- Email: [email protected]
Interoception of respiratory resistance in asthmatic patients
International Journal of Drug Policy 14 (2003) 209 /212 www.elsevier.com/locate/drugpo
Response
Colombia: prohibition’s frontline Sir Keith Morris *,1 72, Farquhar Rd., London SE19 1LT, UK Received 6 January 2003; received in revised form 10 January 2003; accepted 14 January 2003
Colombia: prohibition’s frontline Colombia has been the testing ground for full-scale multilateral cooperation against the drugs trade since 1989. It has also seen, not coincidentally, the greatest US efforts, both bilateral and unilateral. US cooperation with the Colombian authorities against first marijuana and then cocaine had started 20 years before but in 1989 this was intensified and widened to include the EU and other countries. This formed part of an increasingly interventionist US policy, a policy that the US took great care to legitimize by committing the rest of the world through the UN system. The previous year the US had seen its constant diplomatic efforts crowned by the conclusion of the UN Vienna Convention of 1988 that obliged UN members to increase efforts against drug trafficking and for the first time committed them to tackle money laundering and the supply of precursor chemicals. The international cooperation that followed in Colombia was placed firmly under the UN Vienna Convention banner. Two other important developments in US policy helped to create the conditions for this heightened effort. First President Reagan’s National Security Decision Directive of April 1986 defined drug trafficking as a lethal threat to US security and opened the way for military involvement. This led to US military logistical support for operations Blast Furnace and Snowdrop in Bolivia over the next 3 years. Second the end of the Cold War in 1989 freed military resources for the war on drugs. The US National Defence Authorization Act of September 1989 made it a high priority for the military who until then had taken part only reluctantly. Indeed, both the military and the intelligence community now saw an urgent need to play a role in an area that they * Tel./fax: /44-208-670-3635. E-mail address: [email protected] (S.K. Morris). 1 British Ambassador to Colombia 1990 /1994. First Secretary, Bogota 1967 /1971.
had always regarded as something to be left to policemen and customs officers. What was required was a trigger to mobilise international efforts. It came in the most dramatic and tragic way imaginable with the assassination of Luis Carlos Ga´lan, the leading presidential candidate for 1990, by the Medellin Cartel, and President Virgilio Barco’s appeal for international support against this direct assault on the Colombian state. There was a heroic martyr, Gala´n, a villain from central casting in Pablo Escobar, the leader of the cartel, and a defiant and stoical defender of the established order in Barco. Gala´n was a charismatic leader of the progressive wing of the majority Liberal party who had campaigned strongly for constitutional reform to widen participation in the political process and to reduce corruption. He was also a firm supporter of extraditing drug traffickers to the US. He was the hot favourite to win the Liberal nomination and then the presidency in 1990. To many Colombians he seemed the best chance of radical reform since Jorge Elie´cer Gaitan had been assassinated in 1948. Galan’s death produced shock and despair. Sadly Pablo Escobar needs little introduction. He was a well-known public figure, even sitting briefly in the House of Representatives, before he went underground in 1984. His wealth, in 1989 ‘Forbes’ rated him seventh in the world, was far beyond what anyone in Colombia, a historically poor country, had ever dreamed of (Bowden, 2001: 20). His extravagant life style, luxurious haciendas, private zoos, planes and helicopters, not to mention his private army, was pure James Bond villain. His ruthlessness was legendary. When he declared war on the Colombian state by killing the likely next president, there could be no doubt that he would stop at nothing. If Gala´n was the archetypal Latin hero and Escobar villain, Virgilio Barco was a most unlikely Latin leader. A shy man of few words he was an engineer with a passion for public works. His inherited wealth made it easy for people to believe his reputation for honesty.
