The Cocaine Ties That Bind Colombia and Venezuela

Colombia and Venezuela share the problem of the illicit drug trade, but the ramifications of such trafficking could not be more different for the next-door neighbors. From the United States' point of view, Colombian criminality and Venezuelan authoritarianism are two looming foreign policy problems that are linked by the cocaine trade and that require vastly different solutions. In Colombia, a spike in rural violence is likely to occur in the coming years as criminal groups contest areas abandoned by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in its peace deal. Some FARC leaders will likely return to a life of crime, exacerbating the violence already occurring. Over the border in Venezuela, government officials — some under investigation by U.S. authorities in cocaine-trafficking and money-laundering cases — will band together in the face of increasing internal threats to cling to power and preside over a political and economic meltdown that will continue to induce mass migration. In the end, Bogota might be well-placed to apply a steady hand to some of the problems stemming from drug trafficking — in stark contrast to its ailing neighbor. More…