COLOMBIA AND THE DRUG WAR: U.S. MUST WALK FINE LINE

Proposed Get-tough Policy Ignores Realities

Before a debate over Colombia turns into a battle between hawks and doves,
the Clinton administration and Congress need to take a hard look at funding
a so-called drug war.

In coming weeks, Congress will discuss a proposed $1.5 biooion package to
help colombia fight a drug-funded insurgency.

This conflict has become a U.S. problem. Colombian rebels are funding their
war machine by charging money to protect coca and poppy fields.

Their protection has enabled the drug trade to grow. Colombia now supplies
70 percent of the cocaine sold in the United States, and most of the heroin
found along the Eastern Seaboard.

Many Republicans are frustrated with the Clinton administration because
it's trying to help Colombia build a kind of anti-drug police force, but at
the same time is giving President Andres Pastrana a chance to negotiate peace.

Yet Pastrana's peace initiative is foundering, and Congress is running out
of patience. Some congressional members favor a more aggressive U.S.
approach, one that would help Colombia's army get rid of the guerrillas
once and for all.

This proposed though policy ignores a few realities about Colombia. The
country has been fighting a peasant war, in one form or another, over the
past 100 years. Illegal drugs are a relatively new part of the fighting.

Some U.S. lawmakers also fear Colombia could become another Cuba, but that
isn't likely to happen because most Colombians do not support the guerrillas.

The dilemma is how to help Colombia, and ourselves, without getting sucked
into a war that cannot be won by bullets alone. Colombia's military has
tried and failed for decades.

The immediate question for Congress and for the Clinton administration is
how much of the proposed $1.5 billion aid package should be used for
military hardware and how much of it should go for economic development.
Colombia needs both.

The larger question, though, is how much Washington should spend to
eradicate the last coca and poppy plants in Colombia, and what good this
will do. While American consumers continue to buy illegal drugs, foreig
suppliers will continue to sell them. This is the law of supply and demand.

The United States has a stake in ending Colombia drug-funded war, but must
find a way to do so without making the conflict worse.