Speech by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Alabama), June 20, 2000

Speech by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Alabama), June 20, 2000
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I am troubled by our efforts, which I support, to help the nation of Colombia.

I serve on the Narcotics Committee. I serve on the Armed Services Committee. Over quite a number of months, we have had testimony and hearings involving this issue. I have become quite concerned about the stability of the nation of Colombia. I believe it is a democracy, and it is one of the oldest in the Western Hemisphere. It is worthy of our support.

I believe Colombia is in a critical point in its history with over 50 percent of its territory--or at least over 40 or perhaps 50 percent of its territory--under the hands of insurgent forces. This great nation is in trouble.

I hope we can devise a way to effectively assist them in their efforts to preserve democracy and freedom, economic growth and prosperity, and safety and freedom for their people.

That is the intent of my amendment. It goes to an issue that I think is important.

This is the problem we are dealing with. The President, his State Department, and his representatives have testified and said repeatedly that our goal here is to reduce drugs in America and to save lives in America.

Our goal is to fight drug dealers in Colombia. Our goal is to help defoliate and destroy coca production in Colombia. The administration has steadfastly avoided and refused to say that this Nation, the United States of America, stands with the democratically-elected Government of Panama against two major Marxist organizations that seek to overthrow the Government of Colombia, and have actually occupied large portions of that nation.

It is baffling to me why this is so. I do not understand what it is. Maybe it is an effort to appease the hard left in this country. Maybe it is an effort to appease certain liberal Members of this Senate who just can't see giving money to fight a left-wing guerrilla group anywhere in the world. Indeed, I can't recall an instance in which this administration has ever given any money to support democratically-elected governments, or other kinds of governments, for that matter, against left-wing Marxist guerrillas.

These guerrilla groups have been involved in Colombia for many years. They have destabilized the country. They have undermined economic progress. They have provided cover and protection for drug dealers. They have in fact damaged Colombia substantially.

I believe it is time for us to encourage Colombia to stand up to these organizations, to retake this country, and to preserve democracy in the country. It is a serious matter, in my view.

Colombia has been an ally. We have encouraged them to enter into peace negotiations, and President Pastrana has tried his best to negotiate with these guerrilla groups. In fact, Colombia has given a piece of their territory, I am informed, the size of Senator Leahy's State of Vermont to the guerrillas as a cease-fire zone, a safe zone in which they can operate without fear, and that the duly constituted Government of Colombia would not enter there and do something about it while they attempt to establish peace. But this concession, this appeasement to the guerrilla groups, has not appeased them. It has not caused them to be less violent or aggressive. But in fact it appears it has encouraged them in some ways.

I believe Colombia is at the point where they can achieve stability. I believe they can drive home, through a combination of diplomacy and military efforts to these insurgent forces, that war is not going to pay off, that war is a dead-end street for everyone, that they are willing to accept divergent views in their democracy, that they are willing to hear from the underlying concerns of the guerrilla groups. In fact, President Pastrana has said that over and over again. But fundamentally they have to send a message that they are willing to pay the price, that they are going to produce an army capable of putting these guerrillas on the defensive, and that they will take back their territory and unify their country.

There are also right-wing para-military groups in the country, a right-wing militia, that is involved in terrorist-type acts and violations of human rights. They also need to be defeated and disbanded before Colombia can be unified. There can be no higher goal than that, from my perspective, for our country at this critical point in time.

What are our goals? Why won't the President discuss them plainly? Our goal in Colombia is to produce regional stability. The collapse of Colombia can undermine nearby nations, whether Bolivia or Peru or other countries that border it. It can have a tremendous adverse effect on their stability.

Instability in Columbia, should it occur, would knock down and damage one of our strongest trading partners. Colombia has 40 million people. Those people trade with the United States to a heavy degree. It would be a tragedy if they were to sink into chaos and could not maintain a viable economy. We have a self-interest in that, but we have a real human interest in trying to make sure we utilize our abilities, our resources, to help that nation to right itself and take back its territory.

