[Marxism] Re: A few words on "The Prospects for Peace in Colombia"

[Greg McDonald <sabocat59@xxxxxxx>]

> Garry Leech
> Editor
> Colombia Journal
> www.colombiajournal.org
>
>
> While Anthony is essentially correct in pointing out all the  
> reasons that peace will likely not be achieved following the 2010  
> elections, he is only re-iterating what I stated in the article  
> that an incredible array of factors would have to fall into place  
> and that it is a long shot. However remote the possibility though,  
> I do believe it is a little bit more conceivable than at any other  
> time in the past twenty years, as I stated in the article. It is  
> easy to be a naysayer when discussing the situation in Colombia, I  
> know, because I'm one most of the time. But every once in awhile I  
> think it is healthy to actually try and find a reason to be a  
> little bit optimistic, which was the point of this article.
>
> I think many of Anthony's comments are actually implicitly  
> addressed in the article, but I will discuss some of them here.  
> With regard to Uribe orchestrating another amendment to the  
> constitution to allow him to run again, I feel that it is highly  
> unlikely now that the para-politics scandal has occurred. Any such  
> attempt would likely fail because increasing numbers of his  
> supporters in Congress are being discredited by the scandal. As for  
> the ideological component of the paramilitaries, I do not disagree  
> that it still exists, as I stated in the article, I only argue that  
> it has diminished. How else do you explain the decrease in the  
> number of killings perpetrated by the paramilitaries over the past  
> three years?
>
> Once the current AUC leaders have received their sentences under  
> the Justice and Peace Law before Uribe's term ends then they will  
> not be as concerned with who wins at the polls. They and the new  
> paramilitary networks will not need to wage such an extensive dirty  
> war against those struggling for social justice unless that  
> struggle begins to interfere with their criminal activities (ie.  
> drug trafficking). As I pointed out in the article, most of the new  
> paramilitary groups will function like the armed gangs in Central  
> America, or like the drug trafficking groups in Mexico. In neither  
> of these cases do the groups require the existence of a civil  
> conflict in order to go about their criminal and violent business.  
> Nor do these groups need a high-intensity dirty war against the  
> political left to engage in their criminal activities, only a low- 
> level dirty war against those fighting organized crime, corruption  
> and drug trafficking.
>
> The reason I did not address drug trafficking is because that issue  
> does not necessarily have to be resolved in order to end the civil  
> conflict. If the FARC are still mostly ideologically motivated and  
> all the pieces miraculously fall into place to achieve peace, then  
> they should have no problem extracting themselves from the drug  
> trade. If not, they will have proved their critics correct in  
> categorizing them simply as a criminal organization. The new, more  
> criminally-motivated paramilitary groups and drug cartels do not  
> need the existence of a civil conflict to continue their trade. In  
> fact, removing the FARC from the equation would probably benefit  
> them as they would gain an even greater piece of the pie. Again,  
> the drug trafficking groups in Mexico (and to a lesser degree the  
> gangs in Guatemala) show how effectively (albeit still violently)  
> these organizations can function without the presence of leftist  
> guerrillas and a civil conflict. Also, Chavez's project in  
> Venezuela illustrates how criminal groups can thrive under a center- 
> left government.
>
> And finally, unless a hostage exchange occurs before a peace  
> agreement, the hostage situation would most likely be addressed in  
> peace talks, which would only occur if all the other factors fell  
> into place. Again, as I made clear in the article, there is a very  
> small reason to be optimistic, more than at any other point in the  
> past twenty years. However, the article was never intended to say  
> that peace will occur following the 2010 election.

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