WASHINGTON - For most of the last three years, Clinton administration
officials battled tirelessly with Republicans in Congress over what might
be the right helicopters for Colombia's fight against illegal drugs.

When the Republicans sought six top-of-the-line helicopters for the
Colombian police, administration officials insisted that a rebuilt version
of the old Vietnam-era workhorse, the UH-1H Huey, would do fine. They said
that buying the more expensive aircraft, which cost roughly five times as
much, would throw the State Department's drug-enforcement budget out of whack.

Then, in late December, White House officials confirmed a change of heart.

Going beyond their aides' most ambitious recommendation, officials said,
senior officials proposed immediately buying 30 of the helicopters they had
once rejected, the Sikorsky UH-60L Blackhawk, at a cost of almost $400
million.

It was Christmas not only for the much-criticized Colombian military, which
is to receive the aircraft, but also for United Technologies Corporation,
the Connecticut-based conglomerate that makes the Blackhawk and has been
struggling with declining orders from the Pentagon.

Now, however, the plan is drawing attention to the lobbying efforts of
United Technologies, a major military contractor and political contributor,
the political payoff for Democratic legislators from the state, and the
policy choices implied in the $1.28 billion aid package that the White
House has put forward for Colombia.

The proposal also illuminates the political dynamics of what would be
Washington's first large-scale involvement in a civil conflict in Latin
America since the cold war, an initiative that has brought unlikely
alliances on every side.

"This would be a great relief package - for the state of Connecticut," said
Representative Cass Ballenger, a North Carolina Republican and a supporter
of rival helicopter companies. Mr. Ballenger is one of several Republicans
who have joined with some political liberals to urge the administration to
consider substituting the cheaper Hueys it once championed for some
Blackhawks.

Even if the United States bought Colombia a handful of the Blackhawks and
dozens of the rebuilt Hueys, Mr. Ballenger said wryly, "you'd still have
$100 million or $200 million left over to buy Democrats or Republicans or
whatever you still needed" to win approval of the plan.

Administration officials acknowledged that they had been the target of a
long lobbying campaign for Blackhawk sales to Colombia by United
Technologies and its supporters.

A competing push was made by Bell Helicopter Textron, the Texas subsidiary
of Textron that produces the so-called Huey II that has been considered as
an alternative.

But White House officials denied that politics influenced their decision,
saying they followed the advice of military and intelligence experts. "It
is ferociously expensive," Gen. Barry R. McCaffrey, the White House drug
policy director, said of the Blackhawk. But he added, "It's a hugely
capable piece of machinery."

The 30 Blackhawks, along with a temporary fleet of 33 surplus UH-1N
helicopters, are intended to fly new, American-trained battalions of the
Colombian Army into the coca-growing regions of southern Colombia dominated
by leftist guerrillas. There, the soldiers are to beat back the traffickers
and the rebels who protect their operations.

There is no question that a lack of mobility has been one of the Colombian
military's biggest problems. It is also widely agreed that the Blackhawk is
a much better aircraft than the Huey II: it can fly farther and faster,
carry more troops and better withstand groundfire. But the Blackhawks also
pose some significant problems.

Officials say it could take until late next year for all the aircraft to be
made; it may take almost that long for Colombian pilots to be trained or
retrained to fly them.

The high cost of the Blackhawks - $12.8 million each, according to
administration figures, as opposed to $1.8 million for Huey II's - has also
been brought into relief by the risk that the insurgents, flush with drug
money, could acquire surface-to-air missiles to shoot them down.

"What you can absolutely count on is that with the Blackhawks or the
beefed-up Hueys, the bad guys are going to acquire surface-to-air missiles;
helicopters will be shot down," said Gen. Fred F. Woerner, retired, who
commanded United States forces in Latin America in the late 1980's. "The
question is, will we replace them?"

Administration officials, aircraft lobbyists and Congressional officials
say the decision to buy the 30 Blackhawks was the culmination of lobbying
efforts and political struggles dating from 1996.

