U.S. Willing to Deploy Combat Troops to Colombia

[struggle4progress]

While the U.S. mainstream media widely-reported the U.S. Department of Justice’s recent indictment of 50 rebel leaders belonging to the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), an announcement by the State Department the next day received surprisingly little coverage. On March 24, Assistant Secretary of State Anne Patterson told Colombia’s Radio Caracol that, while the United States would not initiate any unilateral military action to capture FARC leaders, it would intervene if invited by the Colombian government. Given that the U.S. government’s intervention in Colombia already involves everything but the deployment of U.S. combat troops, it is clear that Patterson’s comments were intended to illustrate the Bush administration’s willingness to deploy U.S. troops to Colombia to combat FARC guerrillas.

The indictment of the FARC leaders further illustrates the Bush administration’s strategy to portray the FARC as the greatest perpetrator of violence and drug trafficking in Colombia. The reality, however, is very different from the Bush White House’s fictitious portrayal. The U.S. indictment provided no evidence to support its claim that FARC leaders have earned $25 billion from drug trafficking and are responsible for 60 percent of the cocaine shipped to the United States.

Meanwhile, most Colombia experts agree that the country’s right-wing paramilitaries are far more deeply involved in drug trafficking than the rebels, a fact supported by the numerous drug busts in which the seized cocaine was traced back to paramilitary groups. In fact, former associates of Pablo Escobar, the notorious leader of the now-defunct Medellín cartel, established some of Colombia’s most prominent paramilitary groups. <snip>

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=9&ItemID=10031

[architect359]

1. What? What combat troops?

Aren't we already worried about being spread too thin in the M.E.?? Jeez!

[Kagemusha]

2. Special forces. Like in 'Clear and Present Danger' or something.

One of the Clancy books before he went off the deep end.

[sce56]

3. Before he went off the deep? He wrote the idea to crash a

Fully Loaded 747 into the Capitol Building during a Joint Sesseion of Congress wiping out the entire US Leadership All three branches of the Goverment
Where do you think AlQueda got the Idea to use planes as weapons? MANILA, Philippines (CNN) -- The FBI was warned six years ago of a terrorist plot to hijack commercial planes and slam them into the Pentagon, the CIA headquarters and other buildings, Philippine investigators told CNN.

Philippine authorities learned of the plot after a small fire in a Manila apartment, which turned out to be the hideout of Ramzi Yousef, who was later convicted for his role in the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center. Yousef escaped at the time, but agents caught his right-hand man, Abdul Hakim Murad, who told them a chilling tale.

"Murad narrated to us about a plan by the Ramzi cell in the continental U.S. to hijack a commercial plane and ram it into the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, and also the Pentagon," said Rodolfo Mendoza, a Philippine intelligence investigator.

Philippine investigators also found evidence targeting commercial towers in San Francisco, Chicago and New York City.

They said they passed that information on to the FBI in 1995, but it's not clear what was done with it.


Debt of Honor (1994)
Clark and Ding help Ryan avert (win?) a war with Japan; a Japanese pilot avenges his son's death by crashing his airliner into the US Capitol, killing the entire Congress, Supreme Court, and all but two White House officials, which segues into...

[Kagemusha]

6. Yes, Clear and Present Danger was before that book.

Which I read, and which I consider to be when he went off the deep end with the anti-Japan mouthpiecing. IMHO.

And I don't think Al Qaeda needed him to come up with the idea, but I did find Rice's claims no one could have imagined this as particularly galling in this context.

[file83]

4. I'm sure the 'Black Water' merc group would just LOVE to get their hands

on the Colombia contract.

[oscar111]

5. Marines ever land in S Amer like in Central, Carib?

I cant recall ever hearing of a marine or Army regulars landing in SA, like i have read of in the closer nations.

Why is that pattern? Seems odd that a line may exist putting SA off limits for such a landing.

What is the overall total, BTW, for marine landings in latin america?

[struggle4progress]

7. Instances of Use of United States Armed Forces Abroad, 1798 - 2004

This seems to be a document produced at govt expense and posted on a govt website. I therefore assume copyright restrictions do not apply. I have copied portions verbatim: this does NOT imply that I accept the official version of events.

Instances of Use of United States Armed Forces Abroad, 1798 - 2004

... 1833 -- Argentina. - October 31 to November 15. A force was sent ashore at Buenos Aires to protect the interests of the United States and other countries during an insurrection

1835-36 -- Peru. - December 10, 1835, to January 24, 1836, and August 31 to December 7, 1836. Marines protected American interests in Callao and Lima during an attempted revolution ...

1852-53 -- Argentina. - February 3 to 12, 1852; September 17, 1852 to April 1853. Marines were landed and maintained in Buenos Aires to protect American interests during a revolution ...

1855 -- Uruguay. - November 25 to 29. United States and European naval forces landed to protect American interests during an attempted revolution in Montevideo ...

1859 -- Paraguay. Congress authorized a naval squadron to seek redress for an attack on a naval vessel in the Parana River during 1855. Apologies were made after a large display of force ...

1868 -- Uruguay. - February 7 and 8, 19 to 26. US forces protected foreign residents and the customhouse during an insurrection at Montevideo.

1868 -- Colombia. - April. US forces protected passengers and treasure in transit at Aspinwall during the absence of local police or troops on the occasion of the death of the President of Colombia ...

1890 -- Argentina. A naval party landed to protect US consulate and legation in Buenos Aires ...

1891 -- Chile. - August 28 to 30. US forces protected the American consulate and the women and children who had taken refuge in it during a revolution in Valparaiso ...

1894 -- Brazil. - January. A display of naval force sought to protect American commerce and shipping at Rio de Janeiro during a Brazilian civil war ...

1902 -- Colombia. - April 16 to 23. US forces protected American lives and property at Bocas del Toro during a civil war ...

1986 -- Bolivia. US Army personnel and aircraft assisted Bolivia in anti-drug operations ...

1989 -- Andean Initiative in War on Drugs. On September 15, 1989, President Bush announced that military and law enforcement assistance would be sent to help the Andean nations of Colombia, Bolivia, and Peru combat illicit drug producers and traffickers. By mid-September there were 50-100 US military advisers in Colombia in connection with transport and training in the use of military equipment, plus seven Special Forces teams of 2-12 persons to train troops in the three countries ...

http://www.history.navy.mil/library/online/forces.htm

[teryang]

8. Sickening n/t