Blended Legacies: Vietnamese and Other Foreign Influences on the FARC-EP

Abstract

The article analyzes the phenomenon of blended legacies. It is defined as the local synthesis of foreign guerrilla warfare traditions that the FARC-EP adopted to gain the advantage in their own war. We focus on Vietnamese influence within FARC-EP. The text tracks three types of connections between the FARC-EP and the guerrilla warfare legacies: first, early influence of Vietnamese and Maoist guerrilla political, strategic and tactical literature, as well as Soviet influence through the Colombian Communist Party; second, training in Vietnamese methods from secondary and tertiary parties, particularly instruction the M-19 and ELN received in Cuba and El Salvador respectively that they later passed on to the FARC-EP; and third, direct training the FARC-EP received in Vietnam in 1990. The text also demonstrates the local synthesis through an analysis of the FARC-EP special forces development, as well as their use of improvised explosives.