NCJ Number
127864
Journal
Hemisphere Volume: 3 Issue: 1 Dated: (Fall 1990) Pages: 4-5
Date Published
1990
Length
2 pages
Annotation
Following the signing of the Cartegena agreement in February 1990, the Bush administration and the Andean governments of Bolivia, Colombia and Peru claimed a significant victory in the "war on drugs."
Abstract
The Bush administration, claiming that drugs constituted the major security threat to the US, unveiled its Andean strategy of $2.2 billion economic aid for the three countries, contingent on their acceptance of military aid. The US pressured them to accept this as a step toward using their own armed forces whom, with US-provided logistics, training and equipment, would undertake coordinated attacks against cartel targets with US special forces on stand-by. Since the Cartegena summit, domestic conditions in the US and the Andean countries have threatened to unravel the Bush initiative. The deployment of US troops in the Persian Gulf may force redistribution of funds promised to the Andean campaign. The Pentagon, apart from General Maxwell Thurman, commander of the Southern Command, has few enthusiasts for the Andean strategy. Among those in Congress, even those who take a hard line against drugs oppose the strategy. Andean opposition to the strategy is based on the view that the US has done too little to support non-military options discussed in Cartegena. Escalating violence upon the launching of government offensives against drug lords has also caused attitudes to shift, as has the drug trial of Washington, DC Mayor Marion Barry who had once advocated the strategy.