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A View from the Ground of American Influence in Colombia
 

"This country will eventually fall into the hands of the unbridled mob, and will proceed to almost imperceptible petty tyrannies of all complexions and races"

Simon Bolivar, from a letter written a month before his death in 1830.

A few hours in Colombia is all it takes to reaffirm that Americans are definitely not popular with ordinary people here. They are seen as an unwanted interference by many, and few seem to regard their influence as being in any way positive.
 
This is perhaps hardly surprising at a time when US courts have instigated legal proceedings to extradite members of Colombia's most powerful guerilla group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). While the logic in this is clear to the Americans - that Farc drug trafficking is causing untold damage in USA - it is not so clear to many Colombians.People are struggling to understand how their government can allow Colombian nationals, however corrupt; to be tried in USA for crimes alleged to have been committed in Colombia.
 
Ironically, FARC and others claim to have been driven to this trade by the Americans - who have been destroying coffee plantations while trying to eradicate coca plants by crop spraying from planes. Many of the locals we have encountered were actively hostile towards the Americans while also maintaining an anti-drug stance. America's "War on Drugs" combined with the retaliation of the Farc and other guerilla groups has lead to a steady decline in Colombia's reputation abroad and subsequently the number of tourists visiting Colombia. Thus both the agricultural and tourism sectors of the economy have been seriously damaged in recent years.
   
The result is simple: the people suffer. Some of the peasants turned to other methods to try and scrimp a living - for example around San Augustin there are many magnificent giant stone statues dotting the landscape. These represent the mark of an ancient civilisation and no one knows how many more statues exist. Until a few years ago the tourist trade was thriving enough to employ many locals, but when we arrived we were the only tourists in town. Rather than sit about all day in empty restaurants, some people have resorted to roaming the hills - digging for more statues or artifacts to sell. This work is apparently done mainly on the basis of a hunch, and we spoke to people who had spent days at a time away from the village and returned empty handed, tired, hungry and bitter.
 
It is not hard to make the logical jump needed for a young man in such a predicament to find an outlet to vent his anger. To many we spoke to it is clear - the problems are caused by the interference of a nation who they feel has no right to interfere, USA. With the Colombian government backing the USA, the natural progression is for these men to join the fight against this, to join the FARC.
   
The FARC are now an influential group, formerly with the financial backing of Cuba and USSR. A few years back they were given an area of land the size of Switzerland by the government, a decision which the current administration regrets to the point of all out war to regain it. As such the guerillas are keener than ever to gather new recruits. It is not in dispute that they now raise funds through drugs and extortion - they now see this as necessary.
 
We got some insight into the scheme of things when we walked through the hills around San Augustin, only a little nervous. If we had been millionaires, CIA or working for the oil companies then our worries ought to have been much greater. We had been told we would meet guerrillas in this area, but were also told that they were unlikely to have any interest in two scruffy backpackers. The police told us where the guerrilla camps were and that they were armed with laptops which allowed them to scan a US citizen's passport and find out whether there could be anything to be gained from detaining them (Nobody I spoke to knew where the FARC obtained this database from). "You are not American's?" the Captain had asked us. "No problem," he laughed when we replied in the negative. The Oilmen working in parts of Colombia are seen as another sign of American exploitation, and the police told us not to travel in Jeeps for fear of being mistaken for them or indeed for members of the CIA - both groups are considered legitimate targets.
 
The police did not, however, tell us about the bridge that had been blown up on the road to San Augustin, and the diversion we would have to take as a result. We had heard this from other travelers and it meant we had an extra four hours on our journey time. It also meant that the police might not have cared to tell us the whole truth. That aside, our bus arrived safely and we were encouraged by the locals to walk for two days to a small town called Valencia, via a beautiful lake "Lago Magdelana".
 
As it transpired this walk was also incident free. Except for the rain that is. It turned out to be two of the most miserable days I have known and any sane guerrilla would have stayed at home drinking sugary cups of agua de panella, letting anyone stupid enough to walk in such weather go about it unharassed. We stayed overnight in the house of a local couple and they talked freely of the problems caused by the Americans - the crops that had been damaged and the need to move the coca plants to more remote places. They said the Americans had made life harder, that was all. Villagers in San Augustin had told us they had asked the guerillas for help when bandits were a problem and order had been restored to the hills through force. Other British travelers we met had been stopped by the FARC - the bus they were on searched and their passports examined. They were then told to enjoy their trip and left alone.
 
When we reached our destination, the small village of Valencia, the response was somewhat different. The people were very guarded on the subject, asking us what the guerillas has said to us, not if we had met them. They seemed scared of the FARC and no-one came out in support, as had been the case in other villages. We heard rumour that the FARC had begun recruiting by force - marching into a town a taking young men under threat of death. We saw no evidence of this, but the mood was inexplicably different, the people seemed scared and wary.
 
It appears from my experiences that the problem is a vicious circle - the Americans are trying to help themselves and the Colombians, but their actions are seen as mainly harming the people who have the least to lose, and when even this is taken from them they are angry and seek revenge. Since I have returned the President has changed and he has pledged to double the army and increase American aid. Many people are weary of the fights and the new incumbent, Alvaro Uribe, was elected on a mandate to end the violence - but still many more people are willing to fight on. It is thought the FARC has recently been receiving training from the IRA, and it has begun bombing civilian targets for the first time. As to whether this is a disastrous tactic is yet to be seen, but everyone in the country seems to be increasingly forced to take a side, and the result is a depressing squabble where no one wins, liable to continue for years. It is doubtful how much a change in American policy would achieve now, for it seems that the damage may have been done.
 
© Mike Bickett, November 2002
 
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