THE MISSION IN COLOMBIA

The most powerful man in the world on Wednesday spent 11 hours in
Cartagena, the nicest and safest of Colombia's cities, and then left,
afraid to sleep there. Despite the fact that President Clinton was
protected by thousands of security agents, troops and police officers
plus six military helicopters patrolling the skies over his head, his
advisers felt that the risk was simply too high to stay in Colombia
overnight.

Thirty-eight million Colombians, meanwhile, spend night after night in
uncertainty and dread with no one to protect them. Colombia has a
murder rate 10 times higher than that of the United States; one
Colombian is murdered every 20 minutes. In the rural zones, left-wing
guerrillas and right-wing paramilitaries prey on peasants, committing
nightly massacres - sometimes of whole villages - in an effort to
eradicate their enemies and show their power. Last year, according to
Colombian authorities, 399 such massacres took place. Almost 2 million
Colombians have run away from their homes to avoid the violence,
becoming refugees in their own country.

Colombians in the cities don't have it much better. Random bombings,
delinquent gangs, and kidnappings for ransom - 3,000 of them last year
- - keep Colombians living in fear.

This is reality for Colombians, and despite Clinton's insistence that
the United States' $1.3 billion aid package for Colombia does not
further a military objective, calling it a "package in favor of peace"
does not make it so.

The US aid package includes 60 Black Hawk and Huey combat helicopters
and US military advisers to train and outfit Colombian antidrug
brigades to eradicate coca crops in two southern provinces that are
largely controlled by Colombia's largest guerrilla group. That
inevitably will intensify Colombia's civil war. The Army Revolutionary
Forces of Colombia, or FARC, announced through a spokesman that the
FARC is prepared to fight any encroachment into the territory it
holds. Clinton last week waived several human rights conditions put on
the aid program by Congress, declaring Colombia a national security
priority.

Clearly the sides are gearing up for more war, not peace. And
desperate Colombians seem to expect that the greatest conflict will be
between Colombian guerrillas and US troops. A poll conducted in July
for Colombian television broadcaster Canal Caracol asked: Who do you
believe has more power right now in Colombia?

FARC leader Manuel Marulanda, known as "Tirofijo" or "Sureshot," came
in first with 46 percent. The United States was second with 31
percent, and only 10 percent picked Colombia's president, Andres
Pastrana. Another poll, by the Gallup Organization, indicated that 56
percent of Colombians would support direct military intervention by
the United States to stop the bloodshed. Of course, Colombians believe
a lot of the bloodshed is the fault of the US demand for cocaine,
which the Colombian defense minister estimated at 300 tons per year.

Clinton's message to Colombians during his visit - "Please do not
misunderstand our purpose; we have no military objective. There won't
be American involvement in a shooting war" - flies in the face of
common sense. Can any informed person really believe this?

Why does Clinton not call a thing by its name? Though $238 million of
the aid package will go for programs to support drug crop
substitution, judicial reform and human rights in Colombia, 80
percent, or more than a billion dollars, will be devoted to funding
the Colombian military. A popular Colombian expression seems to apply:
"Aunque el mono se vista de seda mono se queda" - "Even if the monkey
decides to wear a silk outfit, it still would be a monkey."

Pastrana, meanwhile, is playing his own word games. He repeats that
while he is president there will not be foreign military intervention
in Colombia. But that depends on how you define the word
"intervention."

There are already 100 US military advisers training Colombian
soldiers, and according to the Miami Herald, the Pentagon will send US
Army General Keith Huber to oversee deployment of part of the $1.3
billion package, making him the only US general posted in South or
Central America.

It is important that the United States shows interest in Colombia. But
it is also important that US and Colombian leaders tell people what is
really happening and not just what they want to hear. The most
straightforward answer as to what the future holds seems to come from
the commander of the Colombian armed forces, General Fernando Tapias,
who said: "There will be peace. But first there will be war."