RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE US AND COLOMBIA

LIANE HANSEN, host:

During the last months of the Clinton administration, the United States
began a $ 1.3 billion effort to rescue Colombia. The US has gradually
become more involved in the country, which is beset by Communist
guerrillas, private armies, drug traders and one of the hemisphere's
highest murder rates. But President Bush has said that he wants to avoid
being drawn in too deeply into the violence there, and now the new
president is deciding what to do about the battle he inherited. NPR's Steve
Inskeep has more.

STEVE INSKEEP reporting:

The United States is sponsoring a kind of military offensive in the
Colombian wilderness. Starting in December, Colombian soldiers moved into a
remote region of forests and farms. Then airplanes arrived. Crop dusters
skimmed over green fields in the province of Putumayo. That thin sliver of
land is Colombia's biggest source of coca plants, the raw material for cocaine.

Mr. RAND BEERS (State Department): It was a very target-rich environment.

INSKEEP: Rand Beers, of the US State Department, says the Colombian
soldiers had been trained by US military advisers. Some traveled in US-made
helicopters. Retired US military pilots flew some of the crop dusters and
found their targets using US military maps. Beers says the pilots sprayed
the coca fields with a version of the weed killer commonly known as Round-up.

Mr. BEERS: There is so much coca in Putumayo that we have reports of spray
pilots coming down, turning on the spray nozzle and continuing to fly until
the tank is empty, 120 seconds later, and them peeling off to go back for
another load.

INSKEEP: Local farmers charge the crop dusters often miss their targets,
spraying legitimate crops, or even people. But the State Department says 78
squares miles of coca fields turned from green to brown. Those fields offer
a visual reminder of expanding US involvement. Old-style Marxist guerrillas
have been fighting Colombia's government for decades. Right-wing private
armies are fighting the guerrillas, and rather than attack each other
directly, armed groups often kidnap or kill civilians. They raise money by
imposing what they call 'taxes' on the drug trade.

The US-sponsored anti-drug offensive marks a milestone for a few
conservative lawmakers who've been agitating for tougher action. One is
Congressman Cass Ballenger of North Carolina.

Representative CALL BALLENGER (North Carolina): We've been working on this
thing five years now trying to get something done. And so now it's finally
becoming effective, through no fault of the previous administration. Pardon
me for being biased, which I am.

INSKEEP: Barely two years ago the conservatives were outraged at President
Clinton for seeking a more peaceful solution. American diplomats held
furtive meetings with Colombia's guerrillas. The US wanted to help work out
a peace settlement. An end to the civil war might make it easier to attack
drugs and other problems. But those efforts collapsed, and at about the
same time, according to the State Department's Rand Beers, the US uncovered
a dramatic increase in coca cultivation.

Mr. BEERS: We discovered, at the beginning of 1999, that we had made a
major miscalculation in terms of the coca yield in Colombia.

INSKEEP: Expanding crops fueled an expanding civil war. Barry McCaffrey
directed drug policy for President Clinton.

General BARRY McCAFFREY: We're talking about narco-terrorist battalions
with more machine guns than the Colombian army has.

INSKEEP: Facing charges that it was soft on drugs, the Clinton
administration gave the conservatives a plan they couldn't refuse. Congress
overwhelmingly approved more than $ 1 billion in mostly military aid to
Colombia. A few liberal lawmakers protest that the United States might be
edging toward a repeat performance of El Salvador. In the 1980s, a
US-backed government there sometimes massacred its own civilians. In
Colombia today, soldiers are accused of standing by while private death
squads kill thousands of Colombian civilians. But Republican Congressman
Cass Ballenger dismisses those risks.

Rep. BALLENGER: The biggest risk we've got is the millions of kids that are
dying in this country from the use of drugs.

INSKEEP: And the plan enjoys support from leading Democrats, like Senator
Chris Dodd of Connecticut.

Senator CHRIS DODD (Connecticut): The alternative is doing nothing, and
that's not an acceptable alternative to me.

INSKEEP: Still, Dodd says he's begun to worry. The attack on coca is
supposed to be part of a bigger strategy. Colombian President Andres
Pastrana has appealed for billions of dollars in economic aid, but much of
that money is supposed to come from Europe. And this month, the European
Parliament passed a resolution denouncing the plan. By a vote of 474-to-1,
the Europeans said the policy includes too much military force. Senator
Dodd says the US is almost alone.

Sen. DODD: Europe was supposed to weigh in here and provide a good hunk of
change. I don't want this to be a US-Colombian deal. I have great fear of
that happening. If that does, I'm very worried about failure.

INSKEEP: The first phase of the anti-drug offensive ended just as President
Bush was settling into the White House. The new administration has
occasionally sounded ambivalent about continuing that fight. President Bush
met Colombia's president.

President GEORGE W. BUSH: I explained to the president that we're fully
aware of the narcotics that are manufactured in his country, but I also
told him that many of them wouldn't be manufactured if our nation didn't
use them.

INSKEEP: President Bush sounded a little like the critics of US policy,
like Senator Paul Wellstone of Minnesota.

Senator PAUL WELLSTONE (Minnesota): As long as we don't put money into drug
treatment and drug prevention in our own country and continue to demand it,
just plan on it being grown in Colombia or Peru or Brazil. No, it's not
going to stop.

INSKEEP: But a drastic change in policy would not be easy now, and
administration officials say it's not likely. Conservative lawmakers are
already maneuvering to gain more funding to fight Colombia's heroin and
cocaine. In his first budget, President Bush is expected to prepare for the
possibility that the drug war might widen. The administration plans an
increase in aid to Colombia's neighbors in case the coca spraying in
Colombia merely causes drug traders to relocate.

The State Department's Rand Beers hopes the destruction of coca farms has a
broader effect on the interconnected causes of Colombia's almost unbearable
violence. Beers says Colombia's rebels might be more willing to negotiate
if the offensive cuts off the drug money that pays their bills.

Mr. BEERS: There is a very clear belief that this eradication program can
and will contribute to the peace talks.

INSKEEP: Two years ago, the Clinton administration was hoping that
Colombia's peace talks might make it easier to go after the drug trade.
Today the Bush administration hopes its attack on the drug trade might make
it easier to find peace. Steve Inskeep, NPR News, Washington.

HANSEN: It's 18 minutes past the hour.