The Washington Post 

U.S. Forces Training Troops in Colombia

By Dana Priest and Douglas Farah
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, May 25, 1998; Page A01


U.S. Special Forces troops have been conducting extensive training exercises 
with Colombian soldiers fighting drug traffickers and guerrillas under a 
program that avoids restrictions imposed on military aid by the Clinton 
administration in response to Colombia's abysmal human rights record and 
drug-related corruption.

The training, involving hundreds of U.S. troops each year, has allowed the 
U.S. military to play a much more direct and autonomous role in Colombia 
than officials have publicly acknowledged. Small teams of elite American 
troops have instructed Colombians in light infantry tactics and intelligence 
gathering for anti-drug operations, and have conducted eight-week 
counterterrorism courses, usually in remote jungle bases where guerrillas 
and drug traffickers are most active.

The program is authorized under a 1991 law that permits U.S. Special Forces, 
America's premier irregular fighters, to train on foreign soil if the training is 
designed primarily to benefit the U.S. troops. While not secret, the training is 
sensitive enough that few in Congress are aware of it and the exercises have 
been suspended this month as Colombia holds presidential elections.

The law authorizing the Special Forces exercises does not require U.S. troops 
to abide by a State Department policy in which military aid is restricted to 
Colombian units that have been cleared of any involvement in human rights 
abuses. Colombian troops trained by the Special Forces are not similarly 
vetted.

It was under the same program, known as JCET for Joint Combined Exchange 
Training, that U.S. troops conducted 41 training exercises with Indonesia in 
the past seven years even though many members of Congress believed they 
had curtailed military ties with that country because of human rights abuses. 
Defense Secretary William S. Cohen suspended the Indonesia program two 
weeks ago because of turmoil in the country.

"We consider JCET an important program because it allows us to train in 
different areas of the world and to learn how other militaries operate," 
Pentagon spokesman Kenneth H. Bacon said. "It also allows us to learn 
important skills," such as hostage-rescue training. "We did this under the 
terms of the law. It was totally legal and reported to Congress."

The training program has quietly proceeded in Colombia as a civil war there 
has intensified and Washington debates how to oppose drug trafficking from 
the world's top cocaine producer, where all centers of power ö the military, 
the government and the guerrillas ö have been tainted by the drug trade. 
While the United States is reluctant to get involved in counterinsurgency 
operations, the line between the narco-traffickers and the guerrillas has 
blurred.

Senior administration officials said an across-the-board assessment of 
Colombian policy is underway, involving the State Department, Defense 
Department and intelligence agencies, because of a consensus that Colombia, 
the hemisphere's second-oldest democracy, is facing an escalating threat to its 
stability.

In recent months, the two Marxist guerrilla movements have inflicted heavy 
losses on government troops and now control about 50 percent of the 
country. A recent Defense Intelligence Agency report estimated that the 
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) has 15,000 troops and the 
National Liberation Army (ELN) has 5,000 troops, a substantial increase from 
a year earlier.

U.S. Special Forces officers involved in the training program in Colombia say 
it plays an essential role in maintaining good relations with a longstanding 
U.S. ally. They also say U.S. troops learn to operate in jungle and mountain 
terrain not found in the United States and train for emergency evacuations of 
U.S. personnel and for fighting terrorism.

But the uneasy, broader U.S. relationship with Colombian authorities was 
highlighted this month when the United States revoked the visa of Gen. Ivan 
Ramirez, the inspector general of the armed forces, over his alleged ties to 
several army massacres of civilians. Two years ago the United States barred 
contacts with Gen. Hernando Camilo Zuniga, then commander of the armed 
forces, because of suspected ties to drug traffickers.

Under heavy U.S. pressure, President Ernesto Samper Tuesday disbanded the 
20th Intelligence Brigade because of evidence the unit was responsible for a 
series of murders of civilian politicians and human rights activists.

The Special Forces training program has survived the vicissitudes of U.S.-
Colombian relations, including President Clinton's "decertification" of the 
country for its poor anti-narcotics efforts in 1996 and 1997, which triggered a 
ban on military equipment transfers and all U.S. military training except by 
the Special Forces.

"During decertification," said one officer involved in the Colombia program, 
"Special Forces has been able to maintain the patience, perseverance and 
presence to maintain a very good relationship with the military."

The program is also exempt from a State Department policy that allows U.S. 
military aid to be given only to Colombian army units whose members have 
been vetted by the U.S. Embassy for possible human rights violators. The 
policy, agreed to by both nations in August, also limits those units to using 
U.S. military aid in a specifically defined area in the southern half of the 
country known as "the box."

Defense Department officials said the Special Forces program was exempted 
from these restrictions because of difficulty in finding troops with which to 
train. They pointed out that all training missions are approved by the U.S. 
ambassador to Colombia as well as the defense secretary.

"We're dealing with combat units, and you can't tell the host nation who 
they can have in a given unit," said a senior defense official.

Some members of Congress and human rights organizations expressed 
concern that the program is a way to circumvent restrictions on military 
assistance to Colombia.

Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) said that while it is illegal to train or equip 
foreign security forces who violate human rights, "from Colombia to 
Indonesia, our Special Forces have trained foreign troops without regard for 
who they are or whether they turn around and torture and shoot pro-
democracy students."

Gen. Manuel Jose Bonett, commander of Colombia's armed forces, declined 
to discuss the U.S. training but said he welcomes any and all help. "You have 
to understand we're fighting this war on behalf of the United States. We're 
fighting for you," he said. "Given the limitations our military has, instead of 
criticizing us, you should see us as heroes."

The flexibility of the JCET program ö as well as its low profile ö is illustrated by 
the conflicting ways that the military tracks training exercises authorized by 
Section 2011 of the U.S. Code, the law that applies to Special Forces training 
abroad.

According to Defense Department documents, U.S. troops were involved in 
10 training exercises in fiscal year 1996 involving 114 U.S. troops and 651
Colombian troops. But according to the Special Operations Command of the
Southern Command, there were 28 Special Forces deployments in 1996. The
Defense Department documents said only three JCET exercises took place in
fiscal 1997 involving 143 troops, while the Special Operations Command
lists 29 involving 319 U.S. troops authorized under Section 2011.

About 24 deployments involving 274 U.S. troops are planned for fiscal year
1998, according to the Special Operations Command. Most of the U.S. troops
come from the 7th Special Operations Group based at Fort Bragg, N.C., or
from the Navy SEALS.

In February, according to members of the 7th Group at the Army's Special
Forces Command, 20 U.S. Special Forces troops trained 56 Colombians at a
base 50 miles south of Bogota. They requested that the name of the base not
be disclosed because of concern about the safety of U.S. soldiers, whom the
guerrillas have said they would target.

On any given day there are about 200 U.S. military personnel in Colombia,
according to the U.S. Southern Command. Nearly 60 of them are stationed at
three radar sites around the country to help monitor suspected drug flights.

U.S. military aid to Colombia is expected to total about $37 million in
fiscal 1998. Most of the money is to be used for spare parts, communications 
equipment, ammunition and maintenance for helicopters and boats, U.S. 
officials said.