On Thursday 6th September the President of Colombia – Juan Manuel Santos – rejected a proposed bilateral ceasefire by FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) rebels aimed at bringing an end to Colombia’s armed conflict. He declared that he had asked operations to be intensified and stated that “there will be no ceasefire of any kind.” ((Reuters, Colombia’s Santos Rejects FARC call for Ceasefire, 7th September 2012.)) These comments bear reflection upon Colombia’s half century dirty war, the actors involved and the motives behind U.S. policies that have merely served to worsen the conflict.
Today Colombia is one of the largest recipients of U.S. military training and aid in the world. Although the U.S was involved in counterinsurgency operations in Colombia during the Cold War the continued flow of military funding and training occurred as a result of Bill Clinton’s “Plan Colombia” (2000-2006) and George W Bush’s “Andean Regional Initiative” (2008-2010) both of which were aimed at the forced eradication of coca and fighting Colombia’s left-wing guerrillas due to their involvement in terrorism and the international drugs trade. Through these initiatives billions of dollars have been spent fighting a war on drugs followed by a war on terror. Coca production in Colombia, however, has increased as has the intensity of the internal armed conflict with both FARC and right-wing paramilitary groups growing in size and strength.
Despite numerous studies concluding that the cheapest and most effective way to deal with the drug situation is to redirect funds from law enforcement and forced eradication into treatment and prevention, ((See for example, C. Peter Rydell (1994), Controlling Cocaine: Supply Versus Demand Programs, Rand Drug Policy Research Center.)) the U.S. government has maintained its militaristic approach to the so called ‘war on drugs’ both at home and abroad. Given the resounding failure to achieve the stated objectives of these initiatives one must ask; is there an alternative objective, one that the current strategy achieves sufficiently?
The Neo-Liberal Effect
The U.S. has long held a policy of pushing neoliberal economic polices in Latin America. This has been achieved through NGO activity, strategically allocated aid, coercive interventions, conditions attached to IMF and World Bank loans and bi-lateral and multi-lateral free trade agreements. There is a substantial literature exposing the resultant social stratification these policies have caused in Latin America, ((See for example: Stokes, Susan C. (2001), Mandates and Democracy: Neoliberalism by Surprise in Latin America, Cambridge University Press; Weyland, Kurt (2004), Neoliberalism and Democracy in Latin America: A Mixed Record, Latin America politics and Society. 46(1): p. 135-157; Gwynne, Robert N. and Cristóbal Kay (2000), Views from the Periphery: Futures of Neoliberalism in Latin America, Third World Quarterly. 21(1): p. 141-156.)) but there is one particular effect of neoliberalism that has directly resulted in increased cultivation of coca for export.
The neoliberal model aims to re-orientate agricultural production to the export market. While neoliberal policies remove protective tariff barriers on agricultural goods, subsidised U.S. agricultural imports undermine the price received for locally produced crops. Larger farms and ranches with sufficient resources can move into growing export crops such as coffee but these crops are more labour intensive, require more land and cost more to transport. Many small farmers and peasants therefore find that the only area in which they can maintain a competitive advantage is in the cultivation of coca. This was evident in Mexico after the signing of NAFTA (the North American Free Trade Agreement). U.S. subsidised corn imports destroyed Mexico’s domestic production and those who could not afford to invest in the production of other export crops either switched to cultivating illicit drugs or left their land for the city where a lack of employment opportunities pushed many rural immigrants into other elements of the drug trade.
It is clear that if the U.S. wished to reduce the cultivation of coca in Colombia the most effective policy would be to redirect military aid into funding government subsidisation of legal crops. Yet the US-Colombia Trade Promotion Agreement actually prohibits such action. Under the agreement, that was signed in 2006 and came into affect in May of this year, Colombia is obliged to dismantle all of her domestic protections while the U.S. is permitted to maintain her own agricultural subsidies and thus an unfair advantage in the trade of agricultural produce. In 2010 Oxfam International commissioned a study which revealed the unequal terms of this trade agreement. It demonstrated that the agreement would lower the prices local farmers would receive for major crops such as corn and beans which, in turn, would reduce domestic cultivation of these crops and substantially impact the income and livelihood of hundreds of thousands of Colombia’s peasant farmers. ((Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (2010), Will the U.S.–Colombia Free Trade Agreement Help Colombia’s Small Farmers? March 10.))
