Colombian Labyrinth: The Synergy of Drugs and Insurgency and Its Implications for Regional Stability
Drug trafficking and political disintegration in Colombia could con-frontthe United States, if present trends continue, with the most se-riousforeign and security policy crisis in the Western Hemispheresince the Central American wars of the 1980s. The first question iswhy Colombia matters. U.S. policy toward Colombia has beendriven to a large extent by counter-narcotics considerations, but thesituation in that South American country is a national security asmuch as a drug policy problem. Colombia is a strategically importantcountry. It is South America's fourth largest country in area and thesecond largest in population. It is the only South American countrywith coastlines on both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans and it is con-tiguousto the Caribbean basin, Central America, Venezuela and itsoil fields, and Panama and the Canal. Colombia also has some of thelargest untapped petroleum reserves in the Western Hemisphere.Colombia's trajectory will also influence the direction of broadertrends in the unstable Andean region and beyond.This study, conducted in Project AIR FORCE's Strategy and DoctrineProgram, examinesthe sources of instability in Colombia;the objectives, strategies, strengths, and weaknesses of the majorColombian actors-government, guerrillas, and paramilitaries-and the balance of forces among them; andthe impact of the U.S. assistance program.The study concludes with possible scenarios for Colombia and theimplications of these scenarios for the security and stability of neigh-boringstates and U.S. regional security interests.This research was sponsored by the Deputy Chief of Staff for Air andSpace Operations, U.S. Air Force (AF/XO), and the Director ofStrategic Planning, U.S. Air Force (AF/XPX). It is part of a largerstudy, entitled "New Challenges for the U.S. Air Force," that reviews"off-baseline" scenarios and threats-those receiving little attentionin the defense community-for the purpose of identifying weak linksin potential U.S. Air Force operations. Concurrent research is exam-iningpotential vulnerabilities and remedies in the deployment andemployment of aerospace forces.This report should be of value to the national security communityand interested members of the general public, especially those withan interest in Latin America and the future of hemispheric relations.Comments are welcome and should be sent to the authors or to theproject leader, David Shlapak. Research was completed in January2001.PROJECT AIR FORCEProject AIR FORCE, a division of RAND, is the United States AirForce's Federally Funded Research and Development Center(FFRDC) for studies and analyses. It provides the Air Force with in-dependentanalyses of policy alternatives affecting the development,employment, combat readiness, and support of current and futureaerospace forces. Research is performed in four programs: Aero-spaceForce Development; Manpower, Personnel, and Training;Resource Management; and Strategy and Doctrine.