As I had occasion to say to President Pastrana recently: I want to see that we help. I want to help you strengthen your country. But I would like you to think about a great American. I would like you to think about Abraham Lincoln, who was faced with division of his country. Nearly 50 percent of his country had fallen under the hands of the Southern States. He had to make a big, tough decision. That decision was whether he was going to accede to that, was he going to allow the United States to be divided. He decided no, and he rallied the American people.

In the course of it, as I told Senator Biden, at one point when we discussed it, he had the occasion to have my grandfather killed at Antietam, who fought for the South at that time. But that was a tough war. It was a tough decision. But in the long run, this country is better because we are unified today.

I do not believe we can achieve any lasting ability to reduce drugs being imported into this country from Colombia if Colombia cannot control its territory. How is it possible we can expect we will make any progress at all if Colombia cannot control nearly 50 percent of its territory? It boggles the mind.

I have been a Federal prosecutor for 15 years. Prosecuting drug cases was a big part of my work starting in the mid-1970s, through the 1980s and through the early 1990s. At one point, I chaired the committee in the Department of Justice on narcotics. I had briefings from everybody. During the time I was working on this issue, we believed and worked extraordinarily hard to achieve the end of drugs in America by stopping drug production in South America. Colombia, for well over 20 years, has been the primary source of cocaine for this country. They remain so. In fact, cocaine production in Colombia has exploded. It has more than doubled in the last 3 years. It is a dramatic increase. That is a concern of ours.

I believe we can, I believe Colombia can, make some progress in reducing that supply. My best judgment tells me that after years of experience and observation, this Nation is not going to solve its drug problem by getting other countries in South America to reduce their production. In fact, an ounce of cocaine sells in the United States for maybe $150. The cost of the coca leaf utilized to make that $150 product is about 30 cents. Farmers in South America are making a lot of money producing coca at 30 cents for those leaves. They could pay them $2, $3, $4, 10 times what they are paying now for coca leaf, and these farmers would yield to the temptation and produce coca.

I do not believe this market of illegal cocaine is going to be eliminated from our country by efforts to shut off production in South America. The reason countries need to shut off the production of cocaine--and Bolivia and Peru have made progress in

that regard--is to preserve the integrity of their own country. They do not want to allow illegal Mafia-type drug cartels to gain wealth and power to destabilize their countries in democracy and turn it into chaos and violence as has so often occurred. They have a sincere interest in achieving that goal, but that interest has to be understood to be primarily their own interest.

This administration refuses to talk about the real situation in Colombia. It refuses to be honest with the American people. Their foreign policy request was $1.6 billion. That has been approved in the House. This bill wisely reduces that, I believe, to a little less than $1 billion. They are requesting this much money to make a government that our Nation, the President, and the Secretary of State will not assert to be a country we support in their efforts against these guerrilla groups. I believe that is wrong. I think we need to be more clear eyed, more honest about our foreign policy. I believe that would be the healthy approach. It will help the American people to understand exactly what their money is being spent for. It will help them to understand what our goals are in the region. It will help them to understand whether or not we are achieving those goals.

If we do so correctly, we could utilize this money to inspire President Pastrana and the people of Colombia to rise up, take back their country, to preserve their democracy, take back their territory from those who don't believe in democratic elections, who kidnap, kill, protect drug dealers, who rob and steal. That is what is going on.

We can do something about it. We have an opportunity to utilize the wealth of this country to encourage that kind of end result. If we do so, it would be a magnificent thing for the country. To say we will spend $1 or $2 billion in Colombia, give it to a country we don't even support in their efforts to take back their territory, is typical of the kind of disingenuousness that has characterized this administration's foreign policy. It is not healthy. It should not be done.

Therefore, I have offered a simple amendment that will say one thing: Mr. President, you can spend this money, but you have to publicly state and assert and certify to this Congress that you support the duly elected Government of Colombia in their efforts against the Marxist, drug dealing insurgents who are bent on destroying the nation.

This is more important than many know. I thank the distinguished Senator from Kentucky for allowing me to have this time, and more than that, for his leadership on a foreign operations bill that protects the interests of the United States. It is frugal, as frugal can be in this day and age. He has done his best to contain excessive spending and has improved and reduced this spending bill. I appreciate his leadership.

I yield the floor.

As of June 21, 2000, this document was also available online at http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?r106:S20JN0-403: