New U.S. military threat in Latin America

May 4, 2008

U.S. imperialism is ramping up its military threats in Latin America and the Caribbean. On April 24 the U.S. Navy announced the re-establishment of the U.S. Fourth Fleet to increase and coordinate the U.S. military presence there. As a sign of its aggressive intent, the new commander is Rear Adm. Joseph D. Kernan, who has been head of the Naval Special Warfare Command, better known as the SEALs.

The SEALs’ Web site says, “The most important trait that distinguishes Navy SEALs from all other military forces is that SEALs are maritime Special Forces, as they strike from and return to the sea. ... Their stealth and clandestine methods of operation allow them to conduct multiple missions against targets that larger forces cannot approach undetected.”

Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, reacting on state television to the Navy announcement, said: “They don’t scare us in the least. Along with Brazil we’re studying the creation of a South American Defense Council.”

The Navy’s announcement came at the same time that more U.S. politicians, like House Majority leader Nancy Pelosi, are admitting the failure of the U.S. blockade on Cuba, which was intended to starve the island into abandoning its socialist revolution. As the failure of the blockade is recognized, the military threat to Cuba and other countries in the region from the rebuilt Fourth Fleet cannot be ignored.

Attempt to split Bolivia

A dangerous U.S.-backed referendum is scheduled for May 4 in Santa Cruz, an oil-rich province of Bolivia where a rich, white, pro-imperialist minority is attempting to undermine the government of Evo Morales. Morales is the first Indigenous president of Bolivia. Using the smokescreen of “autonomy,” the campaign to withdraw from Bolivia is an effort to break up a nation populated mostly by Indigenous peoples, who endured hundreds of years of colonial oppression, and rob them of their most valuable resources.

Venezuelan President Chávez called an emergency meeting of ALBA, the Bolivarian Alternative of the Americas, in Caracas on April 24 to discuss the danger in Bolivia. Other countries of the region, including Argentina, Ecuador and Brazil, expressed their concern. Chávez calls the vote “Operation Kosovo’’—a plot to split up Bolivia and create a pro-Washington rump state in the east. Interestingly enough, the U.S. ambassador to Bolivia, Philip S. Goldberg, was the ambassador to Yugoslavia and a key figure in the separation of Kosovo from that country.

An online petition is exposing this fraud. Headed “The Conspiracy to Divide Bolivia Must Be Denounced,” it says in part:

“The subversive and unconstitutional actions of the oligarchic groups to try to divide the Bolivian nation reflect the racist and elitist minds of these sectors and constitute a very dangerous precedent not only for the country’s integrity, but for other countries in our region.

“History shows with ample eloquence, the terrible consequences that the divisionary and separatist processes supported and induced by foreign interests have had for humanity.

“Faced with this situation the signers below would like to express their support for the government of Evo Morales Ayma, for his policies for change and for the sovereign constituent process of the Bolivian people. At the same time we reject the so-called Santa Cruz Autonomy Statute due to its unconstitutionality and the attempt against the unity of a nation of our America.”

To sign on and forward, go to www.todosconbolivia.org.

Meeting in Cuba on Marxism today

Havana will host the IVth International Conference on Karl Marx and the Challenges of the Twenty-First Century, May 5-8. The conference opens on the 190th anniversary of Marx’s birth and is dedicated to the 50th anniversary of the victory of the Cuban revolution of Jan. 1, 1959.

“These are times of special importance for the destiny of humanity, given the increase in imperialist aggression and its confrontation with the resistance of peoples from all corners of the globe, who are engaged in important struggles. ...

“With the passage of 125 years since the death of Karl Marx, the strength of his work and its permanent capability to be enriched is demonstrated by the actions of all those who struggle for the emancipatory ideals announced 160 years ago in ‘The Manifesto of the Communist Party.’

“How can we contribute today to ‘the emancipation of the modern proletariat [working class],’ to forge ‘the consciousness of its own situation and needs, and the consciousness of the conditions required for its own emancipation?’ This is a challenge which today is more urgent than ever, given the continual and accelerated destruction of all our spaces of mutual coexistence, a process which is driven by the internal logic of capital.”

