Kenneth H. Bacon, assistant secretary of defense for public affairs, press briefing, January 11, 2000

Kenneth H. Bacon, assistant secretary of defense for public affairs, press briefing, January 11, 2000

DoD News Briefing

Tuesday, January 11, 2000 - 2:00 p.m. EST
Presenter: Mr. Kenneth H. Bacon, ASD PA

Yes, Pam?

QSubject change to Colombia?

MR. BACON: Sure.

QCould you talk about what the military will be doing as part of that -- the aid package that's going, how much of what and when is going down?

MR. BACON: Well, I think that Secretary Albright and Director McCaffrey are briefing on that right now. But let me tell you what I know about the package.

The increase is part of a large plan, called the Plan Colombia, that President Pastrana has devised to improve his ability to protect democracy, to defeat insurgents, to cut down on the flow of illegal drugs, and to improve the justice system in Colombia.

This plan is a $7.5 billion plan over three years. Of that, Colombia plans to put up $4 billion, and President Pastrana of Colombia has asked other countries, including the U.S. and Europe, to supply the rest -- $3.5 billion.

The American decision, made by President Clinton, is to increase our aid to Colombia by approximately $1.3 billion. Of that, the Pentagon -- that's over two years. The bulk of it will come in the current fiscal year, '00, and I think that's approximately $950 million. And the rest will come in '01, the next fiscal year. Of that, approximately $1.3 billion -- it's slightly less, it's $1.278 billion, I think -- of that, the Pentagon share is approximately 10 percent, a little more than 10 percent -- $144 million over two years.

That will generally be used for three things. One, to train and equip two more counterdrug battalions. As you know, right now we are working to train and equip a counterdrug battalion. This is a battalion that will work completely on interdicting narcotics flows and eradicating narcotics facilities. It is not involved in counterinsurgency; it deals exclusively with arresting flows of illegal narcotics. By order of Congress, the members of these counternarcotics or counterdrug battalions have to be vetted for human rights abuses to make sure that we're not bringing abusers into the military and training them. And so everybody who participates in these counterdrug battalions will be properly vetted.

So, the $144 million that will go to the Pentagon will, one, train and equip two more of these counterdrug battalions.

QHow many people is that?

MR. BACON: I don't know the size of a Colombian battalion.

QHow many U.S. soldiers are down there? And do you envision more heading down?

MR. BACON: I don't envision that -- the number of soldiers -- or the number of U.S. citizens working on military programs varies between approximately 150 and 200, you know -- I mean, over time. Many of them are contractors or civilians running radar facilities. And the number of trainers who are from the Seventh Special Forces Group, varies from time to time, but I don't know how many are there now. But there will be, obviously, probably a small increase in the number of trainers at specific times as we begin training more Colombian soldiers. But it's a very modest number of American soldiers or military people there at any one time.

Let me just run through the rest of the program.

One will be to help set up a forward-operating location, which is actually in Ecuador, on the border of Colombia, to help strengthen our ability to provide intelligence information, mainly radar information, to the Colombians so they can use that to interdict illegal narcotics shipments.

And then the third element of our program will be to improve some radar and interdiction facilities within Colombia. I don't anticipate that this will lead to a major increase in the number of Americans in Colombia, and it certainly will lead to absolutely no change in our mission, which is to train and support the counter-drug forces.

QDoes that mean we will put more radar sites in Colombia?

MR. BACON: The main -- there will be some enhancement of the radar operations in Colombia. I don't have the exact details on that.

QWell, of the three sites that are currently operating, we'll just have better stuff?

MR. BACON: I believe that's the case. I don't believe there's a new site, but I'll double check on that.

QWith a forward-operating base in Ecuador, is there a chance that there would be any flight ops or any operational operations launched from there into Colombian territory?

MR. BACON: Well, we don't do interdictions, as you know. We give information.

QBut you do survey and intelligence-gathering --

MR. BACON: We could do survey and intelligence-gathering out of Ecuador.

QSo it would be an air base?

MR. BACON: Yes.

Let's go -- yes.

And also, one part of improving their ability to interdict, there'll be some increased training for riverine operations. They've got plenty of equipment for that, but the more successful we are at preventing narcotics shipments through air, the more they're driven to the ground and the rivers, so we have to help them stop up all avenues of exit.

QDid you check about the Black Hawks? And then also the $144 million increase that brings the total amount of money that DOD spends --

MR. BACON: We're spending about $50 million, $53 million this year, I think, and this would be 144 (million dollars) over two years. Black Hawks are being paid for by the State Department; the bulk of this money will be spent by the State Department. I believe there are 30 Black Hawks and 15 Hueys. The Black Hawks are new, the Hueys are old, secondhand. And that will be paid for out of the State Department allocation.

Here.

QThe Black Hawks will be for the two additional battalions, or will there be additional helicopter --

MR. BACON: Well, the Colombians will use them as they see fit, whether they're used by these particular battalions or by others, I don't know. I assume that they be used in part for interdiction to try to stop the airplane traffic.

QWill they be used for counterinsurgency? Are there restrictions? Do we have restrictions on them saying we can't use them --

MR. BACON: Because the Black Hawks are being supervised by the State Department, I can't speak authoritatively about them beyond their numbers.

QI assume that since the Hueys are all going to come out of the surplus U.S. military stocks --

MR. BACON: Yes. I believe that --

QThe number of Hueys is 15 or 50?

MR. BACON: Fifteen.

Thirty Black Hawks, 15 Hueys, I believe, are the proper numbers for this.

QWhen you say are "training battalions only to do drug interdiction and narcotics operations," I am a little confused because the insurgents are now in the drug and narcotics business. You are indicating that these troops will not fight the insurgents, but how in the world can you avoid it? And how can you tell?

MR. BACON: This is the type of difficult distinction our military is trained to make. (Laughter.) You are absolutely right: We are not in the counterinsurgency business; we are in the counternarcotics business. And we do our best to separate the two.

As of March 13, 2000, this document is also available at http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Jan2000/t01112000_t0111asd.html