DATE=8/2/1999
TYPE=U-S OPINION ROUNDUP
TITLE=COLOMBIA UNDER THREAT
NUMBER=6-11406
BYLINE=ANDREW GUTHRIE
DATELINE=WASHINGTON
EDITOR=ASSIGNMENTS
TELEPHONE=619-3335
CONTENT=
INTRO: Although it went almost unnoticed at the time,
a plane crash that killed five U-S military men and
two Colombian officers has again focused editorial
comments on that nation's deadly struggle against
narcotics producers.
The plane, flying near the Ecuadoran border, was on a
drug interdiction mission when it crashed into a
mountain, a few days after John F.Kennedy Junior's
plane crashed into the sea. The Colombian crash took
a back seat in the media to the Kennedy crash story,
but now, a series of editorials about the Colombian
crash and what it symbolizes, are appearing.
We get a sampling now from ____________ in today's U-S
Opinion Roundup.
TEXT: The plane crash took the lives of the first U-S
troops to die in Colombia in about 35-years, and
focused attention on the small, but growing U-S
military presence in that Latin American nation.
Colombia is home to some of the largest narcotics
dealers in the hemisphere.
In addition, it suffers the longest-running civil war
in the Americas, with various guerilla factions
controlling large areas of the country. Some of the
guerrillas are connected to the drug dealers and
provide protection for their operation.
The crash evoked memories from "Dallas Morning News"
editorial page associate editor Richard Estrada, of an
earlier air crash in Colombia, that took the life of a
U-S Army Green Beret officer.
VOICE: The year was 1964. I was the young son
of a U-S Army intelligence officer stationed
.[in] the Panama Canal Zone. . my recent
flashback about Major Mallory did not arise out
of the blue. It was inevitable, given the news
. that five American service personnel on active
duty had perished in an airplane crash on a
mountainside in Colombia. . Upon due
reflection, it struck me that U-S policy in
Latin America is going back to the future. The
victims had been on an anti-narcotics mission.
But today that fight is being made more
difficult because some of the armed factions
that had been operating in the 1960's still are
under arms and cooperating with the drug
traffickers. . what if prosecuting the drug war
leads to fighting rebels in the field or helping
Colombian troops fight rebels? . The need to
address such questions is especially urgent
because the peace initiative undertaken by
Colombian President Andres Pastrana earlier this
year is in shambles. . It is time for Americans
to take the blinders off: The admixture of drug
production and armed rebellion is yielding a
giant Molotov cocktail with the potential to
blow the lid off South America.
TEXT: "The New York Times" says one problem with
Colombia is that, with the collaboration of the drug
traffickers with the guerrilla forces, the situation
is much more confused than it was.
VOICE: The issues have gotten confused because
both sides in the political conflict benefit
from drug trafficking in different ways. The
largest guerrilla group controls much of the
area where coca is grown and protects peasant
growers. . On the other side, many top-ranking
and mid-level army officials have close links to
paramilitary groups, which also control drug-
growing areas. Some paramilitaries are
extensively involved in cocaine trafficking.
Colombia's army, which has demonstrated more
interest in fighting the rebels than fighting
cocaine, has in the past misused American
counter-narcotics aid, turning it against the
guerrillas. That is why Washington must be
careful about military aid . The United States
has already been drawn too far into the
conflict. Such new aid would widen the war.
Instead, Washington should give all possible
support to the peace effort.
TEXT: Turning to "The Washington Times", we read, in
a column by syndicated foreign affairs writer Georgie
Anne Geyer, about an area of the country as large as
Switzerland which has been ceded to the largest rebel
group, F-A-R-C, or the Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia.
VOICE: Behind this new reality are two
developments crucial to Latin America and to the
United States: One If F-A-R-C . takes power,
Colombia could well become the first narco ruled
state in the world; Two given such extraordinary
possibilities, Colombia is already becoming the
Latin American country for the next U-S
involvement. . Despite the pleadings of the
Colombian military for help, the United States
has been unconscionably late in supporting the
government forces. Washington allowed itself to
be tied up in pious arguments about the
military's human rights record and so, until
now, essentially gave Colombia nothing -- and
even decertified the country for aid until
recently. Now, with every study showing clearly
that there are virtually no human rights abuses
by the military, and that 90 percent of the
abuses are on the part of the guerrillas and the
rightist paramilitaries, the United States
finally is acting.
TEXT: To get the view from the Midwest, we turn to
the editorial pages of Ohio's [Akron] "Beacon
Journal", which exclaims:
VOICE: Colombia supplies 80-percent of the
world's cocaine. Fighting that trade is one
thing. Helping crush a rebel movement is quite
another. The United States has been burned
badly in such causes elsewhere over the years.
Repackaging this as a good-guy government verses
narco-guerillas does not exactly wash. It is
more complex. In 30-years of strife, 31-
thousand Colombians have died, many at the hands
of military death squads. Colombia's police,
judiciary and military have been as corrupt as
any in Latin America. A foreign policy that
inaccurately reflects what is happening .is
doomed. It will fail to engender necessary
popular support, here or among Colombians.
Congress would better honor the five dead U-S
airmen's memory by resisting any effort to draw
the United States in Colombia's vicious rebel
war.
TEXT: On that note, we conclude this sampling of
comment on the drug and rebel situation in Colombia,
reflected by the recent crash of a drug interdiction
flight, killing U-S and Colombian military crewmen.
NEB/ANG/RAE
02-Aug-1999 16:15 PM LOC (02-Aug-1999 2015 UTC)
NNNN
Source: Voice of America
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