TomPaine.com
March 15, 2002
By Sandra Alvarez and Jason Mark

As peace talks fail and the civil war in Colombia heats up, the White House and members of Congress are considering expanding the U.S. military's role in that troubled country. This major shift comes as the anti-drug effort, known as 'Plan Colombia,' has failed to curb coca production, according to the White House's own reports.

But rather than reconsider military intervention in a country with one of the hemisphere's longest-running civil wars, the Bush administration and Congress are considering lifting long-standing restrictions that limit the U.S. military's involvement in Colombia to anti-drug efforts and impose human rights standards on the Colombian military.

'Plan Colombia' opened a new chapter in U.S.-Colombian relations. In 2000, the U.S. gave $1.3 billion in mostly military aid to the Colombian government to help eradicate coca crops, the raw material used for making cocaine. The United States provided the Colombian military with dozens of top-of-the line helicopters to help locate and fumigate coca fields. The plan, ill-conceived from the start, has failed.

According to figures released this month by the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, coca production in Colombia actually increased by almost 25 percent between August 2000, when Plan Colombia went into effect, and December of 2001. During that time, 80,000 acres of land were opened up for coca cultivation, according to the administration's figures.

In a sane world, such a failure of U.S. strategy should force policy makers to reconsider our involvement in Colombia -- or any country. But exactly the opposite is happening, as White House officials and some lawmakers on Capitol Hill are talking about actually deepening the U.S. role in Colombia.

The Colombian civil war is one of the bloodiest ongoing crises in the western hemisphere. The 40-year conflict has taken 40,000 lives in the last decade, the vast majority of them unarmed civilians. The conflict heated up last month when three-year-old peace talks between the government and the country's largest guerrilla group broke down. However, instead of pursuing policies to pull the combatants back from the brink of an all-out war, the United States may now push the country over the edge.

When Congress passed Plan Colombia in 2000, the legislation limited U.S. arms to being used for counter-narcotics mission. U.S. weapons and training could not be used for counter-insurgency activities. Congress is now considering overturning those rules. On March 8, the House approved a non-binding resolution written by Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill.) inviting president Bush to seek broader aid for Colombia. On March 14, the White House announced it will soon ask Congress to repeal these restrictions.

Meanwhile, the Bush administration has been supplying the Colombian armed forces with intelligence reports on guerrilla movements as part of the broader "war on terrorism." It is likely that the White House will ask for more aid for the Colombian military as part of the president's pledge to "actively prepare" other countries to fight terrorism. Colombian President Andres Pastrana has sought this aid.

The Colombian conflict, however, has no relation to the war on terrorism being fought in Afghanistan. There is no Colombian corollary to capturing Osama bin Laden. Colombia's war is nightmarishly complicated. There's plenty of blood on the hands of all combatants.

On one side are two left-wing guerrilla armies that have battled the Colombian government since before President Lyndon Johnson expanded the U.S. role in Vietnam. On the other side are right-wing paramilitary groups with close ties to the Colombian armed forces. The United States has classified both the paramilitaries and the guerrillas as terrorists.

Sending new arms to the Colombian military would strengthen the most extremist factions on both sides. It would also link the United States to the right-wing paramilitaries -- which the U.S. government has designated as terrorists -- even though they're known to work with Colombian government forces.

Oil politics further complicate the situation. Colombia is one of the most oil-rich nations in the world, and U.S.-based multi-national corporations are heavily invested there. Not surprisingly, perhaps, oil pipelines and refineries have been favorite targets of guerrilla groups hoping to weaken the government.

In January, the Bush administration asked Congress for $98 million to train and equip Colombian troops to guard an oil pipeline operated by Occidental Petroleum. The request raises questions about the real motives behind the prospect of increasing U.S. military involvement in the war-torn country. Are U.S. taxpayers being asked to foot the bill to protect U.S. oil industry profits?

As the White House drug czar's new report shows, the assumptions behind Plan Colombia were fundamentally flawed. Coca production is on the increase; not decrease. Moreover, the United States will never end drug abuse by eliminating the supply. An effective policy would seek to limit demand for drugs in the United States. Similarly, the United States shouldn't be trying to guarantee sufficient oil exports to the United States by defending oil supplies in far-off, troubled countries. A far sounder way to ensure energy security is to limit the demand for oil here in the United States.

The U.S. involvement in Colombia is quickly changing from a mission intended to end our addiction to drugs to an operation designed to feed our addiction to oil. Congress should reject an expansion of military involvement in Colombia.

Sandra Alvarez and Jason Mark work for the international human rights organization Global Exchange.