Pubdate: Sunday, Oct 31, 1999
Source: Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel (FL)
Copyright: 1999 Sun-Sentinel Company
Contact:  http://www.sun-sentinel.com/services/letters_editor.htm
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Forum: http://www.sun-sentinel.com/community/interact1.htm
Section: Outlook
Author: E.A. Torriero and Pedro Ruz Butierrez (Staff Writers)

THE FORGOTTEN WAR

Society on the Edge [image: "In the shadows" - Members of the Columbian
army take a break in the shade during exercises at the Tolemaida military
base near Bogota. A 1200-man special anti-narcotics battalion is being
trained by the United States to search and destroy drug labs and
fabrication plants in Columbia.]

Columbia is desperate for U.S. help to fight its drug war. But some worry
that the United States will become mired in another difficult regional
conflict if it helps Columbia fight...

TOLEMAIDA MILITARY BASE, Columbia -- Uncle Sam's special forces walk the
firing line barking orders in Americanized Spanish to young Columbian
soldiers who are being taught to kill with precision.

"Take a position: one knee down," a U.S. Army commander from Fort Bragg,
N.C. yells.

The Columbian troops, spread a few feet apart on bended knees at a firing
range, aim their Israeli-made Galil rifles.

"Ready. Charge. Fire," the American orders.

After unloading their rounds, the Colombians trudge toward their cardboard
targets. The six American drill instructors -- part of an elite U.W.
commando unit -- evaluate the Colombians' marks and show them how they can
shoot more accurately.

"You can do it, hombre," one American tells a Columbian soldier. "A little
more to the left and you will be straight on."

The U.S.-led training here is one of several Pentagon missions to shore up
Columbia's woefully understaffed and under-equipped armed forces and to
prepare them tho fight more skillfully in their war against
narco-guerrillas -- the protectors of Columbia's drug trade.

Increasingly, Green Berets, the U.S. Navy's special warfare unit, top
Marine Corps forces, Air Force surveillance teams, and even the U.S. Coast
Guard are on deployment in and around Columbia under the umbrella of the
anti-narcotics mandate.

As many as 200 American military personnel are in Columbia at any one time.
Their aim: to help make a dent in the growing drug trade, which is dumping
cocaine and heroin onto American streets at a record pace.

But is the growing U.S. involvement in Columbia's thorny civil war a
prelude to another Vietnam, as some critics charge? And has the
U.S.military already gotten too deep in Columbia's conflict?

"It's very problematic," said Mark Cherwick, a Columbia expert at
Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. "There is a risk that the U.S.
will get mired in a major, active conflict."

The Columbian government has fought a flagging battle against insurgents
for much of the last 40 years in a civil war that shows no signs of easing.

In the beginning

Rebels fighting for the rights of poor peasants first began the civil war
to empower the underprivileged. but today, it is largely a widening
conflict fueled by two leftist guerilla groups, which provide much of the
protection for the harvesting of coca opium. Coupled with the worst
recession in 70 years, the war is taking a toll on Colombians.

At least 35,000 Colombians have been killed in the last decade of the civil
war. Kidnappings and extortion are rampant. Up to a million Colombians have
been uprooted by the civil conflict and move throughout the country.

As it debates how to help Columbia in it's worsening situation, the Clinton
administration has been quick to declare that sending U.S. troops on battle
missions to Columbia is not on the agenda. Already there have been U.S.
military casualties. Five U.S. soldiers, including Capt. Jose Santiago Jr.
of Orlando, died in July when their U.S. Army spy plane crashed in the
mountains of southwest Columbia.

The crash remains under investigation. But U.S. officials say the American
servicemen were there only as a part of an advisory, training and
surveillance mission -- the limits of U.S. involvement. In the coming
months, the United States will pay for more military equipment, training,
and increase its support role in Columbia, U.S. officials say.

But as far as U.S. troops participating in armed combat on Columbian
soil:"There is zero possibility that any U.S. intervention will take
place," White House drug chief Barry McCaffrey said in a stopover in
Columbia last summer.

"It's an astonishingly bad idea." he told the U.S. Congress recently.

Few military analysts disagree. They see no parallels to another conflict
three decades ago which bogged down U.S. troops and tore at the social
fabric of America.

"The Vietnam analogy is not applicable," said Gabriel Marcella, a Columbia
authority a the U.S. Army war College in Carlisle, Pa. "It's fantasy to say
that the U.S. is in Columbia in any other capacity than a support role."

Still, the questions over how to best aid Columbia are consuming the U.S.
Congress and the Clinton administration, which are debating a huge boost in
U.S. military aid.

U.S. aid to Columbia skyrocketed from $85.7 million in 1997 to $289 million
in the last fiscal year, making Columbia the third largest recipient of
U.S. foreign aid after Israel and Jordan. Much of the increased money was
used to outfit the Columbian military, but then more helicopters and
high-tech surveillance gear, and to equip the national police with crop
dusting capabilities to attack drug crops with aerial chemical spray.

The republican-led Congress is proposing an even more aid -- about $1.5
billion over the next two years. Much of the money would go to providing
Columbia with 15 now Blackhawk helicopters, radar and surveillance
equipment, military hardware to intercept drug traffickers and chemicals to
eradicate the drug crops.

