cannabisnews.com: U.S. Worries That Aid Could Expand Drug War





U.S. Worries That Aid Could Expand Drug War
Posted by FoM on December 01, 2000 at 21:44:43 PT
By John Diamond 
Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch
The Clinton administration is preparing to hand off to the next president a large commitment to finance Colombia's drug war, an effort that will take years to yield results and could widen to neighboring countries.President Clinton and his advisers make their point again and again: The new U.S.-funded war on drugs in South America won't turn into another Vietnam. With the passage of ``Plan Colombia,'' a $1.3 billion aid package, the United States is, in essence, going in with its wallet, not with its boots.
Still, the hazards of what is certain to be a costly and lengthy jungle war against Colombia's drug producers bear echoes of the Vietnam conflict. Given Washington's opposition to committing U.S. troops, it will almost certainly be less costly in lives than was Vietnam, but all signs point to a long, expensive and possibly widening struggle.``Turning the situation around in Colombia will take time, probably at least three to five years,'' Undersecretary of State Thomas Pickering said this week after returning from a trip to Colombia. ``And I think this is evolving now into not just a pure Colombia issue but an Andean regional issue.''Sen. Paul Wellstone, D-Minn., and U.S. Ambassador Anne Patterson got a chilling reminder of the risks Friday when authorities in the violence-torn town of Barrancabermeja found two land mines alongside a road near the airport hours before the pair arrived.Wellstone was visiting Colombia to investigate allegations that the Bogota government tolerates human-rights abuses, including kidnappings and murders, by paramilitary groups with ties to the Colombian military. Already Clinton has had to sign a waiver to keep aid money flowing even though Colombia cannot yet certify full compliance with human-rights requirements imposed by Congress.``I don't think we can conveniently turn our gaze away from this unpleasant reality of the rash of extra-judicial killings, the rape, the murder, the torture, the kidnappings,'' Wellstone said before his departure.In this case, it appears the rebel National Liberation Army, or ELN, which controls a section of northern Colombia, may be have been responsible. Authorities arrested a suspected ELN member in connection with the land mines.The ELN and the even more powerful Marxist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, have threatened to escalate violence if Plan Colombia becomes a war against rebel forces.The $7.5 billion plan was developed by the Colombian government with step-by-step help from Washington and the crucial support of House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill. The goal is to cut coca cultivation in half over five years. Colombia pledges to provide $4 billion.Most of the U.S. taxpayer money will go to the Colombian military. That includes some 60 helicopters and training of three Colombian battalions. U.S. troop presence in Colombia is capped at 500; there are290 American soldiers now and they are forbidden from going on patrol.The U.S. role is to finance a massive effort by Colombian police, backed by the military, to break the drug cartels and coca growing operations centered in the mountainous jungles of southern Colombia.More than half the total would go toward economic development programs to give peasants an alternative to growing coca leaves and to reverse Colombia's economic tailspin that is producing ready volunteers for the two major guerrilla movements.Both Vice President Gore and Texas Gov. George Bush endorse the effort to stem the tide of cocaine and heroin from Colombia. Bush, especially, has pledged to make Latin America a top foreign policy priority.``Should I become president, I will look south, not just as an afterthought but as a fundamental commitment of my presidency,'' Bush said during the campaign.But only a few months into its life, Plan Colombia is showing some cracks. European nations have chipped in far less money than hoped. Colombia has barely begun to spend money on the program. U.S. military helicopters vital to carrying the fight against drug cartels in jungle terrain are slow in getting to Colombia.``United States assistance to Colombia will take years to produce results,'' said Rep. John Mica, R-Fla., who led hearings on Plan Colombia. ``The prognosis for future aid delivery is dismal probably at best.''U.S. policy in Colombia has been to insist that American aid be limited to the drug war, not the civil war.``This assistance is for fighting drugs, not for waging war,'' Clinton said on his Aug. 30 visit to Cartagena, Colombia, to formally present the $1.3 billion U.S. aid package to the Colombian government.But the same U.S. officials who articulate this policy admit that the guerrillas and the drug barons have become ``inextricably linked,'' as Pickering put it recently.The problem posed by narco-trafficking from Colombia can be framed in stark terms.Ninety percent of the cocaine seized in the United States comes from Colombia, as does 70 percent of the heroin. Cultivation of coca, the raw material of cocaine, has more than doubled in Colombia over the last five years. The worst of the problem is concentrated in remote southern regions out of reach of the Colombian army and police.``The expansion of coca growing areas, especially in the .125southern.375 Putumayo Department, has progressed virtually unchecked,'' Brian Sheridan, assistant secretary of defense for special operations, told lawmakers recently.Colombia, Latin America's oldest democracy, is struggling through the longest running civil war in the hemisphere, dating back nearly 40 years. The government of President Andres Pastrana, who has skillfully lobbied Washington for support of the plan, has ceded a swath of territory the size of Switzerland to guerrilla control.More than 1 million Colombians are considered ``internally displaced'' refugees. The country has the highest kidnap rate in the world. Barrancabermeja, the town visited by Wellstone, and Patterson, the U.S. envoy to Bogota, is the most violent town in Colombia with nearly 500 politically related murders this year alone.With congressional passage of the aid package this year, Colombia becomes the third largest recipient of U.S. aid after Israel and Egypt. Lawmakers expect annual requests in subsequent years for anywhere from $300 million to $600 million.``We're in it for the long haul,'' says Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.Assuming Plan Colombia eventually gets off the ground, U.S. officials and leaders of Colombia's neighbors worry that success in the field may merely push trouble across borders, as drug producers and guerrillas flee a strengthened, U.S.-trained Colombian military. Pickering calls this ``the balloon effect'' -- ``That is, if you push in on one end, it's bound to bulge out in others.''The balloon effect is precisely how Colombia became the world's largest cocaine producer during the 1990s. Successful efforts by Peru and Bolivia to slash coca cultivation and drive out narco-traffickers pushed problems over the remote borders into Colombia.For this reason, countries such as Peru, Venezuela, Brazil and Argentina are conspicuously unenthusiastic about Plan Colombia.Complete Title: U.S. Worries That Aid to Colombia Could Expand Drug War Source: St. Louis Post-DispatchAuthor: John DiamondPublished: December 1, 2000Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.© 2000 St. Louis Post-Dispatch, postnet.com Website: http://www.postnet.com/Related Articles:Minnesota Democrat is Leading Critic of Colombiahttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7844.shtmlBomb Discovered Before Visit of Senator Wellstone http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7838.shtmlColombian Police Spray Herbicide on Wellstonehttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7837.shtmlWellstone Heads to Colombia To Question Drug Warhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7806.shtmlCannabisNews Articles - Colombiahttp://cannabisnews.com/thcgi/search.pl?K=colombia 
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Comment #4 posted by dddd on December 02, 2000 at 06:56:00 PT
subversive
 Powerful stuff Pepe.I like the concept of writing the congressperson in fanatical support for global aggression to rid the planet of the scourge of illegal drugs. Excellent commentary.......dddd
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Comment #3 posted by Pepe on December 02, 2000 at 06:39:43 PT
Colombia
I agree, it will not be the same as Vietnam. The American commanders, well known for attacking weaklings and then backing off when the TV ratings slacken, will not find it so easy to walk away from Plan Colombia. The Colombian civil war, unlike the Vietnamese conflict, will spread to neighboring countries and engulf most of South America and Mexico too, all easily predictable in the light of the domino theory! These countries, at the strategic moment, will play their trump card: drug legalization. The war will be brought home to us by thousands of drug-bearing guerrilla fighters who will cross the border to rob banks, steal cars and take refuge among relatives, sympathizers and anyone who needs drugs or money. There's more than herbicide blowing in this wind.Hoping for chaos and a quick defeat of federal propaganda and anti-drug forces in the illegal drug war, I write my dullard congressmen and use all their own drug war propaganda slogans to urge their unwavering support for Plan Colombia: Dear Representative, I oppose the destruction of our children's lives by the scourge of drug addiction and support any and all efforts to eradicate the production of addictive narcotics by kingpins who would attack our society, our children and our way of life. What kind of a person would be against good policies that destroy drugs and protect children? What sort of congressman wants to see a child desperately jabbing a needle into his penis and probing for a last functioning vein to carry powerful narcotics to his brain? Forward, Plan Colombia. Can a person be subversive by supporting government policy? Can I be prosecuted for treason by agreeing with Clinton and McCaffrey? Confusing? Visibility is becoming very poor here, and maybe, Congressmen, it's time for a public debate. It will be way over your political heads, but you'll be pleased with the tv ratings. 
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Comment #2 posted by Ed Carpenter on December 02, 2000 at 06:25:40 PT:
Plan Columbia
It is no wonder that so many people all over the world hate us. We have troops in over 100 countries meddling in everybody else's affairs. We've become a meals-on-wheels for any government who sides with our drug war lunacy, and this "Plan Columbia" is more taxpayer dollars down the rathole. 
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Comment #1 posted by dddd on December 02, 2000 at 04:58:14 PT
winner
 I kinda think if Dubya,or the Gorester knew how ghastly the situation they will have to deal with concerning the "Plan Colombia"mistake,they would probably be arguing the other way around,,,saying;Gore:"O.K. you win,,"Bush:"No,I think you won."Gore:"No,that's OK,,I insist,,you won."Bush:"No,you were right all along.There was something fishy going on in Florida....You win." It aint gonna be pretty in Colombia in the next few years.It's a sleeping scandalous shocker,that the rest of the world is not really aware of,,,,,yet......dddd
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