Pubdate: Fri, 08 Sep 2000
Source: Seattle Times (WA)
Copyright: 2000 The Seattle Times Company
Contact:  P.O. Box 70, Seattle, WA 98111
Fax: (206) 382-6760
Website: http://www.seattletimes.com/
Author: William Pfaff, Syndicated columnist

THE DISCONNECT BETWEEN U.S. POLITICS AND REALITY

PARIS - The $1.3 billion U.S. grant of police and military aid to 
Colombia's counter-narcotics program, which President Bill Clinton launched 
during a flying visit to that country Aug. 30, has three things in common 
with the American plan for a national missile defense.

First, both are inspired by ongoing U.S. electoral politics, not by serious 
policy analysis.

Second, neither can succeed in terms of its avowed objective. The Colombian 
program can't really reduce the supply of drugs to the United States or 
make a real difference to America's drug crisis. And limited national 
missile defense can't really protect the United States from "rogue" or 
terrorist mass-destruction weapons. (The president has just postponed a 
decision on deployment, leaving it to his successor to decide.)

However, success or failure in their avowed purposes makes no difference to 
the political sponsors of the two projects. They ask only that the issues 
serve as electorally potent symbols of action against drugs and protection 
against rogue states - allowing the programs' opponents to be characterized 
as "soft" on drugs or weak on defense.

The final common element is that both are essentially unconnected to the 
possibilities the real world affords, and both could have serious negative 
consequences. Aid to Colombia might contribute to regional destabilization 
and possibly draw the United States into deeper Latin American military 
engagement. A national missile defense could easily subvert the existing 
international balance of nuclear deterrence and restraint.

The missile defense project, as even supporters concede, is of extreme 
technological difficulty. The likelihood is remote that in the next decade 
it could provide even limited effective defense against "rogue" missiles.

Even if it proved able to do so, the security of the United States would 
not measurably be improved. The rogues or terrorists from whom the missiles 
are meant to defend the United States know that nuclear devices, anthrax 
bacteria or containers of lethal gases with timing devices can be shipped 
to New York or Los Angeles in easier ways than by expensive, complicated 
and conspicuously identifiable intercontinental missiles.

The program is fundamentally meant to exploit a potent image of national 
security for electoral advantage. It provides a second electoral benefit to 
its supporters. Aerospace manufacturers want the program because it 
promises them important government contracts. Therefore, the aerospace 
firms are willing to contribute a great deal to the re-election campaigns 
of congressional backers of NMD.

The aid program for Colombia is likewise an essay in illusions. For 
Colombians themselves, the problem created by drug producers protected by 
rebel bands constitutes a terrifying threat to national unity and security. 
But as the Clinton administration has repeatedly stated, U.S. military 
trainers, equipment and funds are not going to Colombia to fight a war 
against Colombia's rebels. They are only there to support the campaign 
against drug producers and traffickers.

But once again, the program cannot succeed. It can't do what the United 
States ostensibly expects of it, which is to resolve America's own drug 
crisis. Again, its backers understand this. So long as the United States 
provides an enormous and lucrative market for drugs, the drugs will be 
supplied. That is the reality of market economics. The demand will be met.

Even if Colombian President Andres Pastrana's ambitious anti-narcotics and 
political pacification policies should succeed inside Colombia, drug 
production would simply move to another country. As Pastrana said during 
President Clinton's visit, "What we are talking about is the most lucrative 
business in the world."

Production would move across the frontiers to Peru, Brazil or Ecuador. 
Asian producers would take up the slack. Narcotics production in Africa has 
already begun to expand.

Foreign intervention to fix America's drug problem once again offers voters 
an illusion to distract them from the politically unpalatable reality that 
the drug crisis is caused inside the United States, not beyond its borders.

Washington externalizes the problem by sending soldiers, helicopters and 
money to Colombia. It knows no politically acceptable way to deal with 
addiction and the drug traffic inside the United States. Therefore, it does 
what it knows how to do. The illusion of action is thought to make voters 
feel better.

The United States is not the first country, nor are these the first 
occasions, in which politicians have manipulated foreign threats to deceive 
the electorate. It nonetheless should be understood that this is what is 
going on.
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MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart