Was The Military Coup in Honduras Engineered By Two US Companies?

[Orwellian_Ghost]

...

NIKOLAS KOZLOFF: ... I think there’s this revolving door of Washington insiders that are supporting companies like Chiquita banana. I just wrote an article about Chiquita, formerly known as the United Fruit Company. And, you know, throughout history, Chiquita banana has had enormous sway and power over Central American nations.

And we know that prior to the coup d’état in Honduras, Chiquita was very unhappy about President Zelaya’s minimum wage decrees, because they said that this would cut into their profits and make it more expensive for them to export bananas and pineapple. And we know that they appealed to the Honduran Business Association, which was also opposed to Zelaya’s minimum wage provisions.

And we also—and what I find really interesting is that Chiquita is allied to a Washington law firm called Covington, which advises multinational corporations. And who is the vice chairman of Covington? None other than John Negroponte, who your previous guest mentioned in regards to the rampant human rights abuses that went on in Honduras throughout the 1980s. So I think that’s a really interesting connection.

AMY GOODMAN: You talk about the money and the support, Chiquita, then and now. It’s interesting, this is so reminiscent of the coup against the Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide. He wasn’t in office but a year, 1990, 1991, when he was ousted, and one of his first acts when he became president was to increase the minimum wage, as Zelaya has done.

NIKOLAS KOZLOFF: Well, right, and this is nothing new, as I point out in a recent article. Throughout the twentieth century, Chiquita, formerly known as United Fruit, was associated with some of the most backward, retrograde political and economic forces in Central America and indeed outside of Central America in such countries as Colombia. And we know that United Fruit Company played a very prominent role in the coup d’état against democratically elected President Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala in 1954. And, you know, after that, that ushered in a very turbulent period in Guatemalan history, rampant human rights abuses, genocide against the indigenous people of Guatemala. And so, Guatemala is only now recovering from that.

...

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/7/21/from_arbenz_to_zelaya_chiquita_in

Overthrow; A Hallmark of U.S. Foreign Policy

By Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman

Hawaii * Cuba * Philippines * Puerto Rico * Nicaragua * Honduras * Iran * Guatemala * South Vietnam * Chile * Grenada * Panama * Afghanistan * Iraq


What do these 14 governments have in common? You got it. The United States overthrew them. And, in almost in every case, the overthrow can be traced to corporate interests.

In Hawaii, the sugar companies didn’t want to pay export duties—so they overthrew the queen of Hawaii and made it part of the United States. In Guatemala, United Fruit wanted President Jacobo Arbenz out. Out he went. In Chile, President Salvador Allende offended the copper interests. Allende—dead. In Iran, Prime Minister Dr. Mohammad Mossadegh offended major oil interests. Mossadegh out. In Nicaragua, President Jose Santos Zelaya was bothering American lumber and mining companies. Zelaya—out. In Honduras, an American banana magnate organized the coup of the Honduran government. And on down the list.

Democratic Party critics charge that the Bush administration is ripping the United States from a long history of diplomacy by violently overthrowing governments. Not true, says former New York Times foreign correspondent Stephen Kinzer. He says that, in fact, the opposite is true.



http://www.finalcall.com/artman/publish/article_2703.shtml

[Gabi Hayes]

1. ask lanny davis

[autorank]

4. Gabi nails it ...

Honduran Coup: The U.S. Connection

Conn Hallinan | August 6, 2009
http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/6329

"If you want to understand who is the real power behind the coup, you need to find out who is paying Lanny Davis," says Robert White, former U.S. ambassador to El Salvador and current president of the Center for International Policy. Davis, best known as the lawyer who represented Bill Clinton during his impeachment trial, has been lobbying members of Congress and testifying before the House Foreign Affairs Committee in support of the coup.

[Orwellian_Ghost]

15. Here's another

Washington behind the Honduras coup: Here is the evidence;

...

