Plan Colombia Cost: $2 Billion and Rising July 3, 2003
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The United States spent $2 billion on its Plan Colombia anti-drug campaign, but critics say that the campaign is doomed to failure and is propping up an abusive Colombian army, MSNBC reported July 2.Former President Bill Clinton first announced plan to increase drug-interdiction aid to Colombia by 10 times its previous level in 2000. Plan Colombia makes the South American nation the third-largest U.S. aid recipient, behind Israel and Egypt.
Plan Colombia supporters say that cultivation of both coca and opium have fallen dramatically over the past two years. The Colombian government claims that half of the nation's coca crop could be eradicated -- by aerial fumigation and other means -- by the end of 2003.
"What we set out to do is starting to pay off," said Luis Alberto Moreno, Colombia's ambassador to the United States. "We don't get credit for doing the right things."
Marshall Billingslea, the principal deputy assistant secretary of defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict, recently told Congress he was "extremely optimistic about potential results in Colombia."
But Rep James McGovern (D-Mass.) calls Colombia a "rathole" for U.S. antidrug money. Critics say efforts like Plan Colombia will never succeed in the face of huge demand for drugs in North America. Colombia still supplies 90 percent of the U.S. cocaine market and is the largest source of heroin for the U.S., as well.
A number of heavily armed rebel groups in the region have turned to drug smuggling to raise money, making military action against traffickers even more dangerous. What started out as an antidrug campaign has quickly turned into a battle against insurgent groups, involving U.S. troops.
Former U.S. drug czar Barry McCaffrey defends the plan. "If you don't like terrorism, crime, thousand of refugees heading to South Florida, don't like imperiling a major source of energy supply, it should be in the U.S. national interest [to help Colombia]," he said.
But McGovern said, "President Clinton was wrong and President Bush is wrong. [Production] is moving to north, east, west, and to Peru. We can play musical chairs, but the reason why it's hard to put an end to coca production in Colombia is because for a lot of farmers, there is no other alternative."
The U.S. plans to give Colombia another $700 million in 2004.
