That information was relayed to FBI personnel at the Joint Interagency Task Force South (JIATF-S) in Key West, Florida, a multi-agency, international alliance whose mission is to cover 42 million square miles of territory primarily in Central and South America to stem the flow of illegal drugs and to disrupt and dismantle sophisticated narco-trafficking networks. Much of that work is carried out on the high seas.

The Honduran traffickers had set out from Limón, Costa Rica. Their “go-fast” boat—a small, low-profile vessel favored by smugglers—was packed with 300 kilos of cocaine and a cache of military-grade weapons, including M16 rifles and grenade launchers.

When intelligence sources confirmed that the boat was in the water, officers on the watch floor at JIATF-S requested that the U.S. Navy launch a P3 surveillance aircraft to locate the smugglers, who were making their way up the east coast of Nicaragua toward Honduras. Because there were no U.S. Coast Guard cutters in the vicinity to make an interdiction, the watch floor commander called the Honduran liaison officer assigned to JIATF-S and asked for assistance.

In a matter of hours, radar-equipped Honduran aircraft had taken over tracking the vessel and Honduran navy patrol boats were under way. As the navy interceptors closed in, the four smugglers beached their craft and ran into the jungle, firing on their pursuers as they fled. In the end, the criminals were apprehended, along with the drugs and weapons. The four are currently imprisoned in Honduras.

“If you take the average price of a kilo of cocaine on Main Street USA,” said Coast Guard Rear Adm. Christopher Tomney, JIATF-S director, “we have taken more than $6 billion worth of illicit profits out of the system. We’re talking hundreds of tons of cocaine that have been intercepted.”

The challenges posed by narco-traffickers, however, remain enormous. “The threats we go against know no boundaries,” Tomney said. “These are threats that affect multiple agencies and multiple nations. It not only takes a whole government approach to go after these problems, it really takes a whole hemisphere approach.”

The task force succeeds by integrating intelligence gathering and sharing with streamlined and highly coordinated tactical operations. Partner nations significantly extend the reach of U.S. capabilities. Everyone works toward the common goal of stopping the illicit drug trade. As one task force member noted, “We all take the field as one team.”

Using intelligence largely supplied by the FBI, the task force detects and monitors the go-fast boats and difficult-to-detect semi-submersible vessels used by traffickers. Then, military and law enforcement personnel from the U.S. and partner nations step in to carry out the interdictions and arrests.

Lt. Col. Gustavo Alvarez, a Honduran Army officer, had just arrived in Florida as the JIATF-S liaison officer in March 2015 when he assisted with the FBI case out of New Orleans. He saw firsthand how the task force model of integrating intelligence and operations gets results.

“One of the biggest takeaways when you come here,” he said, “is that the foreign liaison officers are all just a few steps away, one office to the other.” That means information flows into the task force, Alvarez said, “but it also starts going between the other countries of interest. So the information flow really grows exponentially.”

Cmdr. Jose Jose-Vasquez, a JIATF-S liaison officer from the Dominican Republic Navy, agreed. “If I have to make a contact with the Colombian liaison, for example, I just have to look in the office. I don’t need a passport or a visa or a diplomatic procedure. In a matter of minutes, we have the information needed to be successful.”

Personnel on the Joint Interagency Task Force South describe how the unique makeup of the alliance streamlines efforts to combat drug traffickers and criminal networks covering 42 million square miles, primarily in Central and South America.

Where drug traffickers are concerned, minutes can make a difference. On the JIATF-S watch floor any time of day or night, targeting officers and intelligence analysts may be tracking dozens of vessels on the vast Pacific Ocean or Caribbean Sea suspected of carrying cocaine and other contraband. They must decide how to deploy limited military resources to track these vessels and to target them for interdictions.

Self-propelled semi-submersible craft (SPSS) are the most highly prized catches because they carry the most drugs, anywhere from eight to 10 metric tons of cocaine—that’s roughly $300 million in street value. But these vessels are designed for stealth, with very little of the craft showing above the water line.

“It’s very difficult to find them on radar, said Gerry Canavan, a retired Coast Guard officer who joined the FBI as an analyst helping to target vessels suspected of carrying drugs. “If it’s not flat and calm, the radar probably isn’t going to pick up an SPSS,” he said. The task force has other technical means at its disposal, but intelligence gained through human and other sources is critical to the process.