DON'T FUND COLUMBIA'S CIVIL WAR

Should the U.S. government continue its $1.6 billion plan to finance a
military campaign against drug manufacturing in Colombia?

Colombia's armed conflict between so-called narco-insurgents and government
forces is close to exploding into civil war. Blame, in part, America's
misguided war on drugs.

The Clinton administration committed $1.6 billion to Plan Colombia, a
military campaign to wipe out that country's drug growers and smugglers.
That's money better spent on more pressing domestic needs.

America for years has pumped aid and arms into Latin America on the theory
that the best way to stop drug use is to dry up the supply.

The efforts have failed: Drugs still command up to a 1,000 percent mark-up
on U.S. streets, a profit margin high enough to offset the risk of the
trade. All the United States has accomplished in Latin America is to move
the drug trade from one country to the next.

In Colombia, U.S. aid has sparked a mini-arms race between the government
and the narco-insurgents. It has also encouraged Colombian President Andres
Pastrana to pursue a much more hard-line strategy with the guerrillas.

He suspended ongoing peace talks last week and deployed his military to
drive them out of territory he had ceded to them earlier in his term.
Although talks between the two sides have resumed for now, should they fail
to come to an agreement -- a high probability -- civil war is a near certainty.

The United States has nothing to gain from such a war, financed by its drug
fighting money. Even if the Colombian government wins, the impact on the
drug supply in the United States will be minimal, if history is a guide.

Washington would do better to hang on to the $1.6 billion committed to the
Colombian drug fight and use it for something more likely to produce
results, like the war on terrorism.