FIDEL

To accuse Hugo Chavez, the leader of the Bolivarian Revolution, of inciting a war against the people of Colombia and unleash an arms race, to portray him as the mastermind and promoter of drug trafficking, and accuse him of repressing the freedom of expression, violating human rights and other similar misdeeds is a repugnant and cynical action, as everything else that the empire has done, still does and promotes. We can neither ever forget nor stop reiterating realities. Objective and well-reasoned truth is the most important weapon with which we should ceaselessly hammer into the conscience of peoples.

THE THIRD FRONT, AGAIN

Throughout Latin America and much of the rest of the world, the coup in Honduras is seen as a dangerous example of what the imperial strategists are plotting for the region. As one country after another votes in leftist parties—the latest example is Uruguay, where a former guerrilla leader who spent 14 years in prison was just elected president—the U.S. is expanding its military bases in the region. It may still try to cover its dirty deeds with democratic phrase-mongering, but actions speak louder than words.

HONDURAS COUP ELECTION

The coup and its leaders, as well as their fake elections, are the target of international condemnation. So why is the Obama Administration — after making a strong stand against the coup early on — letting the coup leaders get away with all of this? On the one hand, there’s the Lanny Davis Effect: The good friend of current Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is also a paid lobbyist for the golpistas. On the other hand, there’s the Jim DeMint Effect: The far-right knuckledragging Senator from South Carolina, who of course just loves the bloody-handed golpistas, has been holding key Obama Administration nominations hostage as a means to keep the White House from intervening effectively against the coup.

For more on what’s been happening in Honduras, see RAJ of Honduras Coup 2009’s brilliant summation.

A MEME FOR THE PLAN COLOMBIA

Paul Escobar said... You can be justified in questioning Chavez's evaluation of these men. That's a historical debate.

But Boz did something really despicable in his post: He used Chavez's rhetoric about historical figures to imply Venezuela was the source of aggression.

He calls Chavez's praise for a Palestinian terrorist: "a disturbing sign".

Meanwhile, Colombia is the only Lat-Am nation that has recently used its military to violate a neighbours territory. It's a nation that routinely massacres IT'S OWN citizens, through the army, paramilitaries, & insurgents.

According to Boz, none of this "concerns the analysts". The tunnel vision is astounding.

COLOMBIA BASE AGREEMENT

it has drawn heavy criticism from many Latin American leaders, most notably Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, but also Evo Morels of Bolivia, Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua, and Rafael Correa of Ecuador among others.

---

to help the US and Colombian governments carry out their war on drugs, “narco-terrorism”, and whatever else may come.

---

the growing number of US troops in the Latin America (the US Fourth Fleet was reactivated in the Caribbean by Bush II after a 40-year plus hiatus) has the possibility of sparking a regional war.

---

The US is literally encircling Venezuela with military bases and a naval fleet.

---

Venezuela is the fourth largest petroleum producer in the world and is home to reserves rivaling and maybe surpassing that of Saudi Arabia.

---

Is Chavez paranoid

---

a look to the historical context of the situation will prove illuminating.

---

In 2002 a coup took place

---

the people of Venezuela forced the coup plotters to reinstate Chavez,

---

the US government gave implicit if not explicit support to the coup.

In 2003 the US, after a years long process of encircling and weakening Iraq, invaded and occupied that oil-rich country and installed a government and neo-liberal economic framework more to its liking.

in 2008 the Colombian military launched a cross border raid into Ecuador to strike at a alledged FARC base, a move that was roundly condemned by every nation in Latin America and the OAS

the Colombian government is a recipient of massive amounts of US military aid, receiving over 6 billion dollars in the past decade under the auspices of Plan Colombia. This puts they country third behind Israel and Egypt

Colombia is the world’s largest producer of cocaine.

that there is no military solution to the problem.

While eradicating the coca crops of poor framers and supporting right-wing paramilitaries has produced a situation where human rights abuses are continually placing Colombia among the worst offenders in the Western Hemisphere,

it has done next to nothing to stop the flow of cocaine coming from the country.

If the US was serious about addressing the problem it would have to recognize that while Colombia may be the largest supplier of the drug, it is the US that is the largest consumer. Following the Plan Colombia logic the US military should be engaged in operations in the US to eradicate cocaine users on a similar scale.

incidentally it is worth noting that poppy production, later processed into opium and heroin, has sky rocketed in Afghanistan since the US invaded and occupied that country. After being severely reduced under the Taliban regime, Afghanistan now accounts for over 80% of world production of poppy.

---

The message from the region is loud and clear: Yankees, take your guns and economic models and go home! We are ready and willing to deal with you on fair and equitable terms, but the days of imposing your will over ours have come to an end.

VENEZUELA ARMS

clipped from: wire.antiwar.com

President Hugo Chavez is hailing the forthcoming arrival of 300 Russian-made tanks and armored vehicles, and urging civilians to join government-organized militias to be ready to defend Venezuela from a foreign invasion.

The military acquisitions, coupled with weapons purchases among South American nations including Brazil and Ecuador, have raised concerns of an arms race in the region.

