World Policy Journal: The Next Threat

World Policy Journal
Volume XVII, No 1, Spring 2000

The Next Threat
By James Chace

With the presidential electioneering in full sway, it seems that foreign policy is not only of secondary importance but enjoys a rough consensus. Neither the mainstream Republicans nor the Clinton-Gore Democrats will find much to dispute. Instead, what we are likely to witness are arguments on the margin, or pop quizzes to determine if the candidate is up to speed and therefore capable of carrying out the duties of the leader of the only remaining superpower. Among foreign policy elites there are sometimes sharp disagreements over whether the Age of America is to be a short-lived phenomenon or simply a prelude to a multipolar balance of power.

But these are not questions that can be answered in the near term, nor are they the stuff of television debates. More likely are pumped-up exchanges between candidates on whether we should get tough with China because of its human rights abuses, or pursue a policy of engagement in the hope that open markets and growing prosperity will produce democratic norms in the Middle Kingdom. But no mainstream presidential candidate seriously questions the need for engagement with China; the tactics, not the strategy, are in question. The same approach is true of relations with the European Union, where there are no grave quarrels; NATO expansion is no longer a subject of hot debate, even while there are likely to be differences of opinion as to how far this expansion should proceed: yes to Romania and Bulgaria; maybe to the Baltic States and Slovakia.

The Russian question is clearly of paramount importance, and how Washington handles its relations with Moscow will certainly affect the future of global relations. But here, too, there are no profound differences in the approaches of the two political parties: be cautious about pouring too much money into Russia until the Russian financial institutions are more transparent and corruption has been curbed; try not to isolate Russia but at the same time go ahead building an American limited ballistic missile defense system; explain to Russian leaders that the movement toward democracy is the best path to Western aid.

This is not to say that wise tactics are not vital. Should the tactics the next administration employ prove inept, the long-term consequences could be tragic. But writing in early March, I cannot see the likelihood that any of the candidates will challenge the overall Washington consensus that the European Union, China, and Russia are the other leading players on the world stage.

Nonetheless, in the near term I believe that U.S. foreign policy will be focused, like it or not, on the new arc of crisis in Latin America—Colombia, Venezuela, and Ecuador (with Mexico waiting in the wings). It is Latin America and the Caribbean that most directly affect Americans at home: immigration and drugs fuel the fears of the electorate. (Colombia now produces approximately 80 percent of the world's cocaine and 70 percent of the heroin consumed on the east coast of the United States. ₁ ) What we are seeing now in Colombia (as Linda Robinson reported in the fall issue of this journal) is an American involvement in fighting a guerrilla war under the guise of helping the Colombian army stamp out the drug dealers. As Undersecretary of State Thomas Pickering said in February, "If the guerrillas are taking part [in drug production], then they will be the targets of our fight."

In brief, what has happened over the years is that the long-standing leftist guerrilla movement, the Revolutionary Armed Forces (FARC) of Colombia, now fields a reported 15,000-strong army. Moreover, the guerrillas have displaced the old drug cartels and use the multi-billion-dollar cocaine trade to finance their insurgency. They already control most of the southern province of Putumayo, so the government troops now hope to retake this territory and clean out both the guerrillas and the drug business. To do that, the Colombian armed forces are to be joined by the first counternarcotics battalion trained by US special forces and supplied with Vietnam-era helicopters. To beef up the Colombian forces, the Clinton administration has announced a $1.6 billion emergency aid package to include the training and equipping of three more Colombian counternarcotics battalions, the provision of 63 helicopters, and the completion of a joint-services intelligence base set in the heart of guerrilla-held territory. Colombia is already the largest recipient of US security aid after Israel and Egypt.

Colombian president Andrés Pastrana, inaugurated in August 1998, initially hoped to negotiate an end to the war by granting the rebels' request for a Switzerland-size patch of territory in the south to be demilitarized as a venue for peace talks. But the FARC has yet to offer to make a final settlement, and the Colombian government is now engaged in a military solution. The likelihood that US military advisers will be drawn into the struggle is growing, which puts the United States, as in Vietnam, squarely into the counterinsurgency fight. If and when US troops are captured or killed, or a US aircraft is downed by guerrilla fire, an escalation of US involvement may well take place.