0955-3959/03/$ - see front matter # 2003 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/S0955-3959(03)00011-2
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S.K. Morris / International Journal of Drug Policy 14 (2003) 209 /212
An appeal from such a leader in such circumstances secured a strong response. The Europeans in 1989 had no serious cocaine problem but the possibility that a drug baron could overthrow an elected government was seen as a threat to all. Margaret Thatcher said, ‘Barco cannot fail’. An international coalition formed under US leadership and has continued in varying guises to this day. This is why when I arrived in Bogota´ as British Ambassador in September 1990 anti-narcotics cooperation was my top priority and remained so during my 4 years there. There was considerable optimism that strong international support for Colombia could both stop Escobar and reduce the drugs trade. Our message to the Colombians was that we would act on four fronts. We would provide assistance to their efforts to cut supply. At our end we would act to stem the flow of precursor chemicals, crack down on money laundering and reduce demand. I give my view of how all that turned out below, based on my experience in Colombia and observations during regular visits since. I think that the period can best be understood if divided into three phases. The efforts to tackle the drugs trade in Colombia took place, of course, in the context of Colombia’s longrunning civil conflict. The growth of the cocaine trade in the 1980s saw a revival of the pro-Soviet Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) through taxation of the trade. It seems highly probable that without this source of funding they and the much smaller pro-Cuban National Liberation Army (ELN) would have made peace in the early 1990s when their Soviet backing ended, as did other Colombian guerrilla groups and those in Central America. The increased FARC and ELN threat led to the growth of right-wing paramilitaries, later known as the United Self-Defence Forces of Colombia (AUC), often directly funded by the drug traffickers to defend their ranches from the guerrillas. Unsurprisingly informal collaboration between the AUC and the Army sometimes occurred. This heightened US concern that their support for Colombian anti-narcotics efforts could lead to accusations that they were taking part in Colombia’s civil conflict.
Phase one: 1989 /1994 Much anti-narcotics aid in training and equipment was provided, principally by the US, but also by various European countries, EU and non-EU, as well as Canada and Japan. There was no coordination until the formation of the Dublin group, a coalition of the willing, in 1991. But from the beginning US influence was predominant not only because of the size of their contribution but because Colombian policy reflected strongly the US point of view, although as we will see it did not always follow it.
Economic aid, largely in trade preferences to compensate Colombia and the other Andean countries, minus Venezuela, for their sacrifices in the drugs war, came from both EU and US. In fact the EU’s General System of Preferences (GSP) measures were approved in November 1990 well before the US’s Andean Trade Preference Act. Until Escobar’s death in December 1993 the main focus was on efforts to stop him overthrowing the Colombian state and then to destroy his organisation. After Gala´n’s assassination Escobar launched a yearlong campaign of mass terrorism on an unprecedented scale. Then when President Gaviria took office in August 1990 he halted his attacks temporarily, except for a dozen kidnappings of high profile figures and journalists to remind the nation of the threat. This was to allow Gaviria to find a solution to the extradition problem. Gaviria attempted to do so by resorting to American style plea-bargaining; those who gave themselves up and confessed would be spared extradition. Several leading traffickers took advantage of this offer. But Escobar did not surrender until the very day in June 1991 that a Constitutional Convention, elected to write a new constitution, voted to prohibit extradition of Colombians. Escobar’s surrender was a triumph for Gaviria but a setback to US policy. Gaviria’s success was short-lived. In July 1992 Escobar escaped when the authorities finally decided to move him from his luxurious prison where he had continued to run his business. He resorted again to mass terrorism but his organisation was gradually dismantled by a special task force, backed by strong US support, and by an illegal group of his enemies-right-wing paramilitaries, the Cali cartel, and families of colleagues he had murdered. Escobar’s death in December 1993 was a victory for Colombia and for international cooperation, especially with the US. But as the Americans were the first to point out the cocaine trade had not diminished. The Cali cartel had simply taken it over.