Biological warfare
One major part of both Plan Colombia and the Merida initiative has been the destruction of coca fields by aerial chemical fumigation thus impacting the cocaine trade at it’s source. Glyphosate, the chemical substance used to fumigate illicit crops and known by its brand name Roundup, was originally patented and produced by the most notorious of US agricultural corporations; Monsanto. Glyphosate is classified by Monsanto as a “mild” herbicide but by the World Health Organisation as “extremely poisonous.” ((Bigwood, Jeremy (2001), Toxic Drift: Monsanto and the Drug War in Colombia.)) Roundup is sold over the counter in the US as a herbicide and there it carries these warnings: “Roundup will kill almost any green plant that is actively growing. Roundup should not be applied to bodies of water such as ponds, lakes or streams…. After an area has been sprayed with Roundup, people and pets (such as cats and dogs) should stay out of the area until it is thoroughly dry… If Roundup is used to control undesirable plants around fruit or nut trees, or grapevines, allow twenty-one days before eating the fruits or nuts.” ((Robin, Marie-Monique (2010), The World According to Monsanto: Pollution, Corruption and the Control of our Food Supply, p 138.))
In Colombia however, two additives — Cosmo-Flux 411 and Cosmo InD — are added increasing the toxicity four-fold and producing what is known as Roundup Ultra, or as some call it; “Colombia’s Agent Orange.” ((Robin, Marie-Monique (2010), The World According to Monsanto: Pollution, Corruption and the Control of our Food Supply, p 138.)), ((This nickname no doubt originates from the fact that Monsanto produced the chemical Agent Orange which was used for aerial fumigation during the Vietnam War resulting in birth defects, poisoning of land and outbreaks of cancer. After the war it emerged that Monsanto had known of Agent Orange’s toxicity years before but had tried to cover it up. Due to the side affects seen in Colombians living in areas that have been sprayed with Roundup Ultra, and Monstanto’s less than savoury record, many fear that, like Agent Orange, Roundup Ultra will hold future health implications yet unknown.)) In addition, the concentrations in the mixtures prepared by the Colombian military (under the guidance of their US colleagues) are five times higher than is recognised as safe for aerial application by the US Environmental Protection Agency. ((Robin, Marie-Monique (2010), The World According to Monsanto: Pollution, Corruption and the Control of our Food Supply, p 138.)) This product is regularly sprayed over inhabited areas, farmland, livestock and areas of invaluable biodiversity. ((Chemical War: Herbicides, drug crops and collateral damage in Colombia. After the Fact (a publication of the Institute for Science and Interdisciplinary Studies), Winter 2001.)) The National Environmental Justice Advisory Council, a Federal Advisory Committee to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, issued a letter on July 19 2001 stating that; “Aerial spraying of the herbicide has caused eye, respiratory, skin and digestive ailments; destroyed subsistence crops; sickened domestic animals; and contaminated water supplies. ((Chemical War: Herbicides, drug crops and collateral damage in Colombia. After the Fact (a publication of the Institute for Science and Interdisciplinary Studies), Winter 2001.)) Even anti-drug development projects, including ones funded by U.S. Aid, the UN, the Colombian government and international NGOs, have been destroyed by fumigation. One of many examples is that of CORCUSA, an organic coffee cooperative founded to provide peasant farmers with an alternative to coca cultivation. CORCUSA was fumigated in 2005 and again in 2007 destroying the coffee crop and the project’s organic certification for future crops. ((U.S. based NGO Witness for Peace.))
As well as the clear human health, food security and environmental risks involved in the fumigation campaign, it has also been a massive failure in achieving its stated goal; the eradication of the coca crop. Coca, unlike most other food crops, is actually quite resistant to aerial spraying of glyphosate. Many farmers who have their food crops destroyed are left with few options when coca is all that will grow on their land after the spraying of glyphosate so the result of the fumigation campaign has been a marked increase in coca cultivation. ((U.S. based NGO Witness for Peace.))
Militarisation of the War on Drugs
The militaristic approach to fighting the drug war has intensified the conflict in Colombia. The result has been mass displacement and disenfranchisement of people which, in turn, has pushed more people into some area of the drug trade. What’s more, numerous studies dating back to the 1980’s have mutually concluded that militarising the drug war would have little to no effect on the consumption of illicit drugs in the United States. ((See for example: RAND Corporation, Sealing the Borders; The Effects of Increased Military Participation in Drug Interdiction. The study also noted that seven prior studies on the same topic over the preceding nine years had resulted in similar conclusions, including one done by the Center for Naval Research and the Office of Technology Assessment.)) The effect of the militarised strategy has been a marked increase in drug related violence wherever it is initiated and there is not a more clear-cut example of this than Mexico. Before Calderon militarised Mexico’s drug war the violent crime rate was actually falling. Since this approach has been adopted, with avid U.S. support including the allocation of 1.4 billion dollars over a three year period (2008-2010) through the Mérida Initiative, the homicide rate has more than doubled, the violent crime rate has increased by more than 200% and the number of human rights abuses committed by the military in their attempts to reign in the drugs cartels have increased six-fold. ((Upside Down World, Interview with Peter Watt. ‘The drug war in Mexico; politics, violence and neo-liberalism in the new narco-economy’.))
