US LOOKS TO AID COLOMBIA IN DRUG WAR

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: President Clinton landed in the Colombian port city
Cartegena today amid heavy security.

Some 5,000 Colombian soldiers and police officers had erected roadblocks
and searched motorists in preparation for the President's arrival in this
war-torn country. He came bearing gifts for Colombian President Andres
Pastrana: A $1.3 billion US aid package for Colombia's drug war. That money
is part of $20 billion targeted by the Clinton administration and Congress
to fight the drug war internationally. About a quarter of the money for
Colombia is aimed at judicial reforms and human rights training.

The rest is to provide helicopters and other equipment and military
training for two Colombian anti-narcotics army battalions. Today Reuters
reported that Brigadier General Keith Huber, director of operations at the
US Southern Command in Miami, will go to Bogota to oversee the military
aid. Colombia's army is up against a drug industry that takes in more than
$500 million a year. Currently, the country produces at least 80 percent of
the world's cocaine, and most of the heroin imported into the United
States. Over the last eight years, the country's drug production has grown
an estimated 750 percent. Drug traffickers have close ties with left-wing
guerrillas who have been fighting Colombia's governments for decades.

In its battle against the drug trade and the guerrillas, the Colombian
military has committed well-documented human rights abuses.

In particular, some military leaders have been charged with developing
right-wing paramilitary groups, which have committed mass murders and other
acts. The original aid package passed by Congress required the military to
be held accountable for those violations before the money was released.

But despite criticism from human rights groups, President Clinton last week
waived those provisions, citing national security concerns.

The waiver comes as Colombia's war continues.

Earlier this week, left-wing rebel groups and right-wing paramilitaries
staged attacks on civilians like these.

In all, more than 35,000 people, mostly civilians, have died in this war,
which has been intertwined with turf battles over drug production. In a
speech aired last night on Colombian television, Mr. Clinton said the aid
package is not intended to escalate the war against the rebels.

Plan Colombia

PRESIDENT CLINTON: Of course 'Plan Colombia' will also bolster our common
efforts to fight drugs and the traffickers who terrorize both our
countries. But please, do not misunderstand our purpose.

We have no military objective. We do not believe your conflict has a
military solution.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: But the President faces criticism on several fronts,
including from one of the rebel groups-- the Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia-- also known by its Spanish acronym, FARC.

ALFONSO CANO, FARC spokesman (translated): We reject the military
intervention that sides with one side of the balance in our country.

That is why we do not want Clinton to come. That is why we reject the
presence of Clinton.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Also, in a newspaper interview today, Colombian
President Pastrana placed some blame for the drug war on the United States,
which is the leading consumer of illegal drugs: "Colombia can put a stop to
drugs here at some point, but if the demand continues, somebody else
somewhere else in the world is going to produce them."

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/latin_america/july-dec00/colombia_8-30.html

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: For more on the drug war and Colombia we turn to
James McDonough, director of Florida's Office of Drug Control Policy. From
1996 until last year he served as director of strategy for the White House
Office of National Drug Control Policy under General Barry McCaffrey.
Cynthia Arnson, assistant director of the Woodrow Wilson Center's Latin
America program. Major Andy Messing, executive director of the National
Defense Council Foundation. He retired from the army in 1987. And Mathea
Falco, president of Drug Strategies, a drug policy research institute.

She served as assistant secretary of state for international narcotics
matters during the Carter administration. James McDonough, how is this $1.3
billion supposed to cut back or cut down drug production in Colombia?

JAMES McDONOUGH: Well, it is focused on five areas, one of which is to
strengthen the counter-narcotics effort, which translates into helping the
brigade in its counter-narcotics effort.

So, it is not a counter military per se, but it is counter-narcotics.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Well, let's just stay on that for one minute.

What's it supposed to do? What are the helicopters necessary for? What's
the training necessary for?

JAMES McDONOUGH: Well, as I understand it, there are three components.
Number one is to help them for training so they are standing up a brigade;
they've got about one battalion trained and two more coming.

Secondly they're going to provide them an intelligence picture, which is
very important, as you are well aware, they've been suffering badly on the
battlefield with the FARC. So an intelligence structure will help them. And
thirdly, they are getting the means to move around the area that they've
really lost control of. The mobility advantage at the moment goes to the
FARC. If you take the training and intelligence picture and the helicopters
that will move the counter narcotics brigade around, it evens the playing
field.

No impact on US demand

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Mathea Falco, is this the right policy?

MATHEA FALCO: Well, Elizabeth, of course I'm in favor of providing
assistance to Colombia, and that may well include some military training.
But this package is essentially high-tech equipment that the Colombians
themselves are going to have trouble keeping in the field, keeping
maintained. It will inevitably include Americans on the ground, and they
may well get drawn into the combat situation at some point.

But I think, even more important, this package has the potential really to
make a very difficult situation worse, and also, it won't have any impact
on the drug problem in the United States.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: How about just an impact on the cultivation of
cocaine in Colombia?

