American Killed in Colombia

The bullet-riddled bodies of an American government contract worker and a Colombian soldier were found at the scene of a plane crash Friday as an intensive search-and-rescue operation continued for three other American crew members feared kidnapped by leftist rebels, Colombian and U.S. authorities said.

Colombian investigators said they found the two bodies near the wreckage of a U.S. government single-engine Cessna Caravan 208 that suffered a mechanical failure and crashed Thursday in rebel-held territory in southern Colombia during a joint Colombian-U.S. mission.

Pentagon officials in Washington said the four Americans were civilians working under contract for the U.S. Southern Command, which oversees military operations in Latin America. Their mission was unclear, but Colombian officials said it was an intelligence-gathering operation.

Defense Department contract workers in Colombia perform a variety of tasks, including maintenance of radar facilities at a military base in the southern town of Larandia, the destination of the plane. Defense contractors also train Colombians to fly and maintain helicopters and other U.S.-donated equipment.

“It was a Southern Command asset,” a Pentagon official said of the downed plane.

If the Americans were kidnapped or killed by FARC rebels, it would mark the first time that the group had committed such serious acts against U.S. government employees, leading the U.S. and Colombian governments into unknown territory.

The two found dead “had various bullet impacts in different places on their bodies,” said Alonso Velasquez, the regional director for the Colombian attorney general’s office, which is overseeing the investigation. Although the bodies had yet to be forensically examined, Colombian military officials said the men had been executed with shots to the head and chest.

President Alvaro Uribe, who has stepped up attacks against the guerrillas, called the shootings acts of murder. He said he regretted the deaths of “two people aboard the plane -- a sergeant in our army and an American citizen -- whose murders have been confirmed in the south of the country.”

The U.S. State Department said late Friday that it had “reliable reports” that the three other Americans had been kidnapped by rebels belonging to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC for its Spanish initials.

A Colombian source who spoke on condition of anonymity said local farmers testified to seeing the other Americans being led away from the crash by FARC fighters, who they said also removed equipment and personal belongings from the plane.

FARC dominates the region where the plane crashed, near a town called Puerto Rico in southern Colombia about 220 miles south of Bogota, the capital. FARC units in the area are among the most violent and well armed of the 18,000-member rebel army.

The FARC’s 13th Front, which operates in the region under the command of a top-ranking guerrilla leader who goes by the name of Fabian Ramirez, last year kidnapped presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt. FARC had issued no statement on the crash as of Friday.

“Farmers told us that the guerrillas were armed and that they took the men away. The men were alive,” the Colombian source said. “Nothing moves in that area -- not a leaf or a river -- without the permission of” the guerrillas.

The rebels have kidnapped 51 U.S. citizens since 1992, killing 10. Most had both U.S. and Colombian citizenship, but a FARC unit killed three American activists in 1999 who were helping an indigenous group protest against oil exploration by Los Angeles-based Occidental Petroleum. U.S. Embassy officials declined to confirm that the three aboard the plane were kidnapped, but said they had seen news reports that the Americans had been captured “by one of the terrorist groups.”

“If those reports prove to be true, we’d consider this kidnapping a grave crime and would demand their immediate safe release,” an embassy official said.

FARC has announced a policy of kidnapping prominent Colombians to force the government to release an estimated 3,000 imprisoned guerrillas in return for the captives’ freedom. Recently, FARC told some local leaders that it was planning to begin seizing foreigners because the Colombian government had not responded to the pressure for an exchange.

U.S. Embassy officials said the Colombian government has begun a “massive search-and-rescue” operation, aided by embassy personnel. The Colombian military arrived on the scene of the crash 30 minutes after the pilot reported engine trouble.

Colombian military officials reported fierce fighting in the region Friday, and four Colombian soldiers were wounded by mines.

The United States has for now ruled out mounting a rescue operation using Special Forces in Colombia to provide training to Colombian military officials, a U.S. official said. More than 70 Green Berets are in the northeastern province of Arauca to improve Colombian military protection of an oil pipeline. Other U.S. Special Forces are providing training to Colombian military units to fight narcotics, improve intelligence and train for reconnaissance missions.

However, U.S. analysts said the U.S. might mount a rescue operation if FARC managed to escape with the men.

“On a small scale, absolutely, there would be operations to get these guys out,” said Adam Isacson, Colombia specialist for the Center for International Policy, a left-of-center Washington think tank.

Friday’s events were the latest sign that the U.S. is swiftly becoming deeply involved in Colombia’s 40-year-old conflict. The war pits the Colombian government and right-wing fighters from an illegal paramilitary army against the FARC and other leftist groups.

Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the U.S. has shed restrictions that limited U.S. aid to fighting narcotics. Colombia produces 90% of the cocaine sold on U.S. streets and most of the heroin sold on the East Coast.

The U.S. has provided nearly $2 billion in aid in the last few years, including UH-60 Blackhawk and Huey helicopters that can now be used to transport troops to fight guerrillas.

U.S. contract workers are involved in nearly every facet of the conflict, and have long been among those at greatest risk.

The State Department contracts with Virginia-based DynCorp to do most of the spraying of Colombia’s coca crops, which are concentrated in the south. Eight DynCorp employees, including three Americans, have been killed since 1995, most of them in accidental crashes.

U.S. citizens -- many of them crop-duster pilots seeking DynCorp’s $100,000-a-year salaries -- roar low over jewel-green coca fields in spray planes, frequently taking hits from guerrillas who rely on the illicit crop as a source of income. None have been shot down.

DynCorp also hires foreign-born pilots to fly 32 UH-1N Huey helicopters to transport the Colombian army’s anti-narcotics troops. A Huey piloted by a Peruvian-born employee was shot down by rebels in January 2002, but the contract workers aboard escaped unharmed. Six Colombian police were killed in the rescue operation.

There is a cap of 400 civilian contract workers allowed to work in Colombia at any one time. U.S. officials have maintained that the level hovers between 250 to 300 U.S. civilians, but they do not count foreign-born contract workers employed by the U.S. government.

Defense Department contractors have had a lower profile because their work does not usually bring them into direct contact with guerrillas. A few years ago, guerrillas fired homemade mortar rounds at defense contractors working at a radar station in Larandia, but the rounds fell several hundred yards short.

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Times staff writer Greg Miller in Washington contributed to this report.