HomeNewsAnalysisPeru Looks to Colombia for Counterinsurgency Model
ANALYSIS

Peru Looks to Colombia for Counterinsurgency Model

COLOMBIA / 15 AUG 2011 BY GEOFFREY RAMSEY EN

Peru's new president has vowed to take a hard line against the country’s Shining Path guerrillas, and appears to have modeled his strategy on Colombia’s counterinsurgency successes.

Within days of taking office, President Ollanta Humala called on the country’s armed forces to step up efforts against the Shining Path (Sendero Luminoso). In an August 3 speech to commanders of the Peruvian Armed Forces, Army, Navy, Air Force and National Police, the president called for a radical shift in strategy in the fight against the rebel group. He singled out the embattled Apurimac and Ene Valley region (VRAE), which is the major hotspot of rebel activity in Peru.

Humala, himself a former army major, had stern words for the military leadership. "Security starts with the results. The country will feel safe if its armed forces manage to defeat the enemy. But what we see now is that the enemy is in the same place as always, striking any time it wants. That must end," Humala told the commanders. He then said he would provide military forces in the VRAE region with the resources they needed to finally rout the guerrillas, but that this would be conditional on results.

It appears that Humala has also been encouraging the military to reshape its counterinsurgency strategy. As a La Republica report reveals, the Military Intelligence Wing (Arma de Inteligencia del Ejercito) of the Peruvian army has studied the recent success of Colombia in beating back the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia - FARC), specifically their deadly strikes against rebel leaders like Luis Edgar Devia Silva and Víctor Julio Suarez Rojas, better known as “Raul Reyes” and “Mono Jojoy.” Intelligence work was a key factor in both of these assassinations, and military sources told the newspaper that they are restructuring their intelligence organs to focus on taking out the Shining Path's leaders in the VRAE.

As La Republica reports, the Colombian military has two brigades assigned to intelligence work: a general military intelligence brigade, which is composed of 11 battalions (which typically comprise 300 to 1,000 men) and a counterintelligence brigade, which consists of five battalions. Peru’s military intelligence system, on the other hand, is made up of only a single brigade, consisting of two battalions.

In the coming months, the Peruvian military will introduce at least two more battalions. One has reported already been set up, designed to focus specifically on counterintelligence.

With this restructuring, the Peruvian military hopes to make real progress in its campaign against the Shining Path, which has faltered in recent years. As InSight Crime has noted, despite the claim by the outgoing government to have reduced the rebels’ “area of influence” from 34,000 to 5,000 square kilometers, coca cultivation statistics indicate that drug production is on the rise in the rebel heartland. According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the amount of land under coca cultivation in the VRAE has gone up more than 30 percent since 2005, to at least 19,700.

The military has not captured or killed a senior Shining Path leader in the past five years, although the authorities recently arrested the girlfriend of Florindo Eleuterio Flores Hala, alias "Comrade Artemio," who commands the Shining Path faction in the Upper Huallaga Valley, the rebels' other main operations base after the VRAE.

Still, it should be noted that the Peruvian and Colombian security situations are very different in terms of scale. While the total number of rebels in Colombia is estimated at around 10,000, the U.S. State Department says that the number of Shining Path in the country is only around 300.

Additionally, the Shining Path poses a different type of security challenge than the FARC. The threat comes far more from their involvement in the drug trade than their revolutionary ambitions. The Colombian rebels have the cash and manpower to pose a serious military threat to the authorities, though this has declined sharply in the last decade. This allows them to dominate some parts of the country, and attract recruits, in a way the Shining Path cannot.

Because of this, it is not clear that a security strategy based on Colombia's experience can be applied in the Peruvian case. Humala may have better luck by focusing on social factors which account for the Shining Path's continued existence, namely: spending more on alternative crop measures and economic opportunities for those living in the rebels' areas of influence.

share icon icon icon

Was this content helpful?

We want to sustain Latin America’s largest organized crime database, but in order to do so, we need resources.

DONATE

What are your thoughts? Click here to send InSight Crime your comments.

We encourage readers to copy and distribute our work for non-commercial purposes, with attribution to InSight Crime in the byline and links to the original at both the top and bottom of the article. Check the Creative Commons website for more details of how to share our work, and please send us an email if you use an article.

Was this content helpful?

We want to sustain Latin America’s largest organized crime database, but in order to do so, we need resources.

DONATE

Related Content

ARGENTINA / 6 JUL 2022

Tusi, a pink synthetic drug powder, is increasing its share of Latin America's drug markets.

COLOMBIA / 8 DEC 2021

Three FARC dissident commanders have become the first people to be charged with criminal deforestation under a new law aimed…

AUC / 11 MAR 2022

Alleged drug trafficker alias "Memo Fantasma" or "Will the Ghost," was formally charged during a March 9 virtual audience, of…

About InSight Crime

THE ORGANIZATION

All Eyes on Ecuador

2 JUN 2023

Our coverage of organized crime in Ecuador continues to be a valuable resource for international and local news outlets. Internationally, Reuters cited our 2022 Homicide Round-Up,…

WORK WITH US

Open Position: Social Media and Engagement Strategist

27 MAY 2023

InSight Crime is looking for a Social Media and Engagement Strategist who will be focused on maintaining and improving InSight Crime’s reputation and interaction with its audiences through publishing activities…

THE ORGANIZATION

Venezuela Coverage Receives Great Reception

27 MAY 2023

Several of InSight Crime’s most recent articles about Venezuela have been well received by regional media. Our article on Venezuela’s colectivos expanding beyond their political role to control access to…

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime's Chemical Precursor Report Continues

19 MAY 2023

For the second week in a row, our investigation into the flow of precursor chemicals for the manufacture of synthetic drugs in Mexico has been cited by multiple regional media…

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime’s Chemical Precursor Report Widely Cited

THE ORGANIZATION / 12 MAY 2023

We are proud to see that our recently published investigation into the supply chain of chemical precursors feeding Mexico’s synthetic drug production has been warmly received.