US-BACKED DRUG WAR HAS STRONG START

U.S.-trained army troops are sweeping through the world's top
cocaine-producing region, protecting crop-dusters from enemy fire as they
wipe out coca crops at an astonishing pace.

But the initial success of the anti-drug offensive -- heavily supported by
the United States and criticized by European nations -- cannot be sustained
indefinitely, acknowledged a senior U.S. military official based in Colombia.

Washington's gamble that it can win the drug war with military power
includes the deployment of U.S. special forces as trainers to jungle camps
near the war zone and the delivery of dozens of combat helicopters.

So far, the results of the counterdrug operations in southern Putumayo
state, the world's largest cocaine-producing region, have been beyond most
anyone's expectations, although some food crops have been destroyed.

In the past month, 62,000 acres of coca have been fumigated in Putumayo,
said the U.S. military official, who spoke on condition that he not be
further identified. That acreage is at least one-third of the coca crop
believed to exist in Putumayo, and more than half the coca that was
fumigated across all of Colombia in 1999.

But the pace will be virtually impossible to maintain, the U.S. official
said, partly because of expected "hostile fire" and logistics in the remote
Amazonian region.

The country's largest rebel group -- the Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia, or FARC -- earns huge profits by protecting coca crops and taxing
the growers. Rebel threats to resist the offensive haven't yet materialized
into major action.

However, 70 percent of the coca fumigated so far in Putumayo was under
control not of the FARC but of a right-wing paramilitary group, the U.S.
military official said.

The paramilitary group, which also "taxes" the coca industry, is unlikely
to fight the army because it often maintains covert alliances with army
officers -- as noted in a recent White House human rights report.

Gonzalo de Francisco, President Andres Pastrana's point man for Putumayo,
agreed that when the U.S.-trained army troops move into guerrilla
strongholds, fighting will intensify.

"The FARC has been there for five years," he said. "They will resist."

It's the goal of the U.S. and Colombia that the increased spray operations
will eventually outpace the planters' ability to move to new areas.

Under the U.S. aid package, 10 fumigation planes will be deployed in
addition to the 10 already being used. U.S. special forces have also been
training three Colombian army battalions, containing about 3,000 troops, to
fight the drug war.

The United States also will be sending dozens of Black Hawk helicopters to
Colombia later this year and "Super Huey" helicopters by March 2002.

Critics of the U.S. military aid to Colombia often draw comparisons to the
early years of the Vietnam War, when Washington's involvement began with
the deployment of a few military advisers.

Under Washington's $1.3 billion aid package to Colombia, no more than 500
U.S. soldiers and 300 contract employees can be in the country at one time.
They are barred from going into combat.

The FARC has declared that U.S. troops found in war zones would be
considered "military targets."

The U.S. military official insisted that the Green Berets and other U.S
special forces troops are stationed primarily in "areas where contact with
hostile forces is unlikely."

"Force protection of deployed U.S. trainers is critical," he said