How they stack up

Less than one-quarter of the 120,000 Colombians serving in the armed forces
are prepared and equipped for battle. The trained Columbian soldiers barely
outnumber the 25,000 highly trained rebels. The Republican leadership wants
Columbia's military to be strengthened so that the Columbian government has
leverage in the peace talks with the rebels that began last weekend.

By preparing to escalate the fight with the rebels -- at the same tim they
are talking peace with them -- the Columbia government will show it is
serious about ending the civil war one way or another, Republicans say.

"Without U.S. help, Columbia could lose this war, or seek to appease the
narco-guerrillas," Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms
said recently

The Clinton administration, however, is seeking a more balanced aid package
of between $1 billion and $2 billion that is less tilted toward military
needs.

The Clinton-led plans include a greater emphasis on refurbishing Columbia's
corrupt judicial system and providing economic assistance to an economy in
shambles mainly because of government overspending. How the money will be
distributed is being argued behind closed doors at the White House.

Columbia's well being is of vital concern to the United States. It accounts
for more than $12 billion annually in two-way trade with the United States,
with much of that coming through South Florida.

But Columbia is also a major threat to Americans. It accounts for more than
70 percent of the cocaine entering the United States; with a street value
of $30 Billion, according to U.S. drug statistics.

It also is a burgeoning source for heroine -- more than 70 percent of the
heroine seized on the U.S. east Coast comes from Columbia, U.S. authorities
say.

Opium fields and coca plantations have doubled in size in the last three
years, Columbian drug officials say.

The Columbian military -- and the country's police force -- have been
virtually powerless to stop the escalating drug trade because of their lack
of equipment and training and corruption in their midst.

"Do we need the U.S. to get more deeply involved?", asked a Columbian
military commander as he watched U.S. policymakers concede that the
American military must become embroiled to some extent in Columbia's civil
war, even though U.S. law prohibits the American military from directly
participating in the conflict.

There is a fundamental contradiction, a troubling irony in U.S. policy,"
said Frederick Woerner, a retired U.S. Army general who planned the U.S.
military aid mission to El Salvador in the 1980's. "The aim is to beat back
the drug traffickers," he said. "But to do that you become involved in
another country's civil war. Can a bullet really tell the difference
between a narco-rebel and a guerrilla?"

Critics charge that the U.S. policies will quickly backfire. American
troops will play an increasing roll in Columbia's civil war, even as the
Columbian government proves inept, they say. The increased U.S. military
aid and involvement will only help a corrupt government become even more
corrupt, they charge.

Human rights problems

Columbia has one of the worst human rights records in the world. Its
judicial system is in a shambles, Most of the 23,00 homicides per year in
Columbia go unsolved or unprosecuted.

The Columbian police and armed forces are riddled with spies for the
rebels. Policemen and soldiers have been implicated in beatings, robberies,
kidnappings and massacres.

The Columbian military is also aligned with several paramilitary groups
formed to fight rebels. The militia has a long record of brutality.

Human rights groups charge that the United States is repeating a pattern of
supporting violence as it did when it backed the government of El Salvador
in its civil war in the 1980's.

"Congress and the Clinton administration must realize that aid to the
Columbian army is aid to the paramilitary groups," said Carlos Salinas, the
Latin American representative for Amnesty International.

In efforts to appease human rights groups and U.S. officials, the Columbian
military has promised to curb abuses by its soldiers and police. Foreign
reporters who visit the base here are given a tour of the human rights
courses given through lectures and skits to Columbian soldiers.

"We know we have done things wrong in the past," says Col. German
Pataquiva, spokesman for Columbia's central military command. "We are
trying to change that image and win the trust of the Columbian people."

But retired U.S. general Woerner thinks there is major differences between
conditions in El Salvador and Columbia. "Narcotics turn this into a war of
a different sort," he said. "Ultimately, it is up to the Colombians to find
a way to win it or settle it."

Columbian commanders are convinced that if their soldiers can score some
victories against the narco-rebels that they will gain the respect of
Colombians and leverage against the rebels.

Since spring, as many as 65 U.S. military personnel have been training
1,200 Columbian soldiers who were handpicked for an elite anti-narcotics unit.

They are being taught how to conduct surprise attacks. They have been
outfitted like GI Joe in everything from U.S. issued canteens to army boots
made in the United States.

By December, the unit will be ready to raid remote drug-producing
laboratories in the jungle, many of them protected by the Revolutionary
Armed Forces of Columbia, known by their Spanish acronym FARC.

The FARC, Latin America's oldest rebel group, has proved a formidable foe.
They have successfully kept the government troops at bay with more than
20,000 fighters, and they are reportedly preparing for the government raids
by purchasing sophisticated anti-aircraft equipment and stockpiling weapons.

Columbian commanders fear spies will tip off the FARC to details of their
missions. They also fear that hostages held by FARC will be moved near drug
labs to deter government attack on civilians. And they fear large
casualties among government soldiers during a raid will demoralize the
Columbian efforts.

"We are facing an enemy which knows us very well," Pataquiva said. "They
will not make it easy for us."

The FARC, which strongly dislikes foreign meddling win Columbia, wants to
teach th U.S. a lesson. They eagerly vow to teach the U.S. a Vietnam-like
lesson.

"What this will do is escalate the conflict in Columbia," warns FARC
Commandandte Fernando Caicedo, a 25-year veteran of the rebel cause.

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MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart