Pubdate: Thu, 06 Sep 2001
Source: Economist, The (UK)
Copyright: 2001 The Economist Newspaper Limited
Contact:  http://www.economist.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/132

The United States And Colombia

CHANGING THE PLAN

The United States Should Be Helping Colombia Not To Banish Drugs But To 
Build A Better Army

Next week Colin Powell, the American secretary of state, is due to become 
the first member of George Bush's cabinet to visit Colombia. Not before 
time, you might think. The Bush administration inherited a controversial 
commitment to Plan Colombia, a scheme launched by President Andres Pastrana 
to fight drugs and guerrillas. Mr Bush has opted to continue with the plan: 
he has asked Congress for $880m in aid to Colombia and its Andean 
neighbours, on top of the $1.3 billion in mainly military aid approved last 
year.

Plan Colombia arose from a fear that the country's democracy was being 
overwhelmed by guerrillas, right-wing paramilitary vigilantes and the drug 
gangs that supply four-fifths of the world's cocaine. But, so far, its 
results have been, at best, mixed. Parts of it should be scrapped, and 
others rethought.

At the plan's centre is the creation of an army brigade trained and 
equipped by America. Its job is to give protection to the government's 
agents in their efforts to eradicate coca, mainly through the aerial 
spraying of weedkiller on coca fields. It is hoped that the spraying will 
encourage other coca farmers to agree to voluntary eradication schemes.

There are two main objections to the scheme. One is that the weedkiller 
destroys the food crops of the coca farmers, and may damage human health. 
The other is that the whole exercise is a Sisyphean folly, which benefits 
only a bureaucratic-industrial complex of contractors who carry out the 
eradication. A decade of intense American efforts to eradicate coca have 
had almost no effect on overall cocaine production. Unless cocaine is 
legalised, Plan Colombia will drive coca deeper into virgin jungle or into 
neighbouring countries.

The Bush administration's aid request gives only a token nod to such 
worries: rebaptised as the Andean Regional Initiative, it offers a little 
extra money for economic development and for Colombia's neighbours (though 
Congress may yet trim the total). A better, though more expensive, policy 
would concentrate on promoting economic alternatives to coca, especially 
since the collapse in coffee prices is driving thousands more farmers into 
coca production.

A second aim of Plan Colombia is to strengthen the army, thus, it was 
hoped, forcing the main guerrilla force, the FARC, to take more seriously 
peace talks begun by Mr Pastrana in 1998. The two aims are linked: the idea 
was that coca eradication would weaken the guerrillas by squeezing their 
drug income. In practice, Mr Pastrana has held back from eradication in 
FARC-controlled areas. However, thanks in part to American aid, the army is 
stronger than it was three years ago. The FARC is no longer winning the 
war. But neither has it shown any sign of being serious about making peace 
(see article).

Mr Pastrana now looks unlikely to achieve a ceasefire with either the FARC 
or the ELN, the second guerrilla group, before his term ends next August. 
That is leading to calls, both in Colombia and in Washington, for him to 
put an end to the "demilitarised zone" that he granted the FARC to get 
talks going. Yet that would be a mistake. There is a case for reducing the 
size of the zone, and for insisting on outside monitoring of the FARC's 
activities there. But ending it, and thus the talks, would give credence to 
the idea, held by army commanders and some of the candidates to succeed Mr 
Pastrana, that the FARC can be defeated militarily. It cannot. It can, 
however, be weakened to the point where it seeks peace. Even so, political 
engagement and talks will still be needed.

Drug-Takers Have Obligations Too

So, too, may military aid. That horrifies Europeans. But as a democracy 
under siege from drug-financed illegal armies, Colombia has the right to 
ask its drug-consuming allies for help. On the other hand, there is a 
genuine danger that the army's greater military strength will turn into 
greater political power.

To counter that means doing more to safeguard democracy and human rights. 
The United States should be pressing harder than it has so far for 
Colombia's army to tackle the rightist para-militaries, who work in cahoots 
with some of its officers. And if a new national-security law that gives 
the army quasi-judicial powers in some circumstances is not to be misused, 
Colombia needs a stronger prosecutors' office and a stronger judiciary. 
Plan Colombia should pay less attention to weedkilling, and more to 
strengthening democracy.
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