Office of National Drug Control Policy

ONDCP Excel One Hundred Second Row

Action Item Number: 
Action Item Name: 
Disrupt Illicit Drug Trafficking in the Transit Zone
Action Item Description: 

The Joint Interagency Task Force South (JIATFS), a DOD component of U.S. Southern Command, coordinates and directs detection and monitoring of all illicit drug-trafficking activities in the Transit Zone.

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Bringing together partners from the military, law enforcement, and intelligence communities, along with our international allies, JIATFS has contributed to impressive interdiction results and disruptions of trafficking organizations by United States law enforcement agencies and our international partners, allowing us to “work smarter.” This has largely been accomplished through the consistent employment of Maritime Bilateral Counter-Drug Agreements and Operational Procedures, improvements in the exchange of information among our partners, better detection technology, development of more and better actionable intelligence, and improvements in the ability of transit zone partner countries to conduct interdiction endgame operations on their own. Our law enforcement agencies must continue to develop technology, tactics, and procedures to combat evolving smuggling trends in order to improve our interdiction capabilities. Achievement of the national interdiction goal—removal of 40 percent of all documented movement of cocaine through the Transit Zone by 2015—will rely on continued refinement of every facet of the interdiction continuum. If this goal proves not to be attainable even with those improvements, it will be evaluated to determine whether the goal is realistic or should be revised in light of the limits of interdiction.

Lead Agency: 
DHS
Component(s): 
USCG