ECUADOR AIR BASE KEY TO DRUG WATCH

MANTA, Ecuador (AP) - American airmen armed with M-16 assault rifles keep a
close watch on U.S. Navy (news - web sites) spy planes parked on a runway
at an airfield on the outskirts of this Pacific port.

The Ecuadorean air base has become the new hub of U.S. surveillance flights
over the vast cocaine-producing areas of South America, and the U.S.
military guards have reason to be vigilant.

The drug-fueled violence that Ecuadoreans long feared would spill over the
Colombian border has arrived - intensifying a debate over the wisdom of
giving the United States a foothold close to the troubled frontier.

Many Ecuadoreans worry their country is being set up as a staging ground
for U.S. intervention in Colombia and could be sucked into a regional conflict.

"We support the base being used to fight drug trafficking," Antonio Posso,
an influential congressman, said in an interview in Quito, the capital.
"But the base apparently is being used also to put together an operation to
fight Colombia's guerrillas, which involves us in a conflict that is not
Ecuador's."

The United States is spending $62 million to expand and improve the Manta
runway and build hangars, dormitories and a dining hall. The number of U.S.
servicemen assigned to Manta has risen to 125 and that figure will reach
400 after construction work is completed in October.

At that point, giant U.S. AWACS surveillance planes and tankers to refuel
them will replace the smaller Navy aircraft, allowing the United States to
monitor air and marine activity far into the Caribbean. That will allow
full resumption of U.S. anti-drug surveillance flights, which were cut by
two-thirds when U.S. forces evacuated Howard Air Force Base in Panama in 1999.

The United States maintains the Manta base will remain under Ecuadorean
control and is being used only as an observation post to track
drug-smuggling aircraft and boats. U.S. officials insist it has nothing to
do with the $1.3 billion U.S. aid package for the counternarcotics
offensive in Colombia.

"The closing of Howard Air Force Base in Panama stopped the ability of the
U.S. government to easily look at the movement of drugs from Latin America
to the United States," U.S. Ambassador Gwen Clare said in an interview in
Quito. "Manta, which sits in the middle of the source zone, has improved
dramatically our ability to monitor movement of drugs in the region.

"Why would we put at risk this pearl that we have? Why would we put at risk
this opportunity to see, as we have never seen before, what is going on in
the transit zone," Clare said.

But many Ecuadoreans remain suspicious and the anxiety level in the country
has risen as Colombia's violence has begun to directly impact Ecuador.

A recent attack in a coastal village on the Colombian border, Palma Real,
stunned Ecuadoreans by its savagery.

Colombian drug traffickers abducted and killed a village official and six
of his relatives and friends, including his 14-year-old daughter. They
disfigured their victims' faces with acid and slit open their abdomens,
spilling out their intestines.

The motive? The official had dared to confiscate 200 kilos of cocaine the
Colombians had tried to smuggle through Ecuador.

The violence was a nightmare for many Ecuadoreans, who fear U.S. use of the
Manta base may provoke bloody reprisals from powerful Colombian rebel
groups who protect the narcotics trade.

Ecuadoreans' suspicions of U.S. plans for Manta may stem partly from the
secrecy surrounding the government's agreement to let the United States use
the air base for 10 years.

Jamil Mahuad, the president who approved the arrangement in November 1999,
was overthrown two months later in a military-backed coup provoked by
widespread public discontent over his mismanagement of the economy. He fled
the country in disgrace.

Critics say Mahuad had hoped the Manta agreement would lead to U.S. support
for international loans to bail out the sinking economy.

"He never thought about what it meant for Ecuador's security," said Andres
Bonilla, a political scientist.

Former Foreign Minister Benjamin Ortiz said the Mahuad government viewed
cooperation with the United States as "a way of protecting the country from
the problem of drug trafficking" in Colombia.

"We should realize that we have the world's largest criminal enterprise
next door and that it can destroy us," he said.

The Manta base commander argues it is in his country's interest to
cooperate with the United States.

"I'm convinced the Colombian guerrillas are going to spread out because of
Plan Colombia and the north of Ecuador is going to be an escape route for
them," said Col. Jose Bohorquez. "It is something that is coming whether
the Ecuadorean base harbors the Americans or not."

Despite the controversy, there is little opposition among the residents of
Manta, who have put out the welcome mat for American servicemen.
Townspeople are delighted with the prospect of millions of dollars pouring
in at a time when Ecuador is trying to dig its way out of its deepest
economic crisis in decades.

The airport expansion has produced hundreds of construction jobs, and new
restaurants and bars have popped up along the port's seaside avenue aimed
at pulling in the Yankee dollar.

"They've treated us very well," said Lt. Col. Richard Hair, chief of the
U.S. Air Force mission. "Obviously, they're interested in the economic
benefits, but they've been very, very friendly and we've felt a great deal
of support from everyone in town."