50 Years Of US Intervention In Colombia II
posted by Chelsey Dyer
Oct 15, 2013
~snip~
Between 1954 and 1964 the U.S. trained about 250 Colombians in counterinsurgency tactics. In 1964 this number rose to about 300 a year. The U.S. espoused a National Security Doctrine focused on destroying “internal subversives”- the PCC- backed (Communist Party of Colombia) independent collectives of peasants that had fomented throughout a civil war in Colombia known as La Violencia. In 1964, with the support U.S. recommendations, aid, and training, the Colombian government launched “Operation Marquetalia”. Tasked with retaking the Marquetalia region in the Tolima province, and capturing or killing Manuel Marulanda, (an active PCC member who would later play a role in establishing the FARC), government troops launched an attack on the region. However, Colombian troops failed to kill or capture Marulanda, and the region was taken back from government hands months later. Further disenchanted with the Colombian government’s policies, many in the rural populace were emboldened and determined to defy government decrees and violent rule. “Operation Marquetalia” marked a turning point that initiated the creation of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, or the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).
The FARC was founded on a Marxist-Leninist ideology which they claimed was designed to protect the interests of the rural peasantry. When founded, they were a defensive organization that did not yet employ offensive tactics or participate in the drug trade. It was not until 1982, at the seventh conference of the guerilla movement, that the FARC officially ratified the use of offensive tactics, though in practice they had been engaging in offensive attacks before the strategy was made official. Over time the FARC’s strategies devolved and preyed on the population they claimed to protect. In order to fund their campaign the FARC engaged in aggressive kidnapping and ransoming tactics, extortion of wealthy land owners, taxing drug traffickers, and though they still deny it, trafficking drugs themselves. Today, they engage their old ideology, referencing concern for marginalized groups throughout Colombia in order to legitimize violence and terror tactics.
To combat the FARC, paramilitary groups began to coalesce throughout the 1980s as private militias hired by wealthy land owners to protect them from extortion. These right-winged militias united in 1997 to form the umbrella paramilitary organization Autodefenas Unidas de Colombia (United Self Defense Forces of Colombia) and came to be some of the deadliest actors in the conflict.
Throughout the 80s and 90s actors in the conflict (guerrillas, paramilitaries, and the Colombian government) became increasingly involved in the drug trade and corrupted by a lust for money. U.S. recommended and funded counterinsurgency tactics continued, despite evidence that they were inducing harm. In a 1994 CIA Intelligence Memorandum released under the Freedom of Information Act, intelligence verified that “Gaviria’s [Colombian President from 1990-1994] hardline counterinsurgency approach has sent a clear law-and- order message and has reassured U.S. firms interested in continued investment in Colombia”. Rather than highlighting concerns with human rights and ‘collateral damage’, the report denotes that the guerrillas “continued ability to hit military and economic targets in remote regions and to sow fear through assassinations and bombings in the cities undermines popular confidence in the government and makes foreign investors wary”.
More:
http://colombiareports.co/94669/
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