In 1978 the primary terrorist groups were FARC (Communist Revolutionary Armed Forces) and the M-19; they had a combined total of 19 squadrons or fronts having approximately 1,800 members. Today, the FARC has approximately 5,000 members. In 1985 these political terrorist groups united with the major Colombian narcotics traffickers to form the National Terrorist Coordinator. This group aims to obtain power over the country by combining political and military action based on terrorism and mobilizing the masses to attain political, economic, social, and military destabilization of the country. The final phase is to produce general insurrection. Assassinations and kidnappings of public figures, bombings, and attacks on the media are the primary terrorist tactics. A counterterrorist strategy should include laws which punish terrorists and their collaborators, an intelligence system that produces a rapid and expeditious acquisition of information, and the creation of a unit that will coordinate intelligence efforts and the timely diffusion of information. The forces which battle terrorism should be centralized. There should be no yielding to terrorist extortion, and the government must aim at the achievement of economic justice to reduce the appeal of terrorist propaganda.