U.S. IMPERIALISM PLANS FOR WAR IN COLOMBIA
By Andy McInerney in Workers
World, August 8, 2002
With little fanfare, the Bush administration is moving
forward with its war plans for Colombia.
On several fronts, U.S.
plans for intervention--first called Plan Colombia
under the Clinton administration,
now known as the Andean Initiative--are unfolding according to plan.
On July 24, the U.S. Congress authorized a formal change in
the funding already provided to Colombia's
military. For the first time, the distinction between anti-narcotics aid--the
fig leaf for the $2 billion provided over the past three years--and
counter-insurgency aid would be dropped.
The military aid "shall be available to support a
unified campaign against narcotics trafficking and designated terrorist
organizations and to take actions to protect human health and welfare,"
according to the legislation. The U.S.
government calls the two main Colombian insurgencies--the Revolutionary Armed
Forces of Colombia-People's Army (FARC-EP) and the National Liberation Army
(ELN)--"terrorists."
The legislation was part of the $29 billion so-called
Anti-Terrorism Package requested by the Bush administration.
The bill also includes another $35 million on top of the
money previously authorized as part of Plan Colombia;
$6 million of that is specifically designated for protecting U.S.-owned oil
pipelines from guerrilla attacks.
Colombia
is already the third-biggest recipient of U.S.
military aid in the world. While the main targets of that aid have been the
FARC-EP and the ELN, prior legislation required that the counter-insurgency war
be disguised as a "war on drugs."
The Pentagon quickly endorsed dropping the disguise. The
Bush administration's nominee to head the U.S. Army Southern Command,
responsible for U.S.
military operations in Latin America, testified on July
26 that he favored dropping the restrictions on counterinsurgency and favored
expanding U.S.
intervention there.
"It would be a terrible loss if democracy failed in Colombia,"
said Lt. Gen. James Hill. By "democracy," Hill apparently meant Colombia's
corrupt, pro-U.S. capitalist class.
Also on July 26, U.S. Ambassador to Colombia Anne Patterson
announced that a new U.S. Special Forces team would be in Colombia
"over the next few weeks" to train a brigade of Colombian troops,
according to the French Press Agency.
In another sign that the provisions of Plan Colombia
are moving forward, the Brazilian daily newspaper Jornal do Brasil reported
July 24 that the Chilean military is training 2,600 troops to join a U.S.-led
multinational force that would be prepared to intervene in Colombia
by January 2004. The account, described in the New York-based El Diario-La
Prensa on July 25, claimed that Argentina,
Chile, Uruguay,
Peru and Ecuador
had pledged troops.
Chile
and Ecuador
immediately denied the charges. But confirmation came immediately from a
retired Ecuadorian general, Rene Yandun, who was previously the head of the
Joint Command of the Ecuadorian Armed Forces and is now the prefect of Carchi
province, bordering Colombia.
The multinational force "is not a new proposal,"
the general told El Diario. The Brazilian press report "is nothing to be
surprised about."
The recent troop mobilization on the Ecuadorian border
"means that we are participating in the military maneuvers," Yandún
said.
Yandun also claimed that during a March visit, U.S. Army
Chief of Staff Gen. Eric Shinseki reminded his counterparts in Colombia,
Ecuador and Brazil
"to respect the promises that each country made as part of Plan Colombia."
Regionalizing the war in Colombia
was one of the Bush administration's original goals. Initially this effort
received little support from Latin American heads of state, at least not
publicly. Now it appears that the U.S.
government is taking advantage of the post-Sept. 11 climate to advance this
strategy again.
These signs of increased U.S.
military intervention come as the civil war in Colombia
sharpens. Right-wing President-elect Alvaro Uribe, heavily backed by Washington,
is set to take office on Aug. 7. Battles between the FARC-EP and government
forces are on the rise. Government-sponsored death squads have stepped up their
terror campaign.
Activists in cities around the United
States are planning to stage pickets on Aug.
7 to protest this growing intervention.
*****
COLOMBIA
ACTIONS
On Aug. 7, Alvaro Uribe Velez will be inaugurated as Colombia's
next president. Uribe has a bloody history of support for that country's
paramilitary death squads.
Uribe and his masters in Washington
are planning to escalate the war against the people of Colombia,
including the rebel groups, labor unions, students and others. Urged on by the U.S.,
Uribe promises to double the size of the Colombian military and arm it to the
teeth with U.S.
weapons.
It is now more important than ever that people in the U.S.
build a strong solidarity movement to defend the people of Colombia
and their struggle for peace and social justice.
Opponents of war and racism plan demonstrations in several
cities Aug. 7 to protest Uribe's inauguration and growing U.S.
intervention in Colombia.
In San Francisco, the protest will
be held at Powell and Market streets starting at 5:30
p.m. For more information, contact the Committee for a New Colombia
at (415) 312-9567.
In New York City,
protesters will gather from 5 to 7 p.m. outside the Colombian Embassy on 57th
St. between Lexington
and Third avenues.
For more information on the New York
protest or actions in other cities, contact the Committee to Stop U.S.
Intervention in Colombia/International Action Center at (212) 633-6646 or visit
the Web site www.iacenter.org.
- END -
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