The $13 million radar station was just inaugurated by President Andres Pastrana and the U.S. ambassador to Colombia and even given a blessing by a Roman Catholic priest. While skepticism about the drug war grows among some critics, so does this jungle outpost where the campaign is anchored.

Two Colombian soldiers stand guard in front at the new U.S. radar station for the Tres Esquinas army base, November 29, 2001. The radar, donated by U.S. government at a cost of 25 million US dollars, is part of "Plan Colombia" designated to fight drug traffickers in southern Caqueta and Putumayo provinces. REUTERS/Jose Miguel Gomez

Tres Esquinas sprawls alongside a roiling brown river in southern Colombia within striking distance of drug labs and plantations that are guarded and taxed by leftist rebels and right-wing paramilitaries.

Built in the 1930s, the base was long a sleepy outpost to defend Colombia from attack by Peru. Now, its runways are paved and expanded, long enough to handle jet fighters and Hercules transport planes.

A large dock is being completed for U.S.-donated patrol boats that prowl the rivers that are the highways for rebels and drug smugglers in this roadless region. Banks of computers watched by U.S. and Colombian intelligence officers compile data from satellites and reconnaissance planes.

During Thursday's inauguration ceremonies, U.S. and Colombian officials gave an upbeat assessment of the war on drugs. They also witnessed the kind of firepower Washington is providing under a $1.3 billion aid package approved last year.

Patrol boats bristling with machine guns and grenade launchers zipped in formations along the muddy Orteguaza River, blasting away at the jungle on the opposite bank. Helicopters and warplanes shredded the jungle with bombs, rockets and machine guns while soldiers lobbed mortar rounds from gun pits.

The added firepower and U.S. Green Beret training of Colombian troops is providing security for raids on drug labs and aerial fumigation runs over illegal plots of coca, the plant used to make cocaine.

For some, the drug war is a dud.

Human-rights activists fear the U.S. support will embolden the military to abuse people's rights, or lead to direct U.S.-troop involvement in this South American country's 37-year-old civil war.

Environmentalists worry about safety risks from the herbicides blasting coca fields.

Still other critics say the world's drug supply won't ever be reduced until demand for narcotics is curtailed in consumer nations like the United States.

With American lawmakers echoing those concerns, the U.S. Congress appears ready to slash about $100 million from the Bush administration's $731 million follow-up request to last year's aid plan.

At Tres Esquinas, Brig. Gen. Mário Montoya, the commander of Colombia's southern forces, brushes aside the criticism.

"We are winning this war," he said, rattling off statistics he said showed progress, including the destruction of hundreds of thousands of acres of coca and the combat deaths at the hands of the U.S.-trained troops of 166 "drug traffickers."

U.S. Ambassador Anne Patterson insisted progress is "accelerating," and she said the U.S.-trained troops "have not had a single human-rights complaint against them."

Copyright 2001 Associated Press

###