Story of the Day: Americans Long Held Hostage in Colombia, MSM Snores

Did you know three American citizens are being held hostage in the jungles of Colombia for four years running?

If not, don't feel bad. While the story popped up sporadically in alternative media here and in both big (BBC) and more alternative (The Guardian) media in the U.K., it has largely received the cold shoulder from the U.S. mainstream press.

It's hard to imagine the same lack of media interest if a Democratic president sat in the White House - you know, someone from the "Mommy Party." But, of course, a Republican president - especially a self-proclaimed "war president" whose number one priority is the "war on terror" - gets a free pass when U.S. hostages are held captive on his watch. No double standard there.

Further indication of the short shrift this story still receives here? Today, our Paper of Record, The New York Times, places it in the world briefing section at the bottom of page A8 - a 106-word, four-sentence blurb.

Moreover, do a little digging and you realize the Bush administration and its corporate mercenaries (I'm being literal here, think Blackwater) are the direct beneficiaries of the U.S. media's hands-off approach to this hostage saga. Also highlighting the endlessly frustrating tendencies of our Paper of Record, the following is from a 2004 New York Times article (no doubt buried in its own pages) that was excerpted in CorpWatch:

After their tiny plane crashed deep in the jungles of southern Colombia, three American civilians on a mission to search for cocaine labs, drug planes and, occasionally, guerrilla units were taken hostage by Marxist rebels.

A year later, the men's families say the captives have been all but forgotten. Some say that is the way American officials and the men's employers want it to be.

The three Americans -- Marc Gonsalves, Keith Stansell and Thomas Howes -- worked cloaked in secrecy for two subsidiaries of Northrop Grumman, the huge military contractor, in an arrangement used increasingly by the United States government in conflict zones from Colombia to Afghanistan.

The men's families and critics of American policy here say the case sheds light on a shadowy world of secret operations that employ private contractors in deals that make it easy to skirt public scrutiny and for all to wash their hands if something goes wrong.

"My complaint about use of private contractors is their ability to fly under the radar and avoid any accountability," Representative Jan Schakowsky, an Illinois Democrat, said. "Now we're finding out that because of their low profile, and so little scrutiny, they are able to avoid liability or responsibility for these individuals."

American officials and executives at Northrop Grumman bristle at the suggestion that they have not done all they can to secure freedom for the men. Diplomats say there is probably little that they can do.

[...]

The number of Americans working in Colombia for private contractors has nearly doubled in two years to 400, the congressional limit. Hundreds more are citizens of Colombia and other countries. American law also allows up to 400 military officials in Colombia.

There are now two dozen American companies here, with the contracts for antidrug programs worth $178 million last year. They spray coca fields, operate eavesdropping devices, organize alternative development programs, repair airplanes, assess intelligence and advise the Colombian Defense Ministry.

[...]

American officials, here and elsewhere, say using contractors saves money, provides essential services and specialists and frees military forces that are already stretched thin. They also say the three men taken captive were working within the legal limits set by the Congress.

But critics say that for American policy makers, the political risks surrounding Washington's deepening involvement in Colombia's conflict made using contractors preferable to placing American forces or intelligence officers in similar jeopardy.

[...]

As for those taken captive, the FARC is using them as bargaining chips for a prisoner exchange and has hidden them well. Though American forces tracked the Americans after their capture, the trail has since been lost.

"The intelligence picture has, candidly, dried up," General James Hill, commander of American forces in Latin America, told a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on Oct. 29. "We get very little intelligence on them. We do not know exactly where they are."

What little is known of their fate comes from "Held Hostage in Colombia," a documentary by two American producers, Victoria Bruce and Karin Hayes, featuring interviews with the hostages conducted by a Colombian journalist, Jorge Enrique Botero.

"I don't want more deaths," Mr. Stansell, sitting with his fellow crew members as armed guerrillas stood by, said in the documentary, excerpts of which were shown on "60 Minutes II." "I don't want to die. I don't want anybody dying trying to get me out of here."

The families are demanding negotiations to secure the release of the captives, but American policy forbids talks with the FARC, which the State Department has labeled a terrorist group.

"The Americans are truly making no effort to get them out," said a Western diplomat. "The Americans could be there 10 years."

Ten years. But fortunately for the Bush administration, our media continues to look the other way. Maybe the U.S. hostages should root for a Democratic victory in '08.

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Americans Long Held Hostage in Colombia, MSM Snores