QUEST FOR ANSWERS LEADS TO FARC HIDE-OUT, 24-HOUR 'DETENTION'

BUTUTO, Colombia -- The subcommander's voice was hard and low, with no room
for argument.

"You must wait with us here as detainees," he said.

With those words, my assistant and I, along with our local guide, became
captives of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia for 24 hours. The
FARC took our wallets, notebooks and camera and kept us under armed guard
in a small wooden hut by the side of a broad, slow river in southern Colombia.

We waited. We worried. And we got the smallest hint of what life must be
like for the hundreds of kidnapping victims held by the FARC in hide-outs
throughout Colombia.

We felt a nearly irrational urge to flee. We anguished for our families.
And we suffered a terrible uncertainty. My assistant, Mauricio Hoyos, a
Colombian, asked one rebel how long until we were free. "Days, months,
maybe years," he said.

The young rebels who guarded us were well armed, well disciplined but not
particularly well versed in the Marxist-Leninist philosophy that supposedly
underpins the 38-year-old revolution.

But they clearly believed that Colombia's society, with more than 30
million poor, is deeply unjust.

"One begins to understand that there are differences, and one thinks one
should do something about them," said "Jhony," leader of the small band of
men who guarded us, as he struggled to explain what made him join the FARC.

We had come to the FARC camp in search of answers. Just downriver,
guerrillas from the 49th Front had shot down a U.S. State Department- owned
Huey helicopter returning from a spraying mission. The pilots, foreign-born
contractors of Virginia-based DynCorp, were saved, although five Colombian
police officers were killed in the battle that followed the rescue.

The United States has given Colombia nearly $2 billion in the last few
years, mostly in the form of drug fumigation planes, helicopters and
troop-training to combat drugs. Colombia produces 90 percent of the cocaine
consumed in the United States.

The result has been that the United States has inched ever closer to direct
confrontation with the FARC, which relies on drug crops for revenue. The
FARC denies any involvement in drug trafficking, instead saying that it
places a "tax" on farmers of coca, the plant from which cocaine is derived.

We had sent a fax and e-mail to FARC headquarters, requesting an interview
about the helicopter shoot-down. We received no response but contracted
with a local boat owner who said he frequently took locals to a FARC site
upriver from where the incident took place.

When we arrived, it was clear that we had entered a fairly large FARC
encampment, with several hundred rebels at work in the jungle, hacking down
undergrowth with machetes. There was a small house, surrounded by chickens,
and several smaller buildings that appeared to be shelters.

The subcommander was surprised and angered to see us. After a brief
consultation, he came back to give us the news that we were "detainees." He
told us that we were being held for security reasons, because we were in a
conflict zone and because our media credentials had to be checked out.

But as he called some men to take us to a more secure site, he sent us away
with these words: "We are at war here with everyone. The army. The police.
And the gringos," he said, looking at me.

Along with our guide, we were escorted to the abandoned hut. There, the six
guards took up positions. Each wore a camouflage uniform and carried an
Israeli-made Galil rifle, a 9mm Beretta and a vest with grenades and a long
knife.

Jhony, the leader of the squad, had a walkie-talkie and a sheet of paper
with codes; all sorts of FARC radio traffic could be heard.

They never mistreated or threatened us, although we were forbidden to talk
at night and had to ask permission to move around the clearing. They were
respectful, polite and quick to offer help in the form of aspirin, water, a
spare blanket.

As the night grew dark, one of the rebels, a young man who appeared about
15, brought out a portable CD player and two small speakers. There, under
the dim light of a quarter moon, they blasted guerrilla songs with bloody
lyrics.

We were up the next day by about 5 a.m. The day crept along slowly as I
grew increasingly worried about whether the detention would make the news.
That might bring in local authorities, the FBI and who knew who else,
making release more difficult.

Finally, around 3 p.m., a small motorboat pulled up, and out stepped the
commander of the 49th Front, Hector Ramirez, along with his assistant and
his white toy poodle, Nino.

He talked with his men, then approached us with a smile. He explained that
they had verified our status as journalists and that they would try to
release us by that afternoon, the following day at the latest.

Finally, at 4:10 p.m., Ramirez arrived to take us downriver. Jhony stepped
up and handed us our gear and wallets, counting out the money to show that
each peso was being returned. Then he shook our hands.

We roared away down the flat brown river.