Phase two: 1994 /1998 The US had been privately critical but publicly supportive when extradition was prohibited and when Escobar escaped. EU members continued to back US policy. Things were very different in Phase Two. The change came with the allegations made immediately after his election in June 1994 that President Samper’s campaign had received $5m from the Cali cartel. Senior US officials told him that he would be judged on his anti-narcotics efforts. These were successful with the leaders of the Cali cartel all dead or in prison within a year. But then Samper’s campaign manager and treasurer tried to exonerate themselves by accusing him of knowing about the Cali money. The US seized the
S.K. Morris / International Journal of Drug Policy 14 (2003) 209 /212
opportunity to press Samper to restore extradition and to toughen anti-narcotics legislation. They imposed sanctions on Colombia under the anti-narcotics certification process in both 1996 and 1997, making clear their lack of confidence in Samper, despite the failure of attempts to impeach him. This hard line worked. Samper persuaded Congress to change the constitution and the penal code. But on the ground the situation got worse, partly as a result of other policy successes. The supply of coca base to Colombia was drastically reduced through aerial interdiction and targeting production in Peru and Bolivia. From 1995 the traffickers reacted by quickly quadrupling cultivation in Colombia. The victories against the Medellin and Cali cartels also had their downside. The cartels had controlled most of the trade. Their leaders were few in number and well known before they went underground. The business from 1995 was in the hands of dozens of groups headed by men often unknown and without form. They were a much harder target. US policy against Samper also had heavy costs. Public US criticism of their Commander-in-Chief demoralised the security forces. It encouraged the guerrillas who were simultaneously boosted by revenues from the huge expansion of coca growing. Their paramilitary opponents benefited similarly. US sanctions hit foreign and domestic investment. Samper increased public spending to secure congressional support for his own position and for the US-demanded legislation. The public deficit soared. As he left power in 1998 the economy was entering its first recession in 70 years. It is now only slowly recovering. There have been various cases where US drugs policy has been subordinated to other foreign policy considerations but on this occasion the reverse happened. In Colombia even Samper’s fiercest opponents were critical of US policy. The Europeans made their position clear by maintaining business as usual with Samper.
Phase three: 1998 to date Both the Clinton administration and Congress became alarmed by late 1997 that US policy had destabilised Colombia and had created the risk of a second communist state in the Americas. Colombia was given a conditional national security certification in 1998 and President Pastrana, who succeeded Samper that August, was welcomed with offers of greatly increased support. US policy, as in Phase One, now made some allowances for Colombian concerns. There was public approval of Pastrana’s peace process with the FARC despite grave reservations expressed unofficially. Plan Colombia, launched in 1999, provided an unprecedented $1bn in anti-narcotics aid and $300m in economic assistance
211
over 2 years. This level of support has continued. The EU also committed about $300m but did so outside Plan Colombia to disassociate itself from the military aspects of the Plan. The fact that the Plan had been drawn up by Washington and Bogota´ and then presented to the EU had not helped. On the ground anti-narcotics activities have increased but the flow of cocaine continues and the cultivation of coca has not declined despite increased spraying. The FARC and the AUC have continued to grow. Pastrana’s peace process with the FARC collapsed in early 2002. The US has listed FARC, ELN and AUC as terrorists and US-donated equipment can now for the first time be used against them. The US supports strongly President Uribe who took power last August and is determined to restore the state’s control of the territory.
Conclusion International cooperation against the drugs trade in Colombia under US leadership has now been intense for over 13 years. Many victories have been won. The Medellin and Cali cartels defeated. Thousands of traffickers killed or captured. Hundreds of laboratories destroyed. Hundreds of thousands of acres of coca and opium poppy sprayed. The cost has also been immense in tens of thousands of lives lost, billion of dollars spent, massive environmental damage. The civil conflict much worsened. And the drug business has not been curbed. Coca and opium poppy are still cultivated and cocaine and heroin still produced and shipped to consumers in the US and Europe in as great as quantities as before. I see no way that can change until the consumer countries can deliver on the commitments we made and which I listed in my introduction. That is to say aid Colombia in cutting supply but ourselves to stem the flow of precursor chemicals, crack down on money laundering and reduce demand. We have made no real progress on the last three in this period and personally I see no reason to believe that simply pouring in more resources can change that. Surely it is time to rethink the whole basis of our policy. The CND meeting in Vienna this April provides an ideal opportunity to address these issues. The Colombian case demonstrates that the UN drug control regime enshrined in the prohibition-based conventions, backed by the full weight of the United States, cannot be enforced even in a country so close geographically to the United States and so dependent on US investment and trade. In private many leading Colombians are adamant that without an end to prohibition there can be no solution to their country’s conflicts but add that it is impossible for them to argue this in public. If they did they would risk being denounced in Washington as
212
S.K. Morris / International Journal of Drug Policy 14 (2003) 209 /212
friends of the traffickers. In such an overheated atmosphere progress cannot be made. A fresh and cool look at this immensely complex problem is needed.
