The Quiet War

If you were to ask the average American on the street in what countries are the US military currently involved in combat? Of course you would get the obvious answers of Iraq and Afghanistan but if you were to continue and ask where else? The subject would rub his chin and ponder with “Gee I don’t know?” You prompt him with I’ll give you a hint, we’ve sent them 5 billion dollars in military aid in the last five years, third highest of any country! In frustration he shakes his head and says, “I don’t know.” The correct answer would be Columbia, and why are we fighting in Columbia?

That’s where it gets oily; literally it depends not only on whom you ask but when you ask. If you had asked in 1964 when American involvement first began you would have been told, we are fighting communist expansion in Latin America. That these Columbian rebels would be happy as clams if it wasn’t for being stirred up by agents of Moscow and Castro. But it was a sleepy affair then and US interests allowed it to simmer and stirred it only by the occasional writing of checks. Then under the Reagan administration it morphed and escalated, now we were fighting for democracy against communist rebels fueled by drug money. Perhaps that’s where Reagan got the idea? After Congress cut off funding for the Reagan supported Contras in Nicaragua American streets suddenly became flooded with Columbian cocaine.

But that’s only one leg of the stool because it’s morphed yet again, now under George of the bungle we are fighting Narco Terrorism! But what happened to the communists? Did they all just evaporate or did they learn the error of their ways? No the communists are still there but you must keep abreast of these things. The communists are our pals now! So we can’t go around badmouthing them. But there are good communists and bad communists, now take China or Vietnam for instance they’re good communists they allow capitalists to operate sweat shops and factories in their countries now bad communists are like Castro don’t do business with the capitalists. And if you’re still not sure which is which go to any Wal-Mart if you can’t find that country’s name on any of the products assume they are bad communists.

The ties between the US and Columbia are long and not without strain, when Teddy Roosevelt said, “Walk softly but carry a big stick” he was at the time talking about Columbia. Two different US commissions agreed the best route for a panama canal was through Nicaragua. But other factions in Washington favored the route through Columbia (now Panama) but there were problems with both countries in ceding sovereignty to large land areas of their country. Well old TR sent a battleship down to the Columbian coast just as rebels seceded from Columbia and formed the nation of Panama. Roosevelt’s reaction to this was to immediately cable our Columbian ambassador with news of official US recognition of the Panamanian government. The Panamanian government’s first action in return was to cede the Canal Zone to the US just because they liked us. Relations with Columbia were somewhat cool to say the least for the next generation or so.

In 1930 the country was torn by civil war, highly polarized between the left and rightwing partisans country verses city, rural agricultural verses industrial. In 1934, President Alfonso Lopez Pumarejo put forth a plan for reform known as "Revolution on the March." In the decade between 1948 and 1957, 'La Violencia' erupted, leading to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Colombians. The 1957 plan that ended the violence laid out the provisions for power sharing between the warring Conservative and Liberal parties. The situation soon deteriorated with both sides resorting to terrorism and paramilitaries.

But now a new factor entered into the Columbian equation, oil black gold Texas tea was discovered in the Arauca region. In the 40’s and 50’s the Arauca region was first populated by refugees fleeing “La Violencia the settlers arrived to a region of natural beauty, where Colombia's vast eastern plains begins its sprawl from the Andes mountains toward the border with Venezuela. The region was completely neglected by the government and its residents were among the poorest in the country. Then in 1983 Occidental petroleum discovered oil in Arauca and by 1986 were in full production. The U’wa Indians a river people native to the region complained about Occidentals open pit wastewater disposal, which was the equivalent to dumping eighteen barrels of raw crude into the river daily.

But by now the money had started to flow and nothing makes a bad situation worse quicker than millions of petrodollars floating around. A major court battle ensued that has flowed in both directions the U’wa were granted protection but the oil companies were granted the right to drill up five hundred feet of the U’wa land. The court apparently missing the point of a river people having difficulty trying to survive on poisoned rivers.

Now we get into good guys bad guys name calling and labels, The Columbian government a strong supporter of free trade with close ties with the American government and international oil companies consider themselves the good guys. Why they say, they plan to use those petro dollars to build a grand new Columbia and even though the petro dollars have revolutionized the economy the standard of living has risen only slightly. But be patient it has only been twenty years but trust us it’s coming.

The two major rebel groups the ELN or National Liberation Army and FARC or The Revolutionary Forces of Columbia have between thirteen and twenty five thousand members depending on when you ask. If you ask when Congress is not is session you’ll get a low number but ask when there is an appropriations hearing coming up or you’ll get the higher number. Both groups claim a Marxist ideology with the ELN claiming the stricter party line. But it’s still the same Columbian battle of the left verses the right the haves verses the have-nots. The ELN claim that the multi nationals are looting the nations natural resources. The ELN is based in the Arauca and oil money began to reach them by virtue of local sympathetic politicians. Strange isn’t it? The national government calls them terrorists and claims that they have no local support yet oil money flows to them. Well then FARC by far the larger of the two rebel groups though not nearly as providentially located decides they want oil money too. In 1999 the royalty war had begun and in 2001, the FARC began to unleash a bombing campaign against the oil pipeline that brought a halt to production--and thus to the revenues that the ELN depended on to finance its army.

2001 hmm, what else happened in 2001? That’s right a change of administration in the US and what did they call they royalty war? Narco Terrorism! You see FARC taxed the farmers in there area as well as coca farmers for their funding, but now gone were any references to communism or exploitation or right wing paramilitaries. No these were Narco Terrorists plain and simple and as part of our war on sanity I mean terror the US must dispatch troops down there to defend those poor Columbians from those terrorists!