The turmoil in the Andean region has been exacerbated by the president of Venezuela, Hugo Chávez Mena, a populist ex-paratrooper who has simultaneously criticized Colombia for failing to secure its border area while making repeated sympathetic overtures to the FARC guerrillas. In the meantime, the Colombian guerrillas and drug traffickers have been using the neighboring territories of Venezuela, Ecuador, and Panama as safe havens. Corruption in Panama is endemic, while Ecuador's economy is on the ropes; its democratically elected president was overthrown in January by a military coup d'état, after which the military put the vice president in his place, a return to the classic Latin American solution to seemingly insoluble problems. Both Chávez and the FARC, according to Robinson, "espouse a Bolivarian ideology that is a vague stew of left-leaning, nationalist, authoritarian, justice-for-the-poor ideas."

What is to be done? And is there a role for the United States?

What is happening in the Andean region is suspiciously reminiscent of the Central American turmoil of the 1980s—with the Marxist Salvadoran guerrillas holding one-third of El Salvador, with Washington fighting a "covert war" against the Nicaraguan Sandinistas by arming the "contras," and with Honduras as a US "aircraft carrier" aiding and supplying the contra war. It was not until the Costa Rican president, Oscar Arias, managed to appeal to all the leaders in Central America to find a way to end the fighting, and to do so without US participation, that an overall settlement was achieved.

Something similar might prove feasible in the Andean region. A conference which included the leaders of Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, and Peru that could set out a broad agenda for combating the drug trade would open the way to further action on economic development. The United States should back such a policy, but, as in the Arias plan, not play a central role. Washington should abandon its policy of trying to eradicate the drug-producing plants by fumigation; this was tried, and failed, in Peru. It was not until the Peruvian government took action against the drug dealers and money launderers and abandoned fumigation that Peru was able to cut coca cultivation by half. This was done by encouraging crop substitution, improving rural infrastructure, and instituting a tough law enforcement program that included shooting down drug planes. By contrast, fumigation is the central thrust of Colombia's current counternarcotics policy, and the Clinton administration has backed this approach. The war should be aimed at shippers, not growers.

Peace talks between the Colombian government and the guerrillas are still likely to prove the best solution to both the drug problem and the risks of a continuing counterinsurgency war. This winter, members of the FARC have been meeting with a Colombian government delegation in Norway and Sweden under the aegis of the former Norwegian foreign minister, Jan Egelund, who was named the United Nations special envoy for Colombia by Secretary General Kofi Annan. This could turn out to be a promising path to peace, since the Scandinavians are not involved in the conflict in any way.

Representatives of the FARC also went on a European junket to establish the FARC's legitimacy as a counterweight to the government. Moreover, President Pastrana has long held the view that the guerrillas need to get out of the jungle where they have been for 40 years and see how the world really works. In an inteview with FARC leader Raúl Reyes last summer, Linda Robinson reported that he said that the FARC would be willing to govern with businessmen who accepted the need for reforms; he also declared that Soviet-style socialism is not possible in the modern world. In addition, the FARC proposed that one area under its control become a pilot project for coca substitution. Not surprisingly, the Colombian army is very much opposed to this, pointing out that this area would extend the FARC's free hand beyond the current demilitarized zone down to the border with Ecuador/Peru, allowing the guerrillas to consolidate even wider control of the southern territory.

In the meantime, the deeper the US military becomes involved in the region, the greater the danger of escalation of a war that neither side may be able to win. Thus, while the foreign policy issues in the US presidential campaign will almost surely focus on relations with China and Russia, the fire next time is likely to burn most brightly within the US sphere of influence, where Washington's power is supposed to be absolute.

Endnote

Note 1: Michael Shifter, "The United States and Colombia: Partners in Ambiguity," Current History, February 2000. Back.