Colombian President Alvaro Uribe spent last week lobbying Congress for the renewal of Plan Colombia, the $3 billion drug eradication and development plan approved by President Clinton. Many have pointed out the shortfalls of the plan, including the spillover of violence into neighboring Venezuela, and the fact that the money doesn’t seem to have stemmed the flow of drugs to the United States.Should Plan Colombia be renewed?
21 comments:
Yes
LOL But why? Do you think it has helped at all? The whole purpose it to snuff out drugs, and it doesn't look like that has happened. Some people say that the money has been used by the government to fund the paracos, who do the government's dirty work. I really can't provide any evidence though.
PLAN COLOMBIA IS A MONUMENTAL AND DANGEROUS DISASTER...
Plan Colombia (PC) has never been an effective way to combat drug production and drug traficking in Colombia. When PC was presented by Pastrana to the Clinton Administration in the mid-1990's, it proposed that about 70% of the funding would be used for social development, infrastructure development and alternative crops, and 30% for enforcement. The Republican congress and the Administration subverted the plan, and switch over the numbers, 20-30% for social development and the rest for enforcenment, including fumigations. After over half-a-decade, the results are catastrophic: Coca production has been minutely decreased, new genetically-enhanced coca plants have been tooled, Campesinos in the countryside are being displaced to cities to create poverty belts and human misery, and water, air, human subjects and natural resources are being grossly poisoned and polluted.
My question for other fellow Colombians and Americans: Would you put up with an orchestrated noxious fumigating plan led by government, which would wipe-out Yellowstone or Yosemite Parks amonge many others? WE NEED TO SPEAK AGAINST THIS!!
Suggestion: It's in the best interests that the US comes up with a MARSHAL PLAN for Colombia and LATIN AMERICA.
Plan Colombia is yet another attempt by the U.S. to act against
countries sovereingty. It affects not only Colombia, but now the U.S. has a base in neighboring Ecuador for this purpose.
Plan Colombia has done nothing to stop drug production. It has been successful however in displacement of populations, pollution of water, soil and air, and in generating violence in the region.
Of course President Uribe wants Plan Colombia to be renewed. It brings millions to his government and..that is what it is really about.
Plan Colombia, in my opinion, finances poor people with basic necesities -food, transportation and housing- and weapons -helicopters, guns, bullets, bombs, etc- so they can afford to go hunt other colombians even poorer than themselves.
Paz
Neonovo
As a Colombian I definitely want U.S. aid to continue, even if under a different label.
Personally, I do agree that the Plan is not working as far as counternarcotics go, but that's not something due exclusively to Plan Colombia, but rather a direct consequence of overall U.S./internationl prohibition policies.
And obviously that has had many counterproductive effects, but let's be serious: the end of Plan Colombia doesn't mean the end of prohibition, by far.
With that out of the way...I do, however, support what the Plan represents in two key sectors: security and socioeconomic aid.
The importance and mostly positive effects of the first element are quite clear. Security definitely has improved due to U.S. aid, Plan Colombia included, even if a lot remains to be done. Obviously there are problems in this area, related to continuing degrees of abuses, but it can be quite seriously argued that abuses, in a historical, long term perspective (not talking 5 years or less, which is part of a false dilemma), have been reduced because of the emergence of U.S. security aid and training.
The importance of the second element are a bit less obvious, mostly due to its secondary nature in the implemented version of Plan Colombia (the original version would have been much more expensive and didn't come true due to a number of factos). Still, the fact is that the Plan has allowed for some amount of socioeconomic aid to reach Colombia, in small quantities, something which definitely continues to be necessary.
In fact, if it were up to me, I'd toss out the directly counternarcotics elements in the Plan (fumigation-related, mainly), instead strengthening those elements related to socioeconomic aid and alternative development programs, while more or less keeping current levels of security aid.
As far as the so-called "spillover article" you linked to, a lot of things in that piece have to be questioned. First off, Uribe himself and his government are not the ones that are attacking and exchanging loud words with Chavez. That's what the U.S. itself is doing, not Colombia's government.
Secondly, most of the spillover effects are related to the actions of irregular guerrillas and paramilitaries, and only on a comparatively minuscule basis involving the Colombian Armed Forces.
Curiously, however, several years ago (pre-Chavez), it was Venezuela that officially defended the right to engage in "hot pursuit" against irregular trespassers across Colombian borders, and that still happens once in a while.
The displacement of populations did not begin with Plan Colombia and it's far from the main reason for that. As far as poisoning natural resources goes, blaming Plan Colombia may be partially correct due to fumigations, but that represents an incomplete view.
Chemicals and slash and burn agriculture used for the production and cultivation of drugs, no to mention oil spills caused by guerrilla activity, have also hurt the environment and one rarely sees foreigners taking note of that.
"I don't think I need to remind anyone that President Uribe is connected to the very Cartel's that we're trying to catch."
There goes that old myth again, whenever people try to graps at straws instead of trying to appreciate the complexities of reality. But nevermind me...have fun with that on your own.
"OH BY THE WAY THEY'RE YOUR CAMPAIGN DONORS!"
Seems like you love baseless sensationalism quite a bit, since for instance nobody in Ecuador's government has ever said that. Either way, prove that exact phrase.
Plan Colombia is a disgrace to the Colombian and the US government. The spraying of a highly toxic Roundup-SL in the Colombian Amazon is a violation of human rights. Its impact on human health and on legal crops has been well documented. In addition, spraying adds to the environmental poisoning of the Amazon basin, this impacts not only Colombia. but the neighboring countries as well. The justification is "drug eradication", yet the production of coca has been going in a general upward trend. So what is the point? For those of you who are not aware, there seem to be large oil reserves in the Putumayo, right at the heart of the eradication campaign.
"For those of you who are not aware, there seem to be large oil reserves in the Putumayo, right at the heart of the eradication campaign."
So that means..."it's all about oil!"....? Not again...c'mon the world is not that simple. That may be a factor, but far from the main one. This is not Iraq.
As for the "poisoning of the Amazon basin"...see above. Some poisoning does happen, but it's hardly directed entirely at the "Amazon basin", and Roundup/fumigation chemicals are hardly the only substances harming the environment in Colombia.
For example, massive coca cultivation itself and its aftereffects are also having a negative effect.
The largest oil reserves are not in Putumayo, and in fact Colombia itself has very few prospects of finding further reserves.
In my opinion, PC has not given the prospective results. It is a plan to help to eradicate the illicit cultivations, but they (US) don't know that the guerrilla is the one that manages this drug business. What is necessary to make? First, to eradicate the guerrilla. But how? That is difficult.
The problem begins with the extreme poverty that great part of the country lives and of the state absence in far away areas where guerrilla is the law.
The solution is not to fumigate and exterminate the colombian flora and fauna, neither to deteriorate the deteriorated environment. Anyway the demand for drugs will continue in increase. Before that, is to think in work sources, education and improvement of so many people life's conditions.
Btw...I almost forgot:
"Suggestion: It's in the best interests that the US comes up with a MARSHAL PLAN for Colombia and LATIN AMERICA."
Actually, in fact that was Pastrana's original idea for Plan Colombia, but so much for good intentions...economic and political realities in Europe and, of course, in the United States itself prevented such a thing from even having a chance. A pity.
Taylor,
Money given to help "snuff out drugs" was really a bribe. The US is expecting favors from Columbia.
I believe it's really a hard question to answer, because one has practice cultural relativism which is to be able to understand both points of view within the culture(the Colombians and the Americans). Plan Colombia is supposed to limit or get rid off the drug production/trafficking; however, the way it tries to get rid off it is by basically destroying other important resources (which are considered legal) of Colombia. I think if Plan Colombia wants to get rid off the coca then they have to come up with a better way to make it stop.
I feel that there have to be other ways to stop cocaine production in Colombia than poisoning their land and people. We are killing people, leaving them with deformaties, and seriously inguring people; and through all of this drug production has not diminished even a little bit. There has to be a solution where everyone wins. The people of Colombia have a way of making money to provide for their families and Cocaine production ending.
No, it should not.
Of course, I believe the best way to 1) cut the drug lords off at the knees, 2) help ordinary people in both the US and Latin America and 3) fight gangs drug pushers in the US is to legalize marijuana and perhaps refined and regulated cocaine.
I believe this would also make it harder for kids to get because they card you at Circle K (for example if you are buying alcohol) while the drug pushers who are selling it now don't care if they are selling to a 21 year old or a ten year old.
plan columbia pooped on my face
LOLOLOL That last comment has to be Sly. WHAT A DORK. Anyway, so if Bush actually does approve the aid, which he probably will since he likes his good friend Alvaro, what do you think it should be used for? My thought is that if the government is given a blank check, that is no good. I know Bush has convinced others to support the plan because it supposedly helps fight terrorists, and all one needs to do to get money in DC nowadays is say the word 'terrorists'. But they are ignoring the fact that a lot of the Colombian population finds fault with the paramilitaries just as much as FARC for the violence. I read in Desaparecidos that the paracos were responsible for far more deaths than FARC, though I have no way to verify this. Actually, does anyone know where good stats on that might be found???
I would only like to say that U.S. aid is NOT a BLANK CHECK. The money from the Plan Colombia goes 80% to finance the military component. 75 % of that percent finances Americans living in Colombia (both soldiers and civilians) as well as the purchase of American weapons.
The other 20% goes to finance the "social" component of the Plan. And more than half of this percent goes to USAID, to pay the wages of American people working in Colombia.
Plan Colombia is a good bussines to U.S.
That 's even worse. In the Government Accounting Office, is there a way to get this info? This would be really good to publicize so that when people hear "aid to Colombia" they don't think of actual help.
"My thought is that if the government is given a blank check, that is no good."
That's hardly the case, given that the U.S. itself is directly (partially) responsible for Plan Colombia having morphed into a mostly counternarcotics operation and decides on its on the necessary conditions and budget assignments.
"But they are ignoring the fact that a lot of the Colombian population finds fault with the paramilitaries just as much as FARC for the violence."
True, but I don't see where that factors into Plan Colombia itself, given that law enforcement, counternarcotics operations and counterrorism ones are also directed at the paramilitaries and their businesses.
"I read in Desaparecidos that the paracos were responsible for far more deaths than FARC, though I have no way to verify this."
Probably, but not necessarily always...that's usually held to be the case and estimates exist, but statistics of violence in Colmobia are highly subjective and incomplete.
There are many reasons to explain this. Not all crimes and deaths, regardless of the source, are adequately reported, and much less fully investigated, both in the cases of official authorities and NGOs. Moreover, both parties gather their information with ideological and political bias (Human rights NGOs are usually less interested in deeply covering or researching guerrilla abuses than paramilitary ones than government sources, and vice versa).
The justice system in Colombia is slow, overloaded and full of red tape to begin with, regardless of who is behind this or that crime.
Due to these pitfalls, a sizable gap between statistics and reality continues to exist and that's why you shouldn't take any statistics as gospel.
To answer your question, the "common" figure says that the paramilitaries are to blame for about 70 to 75% of yearly deaths. But the real origin of that figure is unclear, as implied above, though it's quoted by the State Department, HRW, CIP and other NGOs on their websites...yet there's no explanation of what methodology was used, from what samples, and when, in order to reach it (much less if it's actually calculated yearly or only "historically" extrapolated).
At the same time, reports with that figure usually assign the FARC and the ELN 20 to 25% of yearly deaths in Colombia's conflict. The Colombian state's responsibility usually varies between 5 to 10%.
That means that it is proportionally far less directly responsible than all the illegal armed groups, given its larger manpower (more than 400,000 vs. some 50,000 irregulars in total) and infrastructure base.
The FARC and ELN, on the other hand, are almost always considered responsible, even by human rights NGOs, for the vast majority of kidnappings, damages to infrastructure and extortions.
The problem is not simply a matter of quantitative numbers, however, but also of qualitative elements. Much is made of the paramilitaries torturing people and even using chainsaws on occassions, but the FARC and ELN also torture people too, and have used illegal weapons or methods in terrorist acts that have been condemned internationally (bullets with acid tips, traps with fecal matter, gas cylinder bombs, landmines, machetes, etc.), in addition to recruiting children and other abuses.
Colombia really can't be read simply as a matter of "good versus evil", whether you interpret those terms in George Bush's perspective ("The Axis of Evil and terrorists which America must fight for liberty and freedom") or simply in the exact opposite view (ie: "The U.S. is evil and so are its allies so we must crusade against them").
Yes, Plan Colombia should be renewed. Let us ask a question now and see how you would answer it before coming up with your own answer here: What would Colombia look like in 2005 had we NOT developed Plan Colombia in the first place? It HAS made significant strides in Colombia's war against drugs and in other respects. Shouldn't Colombians have a say in the matter as well? As we can see from those Colombians who join us on this bloglist, many feel the need for continued support for the Plan. Drug eradication through the use of herbicides.. now let's talk about this. I just did a recent study on the effects of this herbicide on Colombia. This is one facet of the Plan that I disagree with ... apparently, the stuff they use now (glyphosphate) can do MINOR damage to the human being. Minor including skin rashes, etc. Did you know that this is the same stuff we use here in the U.S. as herbicide (like Roundup, which you can buy at ACE!)... so, is it really that harmful? I don't think so, at least for humans, but it does destroy the "good" crops surrounding the coca fields, such as corn crops. From what I read, and I am by no means an expert on the matter but have done a bit of research on it, Plan Colombia is planning on incorporating a milder herbicide to decrease the risks associated with its uses. Plan Colombia should be renewed, but perhaps should be altered a bit. There should be more focus on the local inhabitants who have to deal with the drug lords in their area. How can we get them involved in efforts for drug eradication if they are so threatened by the FARC? What is the next step? If we do NOT renew Plan Colombia, I fear a tremendous change for the worse would take place and we would once again be ignoring Latin America. An emphasis, however, should be that Colombia MUST try and solve this problem internally; we can provide them some financial assistance, but we must also focus on our own domestic drug problem here in the United States. One blogger mentioned that PC is just a way to get something back from Colombia: to get WHAT back?
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