Step one. Use US troops to guard the oil pipeline. Step two. Train Columbian troops to guard the oil pipeline. Step three. Get Congress to increase military aid to Columbia so that they can have more equipment to defend the oil pipeline. But the public must be made aware of these dangerous terrorists so close to our borders. If you do a google search on Columbia or Farc or ELM and the source is the American media you will see depraved stories of hostage taking and massacres and other moral outrages. Take for example this headline from the Council on Foreign Relations website, “What sorts of terrorist attacks have FARC and ELN committed?” While right underneath is a story by the BBC, “News Online examines Colombia's largest guerrilla group, the FARC, which has been engaged in a civil war for more than 35 years.”

When the government takes hostages it is an arrest when FARC takes hostages they are terrorists. When FARC bombs the pipeline it is a terrorist attack when rightwing paramilitaries massacre farmers in FARC territory it is a counter insurgency operation.
These are your tax dollars at work, rather than try the approach of reaching all sides with an equitable solution we the American tax payer get involved in a civil war and make it yet an another oil war. We aid whichever side we think can supply us the oil and gas the cheapest and damn the consequences. I wonder why they don’t like us I guess they just hate our freedom. I got an idea, lets ask them?

I know this against the administrations policies that we only talk to those who totally agree with us but just for giggles lets give it a try. Hey fella’s? Tell me the truth, just what do you think about the good old US of A? “The American Central Intelligence Agency - the CIA - was created to commit selective crimes against Communists and progressive and democratic expressions in the world. It structured an efficient information network within each nation’s governmental forces, and is supported by the media, military and police forces, the Church, political parties, economic unions, intellectuals, journalists, and social organizations. And it infiltrates leftist organizations.
The CIA is in charge of imparting instructions to the military personnel of countries that are dependent on the Capitalist system through the School of the Americas. There they, lacking any scruples whatsoever, train officials in brutal methods of killing, torture, disappearings, and dissuasive psychological operations.

To make its policy of annihilation of the left from the social scene effective, and to intimidate potential supporters of change, in the 60s and 70s the U.S. Pentagon set up cruel dictatorships in Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Paraguay, Nicaragua, Haiti, Bolivia, and El Salvador, among others. What remained were thousands of dead, tortured, disappeared, exiled, and displaced, victimized by those sheltered in military terror and impunity.
The dictatorships of these countries were able to faithfully carry out their mission of religiously following the instructions and plans for crimes against their political opposition, to guarantee the defense of the interests of Capitalism represented by the United States.
The various administrations of the liberal and conservative parties have led Colombia under the Doctrine of National Security, with the pretense of blocking the rise of political forces opposed to the current system.

Since then the Colombian oligarchy made the mercenary activities of the paramilitaries official. It appropriated, via crime and threats against small landowners, the most fertile land closest to production centers, and began the macabre plan of liquidating the unarmed opposition.
The Liberal administrations continued the policy of extermination of the unarmed opposition. Colombia then began to occupy its shameful place in world statistics for Human Rights violations. In the 90s thirty thousand Colombians died every year from causes related to the social and armed conflict. 95% of these deaths remain absolutely unpunished.

The Theory of National Security is still in force. The unarmed civilian population today suffers from increased massacres, displacements, disappearings, destruction, and death at the hands of the paramilitary State policy. Members of the Army and the Police participate in this openly, financed with monies from narco-trafficking and the support of ranchers, businessmen, and landowners.”

No, really we can take it; tell us what you really think? Ok, so you don’t like us very much maybe that’s why we’ve aliened ourselves with the government of Mr.Uribe Velez
Born on the fourth of July in 1952 Alvaro Uribe Velez Jr. is now President of Columbia, he is the son of Alvaro Uribe Senior was arrested and convicted of drug trafficking in 1982 when Alvaro junior was thirty years old. Juniors illustrious career in public service begins when he was the manager of the Columbian Civil Aeronautics board a post from which he was removed from during a scandal when he issued pilots licenses to members of the Medellin drug cartel. You know I bet George and him would get along great they have so much in common, George used to make large quantities of cocaine disappear in the eighties too! You know, maybe have a few laughs maybe compare family crime records twin sons of different mothers!

Then our hero in 1983 sharpened his public service skills by, A. becoming a tough crime busting district attorney or B. Becoming the mayor of Medellin? And our final Jeopardy answer is, “Who was the Mayor of Medellin when Pablo Escobar was at his peek of cocaine smuggling?” but once again he was removed from office for being too good a mayor to Medellin’s number one citizen Pablo Escobar. Then he became a Senator and championed a law curtailing social security benefits to the poor. You know if I didn’t know better I’d swear his last name was Bush. He’s worked to pass laws making it illegal to strike or even to protest, you got twenty thousand people in the jungles with machine guns and RPG’s but your worried about that guy with the picket sign?

Here is a country that exports 242 thousand barrels of oil per day they have gold mines they are the premier coffee exporter in the world they have huge reserves of natural gas not to mention cocaine yet their personal income is a third of Mexico’s and one of the lowest in Latin America maybe if they didn’t owe two billion dollars to the world bank it wouldn’t be so hard for them. Is it any wonder that there are rebels in the jungles? Pablo’s pal the Ex mayor of Medillin is flush with billions US tax dollars fighting their drug war/oil war all at the behest of George of the bungle. I wonder how it will turn out? With friends like those who needs enemies?