The highest-profile development in the region in 2000 was a $1.3 billion supplemental appropriation for Colombia, its neighbors, and U.S. counter-drug agencies, approved in July as part of the 2001 Military Construction Appropriations bill. Of the $1.3 billion in the aid package, $860 million goes to Colombia (75 percent for the security forces) and $180 million is for Colombia’s Andean neighbors – primarily Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador – almost half for the military and police forces. The section on security assistance to the Andean region discusses the aid package in greater detail.

On December 12, 2000, a U.S. Army news release reported simply, “The U.S. Army School of the Americas (USARSA), located at Fort Benning, Ga., is closing its doors after 54 years of distinguished service. The Army will conduct the closing ceremony at the school Dec. 15.” [1] The news release neglected to mention that the facility will be open for classes once again in January, only with a new name.

In 2000, Congress approved a change, proposed by the Department of Defense, to rename and somewhat restructure the school (Section 911 of the 2001 National Defense Authorization Act, Public Law 106-398). The “new” school is called the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation and is located in the same facility as the School of the Americas. The official purpose of the school is “to provide professional education and training to eligible personnel of nations of the Western Hemisphere within the context of the democratic principles set forth in the Charter of the Organization of American States.” It is not clear whether this provision will require any specific changes in the school's curriculum. The name change did not mollify opponents to the school, who argue that too many of the school’s past graduates have gone on to commit human rights violations. Protests against the school continued in the fall of 2000.

The Colombia appropriation also included $116 million for infrastructure improvements at U.S. Forward Operation Locations (FOLs). Viewed as replacements for the defunct Howard Air Force Base in Panama, FOLs are arrangements allowing U.S. military, DEA, Coast Guard and Customs personnel to use existing airfields in Latin America as platforms for counternarcotics intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance flights. Prior to 2000, the United States had negotiated FOL agreements for the use of airfields in Aruba, Curacao, and Ecuador. In 2000, a new agreement was reached with El Salvador for use of the Comalapa airfield. The Salvadoran Congress ratified a ten-year usage agreement for the FOL in July 2000.

One of the United States’ most controversial hemispheric defense issues in 2000 was the U.S. Navy’s continued practice bombing on the island of Vieques off the coast of Puerto Rico. Congress addressed the Vieques question in the 2001 National Defense Authorization Act (H.R. 4205, Public Law 106-398). This law authorizes $40 million to Vieques (appropriated within the Military Construction Appropriations Act) for economic assistance and development projects, plus the cost of a referendum on the island’s further use for military training. The referendum, which will either affirm or reject live-fire training on Vieques, is to take place on November 6, 2001.

The growing U.S. aid program to Colombia has revealed a relatively new and poorly documented trend: the increasing use of private contractors to provide aid and training. U.S. corporations, many of them staffed by retired military officers, are providing trainers, mechanics, logistics and intelligence instructors, management consultants to the region’s military chiefs, and pilots of helicopters and drug crop fumigation planes. While this phenomenon raises concerns about accountability and proximity to conflict zones, our understanding of the contractors’ role has been inhibited so far by a lack of transparency surrounding their activities.

During 1999, reported the U.S. Southern Command’s March 2000 “Posture Statement,” more than 55,000 U.S. military personnel traveled to Latin America and the Caribbean for “more than 2,800 engagement events,” such as “disaster relief, professional military training, medical training and assistance, joint and combined exercises, and counter-drug operations.” These were carried out “at the modest cost of less than $105 million.” [2] It is not clear whether the “footprint” figure included 23,000 reservists who circulated through Central America in 1999 for post-Hurricane Mitch rebuilding projects.

A frequent mission of these U.S. military visits in 1999 was Humanitarian and Civic Assistance (HCA), the practice of sending military teams to build infrastructure or provide medical care in impoverished areas. Between 1998 and 1999 HCA for Latin America more than doubled. This owed largely to the use of the Defense Department to respond to Hurricane Mitch in Central America and Hurricane Georges in the Dominican Republic. The annual HCA report, which only incorporates the costs of materials used, reflects expenditures of only $6,713,496 for all of Latin America in 1999. The Southern Command’s “Posture Statement,” however, reports a cost of $200 million to respond to Hurricane Mitch alone. [3] The statement also cites the deployment of 23,000 Guard and Reserve forces in response to Mitch, a figure that does not include active-duty personnel. The Southern Command also participated in relief efforts after severe flooding in Venezuela in December 1999.

The 1998 version of Just the Facts reported that the Foreign Military Financing (FMF) program, the main source of military assistance in the 1980s, was almost non-existent in Latin America. The program has since been resurrected. While a decade ago this program provided large grants to foreign militaries or financed weapons purchases, today it is being used to finance training, in a confusing overlap with the International Military Education and Training (IMET) program. FMF paid for the training of 510 Latin Americans in 1999, exceeding training funded by the State Department’s International Narcotics Control (INC) program.

Since 1998, a legal authority known as “section 1033” has allowed the Defense Department to aid the Peruvian and Colombian security forces’ efforts to stem drug smuggling on waterways. Section 1033 authorized a maximum of $20 million of assistance each year until 2002, when the authority was to expire. Section 1021 of the 2001 National Defense Authorization Act (Public Law 106-398) extends this authority through 2006 but excludes Peru, limiting “section 1033” exclusively to Colombia after 2002.

For the first time since 1995, the President did not exercise his authority to “draw down” weapons or training to Latin America for counternarcotics purposes. This is probably because Congress appropriated a great deal of “supplemental” funds, outside the regular budget process, for the Colombia aid package. Section 121 of the Security Assistance Act of 2000 (Public Law 106-280) nonetheless increased the cap on the presidential “drawdown” authority from $150 million to $200 million per year worldwide.

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