Colombia's Paramilitary
Profile of an Entrenched Terror Network
by Adam Weiss
April 22, 2002
~snip~
In 1989, it was discovered that paramilitaries directly involved with drug cartels had received training from retired Israeli officers. A videotape, apparently recorded by Colombian cartel members, showed Israeli trainers “running military and assassination training exercises for about 50 men.” Two of the trainers were retired Lt. Colonel Yair Klein and Lt. Colonel Amatzia Shu’ali. Klein was the president of a private Israeli military advising company, called Spearhead, for which Shu’ali worked. Both men had been involved in other shady training operations; Klein was part of the Israeli effort to train the Nicaraguan Contras and Shu’ali had trained numerous Guatemalan military officers involved in brutal scorched earth campaigns against the civilian population. Regarding the Colombian paramilitaries, Klein claimed that his work was supported by the Colombian government and military, saying the training occurred in very close proximity to an army camp and involved the use of military equipment. The Israeli government claimed that military trainers like Klein were acting independently in their training of Colombian paramilitaries, saying that Spearhead had applied for permission to work in Colombia but was denied. The key issue was whether Spearhead was indeed “freelancing” or if it was a private front for military operations potentially embarassing to Israel. This issue has not been fully resolved, but the fact that Klein, Shu’ali, and other involved in training paramilitaries were high-ranking individuals with close connections to the Israeli government casts doubt on Israel’s claim of non-involvement or ignorance of the situation. As an Israeli magazine, New Outlook, stated, “Israel’s powerful defense ministry and its confederated military industries operate an international network of well-connected former military officers as sales agents. These are people who have access, having cultivated key contacts among foreign armed forces. They and their companies work independently of, but in cooperation with, Israel’s military attaches.”
Further concern comes from the fact that the portion of Plan Colombia dedicated to aerial fumigation of coca crops is focused almost exclusively on FARC-controlled areas. As John Donnelly of the Boston Globe reported, “The US-financed attack stays clear of the areas controlled by paramilitary forces in central and northern Colombia,” where they have their greatest stronghold. Military aid to Colombia has been and continues to be given on the grounds of reducing the flow of cocaine to the US by large-scale fumigation of coca crops, on the supposed grounds that the FARC are “narco-guerrillas.” The irony of this is that paramilitaries are far more involved in actual drug trafficking than the FARC is. The FARC’s role in the drug trade rarely goes beyond taxing coca production, which should be kept in perspective since the FARC taxes most economic activity within their areas of control. Paramilitaries, on the other hand, “protect far more drug laboratories and internal transit routes,” according to freelance journalist Frank Smyth. Carlos Castano has admitted publicly that 70% of AUC funding comes from the drug trade. Two Colombian drug lords, Victor Carranza and Henry Loaiza, are both known to have strong paramilitary forces, are implicated in various massacres, and are thought to have military contacts currently or in the past. One is left with the possibility that either the US is not targeting the paramilitaries simply due to a lack of interest in them or there is actual support for paramilitary activity. While one possibility cannot be proven over the other, given the aiding of the Colombian military while it is known that they collaborate with paramilitaries, the CIA involvement in the establishment of intelligence networks, and the presence of US Special Warfare trainers, it is highly likely that there is some degree of support for paramilitary groups and tactics among certain sectors of the US government.
(snip/...)
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=1450
&w=395
Lt. Col. Yair Klein
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