The United States were willing to unilaterally rescue three military contractors who were held in Colombia by the FARC between 2003 and 2008, a WikiLeaks cable released by the magazine Semana has shown.
According to the magazine, Washington counted on the support of then-President Alvaro Uribe if it decided to carry out its own military operation.
William Wood, who was the U.S. ambassador to Bogota until 2007, wrote to Washington that Uribe “would allow a unilateral attempt of the United States to release the hostages.”
A unilateral rescue attempt was justified because of the “incapacity of the Colombian army to carry out a release operation,” the ambassador wrote.
Colombia’s then-Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos promised the U.S. to keep Washington in the loop if the Colombian armed forces were planning any type of rescue operation involving the three American citizens.
The three Americans, Marc Gonsalves, Thomas Howes and Keith Stansell were eventually rescued by the Colombian military in July 2008 together with French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt and 11 members of the Colombian security forces.