WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Air Force Secretary Deborah James said on Friday she was looking at ways to help Latin American partners boost the fight against drug trafficking and organized crime, possibly by increasing the number of Air Force training flights to the region.

James, who just returned from a tour of South America, gave examples of what the Air Force could accomplish by sending more training flights to the region to do double-duty in the drug- and crime-fighting effort.

In one case in March a B-1 bomber on a training mission in the Caribbean spotted a suspicious vessel in the water and conducted a low-level pass to try to identify the boat and what it was doing, she told a briefing.

“Sure enough, it was drug smugglers,” James said. “Upon seeing the B-1 performing this maneuver, they panicked and they threw the drugs overboard.”

The U.S. Joint Interagency Task Force working on counternarcotics operations in the region estimated the smugglers dumped about 500 kg (1,100 pounds) of cocaine in the sea, she said.

James said a B-52 bomber participating in an air show in Chile while she was there had also conducted some of its nuclear training procedures while en route and had practiced aerial intercept missions with Colombian forces concerned about drug trafficking.

“I’m going to be looking for additional ways to replicate these types of examples more broadly to leverage other training missions, other aircraft, perhaps helicopter sorties and more,” she said.

James noted, however, that tensions and conflict in other areas of the world mean the United States has fewer resources to devote to helping neighbors in its own region.

“A little U.S. goes a long way in much of Latin America,” she said.

James visited Chile, Uruguay, Argentina, Paraguay, Brazil and Colombia on her trip. While in Chile she also met counterparts from Honduras, Spain, Peru, El Salvador, the Dominican Republic and Guatemala.

She said the bulk of discussions with her Latin American counterparts dealt with countering narcotics trafficking and organized crime, how to speed up the approval of U.S. military sales to other countries, increasing military-to-military engagements, air sovereignty laws and peacekeeping.