cannabisnews.com: U.S. Base In Ecuador Stirs Debate 





U.S. Base In Ecuador Stirs Debate 
Posted by FoM on January 24, 2001 at 21:23:43 PT
By Anthony Faiola, Washington Post Foreign Service
Source: Washington Post 
At a military base 20 minutes by air from Colombia's hottest war zone, construction workers are lengthening a runway and excavating ground for cavernous hangars to house some important new arrivals -- U.S. E-3 AWACS surveillance planes.Smaller U.S. spy planes are already flying missions from the Ecuadoran air force base. They are kept in the air by about 150 Americans -- U.S. Air Force crews, mechanics and security guards, among others. 
The AWACS jets will begin operations this summer, and the number of American personnel here will rise to about 400 over the next six months. With that, Manta will become the main hub for U.S. surveillance flights over the vast cocaine-producing areas of Latin America. U.S. officials say it will play a vital role in choking off the drug trade by allowing full resumption of surveillance flights, which were cut by two-thirds when U.S. forces vacated Howard Air Force Base in Panama 18 months ago.But in a country where violence from Colombia's drug-fueled guerrilla war is spilling over the border at an alarming rate, the project has touched off a bitter debate about the wisdom of opening the door to Uncle Sam. Last year, a Colombian guerrilla leader pronounced the Manta project a "declaration of war.""We are compromising our neutrality in the Colombian conflict with the Manta base, dragging ourselves into a war between the Americans and their enemies in Colombia," said Congressman Henry Llanes, who is leading a fight to block the Manta project.On Friday, Ecuadorans got unsettling news that their troops had killed six men at an illegal drug-making lab near the Colombian border. By some accounts, the casualties were members of the main leftist guerrilla group associated with the Colombian drug trade, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC. If so, it would be the first clash between that group and the Ecuadoran army.Llanes and others see the expansion at Manta as part of Plan Colombia, the U.S.-backed effort by the Colombian government to turn up the heat on drug lords and the guerrillas who protect them. Washington is putting about $1.3 billion into the program. Using radar, cameras and communications-intercept equipment, U.S. spy planes can pinpoint low-flying drug-smuggling aircraft, clandestine labs, cultivation fields and transit routes. Information is passed instantly to police and soldiers in the countries below for interdiction; it also goes to authorities in the United States, so they can intercept incoming planes or boats.The critics also note that the United States will pay no rent at Manta and signed the deal to build the AWACS facility with a former president, Jamil Mahuad, who is now in exile in the United States and under indictment here on a charge of abuse of power. Mahuad was overthrown in a military coup 12 months ago.Opponents of the U.S. operation view it as the latest aspect of a pattern of expanding American influence here. Ecuador last year adopted the U.S. dollar as the national currency, which many people see as giving Washington influence over the economy. U.S. diplomats also have pressured the country on political issues.All of this leads to talk here that Ecuador is turning into America's "new Panama" -- a reference to the influence Washington held over that country, which also used the dollar and was viewed by many Latin Americans as a de facto 51st state. Ecuador is becoming "a sold-out country," said Llanes. "I fear we will pay with more than our pride."U.S. officials are well aware of these feelings and go out of their way to soothe local sensibilities. The 150 servicemen at Manta wear civilian clothes when they ride vans and four-wheel drive vehicles between the base and the luxury hotel and high-rise apartments where they live. Some take part in local volunteer work. U.S. officials argue, moreover, that the mission in Ecuador is not directly linked to Plan Colombia, and they have promised the operation will be limited to surveillance and that no armed aircraft will be brought here.The Americans stress respect for local sovereignty. Said U.S. ambassador Gwen Clare: "The U.S. military personnel . . . are there as guests of the government of Ecuador. The [Manta air base] is and will continue to be an Ecuadorean facility under the control of Ecuadorean authorities."What is being built is known in U.S. military jargon as a Forward Operating Location, or FOL -- U.S. officials avoid calling it a base. The idea is that it will create a new geographic net for tracking international drug traffickers by being linked to three smaller FOLs in El Salvador and the Dutch Caribbean islands of Aruba and Curacao.U.S. authorities say that by mid-2002, the annual number of missions out of the four sites will top the 2,000 flights once annually flown out of Panama. Ecuador in particular is located within easy