Inevitably, such a strategy has resulted in an increased U.S. military role in Columbia's 40 year-old civil war as the FARC are now being labelednarco-guerillas? by Washington and, consequently, have become targets in the drug war.? .
In the meantime, the Colombian Armed Forces have been mostly concentrating on fighting the civil war, not the drug war. Because of the latest civil focus of the Colombian military, the narco-traffickers and their paramilitary factions have fought along side the Colombian army in its war against the guerillas. So it has come as no surprise that the Colombian army has not engaged the drug traffickers and paramilitaries in any significant battles recently.
The link between the drug war and civil war in Colombia has caused the U.S many problems trying to decide on an effective policy for dealing with Colombia. The U.S. has to tackle the dilemma of the Colombian cocaine connection and drug distribution in the U.S., while maintaining anat arms length? attitude towards Colombia's civil war. The perception of U.S involvement in Colombia's civil affairs is forbidden by law because of the Colombian military human rights record. Any hint that U.S. aid money given to Colombia would be used for anything other than to fight the drug war is met with cries ofThis is just Vietnam and El Salvador all over again?. Washington has been very careful to position the aid package to Colombia askeeping the drugs off of U.S. streets? .
Determining how Colombia is doing in solving its civil strife is difficult not only because of the drug link but so much depends on the authors of the sources of information and where their loyalties lie. Authors with Latin American roots and ties say that the U.S. is just making matters worse. Those authors contend that the Colombian government drug fighters see very little of U.S. drug war aid money because it really is going to fight the guerillas. , Bernardo Ruiz, associate editor of Report on the Americas, the magazine for the North American Congress on Latin Americas statesThe Clinton administration's exclusive focus on the guerilla groups shows that the war on drugs is as much about politics and ideology as it is about drugs.
