Airstrikes and insults: Trump’s new Latin America crisis

MEXICO CITY — For decades, Colombia and the United States have been staunch allies, sharing military intelligence, strong trade relations and a multibillion-dollar fight against drug trafficking.

Now all that is in jeopardy as the US ramps up deadly airstrikes off the coast of Colombia and the leaders of both countries trade sharp verbal attacks.

President Trump has called Gustavo Petro, a former guerrilla fighter and Colombia's first leftist president, an “illegal drug trafficker.” Petro called Trump “rude” and accused the US of murder, saying a US strike on a suspected Venezuelan drug ship led to the death of a Colombian fisherman in Colombian waters.

Peter condemned the massive buildup of US troops, warships and aircraft in the Caribbean, which he claims is aimed at forcing a change of government in neighboring Venezuela.

Relations between the countries hit their lowest point ever on Monday when Colombia's government recalled its ambassador to the United States and Trump vowed to suspend all U.S. aid to Colombia and impose new tariffs on imports from the South American country.

“Petro is doing nothing to stop” the drug trade, Trump said on his social media site, “despite large-scale payments and subsidies from the United States that are nothing more than a long-term robbery of America.”

The Colombian leader, Trump warned, “better close these killing fields now, or the United States will close them to him, and it won't be done very well.”

Petro has defended his record of curbing drug trafficking despite Colombia's growing production of coca plants, the raw material for cocaine production. He said rampant consumption of illicit drugs in the United States and Europe was behind Latin America's bloody drug war.

Meanwhile, the US said on Sunday it had blown up another ship believed to be linked to a Colombian rebel group. Petro said the boat actually belonged to a “humble family.”

The growing binational crisis threatens to further destabilize a region already on the brink of US military strikes. Some analysts say it threatens to embolden the same drug traffickers Trump claims to be targeting.

“In the fight between the world’s largest drug producer and the world’s largest drug user, only organized crime wins,” former Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos said at a forum in Barcelona, ​​Spain. “As long as we have two presidents who insult each other every day on Twitter, [combating crime] It will be more difficult.”

Colombia is facing its worst security crisis in a decade, with armed groups fighting for control of drug trafficking, illegal gold mining and other illicit economies since the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) militants laid down their arms in a peace deal with the Colombian government in 2016.

If the U.S. were to cut off its military and other aid to Colombia, the consequences could be catastrophic, said Elizabeth Dickinson, senior analyst for the Andean region at the International Crisis Group, a think tank.

Colombia's military, which has long been strengthened by U.S. training, weapons and other assistance, is so skilled that the U.S. pays its troops to train them in counter-drug operations in other parts of the world, she said. “If the United States is truly interested in fighting organized crime and drug trafficking,” she said, “why would it alienate the only partner in the region that is able and willing to help?”

“The relationship between the United States and Colombia over the years transcended personal politics because both sides understood how important it was,” Dickinson continued. “Now the wisdom of the relationship that has kept it together for so long and made it so productive for both countries is thrown out the window and we are losing decades of progress.”

Relations between peoples were unraveling since January, when Trump returned to the White House for a second term.

After Peter refused to accept US military flights carrying deported migrants, Trump threatening tariffs. Petro initially promised retaliatory tariffs, but backed down and agreed to accept migrants to prevent a trade war.

Most recently, the State Department announced that it would revoke Peter's visa after speaking at the United Nations General Assembly in New York, where he condemned American support for Israel and called on American soldiers disobey Trump and “obey the orders of humanity.”

The concentration of US forces in the Caribbean further strained relations.

The Trump administration has deployed nearly 10,000 troops and a fleet of ships and aircraft to the Caribbean, marking the largest U.S. military buildup in the region in decades.

While the force's ostensible goal is to crack down on drug trafficking, it is widely believed to represent an attempt to overthrow Venezuela's left-wing autocratic leader Nicolas Maduro, who critics say has plunged his country into economic and political crisis.

Peter warned against U.S. intervention in Venezuela in a post on X on Monday, saying Washington was going after the country's vast oil reserves.

“The Venezuelan people do not want invasions, blockades or threats against them,” he wrote. “They don’t like dictators, domestic or foreign.”

Last month, the Trump administration revoked Colombia's status as a partner in the war on drugs, a move that could cost the country hundreds of millions of dollars in annual aid, much of which will go to the war on drugs.

Petro's spat with Trump has sparked intense debate in Colombia, which is sharply divided ahead of presidential elections next year. (Petro is constitutionally barred from seeking re-election.)

Peter's supporters praised him for standing up to the world's bully. But his critics said he jeopardized Colombia's economy. The United States is Colombia's main trading partner; In the first eight months of this year, it sent nearly $10 billion in exports to the United States.

Petro's provocative stance toward the Trump administration contrasts with that of left-leaning Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, who sought to accommodate Trump halfway to avoid tariffs on Mexican exports to the United States. But many are concerned that Mexico could also find itself in the Trump administration's military crosshairs because it is a major supplier of fentanyl and other drugs to the U.S. market.