If I might ask a question regarding Escobar as it relates to Americans, while we're on the subject; How well known was it to Americans what was happening in Colombia? I was around the age of 10 when he was finally killed, and although I recall hearing the usual war on drugs propaganda(Just Say No!), I don't recall hearing anything about Escobar or our involvement in Colombia.
I think inaccuracies emerge mostly in the form of what the show left out, rather than direct inaccuracies in the presented narrative. This is somewhat understandable, given that Narcos is a show about the drug cartels, and not so much general Colombian history. Still, there are some events and groups that are nice to know about in order to get the full context of what was going on in Colombia at the time, and extremely interesting in their own right. Some miscellaneous things that come to mind.
Where the heck is FARC?
The most glaring omission is the complete lack of FARC's presence. FARC has always been the biggest communist guerrilla group in Colombia, to whom M-19 was second to; but since their power in the '80s was mostly in the countryside, it makes sense that the show chose to focus on M-19 as "the" communists, since they were the ones with much more presence in the urban areas.
MAS: Way more than just a cartel
Another glaring omission is the lack of discussion around how the Medellin Cartel intersected with legitimate enterprises and the Colombian business elite. I believe it is in Episode 2 that Escobar and his buddies form Death to Kidnappers (MAS) in order to rescue the Ochoa brothers' sister from M-19; but what the show left out was the fact that MAS was also formed in conjunction with a wider swathe of Medellin elites, ranging from emerald miners to cattle ranchers to US oil corporation officials, and served as a violent repressive apparatus against both the armed left (FARC, M-19) and unarmed activists (trade unionists, community organizers, peasant associations).
MAS would also cultivate close ties with the military; in 1983, the Colombia Procurator General released an investigative report on MAS that showed that 59 out of 163 identified members of MAS were active-duty military personnel (its also worth noting that many of these men had received training by the US via the School of the Americas). Understanding these kinds of paramilitary formations is very important to understanding Colombian politics and economics, because these formations would be widely replicated across the country as an effective way to leverage "dirty-war" tactics against communist insurgents, and to protect and expand business interests .
Where are the Castano brothers?
A very bizarre omission is the absence of Fidel Castano and his brothers. Fidel Castano was a security chief early on with the Medellin Cartel as well as a leader of several paramilitary groups, and he plays a very key role in hunting down and killing Pablo Escobar after Escobar's escape from "prison". It is very confusing to me why he is missing from Season 1, and makes me worried about how much they are going to gloss over in Season 2, with regards to what the US and Colombian governments actually do to eventually find and kill Escobar. I won't go into that, though, since it might spoil Season 2.
M-19, not as shabby as they seemed
The show makes it seem like M-19 was betrayed and killed after the Palace Siege (which actually happened, although it is highly unclear whether Escobar had anything to do with it, and whether there was any actual cooperation between the Medellin Cartel and M-19); but in reality, M-19 would remain strong enough to be part of a constitutional reform process that saw them fully demobilize in 1989 in order to play a role in creating the new constitution, which would become finalized in 1991.
The US War on Drugs: Bigger, but Questionable
I don't feel like the show did a very good job of visualizing the full extent of US engagement in the context of the drug war in the late '80s and early '90s; seems like the only Americans in Colombia were the two DEA agents, the Army guy, and the CIA guy. But in reality, there was a lot going on: the "Andean Initiative" announced in 1989 by George H.W. Bush sent $2.2 billion over five years to Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia; 1/4 of CIA activities in Latin America were around counter-narcotics in 1989, and US Army Special Forces were training Colombian security forces in counter-narcotics.
It is, however, questionable how much of US operations in Colombia were around actually combating narco-traffickers; for example, a massive military-intelligence reorganization plan launched in 1991 based on recommendations by US advisers was entirely about fighting communists, and didn't mention drugs at all, and in fact formalized (in a covert manner) existing relationships between narco-backed death squads and the military for the purpose of anti-communist counter-insurgency. The 1996 Human Rights Watch report on the military-paramilitary reorganization is a great read on this subject.
Sources:
Aviles, William. Global Capitalism, Democracy, and Civil-Military Relations in Colombia. State University of New York Press. 2006.
Hristov, Jasmin. Blood and Capital: The Paramilitarization of Colombia. Ohio University Press. 2009.
Hristov, Jasmin. Paramilitarism and Neoliberalism: Violent Systems of Capital Accumulation in Colombia and Beyond. Pluto Press. 2014.
Human Rights Watch. Colombia’s Killer Networks: The Military-Paramilitary Partnership and the United States. 1996.
Stokes, Doug. America’s Other War: Terrorizing Colombia. Zed Books. 2005.
I asked this not too long ago and received a reply
I can't see any accuracy in the part of the "palacio de justicia" http://www.verdadabierta.com/victimas-seccion/los-resistentes/668-especial-la-vida-por-justicia/5778-el-precio-por-la-verdad-del-holocausto