Can Colombia Win Its Own War on Terror?

We've a lengthy history of interaction, both good and bad, with Colombia. At the turn of the twentieth century, the United States was taking a look at building, what can later be called, the Panama Canal. This narrow strip of land belonged to Colombia at the time and they didn't support it. Panama seceded from Colombia in 1903, with the help and assistance of the United States. Shortly thereafter, the United States signed a treaty with the brand new nation of Panama to construct and run the canal. This caused bad feelings that are still felt today.

 

Colombia is a classic country, dating back to early 1500s. They proclaimed independence from Spain in 1813, although it took many years to stand on the own. They've had a lengthy history of internal conflicts, both big and small, but none so defining as "La Violencia" (The Violence). The factors behind La Violencia (1948-1966) were the same as in many insurgencies. Political and economic turmoil, power held in the hands of several elites and class warfare provided all the fuel. Amazon Colombia the early years of the turmoil, there have been many demonstrations that led to the arrest of some 1,500 workers. This caused more protests in Bogotá that escalated into the government attempting to suppress it. This suppression generated the massacre of around 14,000 demonstrators (Sacquety, 2006).

 

Colombia has two political parties, Conservatives and Liberals. La Violencia escalated once the leader of the liberal party, Jorge Gaitan was assassinated, ostensibly by conservatives. This resulted in a huge number of rioting in the streets of Bogotá which spread to the surrounding countryside. The conservative party (currently in power) used government troops to try to quell the violence, forcing most to flee their homes to the countryside. A number of these adopted communist philosophy and became the beginnings of the current insurrection.

 

During the mid 1950s, a substantial change to the country's political structure came about. An agreement was created between both parties for power sharing in an attempt to quell violence. The control of the presidency would alternate every four years between the parties and the Colombian National Police (CNP), which have been principally responsible for working with the public disorder, was brought beneath the Ministry of Defense. This gave authority to the military, which had managed to remain out of a lot of the trouble, to become involved in the pacification. This power sharing agreement caused even more problems as those smaller parties (communist, reformist, etc) felt they had no voice in government resulting in a resurgence of violence (Sacquety, 2006).

 

The US began true help Colombia in the late 1940s once they helped establish the Organization of American States (OAS). With the outbreak of the Korean War, Colombia was the only other nation in the hemisphere to offer troops to the UN after North Koreas invaded the South. Colombia started initially to request aid from the United States in the form of training. Obviously, several root reasons for the insurgency, which had grown during the early years of La Violencia, had been addressed by the central government. There have been numerous insurgent movements that sprang from now period, to incorporate the 19th of April Movement, or M-19 (now a political party). Those principal ones that remain will be the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC, largest group), the Ejercito de Liberación Nacional (ELN, second largest group) and the Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia (AUC), or paramilitaries which sprang from the central governments inability to manage areas outside urban centers (i.e. - nearly all of Colombia.