Robert Villa
Monday, Aug. 20, 2001

In the past week, the involvement of urban terrorism experts from the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and various Cuban and Venezuelan military operatives specializing in artillery and anti-air operations has alarmed Colombia's military. Rumors of involvement of the Basque independence guerrilla group, ETA, have also surfaced but have yet to be confirmed.

Despite repeated concerns regarding the true commitment of both Cuba and Venezuela to the peace process, the current president of Colombia, Andres Pastrana, has been die-hard on involving both groups in negotiations, due to their ideological closeness to the guerrillas.

The President’s Peace Commission even planned for the eventual participation of a contingent of Cuban soldiers that would be members of a U.N. verification team in northern Colombia. The team would have been responsible for verifying the good conduct of the guerrillas in a distension zone controlled by the Ejercito de Liberacion Nacional (ELN).

Negotiations with the ELN failed last week, however, due to the government's failure to produce a timeline acceptable to the guerrillas.

A U.N. verification team was never created for the present distension zone already occupied by the Frente Armada Revolucionaria de Colombia (FARC). That zone, created in 1999, has since become the national headquarters for FARC training, kidnapping, coca growing and military operations.

Formerly, the United Nations and the European Union both had given their support to the creation of the zone, putting aside concerns about illicit activities, but in the past month and a half, a U.N. vehicle has been stopped by the FARC and a member of a U.N. team kidnapped, three Germans have been kidnapped and held in the zone, and many U.N. and E.U. diplomatic missions are making plans to leave. Denmark has already closed up shop.

The appearance of foreign insurgents in Colombia is nothing new. Since the 1948 creation of the Organization of American States, which occurred in Bogota, foreigners have been attempting to overthrow the Colombian government, long a strong ally of the United States. On April 9, 1948, a popular Liberal Party leader was assassinated just as the OAS's first meeting to organize was being convened. The result was massive rioting that shook Bogota for several days, leaving nearly 5,000 dead.

The leaders of the FARC, which traces its origins back to this time, have always lamented that they did not take advantage of the opportunity presented by the rioting, known as the Bogotazo. A young Fidel Castro took part in the rioting. At the time he was supposedly affiliated with a group of Peronistas who were participating in a youth conference.

No one knows for sure who pulled the trigger in the assassination, but speculation has long centered around Soviet involvement because the U.S.S.R. feared that the OAS would create an unshakeable sphere of U.S. influence in the Americas.

Cubans have been involved in Colombia since the 1960s, when a group of leftist students, professors and priests took to the mountains, following the foco theory of Fidel Castro, Ernesto "Che" Guevara and the other proponents of the Cuban revolution. The foco theory insisted that a Communist revolution could be inspired by taking to the mountains, instructing the natives on the importance of overthrowing the regime, and then coming down from the mountains to take the cities.

The ELN dates from this epoch, and while the great majority of the young idealists who founded the ELN were killed in Colombia as they were in other Latin American countries where the foco theory was attempted, Cuban aid long sustained the organization.

Based in northern Colombia, Cuba has lately been involved in the peace process, which had continued unabated until last week in Caracas, Venezuela, under the watchful supervision of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez. Those talks were broken off last week, however, and in the past few days the ELN has launched a series of attacks crossing through Venezuelan territory to attack Colombian border posts.

General Fernando Tapias, commander of Colombia's armed forces, stated that "the objective of the FARC is to strengthen its war against the cities, and they know that they need to learn new strategies and technology." Their "urban offensive," declared last month, was inaugurated with an attack on several of the government's maximum security prisons. The FARC stated that if the government refused a prisoner exchange as part of the peace negotiations, the guerrillas would simply seize the prisons.

There is little question that the FARC has the funds available to pay for international aid in training its soldiers. The Colombian attorney general's office placed the guerrillas' income for the year 2000 at between $500 and $700 million. One military official stated that "they have the money and drugs sufficient to pay for the most sophisticated weapons, training and the highest technology in the world for communications and terrorism."

Three IRA explosives experts were detected leaving from three distinct points in Europe by European intelligence, and were followed closely by Colombian officials until they attempted to leave the country, whereupon they were apprehended. The Colombian police have reviewed their records and found that the same three IRA operatives have repeatedly entered the country since 1991.

The incident has sparked unrest in the United Kingdom as well as in Colombia, due to concerns that the IRA is taking payments in arms or drugs. The IRA has resisted the last few British proposals for disarmament.

Colombia's police in charge of immigration have now raised earlier estimates of at least 20 Cuban military experts to close to 30. This development is also disturbing, due to the supposed commitment of Cuba to the Colombian peace process. Working together with these Cubans are "at least 10" Venezuelan ex-military personnel.

Artillery experts from the two countries are probably training the guerrillas in the creation of new rocket attack methods. For the last 20 years, the FARC and ELN have both used a homemade gas canister rocket that, due to its inaccuracy, has wreaked more havoc on civilians than on military bases.

Anti-aircraft missile experts from Cuba and Venezuela are probably working on the seven anti-aircraft missile bases that have been detected under construction in the distension zone. Armaments tracking detected the arrival of Stinger and Redeye anti-aircraft missiles from Syria several years ago. More shipments of anti-aircraft missiles and launchers have probably been made by the Russian mafia, closely linked to the FARC because of its unique ability to pay in highly lucrative cocaine, which Russia distributes throughout Europe.

A partially completed submarine was discovered last year in central Colombia. The small but highly sophisticated sub was designed to transport drug shipments. The engineering plans were in Russian.

The final destination of the IRA terrorists is still uncertain. Within five days the Colombian attorney general's office should determine whether they will be tried in Colombia or deported. The Bush administration has still made no comment on the case, other than to say that it supports the Pastrana administration's continuing efforts for peace and that it will be watching how the case progresses.

Cuba, for its part, is denying the presence of Cuban troops. Cuban chancellor Aymee Hernandez said in Havana, "It’s a great fallacy, the whole world knows that there are no Cubans there [in Colombia]."

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