By Eva Golinger

en español

July 13, 2009

* The US Department of State had prior knowledge of the coup.
* The Department of State and the US Congress funded and advised the actors and organisations in Honduras that participated in the coup.
* The Pentagon trained, schooled, commanded, funded and armed the Honduran armed forces that perpetrated the coup and that continue to repress the people of Honduras by force.
* The US military presence in Honduras, that occupies the Soto Cano (Palmerola) military base, authorised the coup d’etat through its tacit complicity and refusal to withdraw its support of the Honduran military involved in the coup.
* The US ambassador in Tegucigalpa, Hugo Llorens, coordinated the removal from power of President Manuel Zelaya, together with Assistant Secretary of State Thomas Shannon y John Negroponte, who presently works as an advisor to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
* From the first day the coup occurred, Washington has referred to “both parties” involved and the necessity for “dialogue” to restore constitutional order, legitimising the coup leaders by regarding them as equal players instead of criminal violators of human rights and democratic principles.
* The Department of State has refused to legally classify the events in Honduras as a “coup d’etat”, nor has it suspended or frozen its economic aid or commerce to Honduras, and has taken no measures to effectively pressure the de facto regime.
* Washington manipulated the Organization of American States (OAS) in order to buy time, therefore allowing the coup regime to consolidate and weaken the possibility of President Zelaya’s immediate return to power, as part of a strategy still in place that simply seeks to legitimate the de facto regime and wear down the Honduran people that still resist the coup.
* Secretary of State Clinton and her spokesmen stopped speaking of President Zelaya’s return to power after they designated Costa Rica's president Oscar Arias as the “mediator” between the coup regime and the constitutional government; and now the State Department refers to the dictator that illegally took power during the coup, Roberto Micheletti, as the “interim caretaker president”.
* The strategy of “negotiating” with the coup regime was imposed by the Obama administration as a way of discrediting President Zelaya – blaming him for provoking the coup – and legitimising the coup leaders.
* Members of the US Congress – Democrats and Republicans – organised a visit of representatives from the coup regime in Honduras to Washington, receiving them with honors in different arenas in the US capital.
* Despite the fact that originally it was Republican Senator John McCain who coordinated the visit of the coup regime representatives to Washington through a lobby firm connected to his office, The Cormac Group, now, the illegal regime is being representated by top notch lobbyist and Clinton attorney Lanny Davis, who is using his pull and influence in Washington to achieve overall acceptance – cross party lines – of the coup regime in Honduras.
* Otto Reich and a Venezuelan named Robert Carmona-Borjas, known for his role as attorney for the dictator Pedro Carmona during the April 2002 coup d’etat in Venezuela, aided in preparing the groundwork for the coup against President Zelaya in Honduras.
* The team designated from Washigton to design and help prepare the coup in Honduras also included a group of US ambassadors recently named in Central America, experts in destabilising efforts against the Cuban revolution, and Adolfo Franco, ex administrator for USAID’s Cuba “transition to democracy” program.

No one doubts that the fingerprints of Washington are all over the coup d’etat against President Manuel Zelaya that began on June 28. Many analysts, writers, activists and even presidents, have denounced this role. Nevertheless, the majority coincide in excusing the Obama Administration from any responsibility in the Honduran coup, blaming instead the lingering remains of the Bush-Cheney era and the war hawks that still pace the halls of the White House. The evidence demonstrates that while it is certain that the usual suspects who perpetrate coups and destabilisation activities in Latin America are involved, ample proof exists confirming the direct role of the new administration in Washington in the Honduran coup.

...

http://links.org.au/node/1147

[EFerrari]

6. And Otto Reich. And Death Squads Negoponte.

It's just like the world's most horrible high school reunion.

[malaise]

2. Keep that labor cheap so corporations can get richer

No wonder they hate Cuba.

[autorank]

3. k*r Guatemala 1953 (same as it ever was)

In 1953, Guatemalan president Arbenz was carrying forward the policies of democratization started in the mid 1940's. This included a vastly expanded franchise including all women, land reform, and broader economic opportunities for all citizens. Unfortunately for Guatemala and Arbenz, nationalizing the United Fruit Company was part of the plan. That tipped the scale for U.S. policy during the Eisenhower administration.