By 1997, sending Blackhawks to the well-respected Colombian National Police
had become almost an obsession for several powerful Republican legislators.
For the contractors, Colombia was prized territory, a critical foothold in
a rich and growing Latin American market, analysts and industry officials
said.

Although their helicopter campaigns cannot be broken out from other
concerns, both companies have given generously to politicians.

In the 1996 and 1998 election cycles, Textron and its employees gave
$551,816 to Republicans and $364,420 to Democrats, according to statistics
compiled by the Campaign Study Group, a nonpartisan research company.

United Technologies and its employees also focused on the Republicans
controlling Congress, donating $362,340 over the same period. But the
company was comparatively more generous to Democrats, donating $347,200
over that period and giving them almost twice what Textron gave in
so-called "soft money" contributions in the current cycle.

The two contractors also used less traditional means to make their case.

In the summer of 1998, for instance, just before Republicans forced through
six Blackhawks for the Colombian police by adding more than $100 million to
the State Department budget, Textron underwrote a discussion series called
"Is Colombia Going Down?" at which the Washington office of the Council on
Foreign Relations brought business and government leaders together to focus
on the urgency of Colombia's problems.

Both companies also appealed directly to Colombian officials, people
familiar with their efforts said, and encouraged the Colombians to make
their case to Congressional leaders and administration officials. The
Colombian military, which has itself already bought 25 Blackhawks and is
now purchasing 14 more, was a strong advocate for the best aircraft they
could persuade the United States to get them.

Administration officials say that aides who drafted the Colombia proposal
last fall suggested three options: one with no Blackhawks, and others with
45 or 60 Blackhawks in the latter years of the plan .-- hopefully after
some progress by the Colombian Army - made the huge expenditure more
palatable.

But just before Christmas, White House officials decided to scale back the
aid package to a year and a half of spending, seek 30 Blackhawks
immediately, and cut financing for some development programs by about half,
officials said.

Soon thereafter, the plan came under attack by some of the same Republican
legislators who once championed Blackhawks for the Colombian police.

Several would like to give some of the 30 Blackhawks to the police -- a
move favored by human rights groups that oppose helping an army with a long
history of abuses. Other Republicans, including members of Congress loyal
to Textron and U.S. Helicopter, which also helps build the Huey II, argue
for buying more of the less expensive aircraft and directing the savings to
other Colombian needs, including strengthening the judiciary and weaning
farmers away from drug crops.

"What if peace breaks out?," said Representative Bill Delahunt, a
Massachusetts Democrat. "These helicopters won't even start coming out for
18 months after the appropriation."

But other Democrats have been more conspicuous recently for their silence
on the issue of military aid for Colombia. And while many have been
reluctant to oppose the aid for fear of appearing "soft" on the drug issue,
few have been as reticent as the senior legislators from Connecticut,
Senator Christopher J. Dodd and Representative Sam Gejdenson.

Both have long been vigilant critics of military solutions to civil
conflicts in Latin America, and strong advocates of human rights. But both
have also been champions of United Technologies and recipients of steady,
substantial campaign contributions from the company. Their limited public
role in the Colombia debate - until Mr. Dodd came out recently as one of
the first members of either party to endorse the administration's plan -
has been felt sharply by advocacy groups that had counted them as allies.

"Quite frankly, we wish that Mr. Gjedenson and Mr. Dodd would have been
more helpful on this issue, especially given their experience on Central
America in the 1980's," said Carlos M. Salinas, Amnesty International's
Latin American affairs lobbyist in Washington, who has criticized the package.

In interviews, both legislators strongly denied that prospective Blackhawk
sales had shaped their positions. Mr. Dodd acknowledged that he had
returned from Colombia just days before the aid plan was made final in
December and had told senior administration officials he would support it.
But he said he did so reluctantly, pushing for more economic development
aid, and he insisted that he never pressed the officials to buy Blackhawks.

"I would support a Connecticut company; I wouldn't see that as inconsistent
in this case," Mr. Dodd said. "I just didn't do it."