Stamping Out la Violencia

The fighting has been going for 16 years. In a country less populous than the state of New York, it has already claimed the lives of some 200,000 people -- six times the total battle deaths of all U.S. forces in the Korean war.

Colombians simply call it la violencia, the only way to describe the sense less slaughter and banditry waged by hate-filled peasants who long ago forgot what they were fighting about. Now, at long last, there are encouraging signs that Colombia's government is gaining the upper hand and beginning to pacify the remote badlands.

In 1962, according to statistics reported last week, 75 peasant gangs with 1,500 men terrorized the interior, killing some 2,500 civilians and government troops. Today only 33 gangs remain, with fewer than 800 men. Government and civilian casualties have dropped 50% in the past year, while bandit casualties are up 30%. As in other guerrilla wars, statistics never tell the whole story. Several trouble spots remain, but hundreds of families are returning to their lands in seven newly declared zones of "total pacification" in the outbacks.

Franela & Corbata. Colombia's violence started in 1948 as an ugly political war between the country's Liberals and Conservatives--triggered by the assassination of Liberal Party Leader Jorge Eliecer Gaitan. Conservatives drove Liberals from their villages; Liberals in turn regrouped as guerrillas, making the plains their stronghold. Soon killing became an end in itself, sadistic and without cause. Some machete-wielding fighters specialized in the franela cut, in which the victim's head was sheared from his body with an incision resembling the circular neckline of a flannel undershirt; others preferred the cor bat a --one slice across the throat, through which the victim's tongue was pulled, to look like a necktie. With the grim slogan of "Leave no seed," children were murdered, men emasculated, pregnant women cut open.

Successive governments sent troops in, but the terrain and guerrilla tactics of the peasant gangs proved too much. In 1953, Military Strongman Gustavo Rojas Pinilla granted an amnesty; when that failed, he bombed villages harboring bandits and imprisoned entire communities. In 1958, the Liberals and Conservatives finally patched up their differences and formed the Frente Nacional coalition, hoping to restore peace. But the violence raged on. Besides military action, President Alberto Lleras Camargo tried buying off the bandits; one leader collected $15,000, then hurried back to the hills, where he ran his grisly toll to 592 murders before he himself was killed last year. Not until President Guillermo Leon Valencia was elected in 1962 did the bandit war take a turn for the better. The man responsible: Major General Alberto Ruiz Novoa, Valencia's battle-tough war minister and commander of the Colombian detachment that fought in Korea. Says Ruiz: "We learned from Cyprus, Algeria and other such experiences that you cannot defeat a guerrilla by regular warfare. You have to take away the support of the population."

Carrot & Stick. The basis of Ruiz' campaign is "military civil action," a program for making friends among the campesinos. Army troops show backward peasants how to build schools, highways, health centers, wells and sewers. Government agencies contribute drugs and crop seeds. Alianza funds provide many items, from mobile dispensaries to bulldozers. Army officers help out in classrooms. On Sundays, military bands tootle in village squares. And throughout the country, thousands of posters ask campesinos to help the military track down bandits.

To go with civic action, Ruiz has mounted a military offensive built around 100 mobile, twelve-man "killer" teams from the "Laceros," or Lancers, the army's crack fighting force. In some villages, the military investigates every citizen, questions unarmed strangers, shoots on sight any armed newcomers. Many of Ruiz' patrols are disguised as civilians, inviting bandit attack; army undercover men infiltrate bandit gangs, lead them into ambush. Colombian pilots, who have learned air envelopment tactics in the U.S., are equipped with scores of choppers.

The Gnat & Sure Shot. In the past few months, two of the worst bandit leaders--el Mosco, the Gnat, and el Sultan--have been killed. Between them, they accounted for 500 murders. Most of the bandits are ordinary killers, but Communist and Castroite agents are busy in the backlands. Last week Pedro Marin Marulanda, a well-known Red who calls himself "Sure Shot," destroyed an army helicopter, murdered its two crewmen and kidnaped the passengers. Bandit Frederico Arango, who was killed last year, had a five-foot bookshelf of Communist bestsellers, including Che Guevara's Guerrilla Warfare. Pedro Brincos, also killed last year, was found with Communist documents from Cuba.

The battle is far from over. A change of government could disrupt the whole military program. Disaffected Liberals have joined in a leftist opposition movement that will test the Frente Nacional's strength in congressional elections next week. But for the first time in years, the atmosphere is hopeful. Pablo Samper, a Bogota businessman, actually took his wife with him on a recent visit to his 5,000-acre finca in northern Tolima department. "I used to spend the weekends there with my family," he says. "Maybe the time will come again."

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