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Throughout the past few decades, the interrelated problems of narcotics trafficking
and insurgency have constantly afflicted Peruvian stability. Two major competing
groups have historically perpetrated most of the threat. In its heyday in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the larger Sendero
Luminoso (SL), or “Shining Path,” once possessed a formidable force of roughly
5,000 guerillas. In sharp contrast,
the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA) of that era maintained a mere
force of 100 to 150 fighters. Owing mostly to desertions and counterterrorist
measures by the Peruvian government, the numbers of both have declined drastically
over the last 10 years. The U.S. State Department now estimates the Sendero’s
numbers to be around 200, though recent developments have prompted fears of
the group’s resurgence.
The Sendero Luminoso formed as a splinter group of the Communist Party of Peru,
based ideologically on the writings of Marxist scholar José Carlos Mariátegui,
and imbued with a Maoist ethos from its founder, Abimael Guzmán, a professor
of philosophy at the University of Huamanga in the southern Andean department
of Ayacucho. This university connection provided the movement with a convenient
apparatus for recruitment, which targeted easily impressionable students of
the rural university.
Once enlisted by voluntary or coercive means, recruits underwent a strict,
programmatic indoctrination. Even before it seized any political control, the
group had already adopted personality cult around Guzmán, who had visited China
during the Maoist Great Cultural Revolution. Guzmán claimed to espouse a state
of permanent revolution, demanding no less than the complete overthrow of existing
Hispanic social structures and their replacement with a socialist system run
by indigenous races.
While preparations commenced in the early 1960s, the Maoist model of insurgency
adopted by the group did not progress into an armed conflict until 1980. During
the 17-year incubation period, Sendero established a network of supporters and
guerilla fighters in relatively secluded areas. Beginning in 1980, the movement
launched attacks on areas of agricultural production in the central Andes, the
Upper Huallaga Valley (UHV), and the southern department of Puno, in an attempt
to sever urban areas from their sustenance in Peru’s periphery. In the process,
the group ousted or murdered local government officials and assumed their functions.
In this early strategy of rural revolution, the Sendero clashed most frequently
with the very poor indigenous populations whose interests it claimed to advance.
In areas within its sphere of influence, the group forced farmers to reduce
production to subsistence levels and destroyed modern farm equipment. Beyond
targeting farm production, the Sendero has imposed puritanical regulations on
the populace by outlawing fiestas, prohibiting drinking, and terrorizing peasants
that have turned to trading and selling. Although some the group’s activities,
such as its public executions of corrupt officials, have followed the standard
Maoist doctrine of winning hearts and minds, most of its efforts reflect a simpler
strategy of terrorizing local populations into submission. In response, many
peasants in more prosperous areas, such as the Mantaro Valley in the central
Andes, have cooperated with government forces and formed civil defense patrols
to resist Sendero control.
Despite the long record of intimidation and harassment, not all of the Sendero’s
relations with the peasantry have been hostile. Its occupation of the UHV represents
its most successful venture, which it has guarded jealously from MRTA influence.
The climate and soil of the region are ideally suited for coca production, and
the Sendero has profited from payments from many of the 300,000 coca growers,
whom they have protected from the government’s crop eradication efforts. The
group has also exploited the trafficking end of the cocaine industry for funds
by controlling airstrips and charging fees for safe passage. The remainder
of the Sendero’s financing comes from robberies and a “war tax” on local businesses
and individuals. These activities, combined with the support of radical middle
class intellectuals, have afforded the group an advantageous autonomy from foreign
sponsorship.
Drug traffickers assist the Sendero in procurement of weapons and materiel
for its “people’s war.” While it can be argued that the group engages in selective
violence for political ends as opposed to military ends, its diverse assortment
of political enemies has spawned an equally diverse array of targets. These
range from government officials and foreign diplomats to business owners, and
include other leftists whose social work they regard as a revisionist betrayal
of their revolutionary ideals. The U.S. State Department estimates that since
1980, roughly 30,000 deaths can be attributed to the Sendero Luminoso.
