Pretty soon it will be all government agents.
"Colombia: No. 2 rebel commander killed in raid" by Frank Bajak, Associated Press Writer | September 23, 2010
BOGOTA, Colombia --Colombia's military killed the No. 2 leader and top military strategist of the country's main rebel army in blistering bombardments of a major jungle camp, officials announced Thursday, saying a rebel informant helped prepare the demoralizing shock to an already weakened insurgency.
The death of Jorge Briceno, also known as Mono Jojoy, is a huge setback for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, which has been reeling from years of pressure by an increasingly effective U.S.-backed military.
President Juan Manuel Santos called the attack "the most crushing blow against the FARC in its entire history" -- more important than the March 2008 bombing raid across the border with Ecuador that killed FARC foreign minister Raul Reyes or the bloodless ruse that July that freed former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, three U.S. contractors and 11 other hostages.
Isn't that a violation of international law?
Related: Running With the "Rescue"
Have you HAD IT with the STAGED and SCRIPTED PROPAGANDA passing itself off as news yet?
Santos, who was defense minister during both operations, got the news while jogging in New York City's Central Park.
He's a lying war criminal!! Seems to be a characteristic of U.S allies.
He explained to The Associated Press what Briceno's death means to Colombians: "It is as if they told New Yorkers that Osama bin Laden had fallen."
The guy already has; however, I'm insulted by the analogy.
Briceno, 57, joined the FARC as an illiterate teenager and spent the rest of his life in the jungle, becoming a feared and charismatic commander in a force that a decade ago controlled nearly half of Colombia. Analysts predicted his loss could lead many rebels to give up the fight and might nudge the FARC to seek peace in earnest.
Santos told reporters that at least 20 rebels were killed, including other senior insurgents whose identities were not disclosed pending fingerprint and DNA tests, in operations that began Monday night with bombing raids involving at least 30 warplanes and 27 helicopters and ended with ground combat on Wednesday.
Air force chief Gen. Julio Gonzalez told the AP that Super Tucano and other warplanes dropped more than 50 bombs on the camp.
Commandos found Briceno's body outside a concrete bunker in a camp laced with tunnels and recovered at least 14 laptop computers and 50 USB drives, officials said. They said the raid was six months in the making and benefitted from radio spectrum surveillance.
I'm getting the feeling we are being fooled again.
Defense Minister Rodrigo Rivera higlighted "the collaboration of members of the FARC itself" and added that "the FARC is rotting inside."
Going the way of the Tamil Tigers, 'eh?
He did not offer specifics, though military officials said privately that they were discussing reward payments to collaborators.
An army general told the AP that a single FARC turncoat led military intelligence agents to Briceno and had been spirited out of the country. The general insisted on not being named because he was not authoritized (sic) to talk to reporters.
I wonder which U.S. intelligence agency he was working for.
The U.S. State Department had offered a $5 million reward for Briceno....
YOUR TAX DOLLARS at WORK, America!
Related: US OKs $30 Million In Military Aid To Colombia
Wow, that is a sizable chunk, huh?
Briceno had been rotating for months among a series of camps in a rugged area of nearly 4,000 square miles where the Andes mountains drop off into eastern plains that include La Macarena massif, a national park, said one senior government official.
Police and Navy intelligence agents succeeded in pinpointing his movements, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the subject's sensitivity.
The area is the cradle of the FARC, which was co-founded in 1964 by Briceno's mentor Manuel Marulanda, a legendary fighter who died in 2008 of an apparent heart attack....
Printed paper ends.
Briceno, whose walrus mustache made him widely recognizable, had risen through the insurgency's ranks to become its most powerful and respected field commander as well as a major drug trafficker.
His rise saw the rebels increasingly turn to cocaine production, evolving from taxing farmers who grew coca to producing the drug and selling it to exporters....
Must not have been working out to well seeing as they are at the end.
Military analyst Alfredo Rangel said Briceno's death could lead to many more desertions....
Briceno belonged to the FARC's seven-member ruling Secretariat. Like most insurgents from a humble background, he was a fighter for most of his life, joining as a youth and even learning how to read as a rebel.
Related: Insurgents vs. Incumbents
I should be insulted, shouldn't I?
The group's main leader, Alfonso Cano, remains at large and is believed to be in the mountains of central Colombia. Military commanders claim they've been closing the noose on him as well.
I guess some nooses are okay in this world.
Colombian officials say other Secretariat members are hiding out in neighboring Venezuela.
