CAUTION FOR COLOMBIA

Colombian President-elect Alvaro Uribe Velez used his visit to the United
States last week to push hard for more U.S. military assistance to his
country in its nearly four-decades-long struggle with rebel forces.

He deserved a sympathetic ear but not an open wallet.

The reasons are several. The Colombian government's own commitment to
ending the conflict is not convincing, and the argument that extirpation of
the rebel movements in Colombia will end or even reduce Colombian narcotics
exports to the United States doesn't hold water. The United States should
resist Mr. Uribe's pleas that America become more deeply involved in this
particular "big muddy" for now.

The new Colombian president was elected in May on a platform that promised
a more muscular approach to the country's rebel movements than that taken
by his predecessor, President Andres Pastrana. The outgoing president spent
three years in negotiations with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia, the FARC, and this produced some periods of relative quiet in the
country but no resolution of the conflict. Colombia has received some $2
billion in aid from the United States in recent years, mostly in the form
of military equipment and training. It is the third largest U.S. aid
recipient, after Israel and Egypt.

The Colombian government's war with its rebels is fundamentally a local
affair, and the government's own commitment to winning is not overwhelming.
U.S. military strategists consider its army of 35,000 to be too small to do
the job. At the same time, young Colombians who are college-bound - in
other words, the children of the elite of Colombian society - are exempt
from the draft. The number of U.S. troops stationed in Colombia is capped
at 400. That sounds about right.

Finally, the basis of the $2 billion aid program in the first place - the
idea that getting rid of the rebels would somehow reduce if not eliminate
illegal Colombian narcotics exports to the United States - turns out to be
false when put to the test. A recent study indicates that narcotics
production and exports are not related in practice to turns in the tide in
the civil war.

The right American position toward the Colombian conflict is continuing
interest, but no increase in U.S. involvement in spite of the lures of talk
about the war on terrorism, the war on drugs, protecting petroleum
pipelines, or whatever other combination makes the military aid lottery pay
off in Washington.