A secret US intelligence program has helped Colombia's government kill at least two dozen leaders of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, the rebel insurgency also known as FARC, The Washington Post reported.
Founded in 1964 as a Marxist peasant movement seeking justice for
the poor, FARC operations are now funded in large part by drug
operations. However, given the group’s guerilla-style tactics,
particularly hiding out in the Andes Mountains and in dense
jungles, fighting the rebels has presented a problem for the
government. That is, until now.
FARC, as well as a smaller rebel group, the National Liberation
Army (ELN), has suffered heavy losses due in part to CIA covert
assistance, as well as help from the National Security Agency,
which provided "substantial eavesdropping help" to the Colombian
government.
Once the coordinates of the rebel leaders are determined, not
even the dark canopy of the jungle can protect them from their
pursuers, armed as they are with state-of-the-art weaponry.
The report published by The Washington Post on
Saturday describes a “$30,000 GPS guidance kit that
transforms a less-than-accurate 500-pound gravity bomb into a
highly accurate smart bomb...also called precision-guided
munitions or PGMs.”
The Post mentioned one such operation that had been previously
undisclosed: “In March 2008…the Colombian Air Force, with
tacit US approval, launched US-made smart bombs across the border
into Ecuador to kill a senior FARC leader, Raul Reyes.”
The covert US intelligence work, however, is not limited to
Colombia. Mexico, which is plagued with drug-related crimes, was
reported as having the highest level of US intelligence
assistance “anywhere outside Afghanistan.”
Central America and West Africa where also mentioned as locations
where cartels are on the run due to US-led pressure.
The previously undisclosed CIA program, funded “secretly and
separately” from the $9 billion US aid package to Colombia,
was put in force in the early 2000s by the Bush administration,
which feared Colombian drug trafficking into the US mainland. The
program has continued under Barack Obama, according to the
anonymous sources.
The CIA refused to comment on the Post report.
Colombian officials and FARC have attempted to hammer out a peace
deal since late 2012, but there has been no ceasefire between the
two sides. The tactics are placing a heavy toll on FARC, which
has been reduced to around 9,000 members, down from an estimated
18,000-strong force in 2007.
The United States has declared FARC a terrorist organization due
to its killing and drug trafficking.
By 2003, the US had 40 US agencies and some 4,500 people working
out of the US Embassy in Bogota, which at the time was the
largest US embassy in the world, the report noted.
The CIA is not permitted to participate directly in operations
against the FARC in Colombia.