MATHEA FALCO: Well, I think it will be very tough for this new package to
have much impact.

The Colombians have already been involved in herbicidal eradication of
marijuana, cocaine and heroin over the last several years, and in fact
production continues to increase.

You know, it is a kind of balloon effect, wherever you get one part sort of
taken care of through herbicidal eradication, the cultivation pops up
somewhere else. And, in fact, in Colombia, it has had dire environmental
consequences because the cultivation keeps getting pushed into more and
more remote regions, which are harder and harder for government forces to
attack, but which also involve cutting and burning very important, you
know, resources, natural resources.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Major Messing, what do you think of this policy?

Do you think it will help cut down the cultivation in Colombia?

MAJ. ANDY MESSING (RET.): You have to put things in perspective, Elizabeth.
You had a statistic at the beginning of the program about how we've seen a
750 percent increase since 1992. Before that, under Reagan/Bush, we had a
downturn of activity.

We started seeing even in the demand side some traction. The word is traction.

We can never win the drug war, but what we can do is reduce it to its
lowest manageable level, and just to abandon it to the dark side, so to
speak, to people who attack democracy and light side capitalism, it would
be folly.

So this package is important.

It's a little bit late. We saw the Clinton/Gore administration sit on their
hands for five years before Denny Hastert, Ben Gilman, Dan Burton, and Mike
DeWine wound up putting the blow torch to those people so they would get
with the program as they say in the military.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: But you think the helicopters, the military aid
specifically, will help get rid of some of the cultivation?

MAJ. ANDY MESSING (RET.): Well, a lot has to do with, like what we did in
El Salvador. You have to get parity on the battlefield, first of all,
before there can be any successful negotiations. The drug guerillas, the
narco guerillas have decided to use drugs as their main financial component.

You have to take away some of their strength in order for them to start
talking seriously about laying down their guns.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Cynthia Arnson what about that? Where are the peace
negotiations now? Is it true that the government needs more strength to be
able to get the guerillas to lay down their guns?

CYNTHIA ARNSON: Well, I think there's no question that the government of
President Pastrana has made a significant effort to move the peace talks
forward. And most of the resistance has been on the side of the FARC
guerillas. I think there are problems, however, in the argument that you
have to level the playing field, bloody the nose of the guerillas, for them
to come to the table in good faith.

I think that peace negotiations elsewhere in the region and elsewhere in
the world show that there are important political or psychological
dimensions that have to do with incentives to come to the bargaining table.

These are not strictly military. And I think the composition of this
package has every likelihood of increasing the intensity of the war and the
abuse of the civilian population without noticeably advancing the prospects
for peace.

Skewed to the military

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: So you think that there is too much military aid and
not enough in other, for example, in the justice reform and human rights
training?

CYNTHIA ARNSON: Well, Plan Colombia, I think, tries to attack various
different fronts simultaneously, including the peace process, alternative
development, counter drug operations. But the composition of the United
States package is unfortunately heavily skewed to the military side. Some
80 percent of this money will be devoted to police and military efforts,
and a smaller portion to reform and development kinds of issues.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: James McDonough, what about the tie-in between the
guerillas and the drugs?

It is a very close connection, and will US troops, who are there helping
train these counter narcotics battalions, end up in this civil war somehow?

I mean, I want to quote, there was a mayor quoted in the Chicago Tribune
who said the Americans are going to be in planes, they're going to be in
training centers.

This is a mayor in the middle of the drug-producing region.

They will be in the war, he said.

JAMES McDONOUGH: Well, I think we're going to put a cap on the number of
people that are training.

That cap right now is fixed at, the number 86. And we've done things like
this before throughout the world and have not been drawn into a war. I do
point out that the effort is counter narcotics.

It is not warfare, and some of the aid packages going for law enforcement
as well, which means you have to deal with the criminal outfits that you
are going after. But just to reinforce the point, there are other parts of
the package. The US package is about 20 percent, at $1.3 billion.

The entire plan comes into $7.5 billion.

We're just one of the contributors to this plan. And even within our own
package, a significant amount, I believe, have gone into the development of
alternatives to the economy, the strengthening of the governmental
institutions, so if we do this right-- of course it is not without risk --
but if we do this right, and I think a lot of effort has been invested to
do it right, I would like to see this one have a chance.

MAJ. ANDY MESSING (RET.): Elizabeth, I might have two points.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Yes, go ahead.

MAJ. ANDY MESSING (RET.): First of all, on the front end of this thing, you
have to have a measure of security spending to bring the Colombian police
and military up to speed, and you have to have a cap by our forces, so we
don't wind up being sucked into a long, involved process.

In El Salvador, we had a 55 cap. Colombia is eight times the size and
population, and actually, the country is eight times bigger than El
Salvador. The cap has been projected at 500 for military and about 300 for
contractors. So this is -- we're trying to move toward a quality effort in
advising the Colombian government how to reorganize themselves politically,
militarily, economically, and security-wise. So that's what you have to do
in a situation that's so critical.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Mathea Falco, I see you shaking your head about this.
But I also want us to comment on the international implications in the
bordering countries, Panama, Venezuela, Brazil, Peru, Ecuador. You said
there is a balloon effect.

