01:00 AM EST on Friday, February 20, 2004

IN THE AGE of Terror, it is surprising that Colombia remains outside highly visible policy discussions. While U.S. forces in the Mideast comb Afghanistan for al-Qaida cells and defend Iraqi reconstruction from improvised terrorism, organized terrorism goes on in the Western Hemisphere.

The U.S. State Department identifies three active terrorist groups in Colombia: two leftist guerrilla groups, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the National Liberation Army (ELN), and the United Self-defense Forces of Colombia (AUC). Although it is hard to contest these groups' brutal disregard for human rights, it is important to recognize how the U.S. government's classification shapes their activity, in particular the FARC and the ELN.

Colombia is the third-largest recipient of U.S. military aid. Since Plan Colombia (a funding package originally for the war on drugs, now falling under the heading war on terrorism) was signed into law, in 2000, the United States has sent Colombia $2.44 billion.

In fiscal 2004 alone, $552.59 million in military aid will be spent on supporting Colombia's military and police. This enormous sum not only contributes to Colombian efforts against terrorism; it also contributes to a de-politicization of Colombia's terrorism. In effect, the origins of Colombia's terrorism are rendered irrelevant by Plan Colombia.

Unlike terrorists in Afghanistan and Iraq, the FARC and ELN claim nearly 35,000 members, control substantial territory, and have long histories. In framing U.S. military aid to Colombia strictly as a response to terrorism, the United States denies the complex historical conditions in which Colombian terrorism has arisen.

Terrorism is only the most recent manifestation of Colombia's 40-year armed conflict. In determining policy, U.S. and Colombian officials must recognize how the historical antecedents of the current actors continue to influence the Colombian groups.

Consider Colombia's largest and oldest guerrilla movement, the FARC. Forty-eight peasants formed the movement in 1964, in response to a governmental campaign to eliminate armed communist communities. Forty years later, over 90 percent of the FARC's 18,000-member army remains agrarian.

Recognizing the FARC's agrarian origins and responding to the influences that encourage agrarians to join the group are perhaps the best ways to reduce the group's considerable size.

At the same time, policy makers must recognize that Colombia's armed conflict is not static. The conflict's dynamic nature has given rise to some changing characteristics: For example, 30 percent of the FARC is now female, including (according to Human Rights Watch) some members as young as 8 years old.

There is only limited certainty as to how the changing composition of the guerrilla movement affects the conflict, or how it will affect post-conflict Colombia. Nonetheless, it must be recognized that the face of the Colombian government's enemy is not the same as it was when the conflict started.

There are no simple solutions to Colombia's armed conflict. However, re-politicizing the conflict would be a step toward addressing factors that prolong it. To do so, U.S. and Colombian officials must give greater relevance to the conflict's political origins.

The FARC and ELN both formed in the 1960s in part because of issues that are still unresolved: political representation, land distribution, ending impunity by strengthening judicial processes. While the FARC and ELN's involvement in drug trafficking may call into question their Marxist-Leninist political agendas, the groups cannot be treated simply as delinquents.

There is no single means of re-politicizing the armed conflict. The United States is, however, well positioned to initiate the process. By redirecting aid toward the Colombian social, political, and economic inequities that fuel the conflict, the United States would demonstrate that escalating militarization is not a solution. Increasing social aid and local development, especially in rural areas, would place pressure on all sides of the conflict to find a peaceful resolution.

Addressing these root factors would begin the long but essential process of reconciling differences, and, one hopes, achieving a nonviolent resolution to Colombia's 40-year armed conflict.

Keith Stanski, a former editor of the Brown Journal of World Affairs, has spent the past two years researching the Colombian armed conflict.