range of both Peru and Bolivia, key countries for growing the leaf used to make cocaine. It also borders ground zero, Colombia, where analysts say a projected increase in cocaine production over the past year is at least partially attributable to fewer surveillance flights.Barry R. McCaffrey, the White House drug control policy director who left his post this month, said in a recent interview that "from a geo-strategic standpoint, we're going to be better off than we ever were in Panama. These new operations offer us the opportunity for far greater coverage than we've ever had in the region."U.S. officials say the new arrangement will be very cost-effective. The total cost of infrastructure improvements at all four locations will be $116 million, with yearly maintenance estimated at $14 million, they say. No rent will be paid at any of them. That is far less than a full U.S. base in the region would cost, said Steve Lucas, spokesman for the U.S. Southern Command in Miami. "Compare that to the $78.5 million we paid for operations during just the last year in Panama," Lucas said, "and you get an idea of how much more efficient, as well as effective, these new FOLs will be."The Clinton administration and U.S. military officials have come under fire from congressional Republicans and other domestic critics because the FOLs were only partially, in some cases, minimally, functional before operations ended at the Panama base. But in Ecuador, where the Manta facility is still only 10 percent complete 14 months after the agreement was signed, political and legal resistance to the U.S. presence has played a role in the delays.Part of the trouble stemmed from the ouster of Mahuad by a military coup aided by left-wing indigenous groups in January of last year. Intense pressure from the State Department forced the military to back down, allowing civilian Gustavo Noboa, then Mahuad's vice president, to assume the presidency.While demanding that the United States boost its $70 million in annual financial assistance dramatically -- in large part to offset what it sees as dangers caused by Plan Colombia -- the Noboa administration is nevertheless supporting the Manta operation."The message we are sending to [drug traffickers] is that we don't want you here," Foreign Minister Heinz Moeller said in a recent interview. "We are going to stick with whatever friends we find, and in this case, it is the government and the people of the United States. Yes, they are our friends, our staunch allies in the fight against this criminal corruption of drug producers."Also enthusiastic are local politicians and merchants. Jorge Zambrano, the mayor of Manta, a port city of 220,000 about 150 miles west of Quito, the capital, says that the improved runway will help with air exports of tuna and shrimp, the main industries here. The base also functions as the city's civilian airport.Some residents think the Americans will spark an economic boom; already restaurants that cater to them have raised prices by up to 40 percent. There is talk of building new hotels, and city officials are conferring with Continental Airlines about starting direct flights to the United States."The people in Ecuador opposed to the U.S. in Manta are either jealous because their city did not get the facility, or they are trapped in an ideological box of the past," Zambrano said. "We have nothing to fear from the Americans anymore. By letting them in, we are doing our part in the drug war."Manta, Ecuador Source: Washington Post (DC) Author: Anthony Faiola, Washington Post Foreign ServicePublished: Thursday, January 25, 2001 ; Page A01 Address: 1150 15th Street Northwest, Washington, DC 20071Copyright: 2001 The Washington Post Company Contact: letterstoed washpost.comWebsite: http://www.washingtonpost.com/Feedback: http://washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/edit/letters/letterform.htm Related Articles:Ecuador Afraid as a Drug War Heads Its Wayhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread8239.shtmlEcuador Feels Fallout from Colombia Narcotics Warhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread7636.shtmlCannabisNews Articles - Ecuadorhttp://cannabisnews.com/thcgi/search.pl?K=Ecuador
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Comment #6 posted by Lehder on January 25, 2001 at 18:02:20 PT
"tepuis"
http://store.corbis.com/prodconfig/image_details.asp?navid=top25&imageid=10287935http://store.corbis.com/prodconfig/image_details.asp?navid=top25&imageid=10287904Venezuela has thousands of these things. Angel falls drops over the edge of one of them. Many are isolated peaks resembling with their flat tops our Devil's Tower. The flora and fauna that dwell on the tops harbor unique species because, even when tepuis are separated by only a mile or two, the steep sides and the great elevations of the flat tops isolate them from other ecologies. Small, flat worlds each evolving independently of the others. Most of them are unexplored. None of them need fungicide, nor do the mountains of Colombia and Ecuador.