John Foster Dulles headed up the project. President Eisenhower talked about the tyranny of the Guatemalan government. There was no mention of anything positive about Guatemala's reforms. There was one hitch in 1952, however A young journalist, Sydney Gurson, was going to write about the covert actions of the U.S. government. A reporter at Time Magazine also had the story.

That changed quickly. Henry Luce, publisher of Time had their story rewritten and Gurson came out with this:

"Guatemala Reds Seek Full Power by Sydney Gurson Mexico City, Feb 22 (1953)--Using the controversial agrarian reform law as a lever, Guatemala's Communists are trying to turn the powerful influence that they wield in the governing of that country into outright control." (New York times, pdf of full article

The rational for a coup against a progressive government was in place and that was that for Guatemala. The coup succeeded, 75% of the voters in Guatemala were disenfranchised and United Fruit Company was saved from democracy. The rest is a bloody history.

Sydney Gurson went on to a long and successful career at the Times after learning how to do corporate friendly journalism.

[roody]

5. k and r

[EFerrari]

7. WB, roody!

I've been thinking about you. :hi:

[roody]

20. Gracias.

[Turbineguy]

8. I've always wondered about the economics of this.

Of course, if you have the same guys who said the Iraq war would cost $1 billion and the Iraqis would pay for it, as advisers, you are bound to reach a bizarre conclusion.

[EFerrari]

9. Besides these 2 companies, State and the Pentagon, here's a list

of the ten families of oligarchs and their financial interests:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=405x20798

[Turbineguy]

10. How Neo-Feudal

[EFerrari]

11. In Honduras we can see plainly how Latin America was manipulated

for all these years because it is so small, it's hard to hide the machinations.

[timeforpeace]

12. Bananas are 50c a pound around here.

[Gman]

13. John Negroponte. Why am I not surprised to find this vermin was likely involved

Not in the least surprised.

[G_j]

14. isn't he an adviser to HRC now?

:mad:

[Gman]

16. Not that I know of and not any more likely than John Bolton

[G_j]

18. here: Clinton retains John Negroponte as an adviser

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/democracy-hangs-by-a-thread-in-honduras-1752315.html


Democracy hangs by a thread in Honduras
The right-wing coup d'état is faltering, but its supporters have powerful friends in Washington. Hugh O'Shaughnessy reports


Sunday, 19 July 2009

<snip>
The conservative-minded Mrs Clinton retains John Negroponte, an ambassador to Honduras under Ronald Reagan, as an adviser. He also represented George W Bush at the UN and in Baghdad. Democratic Senator Chris Dodd attacked Mr Negroponte in 2001 for drawing a veil over atrocities committed in Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital, by military forces trained by the US. Mr Dodd claimed that the forces had been "linked to death squad activities such as killings, disappearances and other human rights abuses".

During his time in Tegucigalpa, Mr Negroponte directed funds to the US-supported Contra terrorists seeking to overthrow the government of Nicaragua. He assured them of arms and supplies from the Palmerola airstrip, the main US base in Central America. As President Rafael Correa of Ecuador is in the final stages of closing the US base in his country, Mr Negroponte is conscious of what the US could lose if a Zelaya government banned its presence at Palmerola. For their part, Hondurans have noted that when Mr Zelaya tried to return on 6 July, and his plane was refused permission to land at Tegucigalpa airport, no room was found at Palmerola.

<snip>

[leftstreet]

22. Interesting

Thanks for finding that article

[Gman]

23. I would like to know more than just 2 paragraphs

in an article about Zelaya. The word "advisor" means a whole range of roles.

[Mudoria]

17. Doesn't seem likely.. he just gives his opinions without any current evidence

His opinion is worth about the cliche about assholes and opinions..

[Karenina]

19. . .

[maryf]

21. K&R

"Nevertheless, the majority coincide in excusing the Obama Administration from any responsibility in the Honduran coup," Where does the buck stop???

[cali]

24. opinion piece with no evidence offered. lame.