In terms of preventing the flow of drugs into the U.S. the militarised approach has one simple economic paradox at its core: by disproportionally tackling production and distribution (the supply side of the equation) without equally tackling consumption (the demand side of the equation), the price of the product is increased thus providing a greater profit incentive for people to take the involved risks in trafficking and producing illicit drugs.
War on Narcoguerrillas?
As previously stated, Plan Colombia’s original objective was the eradication of coca plantations by targeting left-wing ‘narcoguerrillas’ (FARC) who, it was explicitly claimed, were directly involved in the drug trade. Evidence of a direct link between the FARC and the illicit drug trade, however, did not emerge until the early 2000’s after Plan Colombia had been instigated. In fact, into the late 1990s, there was little evidence to suggest that the FARC’s involvement in the production and distribution of drugs extended beyond the taxation of coca cultivation in the regions it controlled. In 1997 Donnie Marshall, Chief of Operations for the Drug Enforcement Administration admitted this in a DEA congressional testimony stating that “there is little to indicate the insurgent groups are trafficking in cocaine themselves, either by producing cocaine HCL and selling it to Mexican syndicates, or by establishing their own distribution networks in the United States.” ((DEA Congressional testimony July 9, 1997. Statement by Donnie Marshall, Chief of Operations of the Drug Enforcement Administration, before the Subcommittee on National Security, International Affairs and Criminal Justice.))
Plan Colombia, while stating the pursuit of left-wing ‘narcoguerrillas’ as an objective, did not equally target right-wing Colombian paramilitaries. While a few high profile cases of paramilitaries being tried and convicted on drug trafficking charges have occurred, on the whole, the focus remains principally on the FARC. This is despite the fact that at least as early as 1997 the DEA were aware of their involvement in narcotics trafficking. In the same congressional testimony quoted above Marshal stated that the AUC (United Self-Defence Forces of Colombia), the largest Colombian right-wing paramilitary group, has been “closely linked” to the Henao Montoya organisation; “the most powerful of the various independent trafficking groups that comprise the North Valle drug mafia” and that the AUC’s leader, Carlos Castano, is “a major cocaine trafficker in his own right.” Fumigation too has been concentrated mainly in FARC strongholds in the South East despite the fact that right-wing paramilitaries are known to be involved in cocaine production and trafficking in the north of the country. Suspicions have thus emerged that the real aim of the fumigation campaign is to remove one of the FARC’s key revenue streams (the taxation of coca cultivation in areas they control) rather than coca cultivation in general.
The disparity in treatment between right and left-wing groups has also led many critics to suggest that the U.S. tolerate and even support right-wing paramilitary activities due to their ideological alliance with U.S. economic interests in the country. In 2001 an investigation by Amnesty International led to a lawsuit to obtain CIA records of ‘Los Pepes’, a vigilante organisation set up by Carlos Castano. Its findings revealed “an extremely suspect relationship between the U.S. government and the Castano family — at a time when the U.S. Government was well aware of that family’s involvement with paramilitary violence and narcotics trafficking.” ((Villar, Olivar (2011), Cocaine, Death Squads and the War on Terror: U.S. Imperialism and Class Struggle in Colombia, p. 79. ))
War on Drugs/War on Terror
Colombia was one of the largest recipients of U.S. military aid and training throughout the Cold War. In the Cold War era the communist threat was used to justify counterinsurgency operations against the FARC rebels whose communist/socialist roots posed a particular threat to U.S. economic interests due to Colombia’s extensive natural resources and strategic geographical location. Today, even if the idea of the FARC gaining control over the Colombian state has diminished in credibility, the rebels regularly attack U.S. interests including the infrastructure (railways, pipelines etc.) of U.S. energy and mining multinationals in Colombia. As Marc Grossman, former U.S. undersecretary of state for political affairs put it; “[Colombian insurgents] represent a danger to the $4.3 billion in direct U.S. investment in Colombia…. Colombia supplied three per cent of U.S. oil imports in 2001, and possesses substantial potential oil and natural gas reserves.” ((Stokes, Doug (2005), America’s Other War: Terrorising Colombia, Canadian Dimension Vol. 39, No. 4; p. 26.))
