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Abstract
In light of the cost and complexity of Plan Colombia, this essay makes two central arguments. First, despite receiving $6.1 billion in assistance from Washington from 2000–2008, Plan Colombia has not been a particularly cost-effective framework for the United States. And second, because drug interdiction and crop eradication programs—the centerpiece of US funding—have not achieved all the desired results based on cocaine production trends, there is a need to rethink current funding priorities. If the history of bilateral cooperation in the war on drugs is any guide, the emphasis on “hard-side” elements (e.g., drug control) in dealing with the cocaine phenomenon will endure. This has important policy implications. Although the United States and Colombia agree on the desired ends for Plan Colombia, Washington's pursuit of certain objectives at the expense of others, or the improper synchronization of policy instruments, may actually hinder the sustainment of hard-fought achievements.
The views expressed in this essay are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the Defense Intelligence Agency, the Department of Defense, or the US Government.
Special thanks to the following people for their comments and guidance: Leonard Weinberg, M. Inayat Ansari, Drucilla Cornell, Eric David, Andrew Murphy, and Ghaidaa Hetou.
Notes
1. See, for example, Joseph R. Nunez, Fighting the Hobbesian Trinity in Colombia: A New Strategy for Peace (Carlisle, PA: US Army War College, Strategic Studies Institute, April 2001). The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) is the oldest, largest, and best-equipped guerrilla organization, followed by the National Liberation Army (ELN), and the 19th of April Movement (M-19). The United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), which demobilized in 2005, was the umbrella organization for right-wing paramilitary groups. Since the demobilization of the AUC, other right-wing groups have emerged—these groups are often referred to as criminal bands in the literature.
2. In 1999, President Pastrana committed $4 billion in national funds for Plan Colombia, while the international community provided about $3.5 billion toward the initiative. Through the Andean Counterdrug Initiative (ACI; later renamed the Andean Counterdrug Program in FY 2008), the US Congress in 2000 appropriated $1.3 billion to support programs in Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, Peru, and Venezuela. Colombia initially received $862 million for Plan Colombia. ACI is managed by the US State Department's Bureau of Internal Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement, but the US Agency for International Development now controls funding for alternative development and rule-of-law programs. For detailed discussions on the funding issue, see Connie Veillelette, Andean Counterdrug Initiative and Related Funding Programs: FY2006 Assistance, Congressional Research Service Report for Congress, January 27, 2006, and Liana Sun Wyler, International Drug Control Policy, Congressional Research Service Report for Congress, June 23, 2008.
3. Angel Rabasa and Peter Chalk, Colombia Labyrinth: The Synergy of Drugs and Insurgency and Its Implications for Regional Stability (Arlington, VA: RAND Corporation, 2001), 61–62.
4. Government Accountability Office, Plan Colombia: Drug Reduction Goals Were Not Fully Met, but Security Has Improved; US Agencies Need More Detailed Plans for Reducing Assistance, October 2008, 15. According to the report, from 2000–2008, $4.9 billion of US funding was dedicated to the counterdrug component, while $1 billion was allocated to programs that promote social and economic justice, and $238 million to programs that promote the rule of law.
5. Alexandra Guaqueta, “Change and Continuity in US-Colombian Relations and the War Against Drugs,” Journal of Drug Issues 35, no. 1 (Winter 2005): 27–56, 28.
6. Richard M. Nixon, Public Papers of the President (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1972), 874–875.
7. Guaqueta, “Change and Continuity,” 29.
8. National Security Decision Directive No. 221, Narcotics and National Security, April 8, 1986, 1.
9. Guaqueta, “Change and Continuity,” 33.
10. Ibid., 34.
11. Ibid., 34–36.
12. Ibid., 46–47.
13. Ibid., 47.
14. Peter DeShazo, Tanya Primiani, and Phillip McLean, Back from the Brink: Evaluating Progress in Colombia, 1999–2007 (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies, November 2007), 3–4.
15. Judith A. Gentleman, The Regional Security Crisis in the Andes: Patterns of State Response (Carlisle, PA: US Army War College, Strategic Studies Institute, 2001), 3.
16. DeShazo, Primiani, and McLean, Back from the Brink, 10.
17. Office of National Drug Control Policy, Source Countries and Drug Transit Zones: Colombia, http://www.ondcp.gov/international/colombia.html (accessed March 2010).
18. US State Department, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, International Narcotics Control Strategy Report for 2009, http://www.state.gov/p/inl/rls/nrcrpt/2009/vol1/116520.htm (accessed April 2010).