References Bowden, M. (2001). Killing Pablo . London: Atlantic.
Response
Colombia: prohibition’s frontline Sir Keith Morris *,1 72, Farquhar Rd., London SE19 1LT, UK Received 6 January 2003; received in revised form 10 January 2003; accepted 14 January 2003
Colombia: prohibition’s frontline Colombia has been the testing ground for full-scale multilateral cooperation against the drugs trade since 1989. It has also seen, not coincidentally, the greatest US efforts, both bilateral and unilateral. US cooperation with the Colombian authorities against first marijuana and then cocaine had started 20 years before but in 1989 this was intensified and widened to include the EU and other countries. This formed part of an increasingly interventionist US policy, a policy that the US took great care to legitimize by committing the rest of the world through the UN system. The previous year the US had seen its constant diplomatic efforts crowned by the conclusion of the UN Vienna Convention of 1988 that obliged UN members to increase efforts against drug trafficking and for the first time committed them to tackle money laundering and the supply of precursor chemicals. The international cooperation that followed in Colombia was placed firmly under the UN Vienna Convention banner. Two other important developments in US policy helped to create the conditions for this heightened effort. First President Reagan’s National Security Decision Directive of April 1986 defined drug trafficking as a lethal threat to US security and opened the way for military involvement. This led to US military logistical support for operations Blast Furnace and Snowdrop in Bolivia over the next 3 years. Second the end of the Cold War in 1989 freed military resources for the war on drugs. The US National Defence Authorization Act of September 1989 made it a high priority for the military who until then had taken part only reluctantly. Indeed, both the military and the intelligence community now saw an urgent need to play a role in an area that they * Tel./fax: /44-208-670-3635. E-mail address: [email protected] (S.K. Morris). 1 British Ambassador to Colombia 1990 /1994. First Secretary, Bogota 1967 /1971.
had always regarded as something to be left to policemen and customs officers. What was required was a trigger to mobilise international efforts. It came in the most dramatic and tragic way imaginable with the assassination of Luis Carlos Ga´lan, the leading presidential candidate for 1990, by the Medellin Cartel, and President Virgilio Barco’s appeal for international support against this direct assault on the Colombian state. There was a heroic martyr, Gala´n, a villain from central casting in Pablo Escobar, the leader of the cartel, and a defiant and stoical defender of the established order in Barco. Gala´n was a charismatic leader of the progressive wing of the majority Liberal party who had campaigned strongly for constitutional reform to widen participation in the political process and to reduce corruption. He was also a firm supporter of extraditing drug traffickers to the US. He was the hot favourite to win the Liberal nomination and then the presidency in 1990. To many Colombians he seemed the best chance of radical reform since Jorge Elie´cer Gaitan had been assassinated in 1948. Galan’s death produced shock and despair. Sadly Pablo Escobar needs little introduction. He was a well-known public figure, even sitting briefly in the House of Representatives, before he went underground in 1984. His wealth, in 1989 ‘Forbes’ rated him seventh in the world, was far beyond what anyone in Colombia, a historically poor country, had ever dreamed of (Bowden, 2001: 20). His extravagant life style, luxurious haciendas, private zoos, planes and helicopters, not to mention his private army, was pure James Bond villain. His ruthlessness was legendary. When he declared war on the Colombian state by killing the likely next president, there could be no doubt that he would stop at nothing. If Gala´n was the archetypal Latin hero and Escobar villain, Virgilio Barco was a most unlikely Latin leader. A shy man of few words he was an engineer with a passion for public works. His inherited wealth made it easy for people to believe his reputation for honesty.