Venezuela must prepare for a possible armed conflict, Chavez said, because the United States and Colombia could attack. He claims U.S. "imperialists" want to undermine his "Bolivarian Revolution," a political movement named after 19th-century independence hero Simon Bolivar.

USA HAS PROBLEM WITH BRAZIL

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Brazil’s president, is set to receive Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, here on Monday

is drawing criticism from lawmakers and former diplomats here and in the United States, who say it could undercut Western efforts to press Iran on its nuclear program, and consequently chill Brazil’s relations with the United States

Brazilian officials say the goal of the visit is to strengthen commercial ties between the two countries and help bring peace to the Middle East.

said Michael Shifter, vice president of the Inter-American Dialogue, a policy research group in Washington. “And part of this has to do with Brazil sending a message to Washington that it will deal whomever it wants to deal with.”

“This state visit is a gross error, a terrible mistake,” said Representative Eliot L. Engel, Democrat of New York, chairman of the House Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere. “He is illegitimate with his own people, and Brazil is now going to give him the air of legitimacy at a time when the world is trying to figure out how to prevent Iran from having nuclear weapons.

Relations between the United States and Brazil were already tense after Mr. da Silva’s government criticized the United States over its handling of the crisis in Honduras and increasing its military presence in Colombia.

Ian C. Kelly, a State Department spokesman, said Thursday. “We would hope that Brazil would play a constructive role in trying to get Iran to do the right thing and fulfill its international obligations.”

But Mr. Amorim made clear that Brazil did not see its role as carrying water for the proposed agreement for Iran to export most of its enriched uranium for processing into nuclear fuel.

Since his election in 2002, Mr. da Silva has sought to cement Brazil’s dominance as Latin America’s economic and diplomatic leader, using its economic might to raise Brazil’s foreign-policy profile.

Brazil is no stranger to the region. Its national oil company, Petrobras, is helping Iran develop its oil fields and the two countries did about $2 billion in trade in 2007, mostly in Brazilian exports of food to Iran, Mr. Amorim said.

USA OPENS A SOUTH AMERICAN FRONT

clipped from: www.independent.co.uk

The United States is massively building up its potential for nuclear and non-nuclear strikes in Latin America and the Caribbean by acquiring unprecedented freedom of action in seven new military, naval and air bases in Colombia.

President Rafael Correa, for instance, has refused to prolong the US armed presence in Ecuado

Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, who has not forgotten that US officers were present in government offices in Caracas in 2002 when he was briefly overthrown...warned this month that the bases agreement could mean the possibility of war with Colombia.

President Evo Morales of Bolivia called for the outlawing of foreign military bases in the region.

President Manuel Zelaya of Honduras, overthrown in a military coup d'état in June...has complained that US forces stationed at the Honduran base of Palmerola collaborated with Roberto Micheletti, the leader of the plotters

Brazil had already expressed its unhappiness at the presence of US naval vessels in its massive new offshore oilfields off Rio de Janeiro, destined soon to make Brazil a giant oil producer

The fact that the US gets half its oil from Latin America was one of the reasons the US Fourth Fleet was re-established in the region's waters in 2008. The fleet's vessels can include Polaris nuclear-armed submarines –

the bilateral agreement on the seven Colombian bases, signed on 30 October in Bogota, risks a costly new arms race in a region

Much of the new US strategy was clearly set out in May in an enthusiastic US Air Force (USAF) proposal for its military construction programme for the fiscal year 2010. One Colombian air base, Palanquero, was, the proposal said, unique "in a critical sub-region of our hemisphere where security and stability is under constant threat from... anti-US governments".

The proposal sets out a scheme to develop Palanquero which, the USAF says, offers an opportunity for conducting "full-spectrum operations throughout South America.... It also supports mobility missions by providing access to the entire continent. ("Full-spectrum operations" is the Pentagon's jargon for its long-established goal of securing crushing military superiority with atomic and conventional weapons across the globe and in space.)

The USAF proposal contradicted the assurances constantly issued by US diplomats that the bases would not be used against third countries.

The Colombian forces, for many years notorious for atrocities inflicted on civilians...Civil strife in Colombia meant some 380,000 Colombians were forced from their homes last year, bringing the number of displaced since 1985 to 4.6 million, one in ten of the population. This little-known statistic indicates a much worse situation than the much-publicised one in Islamist-ruled Sudan where 2.7 million have fled from their homes.

Amnesty International said: "The Colombian government must urgently bring human rights violators to justice, to break the links between the armed forces and illegal paramilitary groups, and dismantle paramilitary organisations in line with repeated UN recommendations."

SOUTH AMERICAN FRONT

According to Cordoba, the military agreement is "the first step of an imperialist escalation" in the region that will be followed by a military intervention in Venezuela.

"I think they will begin to create the circumstances that make it possible to isolate Venezuela, isolate President Chavez and will generate a series of alliances to undermine the process (of Chavez' Bolivarian revolution). I think the second step is to go there," the senator said on Venezuelan state television.

http://colombiareports.com/colombia-news/news/6978-cordoba-calls-to-support-chavez.html