The mission has been extremely low-key, perhaps because many Colombians feel certain that Washington wants to invade Colombia to smash its narcotics trade and cripple two leftist insurgencies threatening its democratic government. 

MIAMI HERALD
Tuesday, 7 September 1999

U.S. Army medics treat Colombia's sick

By Tim Johnson

HONDA, Colombia -- A U.S. Army medical team has arrived in Colombia for the first time since a similar U.S. mission in 1994 sparked a national uproar over charges that it was engaged in spying -- not humanitarian work.

This time, a far smaller team of 43 U.S. Army health experts is offering free medical, dental and veterinary care.

``We're just here to perform a humanitarian mission,'' said Maj. Donald Tyne of a U.S. Army Reserve unit in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

The team has set up a makeshift medical clinic in a school in this colonial town, on the banks of the rushing Magdalena River, Colombia's main artery.

The eight-day mission, which ends Wednesday, is providing free medical care to about 7,000 people, some of whom have had rotten teeth extracted, received treatment for intestinal worms or had tropical rashes examined.

``What we are trying to do is make everybody feel more comfortable, giving them cream for sores and that sort of thing,'' Tyne said. ``If we find more urgent needs, we send them to the hospital. We don't do any surgery.''
 

Low-key approach 

The State Department's third-ranking official, Thomas Pickering, later called such speculation ``loco,'' or crazy.

Given the rumors about U.S. intentions, U.S. diplomats declined to say much about the medical mission.

``We have not publicized this,'' one said.

The Colombian army, which had 10 of its own doctors and health-care workers on the mission, also declined to talk much about the exercise. Officers in Honda said they wanted it out of the news.
 

Earlier `spying' incident

Many Colombians grew suspicious when they saw tons of equipment unloaded at the site -- seemingly disproportionate to the task.

Suspicions were so strong that then-President Cesar Gaviria suggested local townspeople in Juanchaco should keep an eye on the U.S. soldiers to ensure that they stuck to humanitarian efforts.

A U.S. Army officer involved in the current mission, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said many of the Army reservists thought the new trip would be canceled up to ``the very, very last minute'' because of guerrilla violence and fears that the exercise could become a ``flash point'' in Colombian politics.

``The first sergeant almost fainted from the tension,'' the officer said.
 

Most new to Colombia

By coincidence, the U.S. Army team arrived during a national strike that saw protesters erect barricades on most of the nation's highways. The strike shaved three days off what was expected to be an 11-day exercise.

Initial suspicions in Armero and Honda, the towns where medical care has been offered, quickly gave way to gratitude for the free care. The only complaints were from those who wanted treatment by U.S. doctors, not Colombian army physicians.

``I wanted the gringo doctors to look at me,'' said Nubia Bermudez, a 49-year-old housewife. ``They have better training in medicine.''

For four days last week, the U.S. team provided attention to about 3,000 people near Armero, a town hit by a massive mudslide in 1985 that killed more than 20,000 people.

On Sunday, the medical team -- which includes general practitioners, surgeons, a dermatologist and an eye doctor -- moved to Honda, 95 miles west of Bogota, where it began dispensing large stocks of medicines.
 

Cost in six figures

Duany said the Southern Command has 83 humanitarian exercises planned in the hemisphere this year, offering U.S. military personnel repeated chances to deploy in foreign countries.

Dr. Dick Shultz, a cardiovascular surgeon from Omaha, Neb., who is a colonel in the Army Reserves, winced as he placed a stethoscope on the chest of Inez Orozco, a 65-year-old housewife, noticing an irregularity, one of several he had seen in recent days.

``I've seen four or five heart murmurs,'' Shultz said.

``He told me that I have angina and that I have to go to a cardiologist,'' Orozco said later, adding that she appreciated the free checkup but had no money to visit a heart specialist.

Standing outside the school with an infant in his arms, Carlos Fernando Franco, 38, said his wife was getting a tooth filled.

``I wish they would come more often,'' he said. ``People are poor. They don't have money to pay doctors.''