The topic of this article should come as no surprise, save for possibly the expansive tentacles that the FARC is thought to have. The FARC’s inception in Colombia in 1964 was to battle the government for the rights of the peasant population, to create an agrarian society. Along the way, the group morphed into a more criminal element, conducting extortion campaigns and kidnappings for ransom to raise funds to purchase weaponry and to fuel its emerging drug trade.

The FARC has been directly linked to the profits of a cargo airline, hotels, a beer distribution company, ranches (preceding according to AP), gold mines (preceding according to El Tiempo), and upward of “a thousand legitimate businesses,” including the largest messenger services and over 300 restaurants (source). The group has access to cocaine labs, anti-personnel mines, unlimited stolen vehicles, over 500 motorbikes, and explosives. Further, the group has substantial resources, to include high speed boats, mentioned in the article, to move weaponry throughout the Western Hemisphere. In fact, the FARC may have traded arms from other insurgencies ? including in El Salvador and Honduras ? for drugs. Investigations are on going.