of the border is greatly 

enhanced through these contacts. According to these officials, the FBI 

also sponsors numerous trainings throughout Latin America to 

enhance its foreign partners’ ability to deal with the increasing 

transnational organized crime threat.

 12According to ONDCP, “disrupted” means impeding the normal and effective operation of 

the targeted organization, as indicated by changes in the organizational leadership or 

changes in methods of operation; and “dismantled” means destroying the organization’s 

leadership, financial base, and supply network such that the organization is incapable of 

reconstituting itself. 

13Executive Office of the President of the United States, FY 2017 Budget and 

Performance Summary: Companion to the National Drug Control Strategy (Washington, 

D.C.: December 2016).
Appendix VI: GAO Contact and Staff 

Acknowledgments

Page 62 GAO-18-10 Counternarcotics

Jessica Farb, (202) 512-6991, or farbj@gao.gov

In addition to the individual named above, Juan Gobel (Assistant 

Director), Julie Hirshen (Analyst-in-Charge), Lynn Cothern, Martin De 

Alteriis, Neil Doherty, Mark Dowling, Reid Lowe, and Shirley Min made 

key contributions to this report. Dawn Locke and Diana Maurer provided 

technical support.

Appendix VI: GAO Contact and Staff 

Acknowledgments

GAO Contact

Staff 

Acknowledgments

(100995)
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