After the Cold War and the fall of the Soviet Union the communist threat no longer justified U.S. counterinsurgency operations in Colombia or elsewhere in Latin America. The US Military’s Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) therefore welcomed the drug war as a new justification for maintaining the same levels of military spending and counterinsurgency training of Latin American militaries and “low intensity warfare strategies employed in Central America were easily adopted to fight a war on drugs.” ((Gill, Lesley (2004), The School of the Americas: Military Training and Political Violence in the Americas. p. 10.)) In Colombia, the FARC, previously labelled “Communist” became “narcoguerrillas” and, post-9/11, this morphed again into “terrorists.” President Bush utilised the war on terror to redefine the Colombian conflict and continue counter-insurgency operations against the FARC. Again, the target of this campaign remained the FARC despite the fact that the Colombian Army and closely linked armed right-wing paramilitary groups have been responsible for countless grave human rights abuses. ((Human Rights Watch, (2011), World Report 2012.))
The Historic Importance of Military Training to U.S. Foreign Policy
Military training and the cultivation of allied militaries whose interests and ideologies would reflect those of Washington has, historically, been one of the main methods of U.S. control in Latin America. Several Spanish language schools were established specifically for training Latin American officers including the notorious School of the Americas (SOA) which trained nearly every officer involved in the 1973 Chilean coup and where many members of the Colombian Army continue to train today. As well as training these officers in counter-insurgency, counter terrorism and unconventional warfare (among other forms of attack) the SOA intentionally cultivates a glorified image of “privileged capitalist modernity and a strong belief in the right-wing capitalist model.” ((Gill, Lesley (2004), The School of the Americas: Military Training and Political Violence in the Americas. p. 10.))
What resulted from such instruction in the past was the creation of highly politicised right-wing military entities which remained allied to the state only insofar as the government in power reflected a similar ideology. Throughout the 1970’s and 1980’s this resulted in military coups overthrowing left-wing governments throughout Latin American and the Caribbean. As Latin American states transitioned to democracy the strength of these staunchly right-wing militaries (as well as well-grounded fears of U.S. military intervention) led to the establishment of ‘pacted democracies’ whereby elite and military support for the democratic transition was conditioned on the formation of certain economic parameters to be enshrined into the constitution. Despite the fact that many democratic movements mobilised on the basis of wealth redistribution these pacts generally guaranteed the continued presence of foreign multinationals in the extractive industries as well as ruling out the nationalisation of resources and the socialisation of land as policy options regardless of electoral outcomes. ((Karl, Terry L. (1987), Petroleum and Political Pacts: The Transition to Democracy in Venezuela, Latin American Research Review. pg82.)) Where specific pacts did not exist left leaning elected governments remained very wary of their right-wing militaries when making policy decisions. In Chile, one of the more modern examples, even though the Concertación (Chile’s democratic movement) opposed neoliberalism, the intimidating power of the right-wing military caused them to accept a moderately reformed version of Pinochet’s 1980 constitution which enshrined the neoliberal model as well as a number of authoritarian enclaves with a bias to the political right. ((These enclaves include an electoral law that results in overrepresentation of rightwing parties, nonelected senators and institutions with veto power over the legislator. Olavarría, Margot (2003). “Protected Neoliberalism: Perverse Institutionalization and the Crisis of Representation in Postdictatorship Chile”. Chile since 1990: The Contradictions of Neoliberal Democratization, Part 2. Latin American Perspectives. 30 (6): p. 10-38.))
This is also the reason why very few Latin American countries, with the notable exception of Argentina, have managed to hold military personal accountable for atrocities of the past. Indeed, in many places, army personal who took part in grave atrocities continue to hold high ranking positions in the military. In Colombia this is particularly so and, as military abuses continue to this day, a culture of impunity has been created which remains a hindering factor to any potential for peace and reconciliation. ((European Commission, Colombia Country Strategy Paper 2007-2013.)) What’s more, many high ranking members of the Colombian military trained in the U.S. as counter-insurgents during the Cold War and were then thought by their U.S. instructors to define a number activities normally associated with a healthy democracy as “Insurgent Activity Indicators.” Such ‘indicators’ listed in Manuals used by U.S. trainers included; “Characterization of the armed forces as the enemy of the people… Increased unrest amongst labourers… Increased number of articles or advertisements in newspapers criticizing the government. Strikes or work stoppages… Increase of petitions demanding government redress of grievance” and “Initiation of letter-writing campaigns to newspapers and government officials deploring undesirable conditions and blaming individuals in power.” ((Stokes, Doug (2005), America’s Other War: Terrorising Colombia, Canadian Dimension Vol. 39, No. 4; p. 26.))