Sendero methods consist mainly of car bombings and assassinations, as well
as other human rights abuses such as torture and forcible conscription. For
some time in the 1980s, most of these actions went unchecked because of the
poor preparation and poor coordination of police and military forces. The low-paid
police forces were highly politicized, and rivalries with the army placed serious
limitations on its counternarcotics capabilities. The military was tailored
more for conventional war against Chile and Ecuador, which left them ill-prepared
to contend with the Sendero’s guerilla tactics. Even a successful 1983 counterinsurgency
campaign in Ayacucho and Andahuaylas only served to scatter and augment guerilla
operations in other areas. The election of Alberto Fujimori in 1990 corresponded
with a rise in incidences of urban violence by the Sendero, mainly in Lima shantytowns.
Shortly after Fujimori’s suspension of the Peruvian constitution in 1992, the
group perpetrated its single most destructive act by setting off two car bombs
in the busy Lima district of Miraflores.
Soon thereafter, however, government forces apprehended Guzmán. This marked
the beginning of the group’s rapid decline, which was accelerated by Guzmán’s
1993 peace proposal from prison. Subsequently, the Sendero split into two factions:
one advocated Guzmán’s peace deal and the other, led by Oscar Ramirez Durand,
continued the armed struggle. The capture of Ramirez Durand in 1999 marked
the culmination of the severe leadership problems that have plagued the Sendero
since 1992.
In spite of these, recent actions attributed to the Sendero have hinted at
the revival of the group’s operations. Stimulated by closer ties to a booming
Peruvian coca industry as well as an expanding market for opium poppies, the
group has stepped up recruiting in the UHV and other rural areas. Other analyses
by Peruvian intelligence speculate that the Sendero was waiting for an opportunity
to take advantage of political and economic instability in the wake of Fujimori’s
resignation. In March of this year, Peruvian intelligence blamed the Sendero
for a bombing attack near the American Embassy in Lima, which occurred three
days before a scheduled visit by President George W. Bush.
To exacerbate the situation, the reformist agenda of current President Alejandro
Toledo has drawn much ire from entrenched military interests. While Fujimori’s
administration had adopted a hands-off approach to the military, Toledo has
tried to root out corruption and reduce military budgets. These changes have
lowered morale among military personnel, and may complicate the counterinsurgency
effort as a result. Thus, the outlook for Peru and its potentially intensifying
struggle for security seems uncertain at best. Bush’s pledge in March for a
renewed U.S. commitment to combating narco-terrorism may be overshadowed by
ominous evidence of a mounting Sendero threat, and a government that shows signs
of being increasingly ill-prepared to manage it.
References
Daniel W. Fitz-Simons, “Sendero Luminoso: Case study in insurgency,” Paremeters,
Volume 23, Issue 2, Summer 1993.
Carlos Reyna Izaguirre, “Shining Path in the 21st Century: Actors
in search of a new script,” NACLA Report on the Americas, Volume 30,
Issue 1, July/Aug. 1996.
“Lima blast blamed on Shining Path,” BBC Online, April 1, 2002.
Robert B. Kent, “Geographical Dimensions of the Shining Path Insurgency in
Peru,” Geographical Review, Volume 83, Issue 4, Oct. 1993.
David Scott Palmer, “Peru, the Drug Business, and the Shining Path: Between
Scylla and Charybdis?” Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs,
Volume 34, Issue 3 (Autumn 1992).
“Peru’s violent past,” BBC Online, March 21, 2002.
United States Department of State, Patterns of Global Terrorism 2001,
April 2002.
Scott Wilson, “Morale crisis in Peru's army could let guerrillas regroup,”
The Washington Post, June 13, 2002.
Scott Wilson, “Peru fears reemergence of violent rebels,” The Washington
Post, Dec. 10, 2001.
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