19. Colleen W. Cook and Clare R. Seelke, Colombia: Issue for Congress, Congressional Research Service Report for Congress, September 12, 2008.
20. Rabasa and Chalk, Colombia Labyrinth, 91.
21. Ibid.
22. Gabriel Marcella, Plan Colombia: The Strategic and Operational Imperatives (Carlisle, PA: US Army War College, Strategic Studies Institute, 1991), 7–8.
23. Michael Bustamante and Sebastian Chaskel, “Colombia's Precarious Progress,” Current History: A Journal of Contemporary World Affairs 107, no. 706 (February 2008): 77–78. See also Wyler, International Drug Control Policy.
24. Terry L. Deibel, Foreign Affairs Strategy: Logic for American Statecraft (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 296–297.
25. Ibid., 301.
26. Ibid., 322.
27. Gentleman, Regional Security Crisis, 11.
28. Barry McCaffrey, The Crisis in Colombia: What are We Facing? Testimony before the House Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources (Committee of Government Reform), 106th Cong., nos. 106–151 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, February 15, 2000), 82–83.
29. Gabriel Marcella, The United States and Colombia: The Journey from Ambiguity to Strategic Clarity (Carlisle, PA: US Army War College, Strategic Studies Institute, 2003), 40.
30. Ibid., 40.
31. Sayaka Fukima, Cocaine Trafficking in Latin America (Surrey, UK: Ashgate Publishing Company, 2008), 215–216.
32. Marcella, United States and Colombia, 12–13.
33. Peter Deshazo, Johanna Mendelson, and Phillip McLean, Countering Threats to Security and Stability in a Failing State: Lesson from Colombia (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies, September 2009).
34. Fukima, Cocaine Trafficking in Latin America, 189.
35. US State Department, Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, International Narcotics Control Strategy Report for 2010, http://www.state.gov/p/inl/rls/nrcrpt/2010/vol1/137194.htm (accessed April 2010).
36. United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2010, United Nations Publication, Sales Number E.10.XI.13, http://www.unodc.org/documents/wdr/WDR_2010/World_Drug_Report_2010_lo-res.pdf (accessed May 2010).
37. Myles R. Frechette, Colombia and the United States—The Partnership: But What Is The Endgame? (Carlisle, PA: US Army War College, Strategic Studies Institute, February 2007), 20–21.
38. Vanda Felbab-Brown, Shooting Up (Washington, DC: Brookings Institute Press, 2010), 102.
39. Ibid., 103.
40. Ibid., 104.
41. Rabasa and Chalk, Colombia Labyrinth, 14.
42. Ibid.
43. Ibid., 15.
44. See also Wyler, International Drug Control Policy, 34. According to Wyler, remnants of the Cali cartel have largely retreated from the drug trafficking part of the business process; instead, they are now focusing on cocaine production. Mexican cartels now control about 90 percent of the lucrative trafficking routes into the United States.
45. Deibel, Foreign Affairs Strategy, 336.
46. In contrast to the nearly $5 billion provided for counterdrug programs since 2000, the United States has provided about $1.2 billion for nonmilitary assistance, focusing on economic and social development and the rule of law, which includes reforming the judicial system and strengthening government and civic institutions. With modest improvements in security across large portions of Colombia—due to the greater presence of military units in areas formerly controlled by the FARC, the demobilization of paramilitaries, and reductions in crime and violence—there is now a greater opportunity to focus on developmental and infrastructural challenges.
47. Cook and Seelke, Colombia: Issue for Congress, 21.
48. Deshazo, Mendelson, and McLean, Countering Threats, 33.
49. Government Accountability Office, Plan Colombia, 48–50.
50. Fukima, Cocaine Trafficking in Latin America, 199.
51. Luz Nagle, The Search for Accountability and Transparency in Plan Colombia: Reforming Judicial Institutions—Again (Carlisle, PA: US Army War College, Strategic Studies Institute, May 2001), 2–3.
52. Ted G. Carpenter, Bad Neighbor Policy: Washington's Futile War on Drugs in Latin America (Gordonsville, VA: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), 86.
53. Stephen Flynn, US Support of Plan Colombia: Rethinking the Ends and Means (Carlisle, PA: US Army War College, Strategic Studies Institute, May 2001), 1.
54. National Security Strategy (May 2010), 49, http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/rss_viewer/national_security_strategy.pdf (accessed June 2010).