The more recent move to the left in Latin America has been a success, in part, because the new generation of left wing leaders are acutely aware of the dangers the military pose. In Bolivia one of Morales’ acts as President was to raise military wages and the recent police strikes (so severe some called them a police mutiny) were partly based on the fact that police wages were roughly half those received by similar ranking military officers. In Venezuela, Chavez holds tight to his military image and many critics have used this to claim he is merely another ‘generalissimo.’ This criticism fails to realise, however, the great political importance in Chavez’s realignment of the Venezuelan military with the democratically elected government of the state rather than outside forces and ideologies. His success in this endeavour was demonstrated when soldiers loyal to him reversed a military coup that displaced him briefly from power in 2002. Both Chavez and Morales, due to their opposition to drug war policies and the imperialist undertones they carry, have driven the DEA out of their respective countries.
The stability of instability
It is clear that the war on drugs and the subsequent war on terror in Colombia have been used as fronts to justify the continued counterinsurgency war against the FARC. Or, as Stan Goff – a retired US Army Special Forces officer for counterinsurgency operations and former military advisor to Colombia – put it: “the ‘war on drugs’ is simply a propaganda ploy… We were briefed by the Public Affairs Officers that counter-narcotics was a cover story… that our mission, in fact, was to further develop Colombians’ capacity for counterinsurgency operations.” ((Feinberg, Leslie (2003), War in Colombia: Made in the U.S.A, International Action Center p. 81.))
U.S. and Colombian government anti-terror and anti-drug policy, however, has actually swelled the ranks of the FARC. Peasant farmers who depend on coca for their livelihoods are forced to rely on the armed guerrillas to protect their crop from planes spraying chemicals. The displacement and terrorisation of people and the destruction of subsistence crops in rural areas due to fumigation and military and paramilitary activity have created a large amount of unemployed, disenfranchised and angry young people who gravitate towards the guerrilla movement due to the impunity of the armed forces and the perceived inability of the Colombian justice and democratic political systems to hear their grievances or reflect their interests. The fact that the Colombian army and paramilitary groups continue to see coca growing peasants as guerrilla collaborators and therefore legitimate military targets (due to the taxes they are forced to pay the FARC on their coca crops) merely exacerbates the divide between the military and the peasantry.
Some have been led to argue that the real aim in Colombia is, in fact, to maintain a state of constant conflict. One in which there is sufficient order to protect investments and transport links but, also, sufficient disorder and terror so as to maintain a subservient and flexible workforce and an economic system which allows only a small local elite and foreign multinationals to benefit from the country’s resources. ((Klein, Naomi (2007), The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism.)) The official military protect investments and transport links important to the extractive industries while paramilitaries closely linked to the official army, and revealed to be linked to the U.S. government, sufficiently intimidate any move towards reform of the system. This is achieved through a policy of assassination, suppression and terrorisation of the political left, human rights activists, trade unionists and peasant and indigenous movements.
Economic Imperialism
In 1996 four years before Plan Colombia was passed by Congress, the U.S.-Colombia Business Partnership, representing U.S. companies with interests in Colombia, was founded. This organisation launched a well financed lobbying effort for U.S. intervention in the resource rich Andean state. Among the companies represented in this Business Partnership were Occidental Petroleum, Enron, Texaco, and BP. ((Gorman, Peter (2003), Plan Colombia: The Pentagon’s Shell Game, From the Wilderness)) A survey released just months prior to the passage of Plan Colombia in the U.S. congress indicated that there were a large number of commercially viable and unexploited oil fields in the Putumayo region of Colombia, ((Gorman, Peter (2003), Plan Colombia: The Pentagon’s Shell Game, From the Wilderness)) incidentally, the same area that experiences the highest intensity of paramilitary activity and aerial fumigation.