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Comment #5 posted by Lehder on January 25, 2001 at 16:34:02 PT
Yeah, too bad about South America
I've long daydreamed of sight-seeing in South America and experience the incredible juxtraposition of ocean-Andes-rain forest, Bolivia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru, Colombia. There are millions of great pictures on the Internet. But, thanks to the drug war, I intend to stay well clear of all these dangerous places. I'm sure many others have cancelled their plans and daydreams for the same reason, and this is a minor example of one of the many costs of the war on drugs that is not computed in dollars. The war just diminishes everyone, turning beautiful people and places into idiots and war zones.http://www.altavista.com/cgi-bin/query?q=machu+pichu&ipht=1&iclr=1&mmW=1&micat=0&imgset=1&stype=simage&pg=q&Translate=on&search.x=17&search.y=8http://www.altavista.com/cgi-bin/query?q=titikaka&ipht=1&iclr=1&mmW=1&micat=0&imgset=1&stype=simage&pg=q&Translate=onhttp://www.hotelbook.com/brands/latin_collection/dest_venezuela.htmlhttp://tula.cura.net/misscaribbean/ballot.html------------------>I hate to think of the horrendous consequences of America's actions. I fear a one-world government, with the U.S. as its hub, dictating every personal decision, all for the "greater good."Here is how the Chinese see it, Dan B. Interesting to see how we look to others:http://www.ndu.edu/inss/books/pills2.htm
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Comment #4 posted by Dan B on January 25, 2001 at 15:32:46 PT:
Destroying South America One Country At A Time
The American government's main objective in all of this is to control by military force the entire western hemisphere. The message is that South American countries have two options: (1) let America buy them, or (2) America will take them over by use of military force.Usually, it is some combination of these two options. Take Plan Colombia, for example.The "Plan" for Colombia seems to be as follows: America will send the Colombian government a bunch of money in exchange for the right to destroy any and all vegetation and potentially millions of their citizens. America has absolutely no interest in any attempt at a peace process. Some of those in power are on a misguided crusade against "drugs," and some want to get their hands on all that black gold waiting under the surface down there. But almost everyone in our government agrees with the ultimate goal of Plan Colombia: United States control of that country.Ecuador has already succumbed.Of course, we can expect any and all uprisings among the general populous (of any country in which the United States is interested--including the U.S.) to be severely dealt with (as we are seeing in the U.S. already, where dissenters to the war on some drugs (and all citizens) are imprisoned--more so than in any other country in the world. I hate to think of the horrendous consequences of America's actions. I fear a one-world government, with the U.S. as its hub, dictating every personal decision, all for the "greater good." China would likely cooperate, as long as they are allowed a controlling partnership. I can think of no other major world power that would (or could) resist.Sorry for the doom and gloom. But I have heard too many Christians proclaiming their desire that everyone in the world believe as they do to discount this theory entirely.Dan B
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Comment #3 posted by kaptinemo on January 25, 2001 at 05:08:36 PT:
Santayana is ruefully shaking his head.
Because we ceratinly don't seem to be learning from history.With regards to the slippery slope we're on in South America: mota is exactly right. We didn't jump into Viet Nam overnight, it was a long, slow slide that began as far back as 1941 (Ho Chih Minh was an OSS agent during WW2, did you know *that*?) and only accellerated after 1964.Just like the Gulf War; we had been building bases in Saudi for *20 years* before it broke. This, *after* we had delivered a not-so-veiled threat back in 1974 courtesy of something called Operation Petroland, which was a thinly disguised threat of taking over the Saudi oil fields during the Arab Oil Embargo of the early 1970's. The Saudis got the message. Apparently, so have the Equadorian leadership. But they, like so many other nation's leaders, are not thinking about the long-term repercussions and messy aftermath of allowing US forces to operate in the vicinity.I hope and pray that the US doesn't require (more!) body bags returning form that region before the reasons *why* we are getting involved down there become a matter of vigorous public debate.Because sending troops down there to die to stop some idiot up here from 'powdering her nose' or sticking a needle in his veins just doesn't cut it. Not in this old grunt's book.
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Comment #2 posted by dddd on January 25, 2001 at 02:44:23 PT
American puppet state
>"Llanes and others see the expansion at Manta as part of Plan Colombia, "All of a sudden,a new air base is part of plan Colombia?I wonder if there would be any way to obtain a copy of the blueprint for plan Colombia?>"The critics also note that the United States will pay no rent at Manta and signed the deal to build the AWACS facility with a former president, Jamil Mahuad, who is now in exile in the United States and under indictment here on a charge of abuse of power. Mahuad was overthrown in a military coup 12 months ago."In other words;First we paid off Mahuad to sign the deal,then we financed a coup by buying the military command, then,,,,the real capper,we indict Mahuad on a charge of "abuse of power"?If this wasnt so sickening it would be funny.If that guy is guilty of "abuse of power",then how would we describe what McCaffrey,and his henchmen are guilty of?,,"Justified abuse of power"??>"What is being built is known in U.S. military jargon as a Forward Operating Location, or FOL -- U.S. officials avoid calling it a base. The idea is that it will create a new geographic net for tracking international drug traffickers by being linked to three smaller FOLs in El Salvador and the Dutch Caribbean islands of Aruba and Curacao."Oh yeah,,sure!...It's not a base.it's just an FOL,,,and by the way,marijuana is deadly.It will make your balls shrivel,and women into whores.>" Foreign Minister Heinz Moeller said in a recent interview. "We are going to stick with whatever friends we find, and in this case, it is the government and the people of the United States. Yes, they are our friends, our staunch allies in the fight against this criminal corruption of drug producers."I wonder if this guy really said this,or if maybe he just said it because he had a pocket full of fresh dollars?>"Ecuador last year adopted the U.S. dollar as the national currency,"Oh my,isnt that a strange coincidence.And now the deisel spill in the Galopagos Islands,will provide an even larger fake welcome mat for us to over run this third world country.Just watch as the US fourth reich consumes Ecuador,and not that many people will care,because they wont even know.d.......d..................d............................d
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Comment #1 posted by mota20 on January 24, 2001 at 22:13:07 PT
don't we ever learn
 This is not much different from the way nam started out and it is going to end up the same way, american youth getting killed in fights to support right wing nuts that can not even get the support of thier own people. mota20
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