geography

Map 2.1 A visual depiction of the FARC-EP blocks of political geography.

Sources: Adapted from information obtained through observational research alongside documents provided by the FARC-EP in 2004; see also Ferra Medina and Uribe Ramón, 2002: 53.

Richani, 2002a: 76–7). Each front has a comandante who keeps an updated list of each member, detailing gender, age, occupation prior to membership, where they are from, education level, reason for joining, disciplinary record, injuries, and rank (Gutiérrez Sanín, 2008: 7; see also Colombia Reports, 2008).

By the mid-1990s roughly 105 fronts existed (Hylton, 2006: 89; Petras, 1999: 31). After observing numerous meetings involving the FARC-EP, I collected data that suggested the possibility of at least an additional dozen fronts by the early to mid-2000s. This assessment was shown to be accurate during a heated debate between Roger Noriega, assistant secretary of state for the Western hemisphere affairs under the George W. Bush administration, and Colombian political scientist Daniel García-Peña Jaramillo. Noriega said US intelligence believed an estimated 120 fronts existed throughout the country in 2008 (The Current, 2008). Such a figure seemed high, as the insurgency appeared to have altered its structure around 2008–09 by reducing the quantity of fronts. A more accurate figure of the FARC-EP’s front status at this time rested around 80 (see Bristow, 2008). Collecting information on the number of combatants in the FARC-EP is understandably difficult. Most figures are grossly out of date, yet used repeatedly. This is surprising as numerous assessments found that the FARC-EP exceeded 30,000 in the early 2000s (International Crisis Group, 2009: 7n.57; Chernick, 2007: 67; Petras et al, 2005: 118; Petras and Veltmeyer, 2005b: 378; Vieira, 2004a; Rochlin, 2003: 137, 165n.81). The following information, compiled through first-hand research, highlights far greater numbers than outdated regurgitated records suggest. Collected over several years, my research found the guerrillas had grown substantially over much of the last 15 years. This growth is largely attributed to continued political-economic repression of the rural population and urban working poor. At its peak (from the late 1990s to mid-2000s) the guerrilla organization was estimated to have 40,000–50,000 combatants (Brittain, 2005e). This number may appear high when compared with popular media accounts and state sources, but it must be understood that the FARC-EP remained disproportionately underrepresented for the greater part of the previous two decades, even though a remarkable physical and geographically expansion was realized. The FARC-EP’s membership has grown consistently (see Brittain, 2005g).3 With over 105 fronts between the late 1990s and early 2000s,4 at a median of 450 insurgents per front,5 the number of combatants roughly equated to 45,000. This is quite different from most of Bogotá and Washington’s figures, which have argued that more and more guerrillas have been captured, demobilized, deserted, or killed in recent years. In contrast, Colombian mathematicians José Fernando Isaza Delgado and Diógenes Campos Romero noted that recruitment expanded in the mid to late 2000s, a position openly shared by various human rights organizations.6 Using state-based statistics concerning FARC-EP enlistment and abandonment, Delgado and Romero (2007: 8) noted, “for every 100 subversives who deserted or were killed, the guerrillas were able, in the 2002–2007 period, to recruit 84 new combatants.” Utilizing this equation, the number of guerrilla forces exceeds 42,500, with the FARC-EP making up the vast majority (Delgado and Romero, 2007: 9; see also Delgado, 2008). In September 2008 further information was obtained referring to the FARC-EP’s size when state forces acquired a database related to one of the guerrilla’s seven blocks. The material suggested the Eastern Block alone housed