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The Nonviolent Activist Editorial
No Solution in Colombia

.S. military aid to Colombia will not promote peace or stop drug addiction. The Clinton administration policy is ill-conceived, following the worst examples of U.S.-Latin American relations, and will lead only to more violence and human rights abuses. Neither Colombia’s civil war nor drug addiction in the United States will be solved on the battlefield. The solution to civil war will be found at the negotiating table; the solution to drug addiction will be found in treatment programs. U.S. military aid of $1.3 billion will only bring more bloodshed to a war-ravaged nation.

Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen passes through a military cordon in Cartagena, Colombia, November 30, 1998. Dept. of Defense.

During President Bill Clinton’s brief trip to Colombia at the end of August, he praised that country’s government even as revelations of new massacres and human rights abuses were reported in the U.S. media. Clinton has pledged an unprecedented aid package, promising that it will be used to fight drugs, not to entangle the United States in Colombia’s civil war, the longest-running conflict in the Western Hemisphere. “We are not going to get into a shooting war. This is not Vietnam. Neither is it Yankee imperialism,” said Clinton during his visit. A week earlier, he waived human rights restrictions that might have blocked the military aid. Human rights abuses and drug trafficking have been perpetrated by all sides to the conflict, but the Colombian military and its paramilitaries are responsible for the majority of the abuses.

The picture of U.S. military intervention in Latin America is painfully familiar. The United States has not been the partner for peace and development that it claims to be. To the contrary, the United States has sought to control the development of its southern neighbors. At different times throughout the 20th century, the United States has invaded sovereign states, supported proxy armies, promoted military dictatorship, financed death squads and supported repressive regimes in Latin America. This bloody history invalidates any credibility the United States would claim as a regional champion of human rights.

At the same time, military aid is an ineffective way to stop drug trafficking. Even the Rand Corporation, a U.S. think tank for military and strategic policy with close ties to the Pentagon, found in a 1994 study that the least expensive way to reduce cocaine consumption is to fund treatment programs. Intervening in the source country is the most expensive. The study, which was partly funded by Pentagon money, concluded that a 1 percent reduction in U.S. cocaine consumption would cost $783 million in source country control versus $34 million for treatment of drug users. The difference is staggering in financial and human terms.

Clinton’s policy in Colombia is based on incorrect assumptions, and many will suffer as a result. In Colombia, thousands more will be victims of military and paramilitary violence; in the United States, thousands more will suffer drug addiction. Not surprisingly, the only winners in this scenario are the arms manufacturers who supply the weapons that U.S. dollars will buy.

U.S. policy toward Colombia must change now before more blood is shed and more money wasted on a failed drug strategy. The United States has a particular responsibility as the world’s leading arms exporter. This country can stop regional arms races and funding violence by unilaterally ending all arms transfers. The money would be better invested on drug treatment in the United States and rebuilding communities that have been devastated by the drug war, as well as by drugs.