The purpose of Plan Columbia was to deal with the increased cultivation and illegal activity associated with that cultivation concerning narco trafficking in Columbia.

Beers earned a bachelor’s degree from Dartmouth College and a master’s degree from the University of Michigan. Beers was appointed as Under Secretary by President Barack Obama on June 19 2009. He entered the Foreign Service in 1971 and transferred to the Civil Service in 1983.

Prior to the 2008 election Beers was president of the National Security Network a Washington D. -based foreign policy think tank he founded in 2006 to foster discussion of progressive national security ideas around the country and an Adjunct Lecturer at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. NPPD collaborates with all levels of government the private sector non-government organizations and international bodies to prevent respond to and mitigate threats to U.