#Television: National Geographic Documentary on Pablo Escobar of Colombia

I watched a documentary on National Geographic on Pablo Escobar, a drug-lord from Colombia in the Investigates series. There are several such videos on YouTube and I am not able to locate the exact one which I watched on TV, but here is one pretty close and may be even better: 

Nat Geo Investigates: Hunting Pablo Escobar

Nat Geo website mentions: "In the cocaine capital of the world, violence is the law. One man, more than any other, holds the country in a bloody death grip Pablo Escobar, the worlds most notorious drug-baron. With US support Colombias President fights back, but Escobar is too strong. In a desperate bid to bring peace, the President resorts to offering a tempting deal if the drug-lord serves just a few years, hell emerge with a clean slate. Escobar surrenders, but his luxurious prison offers him a safe place to keep running his business as usual, and even commit murder. When the government decides to act, after a year of humiliation, Escobar simply walks past the guards and disappears. An elite Colombian force, backed by top-secret US military technology, finally get their man following one of the biggest manhunts in history."

After watching the documentary, the most interesting thing I could notice was the state of total "defiance" in Pablo Escobar. He did not fear the cops, he did not fear the government, he did not fear the President of the country and he did not even fear the American troops who went down there to eliminate him. I wonder how could be have such kind of absolute defiance and fearlessness in him. 

Another interesting aspect was how Pablo helped his local community and supported the poor and needy people in the time of their need. Pablo was also a "family man" and he loved his family immensely; including his wife, children and his sister. Since he loved his family too much, government tried to use that against him and indeed in the end his weakness for his family was exploited in tracking him down and killing him. 

I watched that in the end, the police and armed forces were able to track him down by putting a "trap" for him by forcing him to call up his son and his family who were kept captives by the police. He talked to his son for a long time over phone, answering questions which were supposed to go to the press; without a hint that due to the phone call he was being tracked down by the police. I don't think there was something wrong in it, may be even from ethical point of view, if I think of the menace he had become and the number of lives lost due to his bombings and shootings. 

Still, as the documentary showed in the end; when Pablo Escobar was killed, his rival groups soon took up the position vacated by his group and Colombia still produced 75% of coke supplied illegally into the US. Then the question rises that what was really gained by killing him? It tells that often the war is too difficult to be won and the only consolation is the occasional small battles that can be won. 

- Rahul Tiwary