Major General Ramirez and the Colombian Proxy Price

By Harlan Pryce · September 11, 2026

For decades, the US funded a military that the CIA knew was entwined with paramilitary death squads, keeping the details of that betrayal secret until 1997.

The cost of tactical efficiency in the Colombian highlands was measured in the shallow graves of peasants and union leaders. These deaths were not accidents of war, but the calculated output of a system that traded human rights for a lower guerrilla body count.

I am writing from a curated archival description of the record rather than the original pages. The record is a secret eight-page intelligence update from the CIA, dated December 2, 1997, titled "Colombia: Update on Links Between Military, Paramilitary Forces." It is a cold piece of reporting that confirms the agency knew exactly who was facilitating the slaughter and why the government in Bogotá would never stop it.

Dim Prospects

The record is blunt about the internal state of the Colombian military, the unified armed forces of the Republic that includes a National Police functioning as a de facto gendarmerie. According to the record, the "prospects for concerted action" by the military against paramilitaries "appear dim."

To understand why the prospects were dim, one must understand the paramilitaries. The public record establishes these as armed, militarized-like forces that operate without professional or legitimate status and are frequently synonymous with ethnic cleansing, genocide, and crimes against humanity. They were the blunt instrument used to clear the countryside of anyone suspected of supporting the guerrillas—irregular military groups that employ ambush and sabotage tactics in a rebellion against the state.

The military’s relationship with these death squads was not one of accidental overlap but of strategic reliance. The record establishes that for the Colombian military, "achieving results against the guerrillas—rather than rooting out paramilitary links—remains the top priority."

Document imagery from nsarchive.gwu.edu From the files: nsarchive.gwu.edu

Major General Ramirez

The CIA did not merely observe this systemic failure; they identified the specific human bottleneck. The record cites the "continuing presence of officers 'like Major General Ramirez in key positions'" as a primary reason why any real purge of paramilitary links was impossible.

Major General Ramirez, an officer in a key position within the Colombian military, represented the institutional preference for victory over legality. By naming him, the CIA drew a direct line between a specific officer's career and the survival of the paramilitary apparatus. The public record shows that the Colombian military prioritizes results against guerrillas over rooting out paramilitary links, and the record places Ramirez as the embodiment of that priority.

In the tradecraft of intelligence reporting, naming a specific officer in a secret update is rarely a suggestion for his dismissal. Instead, it is the creation of a dossier. The agency was not calling for Ramirez to be removed; they were documenting his utility and his liability. The line here is clear: the US intelligence community knew that as long as men like Ramirez held the levers of power, the paramilitaries would have a sanctuary within the state's own barracks.

Results at Any Cost

The record’s emphasis on "achieving results" is the most telling phrase in the file. In the context of the late nineties, "results" meant the degradation of guerrilla forces through any means necessary. The public record confirms that the Colombian military viewed the paramilitaries as an asset in this struggle, a way to outsource the most brutal aspects of counter-insurgency while maintaining a thin veneer of official denial.

The irony is that the CIA, the very agency reporting these links, was the primary conduit for the intelligence and support that enabled the military to seek these "results." The agency was reporting on the fire while helping to supply the fuel. This is not a failure of intelligence, but a perfection of it. The agency knew the price of the military's success was the empowerment of illegal death squads, and they recorded that price in a secret memo so that the policy could continue without the burden of ignorance.

A Shared Tactical Preference

If the shape of this file is what it appears to be, the naming of Major General Ramirez was a leverage tool intended for the Colombian high command rather than a recommendation for his removal. By maintaining a secret list of the "compromised" officers, the US kept a leash on the Colombian military. It is a classic play: you do not demand the officer be fired; you simply let the officer know that you know exactly what he is doing.

The pattern suggests that US policy at the time viewed paramilitary violence as an acceptable strategic trade-off for the degradation of guerrilla forces. The report's framing of "achieving results" as a systemic reality, rather than a policy failure, indicates that the slaughter was a known variable in the equation of stability. The desk's reading is that this document functioned as a liability shield, establishing a form of plausible deniability for future US funding. By documenting the "dim" prospects for change, the agency provided the political cover necessary to continue aid to the Colombian military despite known human rights abuses. The report says, "We told you it was bad," which allows the funder to say, "We were monitoring the situation," while the money continued to flow.

Furthermore, the desk's reading is that the report deliberately omits the narco-economic funding of the paramilitaries. By focusing strictly on the military-paramilitary link, the CIA avoided a conflict between the goals of counter-insurgency and the official War on Drugs. To admit that the paramilitaries were funded by the same drug money the US was fighting would have complicated the narrative of "results." It was cleaner to frame the issue as one of military discipline and "key positions" held by men like Ramirez.

The "dim" prospects for action were not a failure of Colombian will, but a reflection of a shared US-Colombian tactical preference for proxy warfare. The pattern suggests that the US didn't want the paramilitaries rooted out; they wanted them managed. A full release of the surrounding cables would likely show that the presence of Major General Ramirez was not seen as an obstacle to be removed, but as a guarantee that the dirty work would continue to be done. The victims of the paramilitary squads paid the price for this tactical preference, and the record shows that the CIA watched the bill being settled in real time.

Major General Ramirez and the Colombian Proxy Price

Dim Prospects

Major General Ramirez

Results at Any Cost

A Shared Tactical Preference

Sources