It happens about four times a day, right under the nose of Peru’s military: A small single-engine plane drops onto a dirt airstrip in the world’s No. 1 coca-growing valley, delivers a bundle of cash, picks up more than 300 kilos of cocaine and flies to Bolivia.
Roughly half of Peru’s cocaine exports have been ferried eastward on this “air bridge,” police say, since the rugged Andean nation became the world’s leading producer of the drug in 2012.
Peru’s government has barely impeded the airborne drug flow. Prosecutors, narcotics police, former military officers and current and former U.S. drug agents say that while corruption is rife in Peru, the narco-flight plague is the military’s failure because it controls the remote jungle region known as the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro river valley.
In this Sept. 19, 2014 photo, the Ene river is seen from a military helicopter as it flies over the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region, in Pichari, Peru. According to authorities the area has no radar coverage and the neighboring nations’ air forces are limited so drug flights can only be intercepted on the ground. Peru has blown craters into 132 clandestine airfields this year, up from 110 last year. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
Wilson Barrantes, a retired army general who has long complained about military drug corruption, said giving the military control over the valley is “like putting four street dogs to guard a plate of beefsteak.”
Deputy Defense Minister Ivan Vega, who runs counterinsurgency efforts in the region, said that he was not aware of any military officials under investigation. “Corruption exists, but we are always looking out for it,” he said. “If we know of anyone involved, we’ll throw the book at them.”
But an Associated Press investigation found that “narco planes” have been loaded with drugs at landing strips just minutes by air from military bases in the remote, nearly road-less valley where about two-thirds of Peru’s cocaine originates.
Videos obtained by AP show small planes landing on clandestine air strips in the jungle region, about the size of Ireland. Elite squads of narcotics police hidden on nearby hilltops videotaped the landings, but were too outgunned to intervene, said two narcotics police officers who provided the videos but declined to speak on the record for fear of losing their jobs. Cocaine regularly disappears aloft in Cessna 206 planeloads, each worth upward of $7.2 million overseas.
The operations normally last about 10 minutes, usually just after dawn and tightly choreographed: A dozen or so cocaine-laden backpackers appear on a landing strip’s fringe as the GPS-guided plane, its pilot having broken radio silence a few minutes earlier, approaches. Men with assault rifles guard the strip. Money is offloaded, drugs are jammed into the cabin. The motor re-engages. The plane departs.
One pilot told the AP that some local military officers charge $10,000 per flight to allow the planes to land and take off unbothered.
Concern over the flights spurred Peru’s congress to pass a law in August that authorizes shooting down drug planes. But critics say the government lacks the will to do the job, having inexplicably scrapped plans to buy and install the necessary state-of-the-art radar.
PERU’S DRUG WAR: “DISTORTED, INCOHERENT AND INERT”
When President Ollanta Humala took office in 2011, he declared combatting illicit drugs a priority. His government has destroyed record amounts of coca leaf. His government has spent more than $60 million on eradication, and is supported by the U.S. government and the European Union. In a July 28 independence day address four years after assuming office, the former army lieutenant colonel said trafficking in the valley had been reined in.
“Drug trafficking is no longer a parallel power in the VRAEM,” Humala claimed, referring to the cocaine valley’s acronym.
But critics say he has allowed most of Peru’s cocaine production to migrate to the valley, where there is no eradication of coca crops and drug enforcement is weak.
Humala also points to more than 550 missions to blast craters into the clandestine airstrips as a triumph. National police director Gen. Vicente Romero has said repeatedly that traffickers fill the holes in a matter of days using local labor.
Sonia Medina, the public prosecutor for illicit drugs, said in an interview that trafficking has gone “from bad to worse” on Humala’s watch — along with narco-corruption in politics, the criminal justice system, the police and military. “What we are doing in counter-narcotics is completely distorted, incoherent and inert.”
Compared to Colombia, the world’s second-largest cocaine exporter, Peru’s drug war performance pales:
—Peru seized 28 metric tons of cocaine or coca paste a year on average from 2011-2014, compared to 170 metric tons by Colombia or partners acting on Colombian intelligence. For Peru, that’s less than 10 percent of potential production, for Colombia it’s more than half, by U.S. estimates.
—While Colombia has systematically arrested major kingpins over the past decade, extraditing many to the United States for trials that yield lengthy sentences, Peru has not jailed and convicted a major trafficker since 2005.
—Peru’s narcotics police operate on a $12 million annual operating budget, with no planes or helicopters. Their Colombian counterpart has a $45 million budget, and some 50 planes and 70 helicopters including U.S. Blackhawks.
A special congressional committee in Peru was convened to probe drug corruption in politics after state and municipal elections last October in which Medina counted 700 candidates either under investigation for or convicted of drug-related crimes. Its chairwoman, Rep. Rosa Mavila, said Peru’s government is in danger of capture by narco-criminal syndicates.
“It is not yet a narco state,” she said in interview. “But it is at risk of becoming one.”