This correlation has aroused suspicion that these policies are actually aimed at displacing local people from their land in order to open it up to speculation by foreign multinationals ((Craig-Best, Liam and Shingler, Rowan, Cultivation of Illicit Crops, Spectrozine.)) while simultaneously clearing the dense rainforest that makes identifying and pinpointing the location of oilfields difficult. ((Gorman, Peter (2003), Plan Colombia: The Pentagon’s Shell Game, From the Wilderness)) This seems to be a recurrent theme in local impressions of the U.S. war on drugs in a number of different countries. In Guatemala, for example, locals have criticised militarisation of the resource-rich north eastern province of Petén. While it is known that this area is used to transport drugs to Mexico locals suspect the heavy military presence is more to do with oil interests in the region. ((Paley, Dawn (2012), Guatemala: The Spoils of Undeclared War. Upside Down World. )) Similar complaints have emerged from the Moskitia region of eastern Honduras which has experienced increased militarisation in recent years, particularly so since the 2009 coup. According to Norvin Goff Salinas, president of an indigenous Miskitu federation; “More than anything else, they’re militarizing because of the natural resources that are in the Moskitia, especially the strategic spots where there is oil.” ((Cuffe, Sandra and Spring, Karen (2012) “Botched DEA Raid in Honduras Exposes How Militarization Terrorizes Communities Around the World,” AlterNet.))
Foreign direct Investment (FDI) flows into Colombia rose from $2.4 billion at the outset of Plan Colombia to $14.4 billion by 2011. In the mid 90s oil and gas constituted only 10% of all FDI in Colombia but by 2010 this had increased to almost one third. ((Paley, Dawn (2012), Guatemala: The Spoils of Undeclared War. Upside Down World. )) Colombia, however, remains the most dangerous country in the world to be a trade unionist and one of the most unequal countries in the world with the top 10% of the population controlling nearly half of the country’s wealth. ((World Bank ))
Conclusions
It is evident that in the stated objective of eradicating coca cultivation and narcotrafficking in Colombia the U.S.’ anti-drug strategy has been a resounding failure. From the perspective of the U.S. State Department, however, Plan Colombia was not a failure at all but instead “allowed for the creation of an effective new model for U.S. intervention.” ((Paley, Dawn (2012), Guatemala: The Spoils of Undeclared War. Upside Down World. )) As the U.S. Government Accountability Office’s director of international affairs and trade put it; “international programs face significant challenges reducing the supply of illegal drugs but support broad US foreign policy objectives.” ((Ford, Jess T. (2012), Drug Control: International programs face significant challenges reducing the supply of illegal drugs but support broad US foreign policy objectives, Testimony Before the Subcommittee on Domestic Policy, Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.)) These objectives, throughout the period of U.S. hegemony, have remained the same. U.S. imperialism is not based on territorial control but on economic control. The adoption of the neoliberal capitalist model across Latin America greatly benefited U.S. companies by making resource extraction cheaper (due to reduced corporate tax), labour cheaper (due to labour flexiblisation practices) and domestic markets easier to dominate (due to the removal of all state subsidies and the breakup of state owned companies). The last point holds a particular level of hypocrisy because, while other countries must abandon all state subsidies, the U.S. maintains high levels of protectionism in the one area that developing countries would hold a competitive advantage in a free market system; agriculture.
The difficulty lies in maintaining a system in which the main beneficiaries of economic production in a country are a tiny local elite and foreign multinationals. This, historically, has been achieved through substantial repression. Throughout the Cold War such repression was justified by labelling as communist any movement or political party whose views fell outside of radical right-wing capitalism. One crucial method of ensuring the maintenance of this economic model in Latin America has always been the cultivation of allied militaries whose ideological beliefs fall exactly in line with those of Washington. The end of the Cold war necessitated a new justification for the continuation of this practice and thus, the war on drugs was born. After the 9/11 attacks this evolved into a war on terrorism.
It is established that U.S. ‘war on terrorism’ policies in Colombia and beyond further alienate the populations of countries where they are implemented and swell the ranks of the militarised ‘terrorist’ forces the U.S. claims to be fighting. The purpose of this war however, like the war on drugs and the war on communism before it, is the creation of a façade that justifies U.S. economic imperialism. The ‘terrorists’ therefore, like the ‘narcoguerrillas’, play a crucial role in maintaining this façade. While the U.S.’ Colombia policy is certainly aimed at making sure the FARC never gain the strength or political unity necessary to overthrow the state, the FARC are also a necessary enemy, just as the continuation of the internal conflict is necessary, to justify continued U.S. military training, aid and intrusion in the affairs of the strategically located, oil and resource rich Andean state.