The conference will focus on three themes: the nature of capitalism, imperialism and their contradictions; the construction of a new militant internationalism, social movements, classes and contemporary forms of class struggle; and the socialist alternative—the need to go beyond the reforms of capitalism, the analysis of socialist experiences and practical proposals to construct a communist society.

Havana is a fitting place for such a conference to examine and evaluate the changes in international working class struggles as a global economic crisis unfolds that proves anew how valid and relevant the theories of Marx and Engels are today.

Left coalition wins  in Paraguay

Paraguay, a small country tucked between Brazil and Argentina, is the latest Latin American nation to elect a left-leaning government. President-elect Fernando Lugo, popularly known as “the candidate of the poor,” is a former Catholic bishop who resigned his church position, saying he could do nothing there for the people, to become the candidate of a coalition of 10 parties and 20 social movements. With 40 percent of the vote, he managed to unseat the Colorado Party, which had ruled Paraguay for 61 years.

For 35 of those years, the dictatorship of Gen. Alfredo Stroessner had absolute sway, jailing, torturing and exiling thousands. The Cuban newspaper Granma reported on April 25 that “Under the Stroessner dictatorship [Lugo’s] father was imprisoned more than 20 times, his brothers were tortured and close friends and relatives expelled from the country, as he himself was in 1983, due to what was perceived to be the subversive nature of his sermons.”

Notorious for its corruption, the Colorado Party left Paraguay one of the poorest and least developed countries in South America. Officially, 43 percent of the people live in poverty and unemployment is 13 percent. The election of Lugo has unleashed great expectations among the poor in Paraguay, who, as elsewhere in Latin America, include many Indigenous people, left impoverished since the days of colonialism.

According to Granma, the program of the coalition “includes the creation of jobs for 100,000 unemployed families; pensions for 200,000 senior citizens; the construction of 40,000 homes per year and the annual creation of 50,000 new jobs; highway construction, sanitation and infrastructural works; contracts for 30,000 teachers to improve education and, within that, the building of 20,000 new classrooms per year; support for research and culture; and the prioritization of primary health care and free access to those services, which includes significant investment in hospitals and medicines.

“The program also promotes an agrarian reform that is not solely confined to land distribution but includes technical aid and credits; reduced electricity and water rates and many other services for the population. In Paraguay 70 percent of productive land belongs to just 2.5 percent of owners.”

Its larger neighbors, where progressive regimes have also been elected, are expected to help Paraguay’s development.

Ecuador declares Mining Mandate

Ecuador’s Constituent Assembly, working to take control of the country’s resources and protect the land from polluting transnationals, on April 18 declared a Mining Mandate that suspended the activities of foreign concessions for 180 days while a new mining law is drafted and adopted. The mandate also limits mining companies to a maximum of three concessions.

Ecuador says it is setting the stage for “responsible mining practices” and expects to have the new mining law drafted by late May. At present, a case against Chevron before Ecuadorean courts charges the company with massive pollution at all its drilling sites in the country.

The Constituent Assembly is in the final stages of drafting a new constitution that will lay the basis for big changes in policies regarding the economy, political and social rights, nature and the environment.

It is also dealing with the question of national sovereignty, which was violated on March 1 when the Colombian air force, with U.S. support, attacked a gathering inside Ecuador and killed 25 people, including leaders of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

Two days later, Ecuador broke off diplomatic ties with its neighbor. President Rafael Correa then removed the minister of defense, the army chief of intelligence, and commanders of the army, air force and joint chiefs, charging them with collusion with the U.S. and Colombia in the attack.

Ecuador’s armed forces, through holding companies, control “one of Ecuador’s largest airlines and enterprises in the munitions, shrimp fishing, construction, clothing, flower farming and hydroelectric industries, making the military one of the country’s most powerful economic groups.” (New York Times, April 21)

The Sovereignty group in the Constituent Assembly is looking into whether U.S. planes from the Manta air base in Ecuador were involved in the Colombian attack, and has called on Colombia to surrender the videotapes of its own planes involved in the operation.

Washington’s lease on Manta, the only U.S. air base in South America, is due to expire next year, and President Correa has already said that Ecuador does not want it renewed.

—Cheryl LaBash and Deirdre Griswold