!Por la Revolución de las Ideas!
ABOARD A MILIRARY AIRCRAFT, April 23,
2012 - Latin America figures prominently in the Pentagon's new defense
strategy as an increasingly capable region that shares
common challenges with the United States, Defense Secretary Leon E.
Panetta said today.
Panetta is on his first trip to South America as defense secretary with
visits planned in Colombia, Brazil and Chile. He has visited the region
before as CIA director, as a member of Congress and as
chief of staff to former President Bill Clinton.
One goal of the defense strategy, Panetta said, is to build innovative
partnerships and alliances that will strengthen relationships in places
like Europe, Africa and Latin America.
"The purpose of this trip is to engage in consultations with a number of
our partners in this part of the world, trying to promote innovative
security partnerships in the region," he told reporters
traveling with him.
Latin America is a key region, the secretary added. Its countries are
neighbors in this hemisphere "and we face some common challenges," he
said.
Among those challenges are narcotics trafficking and its spread to
Africa, terrorism, cyber security, and the ability to provide
humanitarian assistance, he said.
"One of the things these countries are doing is developing their own
regional security [as well as] doing outreach with their security
development," Panetta said. "So that's something we want to
review and try to help them with."
Partnerships in the region will include joint training, exercises, technology sharing and other kinds of assistance.
On this trip, the secretary said, the focus will be on old and new partners.
"I will be in Colombia where we have worked for a long period of time,
even since I was in the Congress, trying to provide assistance to them,
particularly with regard to narcotrafficking," Panetta
said, going after the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarios de Colombia, or
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, called the FARC.
"Colombia, to its credit, has done a tremendous job in going after the
FARC," he added, which at one point numbered 20,000, but now has about
8,000 members.
Many countries in the region look to Colombia for lessons learned over a decade, he said.
In the emerging power of Brazil, Panetta said, "I want to build on the
U.S.-Brazil Defense Cooperative Dialog" that President Barack Obama and
Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff agreed this month to
commence.
There, he said, "We'll be looking at defense trade, scientific research,
technology sharing, logistics cooperation and cyber security."
The secretary then will visit Chile, which Panetta said is "doing a
great job in developing regional security. We'll get a chance to see
some of their exercises up close and their developing
capabilities."
During this trip, Panetta added, "we'll really try to develop a key part
of our new defense strategy, which is to ... reinforce some very
innovative partnerships in a very important region of the
world that represents a key security interest for the United States."
By Cheryl Pellerin
American Forces Press Service
Published on latribunacolus.com by latribunacolus.com Press Service
