Colombia’s Child Recruitment Crisis: A Failure of Government and a Threat to Sovereignty

For over half a century, Colombia has wrestled with internal conflict where leftist guerrillas, right-wing paramilitaries, and criminal cartels vie for power and control. But amid this chaotic battlefield, the newest victims are the country’s own children—recruited as young as nine years old to fuel illegal drug operations. This crisis exposes a government stretched thin and highlights the broader consequences of weak state control that echo far beyond Colombia’s borders. Why Has Colombia Failed Its Children—and What Does That Mean for America? The Colombian government signed a historic peace deal with FARC in 2016, yet dissident factions rejected peace and...