0955-3959/03/$ - see front matter # 2003 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/S0955-3959(03)00011-2
210
S.K. Morris / International Journal of Drug Policy 14 (2003) 209 /212
An appeal from such a leader in such circumstances secured a strong response. The Europeans in 1989 had no serious cocaine problem but the possibility that a drug baron could overthrow an elected government was seen as a threat to all. Margaret Thatcher said, ‘Barco cannot fail’. An international coalition formed under US leadership and has continued in varying guises to this day. This is why when I arrived in Bogota´ as British Ambassador in September 1990 anti-narcotics cooperation was my top priority and remained so during my 4 years there. There was considerable optimism that strong international support for Colombia could both stop Escobar and reduce the drugs trade. Our message to the Colombians was that we would act on four fronts. We would provide assistance to their efforts to cut supply. At our end we would act to stem the flow of precursor chemicals, crack down on money laundering and reduce demand. I give my view of how all that turned out below, based on my experience in Colombia and observations during regular visits since. I think that the period can best be understood if divided into three phases. The efforts to tackle the drugs trade in Colombia took place, of course, in the context of Colombia’s longrunning civil conflict. The growth of the cocaine trade in the 1980s saw a revival of the pro-Soviet Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) through taxation of the trade. It seems highly probable that without this source of funding they and the much smaller pro-Cuban National Liberation Army (ELN) would have made peace in the early 1990s when their Soviet backing ended, as did other Colombian guerrilla groups and those in Central America. The increased FARC and ELN threat led to the growth of right-wing paramilitaries, later known as the United Self-Defence Forces of Colombia (AUC), often directly funded by the drug traffickers to defend their ranches from the guerrillas. Unsurprisingly informal collaboration between the AUC and the Army sometimes occurred. This heightened US concern that their support for Colombian anti-narcotics efforts could lead to accusations that they were taking part in Colombia’s civil conflict.
Phase one: 1989 /1994 Much anti-narcotics aid in training and equipment was provided, principally by the US, but also by various European countries, EU and non-EU, as well as Canada and Japan. There was no coordination until the formation of the Dublin group, a coalition of the willing, in 1991. But from the beginning US influence was predominant not only because of the size of their contribution but because Colombian policy reflected strongly the US point of view, although as we will see it did not always follow it.
Economic aid, largely in trade preferences to compensate Colombia and the other Andean countries, minus Venezuela, for their sacrifices in the drugs war, came from both EU and US. In fact the EU’s General System of Preferences (GSP) measures were approved in November 1990 well before the US’s Andean Trade Preference Act. Until Escobar’s death in December 1993 the main focus was on efforts to stop him overthrowing the Colombian state and then to destroy his organisation. After Gala´n’s assassination Escobar launched a yearlong campaign of mass terrorism on an unprecedented scale. Then when President Gaviria took office in August 1990 he halted his attacks temporarily, except for a dozen kidnappings of high profile figures and journalists to remind the nation of the threat. This was to allow Gaviria to find a solution to the extradition problem. Gaviria attempted to do so by resorting to American style plea-bargaining; those who gave themselves up and confessed would be spared extradition. Several leading traffickers took advantage of this offer. But Escobar did not surrender until the very day in June 1991 that a Constitutional Convention, elected to write a new constitution, voted to prohibit extradition of Colombians. Escobar’s surrender was a triumph for Gaviria but a setback to US policy. Gaviria’s success was short-lived. In July 1992 Escobar escaped when the authorities finally decided to move him from his luxurious prison where he had continued to run his business. He resorted again to mass terrorism but his organisation was gradually dismantled by a special task force, backed by strong US support, and by an illegal group of his enemies-right-wing paramilitaries, the Cali cartel, and families of colleagues he had murdered. Escobar’s death in December 1993 was a victory for Colombia and for international cooperation, especially with the US. But as the Americans were the first to point out the cocaine trade had not diminished. The Cali cartel had simply taken it over.
