U.S. ABANDONS COLOMBIA

Colombia must prepare to stand starkly alone. It is very likely that
military aid from the United States will vanish in the near future,
as Republicans and Democrats do battle.

President Alvaro Uribe may be winning the war in the Colombian
jungles, but he's losing it in Washington.

It is not true that the two U.S. parties unite patriotically when
faced with major foreign-policy challenges. That's part of the
American mythology. If there's any electoral advantage in throwing
overboard a foreign ally (or supporting him), Republicans and
Democrats will do it. The only immovable principle is that elections
must be won at any cost and under any pretext.

Nor should Colombians expect the slightest solidarity from their
"Latin American brothers." That's another myth. The feelings that
prevail in the region are either indifference or satisfaction over
the dangers that loom over Colombian democracy.

The countries in the southern cone are indifferent. Brazil -- despite
the refinement of its ruling class -- is a giant with feet of clay
and a soccer ball for a head.

The governments of Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua and, of
course, Cuba are happy. Panama, which once was a Colombian province,
fears the consequences but, given its limited specific weight, can do
little or nothing.

Mexico, under the Estrada Doctrine of "nonintervention in the affairs
of another state," achieved total insignificance in foreign-policy
years ago and has defended it stubbornly.

Hugo Chavez is rubbing his hands. He has a plan, and Colombian
intelligence is aware of it. It seems he convinced the
drug-trafficking, communist-leaning guerrillas to collaborate in a
strategy that will lead the so-called Democratic Pole to victory in
the next elections.

The Venezuelan colonel is willing to spend whatever is needed: $10
million, $50 million, $100 million. The gush of petrodollars is
enough to bankroll those imperial spasms. After the triumph in
Colombia, Peru will fall of its own weight in the next elections,
maybe by the hand of Ollanta Humala -- and the conquest of the Andean
arch will be complete: 100 million people.

In sum, after amending the views of Lenin and Fidel Castro, Chavez
proposes to repeat the Venezuelan experience in Colombia. That
experience has become a universal theory for the seizure of power:
You win the elections, write a Constitution that destroys the
foundations of a republican structure and wipes out all vestiges of
individual rights, gradually silence the opposition, nationalize the
means of production and militarize the population under a deluge of
revolutionary slogans.

Then you become part of the glorious 21st-century socialism, a
guayabera-and-red-beret version of the Soviet madhouse that was
mercifully torn down last century.

Can Colombia resist, without allies, the hurricane that approaches?
It all depends on the common sense of the democratic political class.
Previous experience has not been very encouraging.

In Venezuela, Ecuador and Nicaragua, the democratic political class
committed suicide. It irresponsibly walked into the slaughterhouse.
It chose to go blind as long as it could poke its political rival in
the eye, even though both belonged to the same democratic family.
Finally, when both were blind, the enemy of republican values
leisurely took over the presidential palace and began the demolition.

The theory heard most often in Colombia is optimistic. People think
that "it cannot happen in this country." Why not? Supposedly because
of the country's political tradition and society's adherence to the
rule of law; and because Colombians know the meaning of a triumph by
the left, with the drug-trafficking, communist guerrillas standing in
the shadows. That is why Uribe retains 70 percent of the popular
support: He represents what Colombians really want.

I don't believe that theory. Colombia, too, can fall.

In 1989, Venezuelans gave Carlos Andres Perez the greatest
endorsement at the polls of any president in the nation's history. In
1991, surveys showed that he enjoyed 70 percent of the popular
support. In 1992, one day after Chavez attempted to overthrow him by
a military coup, it was learned that 65 percent of the Venezuelans
sympathized with the putschist officers.

The conclusion is obvious: Democratic values are hanging by a thread
in Latin America -- and Colombia is no exception. There are too many
problems, there is too much poverty, and the governments have been
thoroughly clumsy in the search for solutions. Our countries are
within the grasp of any populist, leftist adventurer who will promise
people the moon.

They're waiting for it.