Pentagon Opposes Drug War Role

WASHINGTON —  Defense Secretary Frank C. Carlucci said Friday that he would strongly oppose any effort to carve out an active law-enforcement role for the military in the war on drugs.

“That is not the function of the military. We are not the front-line agency in the war on drugs,” Carlucci said in an interview.

Espousing the same approach as his predecessor, Caspar W. Weinberger, Carlucci said he was “very much against giving the military arrest authority or getting them into law enforcement” and did not foresee any change in Administration policy.

Carlucci, who assumed his post in November after Weinberger retired, was asked his views on drug enforcement after Education Secretary William J. Bennett suggested the United States consider “a broader use of military force against both the production and shipment of drugs.”

Kansas Sen. Bob Dole, who is seeking the Republican presidential nomination, adopted the same approach Thursday.

Carlucci, however, said the Pentagon should continue to play only a supporting role in the war on drugs--sharing equipment and intelligence--because otherwise it would lose sight of its real mission.