Phase two: 1994 /1998 The US had been privately critical but publicly supportive when extradition was prohibited and when Escobar escaped. EU members continued to back US policy. Things were very different in Phase Two. The change came with the allegations made immediately after his election in June 1994 that President Samper’s campaign had received $5m from the Cali cartel. Senior US officials told him that he would be judged on his anti-narcotics efforts. These were successful with the leaders of the Cali cartel all dead or in prison within a year. But then Samper’s campaign manager and treasurer tried to exonerate themselves by accusing him of knowing about the Cali money. The US seized the
S.K. Morris / International Journal of Drug Policy 14 (2003) 209 /212
opportunity to press Samper to restore extradition and to toughen anti-narcotics legislation. They imposed sanctions on Colombia under the anti-narcotics certification process in both 1996 and 1997, making clear their lack of confidence in Samper, despite the failure of attempts to impeach him. This hard line worked. Samper persuaded Congress to change the constitution and the penal code. But on the ground the situation got worse, partly as a result of other policy successes. The supply of coca base to Colombia was drastically reduced through aerial interdiction and targeting production in Peru and Bolivia. From 1995 the traffickers reacted by quickly quadrupling cultivation in Colombia. The victories against the Medellin and Cali cartels also had their downside. The cartels had controlled most of the trade. Their leaders were few in number and well known before they went underground. The business from 1995 was in the hands of dozens of groups headed by men often unknown and without form. They were a much harder target. US policy against Samper also had heavy costs. Public US criticism of their Commander-in-Chief demoralised the security forces. It encouraged the guerrillas who were simultaneously boosted by revenues from the huge expansion of coca growing. Their paramilitary opponents benefited similarly. US sanctions hit foreign and domestic investment. Samper increased public spending to secure congressional support for his own position and for the US-demanded legislation. The public deficit soared. As he left power in 1998 the economy was entering its first recession in 70 years. It is now only slowly recovering. There have been various cases where US drugs policy has been subordinated to other foreign policy considerations but on this occasion the reverse happened. In Colombia even Samper’s fiercest opponents were critical of US policy. The Europeans made their position clear by maintaining business as usual with Samper.
Phase three: 1998 to date Both the Clinton administration and Congress became alarmed by late 1997 that US policy had destabilised Colombia and had created the risk of a second communist state in the Americas. Colombia was given a conditional national security certification in 1998 and President Pastrana, who succeeded Samper that August, was welcomed with offers of greatly increased support. US policy, as in Phase One, now made some allowances for Colombian concerns. There was public approval of Pastrana’s peace process with the FARC despite grave reservations expressed unofficially. Plan Colombia, launched in 1999, provided an unprecedented $1bn in anti-narcotics aid and $300m in economic assistance
211
over 2 years. This level of support has continued. The EU also committed about $300m but did so outside Plan Colombia to disassociate itself from the military aspects of the Plan. The fact that the Plan had been drawn up by Washington and Bogota´ and then presented to the EU had not helped. On the ground anti-narcotics activities have increased but the flow of cocaine continues and the cultivation of coca has not declined despite increased spraying. The FARC and the AUC have continued to grow. Pastrana’s peace process with the FARC collapsed in early 2002. The US has listed FARC, ELN and AUC as terrorists and US-donated equipment can now for the first time be used against them. The US supports strongly President Uribe who took power last August and is determined to restore the state’s control of the territory.
Conclusion International cooperation against the drugs trade in Colombia under US leadership has now been intense for over 13 years. Many victories have been won. The Medellin and Cali cartels defeated. Thousands of traffickers killed or captured. Hundreds of laboratories destroyed. Hundreds of thousands of acres of coca and opium poppy sprayed. The cost has also been immense in tens of thousands of lives lost, billion of dollars spent, massive environmental damage. The civil conflict much worsened. And the drug business has not been curbed. Coca and opium poppy are still cultivated and cocaine and heroin still produced and shipped to consumers in the US and Europe in as great as quantities as before. I see no way that can change until the consumer countries can deliver on the commitments we made and which I listed in my introduction. That is to say aid Colombia in cutting supply but ourselves to stem the flow of precursor chemicals, crack down on money laundering and reduce demand. We have made no real progress on the last three in this period and personally I see no reason to believe that simply pouring in more resources can change that. Surely it is time to rethink the whole basis of our policy. The CND meeting in Vienna this April provides an ideal opportunity to address these issues. The Colombian case demonstrates that the UN drug control regime enshrined in the prohibition-based conventions, backed by the full weight of the United States, cannot be enforced even in a country so close geographically to the United States and so dependent on US investment and trade. In private many leading Colombians are adamant that without an end to prohibition there can be no solution to their country’s conflicts but add that it is impossible for them to argue this in public. If they did they would risk being denounced in Washington as
212
S.K. Morris / International Journal of Drug Policy 14 (2003) 209 /212
friends of the traffickers. In such an overheated atmosphere progress cannot be made. A fresh and cool look at this immensely complex problem is needed.
References Bowden, M. (2001). Killing Pablo . London: Atlantic.