I've reached the point where I am sick of (and instantly dismiss) such enemy-creating, war-fomenting charges.
It's the OIL, isn't it?
The hemisphere's last remaining large rebel army, whose numbers authorities estimate at about 8,000 -- half its strength of a decade ago -- the FARC has been badly weakened since 2002 by Washington's strongest ally in Latin America. Colombia has received more than $6 billion in U.S. aid, including Blackhawk helicopters and training by Green Berets....
Related: Obama's Colombian Template
Analyst Leon Valencia of the left-leaning think tank Nuevo Arco Iris said he expected the FARC would now seek to negotiate....
Santos has rejected a peace dialogue unless the FARC ends kidnapping and extortion and halts attacks that claimed the lives of more than 30 police officers since he took office Aug. 7.
Maybe they aren't finished (or it is their death throes, right?).
"This is the 'Welcome Operation' that we have been promising the FARC," said Santos, who was elected on a promise to continue former President Alvaro Uribe's withering military campaign against the FARC. It comes less than a week after Colombia's military killed at least 22 FARC fighters in bombing a rebel camp near Ecuador....
Was it near or in, huh?
And does anyone get the feeling FARC is a FRONT for CONTINUED U.S. PRESENCE in an area that has REJECTED IT?
Critics say the root cause of Colombia's conflict -- a still-widening gulf between its richest and poorest -- remains to be seriously addressed....
Another irritating characteristic of U.S. allies!
The FARC increasingly turned to drug trafficking in the late 1990s, when it was at the height of its military power, as a means of financial support.
--more--"
"Colombia: death of feared No. 2 rebel a watershed" by Frank Bajak, Associated Press Writer | September 24, 2010
BOGOTA, Colombia --The powerful rebel comandante who Colombian officials say died in the bombing of a clandestine jungle camp was nicknamed "Mono Jojoy" by his comrades after a forest-dwelling worm that is white, plump and very slippery.
The killing of Jorge Briceno, the No. 2 leader and field marshal of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, announced Thursday, was a demoralizing shock to an already weakened insurgency because no rebel had more clout or a more fearsome reputation....
President Juan Manuel Santos called Briceno's death in two days of bombardments that ended Wednesday a decisive turn in a half-century struggle against Latin America's last remaining rebel army -- "the most crushing blow against the FARC in its entire history."
"It is as if they told New Yorkers that Osama bin Laden had fallen," he told The Associated Press in New York City, where he was attending the U.N. General Assembly and was to meet Friday with U.S. President Barack Obama.
There he goes again.
Santos later Thursday night directly addressed the FARC's remaining fugitive commanders in a televised speech to the nation.
"We're coming for you and you know we'll succeed," he said. "Demobilize, return to society."
Santos said Briceno's death had more impact than the March 2008 bombing raid across the border with Ecuador that killed FARC foreign minister Raul Reyes and also surpassed the bloodless ruse in July of the same year that freed former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, three U.S. contractors and 11 other hostages. Santos was defense minister during both operations.
How unwitingly close they cut to the truth on that one!!!
Officials said at least one rebel turncoat had made the latest strike possible, pinpointing Briceno's location after six months of intelligence gathering.
The FARC has been reeling from pressure by an increasingly effective U.S.-backed military....
Santos told investors in New York later Thursday that he's optimistic that the digital information they contain will hasten "the beginning of the end of 40 years of war in Colombia."
You know, the important people.
Electronic messages found on computers seized in the Reyes raid proved an intelligence gold mine, including implicating leftist President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela in backing the FARC....
Framed by FARC?
An army general told the AP that a single FARC turncoat led military intelligence agents to Briceno and had been spirited out of the country with his family. The general, who insisted on not being named because he was not authoritized to talk to reporters, said he did not know how big a reward the informant would receive....
Briceno had been rotating for months among a series of camps in a rugged area of nearly 4,000 square miles where the Andes mountains drop off into eastern plains....
All the while, he was being tracked by police and Navy intelligence agents, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the subject's sensitivity....
--more--"
Related: Colombia kills top rebel strategist (by Juan Forero, Washington Post)
I no longer do WaPo or the New York Times if I do not have to.
Also see: Colombia's Body Counts
Right-wing paramilitaries, the heirs of the infamous death squads, have started to re-emerge in Colombia
Time to End the Fumigation in Colombia
Yeah, nothing about the mass-murdering, U.S.-supported, paramilitary death squads or the chemical warfare against Colombians.
Of course, the newspaper is telling you all you need to know, dear Americans.