MATHEA FALCO: The balloon effect is already happening, Elizabeth. There are
increasing plantings in neighboring countries, Venezuela in particular is
very, very concerned, and much of the traffic and the production is moving
now through Venezuela. But to go back to the earlier point, President
Pastrana himself has pointed out just this morning that indeed, American
demand for drugs has got to be addressed.

And this package essentially is a very big military package.

It is our third largest foreign assistance grant in the world.

And I don't think most people realize that. And, meanwhile, we are not
putting a similar accelerated effort into cutting back on the demand in
this country through effective prevention and treatment programs that would
really respond to try to reduce the market.

Diminishing drug supply

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Okay, let's stay on that for a minute.

Let's assume for a second that the military aid package is somewhat
successful in Colombia and there is diminished cultivation of coca and poppies.

Does that necessarily translate -- you touched this in your earlier remarks
- -- into a diminished flow of drugs into this country?

MATHEA FALCO: Unfortunately, Elizabeth, the last 20 years of trying to
reduce the supplies of drugs by working in other countries, in fact, has
not produced results.

Worldwide production of heroin and cocaine are about triple what they were
20 years ago. Drugs are more freely available in this country. Prices are--
heroin is at one-quarter of its 1981 street price. Cocaine prices have
dropped by two thirds.

The price basically on the street in the United States indicates that there
is huge availability.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Why? I mean, I know this is too complex for the last
minutes of this, but just briefly, why? Why is it not better?

MATHEA FALCO: Well, essentially because as long as we have a very strong
demand for this commodity, for these drugs, there will be a market to
supply it. And Colombia is not the only drug producer in the world.

I mean, I think everybody acknowledges that. In fact, right here in the
United States, there is a lot of illicit marijuana production to meet our
American market.

So essentially producers spring up wherever there is a demand for that
market to be met.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: James McDonough, what's your response to that? James
McDonough.

JAMES McDONOUGH: Well, I certainly agree with the view that we have to cut
the demand.

That's the root of the problem.

That's where the priorities ought to go. But I want to point out very
quickly there has been a great growth in the budgetary support for the
reduction on the demand side. On the supply side, this one I think has a
great chance of working.

There is only a few countries that can grow the coca leaf that ends up as
cocaine and we've seen the neighboring countries come down 50 percent in
recent years.

The balloon effect has been right here, right in the FARC-controlled area.
So if you bring that down, you do make a dent it in. Does it get rid of the
problem? No. But supply is part of the issue that must be addressed.

So, you work in a balanced way. You bring down the demand for drugs at home
and overseas too, by the way. You work together as an international effort,
and you certainly try to catch the bees at the beehive before they start on
the way to the target.

MAJ. ANDY MESSING (RET.): I would like to use that one statistic that Ms.
Falco gave that it's one quarter of the price of 1981. Of course in, ma'am,
as you know we were having traction up until January of 1993 where the
Clinton administration and the lack of leadership in the Clinton/Gore
administration wound up having a five-year sabbatical away from the drug
war. That's where we lost a lot of traction.

And the second point is, we're having more, more cocaine and heroin than
demand coming into our country. That shows that drug dealers, the
malevolent elements, understand that they want to create a marketplace,
expand our marketplace.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Cynthia Arnson, one second, let me just get your
response, Mathea Falco.

MATHEA FALCO: Two quick things, Elizabeth. As to the question of reducing
demand in the United States, only one out of three drug addicts can now get
treatment unless they can pay for it in this country, and we know that
treatment can reduce.

MAJ. ANDY MESSING (RET.): No one is fighting the demand side question.

You are 100 percent right.

I worked in a homeless shelter for a year and a half. I saw one third -

MATHEA FALCO: I have one other point, Elizabeth.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Yes, go ahead.

MAJ. ANDY MESSING (RET.): One third of the people in there were drug people.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Let Ms. Falco finish.

Go ahead.

MATHEA FALCO: And that has to do with how little area, geographic area it
takes, in fact to produce enough drugs to supply the whole American market.
For example, it takes 25 square miles of opium poppies to supply the entire
US heroin demand for a year. That's about the size of northwest Washington.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Okay, now Cynthia Arnson.

CYNTHIA ARNSON: I would say the preceding discussion illustrates to a large
extent what is wrong with the discussion of Colombia and the United States.
There is a tendency to reduce this to the question of drugs and drug
interdiction and drug suppression. And I think the crisis in Colombia goes
far beyond that and it is truly unfortunate that the US aid package is so
heavily focused on this one issue.

It makes sense in terms of getting a substantial aid package through the
Congress, but it really doesn't begin to deal with the extent of the
problems of democratic governance, of human rights, of judicial reform that
I think are the core of the problem in Colombia.

ELIZABETH FARNSWORTH: Well, thank you very much, all four of you.