DEEPER INTO COLOMBIA'S WAR

PUSHING YET further into an intractable civil war in Colombia, the Bush
administration is seeking a green light to get directly involved in
fighting Colombia's guerrillas. Congress, to its discredit, appears
unlikely to mount a significant challenge or even ask the tough questions.

Last week, the administration sent to Congress a counterterrorism bill that
includes $35 million in new military aid for Colombia. That would be in
addition to the $490 million allotted for this fiscal year, and $435
million requested for next year.

The Colombian government has not shown much will to fight its own war,
spending little on defense and keeping most of its troops away from combat.
Instead, it has covertly contracted out the dirty work to the rightist
paramilitary Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), a death- squad mafia
tightly linked with cocaine traffickers.

In Washington, there has been shockingly little debate about the increasing
U.S. involvement, which now includes hundreds of military "trainers" and
extensive intelligence cooperation.

In Congress, most critics have focused on making sure any Colombia aid
includes clauses requiring the administration to "certify" that the
Colombian military is making progress in cleaning up its miserable
human-rights record. Last year's aid bill included such a clause; the
current request doesn't; liberals will fight (and probably succeed) in
inserting one this time.

Such clauses typically aren't worth the paper they're written on. With
Colombia, as with the 1980s conflict in El Salvador, the State Department
has proved adept at cynically "certifying" that brutal rightist armies are
paragons of democracy.

What's needed is a far-reaching debate in Congress and throughout the
nation about what the United States is doing in Colombia. What are our
moral standards? What are our benchmarks of success?

And, most important, what's our exit strategy for getting out of this quagmire?