The defence ministry analysis does not refer to any country, but its release comes as Colombia faces off with neighbouring Venezuela in a growing political and trade dispute that analysts believe has raised the risk of border violence.
Entitled “State Forces and Challenges for the Future,” the document calls for more emphasis on defending national sovereignty due to the risk from countries with “expansionist aspirations in ideological and territorial terms.”
Defence Minister Gabriel Silva earlier this month said Colombia faced a foreign threat for the first time in years after decades of concentrating on ending its long internal conflict with leftist guerrillas and cocaine traffickers.
“Colombia should acquire a credible dissuasive capacity to convince a potent adversary that the cost of any aggression would outweigh any eventual benefits from an attack,” according to the document posted on the ministry’s website yesterday.
The study, carried out by the ministry’s analysts and completed in October, was aimed at laying out changing challenges for the armed forces and make recommendations on how to meet them.
The study says Colombia should purchase air defence weapons, advance warning systems and other arms, and beef up its special forces to confront the risk of and nonconventional or guerrilla attacks.
Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez, a fierce US adversary, has urged his military commanders to prepare for possible war and cut back on Colombian exports in protest over a Colombian plan to allow US troops more access to its military bases.
The accord has fueled concern in the region, especially in Venezuela where Chavez says the base deal could be used as a springboard for a US military offensive on his oil-producing country. US and Colombian officials counter there is no planned troop increase and operations will be inside Colombia.
“From Colombia, the Yankee empire is planning, using Colombian troops, an aggression against Venezuela,” Chavez told troops at a ceremony near the frontier yesterday.
President Alvaro Uribe says the accord is an extension of existing US cooperation to fight drug traffickers and FARC guerrillas. His US-backed offensive has severely weakened the FARC, but the guerrillas are resisting, especially in remote mountains and jungles and along frontier zones.
While full conflict between Colombia and Venezuela is unlikely, the confrontation is increasing tensions along porous, poorly guarded 1,375-mile (2,200-km) border where smugglers and armed groups operate.
Chavez has spent billions on building up his armed forces with Russian Sukhoi fighter jets and helicopters. Russia in September agreed to lend Venezuela $2 billion to purchase 92 tanks and advanced S-300 anti-aircraft missile system.