In this Sept. 19, 2014 photo, explosives are detonated by Peruvian counternarcotics forces on a part of a clandestine grassy airstrip in the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region, in Ayacucho, Peru. The dynamiting of craters by Peruvian security forces into clandestine airstrips cuts into profits but hardly discourages cocaine traffickers who net tens of thousands of dollars with each flight flown from these airstrips. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this Sept. 19, 2014 photo, clandestine airstrips are seen from a military helicopter in the Valley of the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region, in Pichari, Peru. The area has no radar coverage and the neighboring nations’ air forces are limited so drug flights can only be intercepted on the ground. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this Sept. 19, 2014 photo, a Peruvian counternarcotics agent signals to a military helicopter a landing area on a clandestine airstrip in the Valley of the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region in Junin, Peru. Security forces destroyed in the last two weeks more than 50 clandestine airstrips for drug planes in the biggest offensive that seeks to combat the intense drug airlift to Bolivia. According to authorities, two of the landing strips cratered in this latest operation have each been repaired four times this year, the 500-meter airstrips are fixed overnight. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this Sept. 19, 2014 photo, a soldier stands guard during the destruction of a clandestine airstrip in the Valley of the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region in Ayacucho, Peru. Peruvian and Bolivian officials have agreed during a meeting in La Paz to share information in real time on cross-border drug flights. They did not, however, divulge details. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this Sept. 19, 2014 photo, a counternarcotics officer explains to the press the two weeks campaign to eradicate clandestine airstrips at the Mazamari counternarcotics military base in the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region, in Junin, Peru. The dynamiting of craters by Peruvian security forces into clandestine airstrips in the VRAEM cuts into profits but hardly discourages cocaine traffickers who net tens of thousands of dollars with each flight. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this Sept. 19, 2014 photo, soldiers sit, back dropped by an image of Jesus Christ embracing a praying soldier, inside a building at the Mazamari counternarcotics base in the Valley of the Ene and Apurimac and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region, in Junin, Peru. An average of about 4-5 small planes daily fly into Peru from Bolivia, picking up about 300 kilos each of coca paste worth about a third of a million dollars in Bolivia. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this Sept. 19 2014 photo, Peruvian counternarcotics forces watch the detonantion of explosives they planted on a part of a clandestine grassy airstrip in the Valley of the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region in Ayacucho, Peru. Peruvian authorities have launched an operation to destroy clandestine airstrips used by drug traffickers. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this Sept. 19, 2014 photo, counternarcotics officers make a hole for placing explosives during the destruction of a clandestine airstrip in the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region, in Ayacucho, Peru. The dynamiting of craters by Peruvian security forces into clandestine airstrips in the VRAEM cuts into profits but hardly discourages cocaine traffickers who net tens of thousands of dollars with each flight. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this Sept. 19, 2014, photo, a military attack helicopter flies over Pichari, Peru in the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro river valley, or VRAEM. It is the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region. Roughly half of Peru’s cocaine exports have been ferried eastward, police say, since the rugged Andean nation became the worldís leading producer of the drug in 2012. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this, Sept. 19, 2014 photo, soldiers carry a TV after descending from a helicopter at Mazamari anti drugs military base in the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region, in Junin, Peru. According to authorities an average of about 4-5 small planes daily fly into Peru from Bolivia, picking up about 300 kilos each of coca paste worth about a third of a million dollars in Bolivia, where it is further refined. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this Sept. 19, 2014 photo, soldiers walk around a crater created by explosives planted by Peruvian counternarcotics forces on part of a clandestine grassy airstrip, located in the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region, in Ayacucho, Peru. According to authorities traffickers pay local villagers up to $100 each to fill the holes blasted into the landing strips that dot the floodplain. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this Friday, Sept. 19, 2014 photo, a soldier signals to his commander while standing inside a crater created by explosives planted by Peruvian counternarcotics forces on part of a clandestine grassy airstrip, in the Valley of the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region in Ayacucho, Peru. According to official data, Peru has blown craters into 132 clandestine airfields this year, up from 110 last year. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this Sept. 19, 2014 photo, counternarcotics officers walk in a clandestine airstrip strewn with boulders, in the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region, in Junin Peru. The boulders are used as a way to camouflage the airstrips from air observation. Security forces say that traffickers pay local villagers to keep the runways hidden and to repair them when they are cratered in counternarcotics operations. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
In this Sept. 19, 2014 photo, a statue of the Virgin Mary stands over a message that reads in Spanish “Blades and good wind, Pilots of the Fatherland” at the Mazamari counter-narcotics military base in the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, in Junin, Peru. The area, also known as VRAEM, is the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
This Sept. 19, 2014 photo, shows the Mazamari counternarcotics military base in the Apurimac, Ene and Mantaro River Valleys, or VRAEM, the world’s No. 1 coca-growing region, in Junin, Peru. According to authorites the area has no radar coverage and the neighboring nations’ air forces are limited so drug flights can only be intercepted on the ground. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
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Having stood in coca fields of the Upper Huayagua Valley in the early 1990s, I can say without fear of equivocation, we are still inept and perhaps more so! God help us.
AP Images Blog 
Having stood in coca fields of the Upper Huayagua Valley in the early 1990s, I can say without fear of equivocation, we are still inept and perhaps more so! God help us.
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