S. America concerned about US military in Colombia

[Bacchus39]

Lula said what I have been waiting for:


" Brazil's Silva took a more measured approach, calling on President Barack Obama to meet with the region's leaders to explain the plan."


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090811/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/lt_colombia_us

By JEANNETH VALDIVIESO, Associated Press Writer Jeanneth Valdivieso, Associated Press Writer – 14 mins ago
QUITO, Ecuador – South American presidents expressed deep concerns Monday over the United States' plan to increase its military presence in Colombia.

The unease reflected the region's deep-seated suspicion of U.S. motives based on a long history of intervention and meddling. But there was no consensus on issuing a statement rejecting U.S. use of Colombian bases, as proposed by Bolivia and backed by its ally and strong critic of Washington's influence, Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez.

The proposed base treaty has been questioned since it was revealed a few weeks ago, with the strongest attacks coming from some of Colombia's neighbors, whose leftist governments are in ideological conflict with its conservative administration.

The leaders agreed to meet again in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to discuss the matter after Chavez raised it during a ceremony to inaugurate Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa as temporary president of the Union of South American Nations, or Unasur. They did not set a date, saying the summit would follow a preliminary meeting of defense ministers Aug. 27.

Presidents Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil, Cristina Fernandez of Argentina, Evo Morales of Bolivia, Fernando Lugo of Paraguay and Correa also expressed unease with the plan.

"I don't want to sabotage your ceremony Rafael ... (but) we are very worried," said Chavez, who added that he believes the bases will destabilize the region.

"This could provoke a war in South America," Chavez said, repeating a theme of his recent criticism of the base negotiations. During his weekly television and radio address Sunday, the Venezuelan president told his military to be "ready for combat" in case of a Colombian provocation.

Brazil's Silva took a more measured approach, calling on President Barack Obama to meet with the region's leaders to explain the plan.

"As president of Brazil, this climate of unease disturbs me," said Silva, who has expressed opposition to American troops being in Colombia but who is viewed in Washington as a center-left balance to more stridently leftist presidents of Venezuela, Ecuador and Bolivia.

"I think we should directly discuss our discontent with the American government — directly with them," said Silva, a union leader famed for his negotiating skills before he became a politician.

Last week in Brazil, the U.S. national security adviser, Jim Jones, acknowledged the deal could have been explained better to the region's leaders and said Washington would send military officials to any interested country "to make sure everybody understands what this is and what this isn't."

Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, who did not attend the meeting in Ecuador, visited several South American countries last week to defend his base deal with the U.S., but Peru was the only nation to openly back the plan.

Uribe's vice foreign minister, Clemencia Forero, said Monday that an expanded U.S. military presence in Colombia will not affect his nation's neighbors while helping in the fight against drug traffickers and leftist rebels.

"The bases will continue to be completely under Colombian jurisdiction and sovereignty," Forero said.

U.S. officials haven't released details of the pact being negotiated, but Colombians say U.S. forces would have access to at least seven Colombian bases.

The Colombians also say there would be no more than 1,400 American personnel and contractors in the country. About 600 U.S. military personnel already work in Colombia and advisers have trained thousands of Colombian troops since 2000.

While in the moderate camp, Silva underlined the region's suspicions of the United States by saying he was concerned over "information we receive about (U.S.) ambassadors that still intervene in internal electoral processes" in their host countries.

He also said he was bothered by the reactivation last year of the U.S. Navy's 4th Fleet, to deploy warships, aircraft and submarines on humanitarian and counter-drug operations in the Caribbean and Central and South America.

Tensions between Venezuela and Colombia have increased over Colombia's base negotiations and the recent disclosure that three Swedish-made anti-tank weapons found at a rebel camp last year had been purchased by Venezuela's military in the 1980s.

[Peace Patriot]

1. Washington "would send military officials to any interested country" to explain??

And South America is to believe what U.S. military officials say because...?

Military officials are notorious liars on their own war profiteering behalf. Politicians are not much better, I guess, but at least they have potential direct accountability for what they allege.

This is the second time that I have had the feeling that these seven new U.S. military bases in Colombia are possibly intentionally insulting to the leaders of South America. The first was with regard to the initial announcement by Colombia. Da Silva responded that no one in the U.S. had bothered to consult South American leaders--not even to warn them that this announcement was coming. How is this consistent with President Obama's stated policy of peace, respect and cooperation? Jones then saying that they will send "military officials" to explain it is tantamount to saying "Shove it!" It is especially worrisome that Obama/Clinton would do this to the "moderates." It is astonishingly disrespectful, non-cooperative and unpeaceful. It is, indeed, a provocation--both the fact of what the U.S. is doing in Colombia, and the way they have gone about doing it. What if da Silva were to suddenly announce that he was inviting China to establish seven military bases in Brazil, without even notifying other countries, let alone asking them what they think about it? And then China said that they were "sending military officials" to explain it? Would Brazil's neighbors and everyone else in the hemisphere not feel insulted and threatened? And this is even worse, because, a) China has not slaughtered a hundred thousand innocent Iraqis, in one week of bombing alone, then tortured and murdered many more, to steal their oil, and b) China does not have a long bloody history of interference in Latin America.

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This Associated Pukes article is not as bad as some I have read, as to psyops and disinformation, but I want to point out a couple of things that readers should take care to make conscious. (Psyops are designed to work on the unconscious--to create certain impressions through selective words, clever lies or incomplete, distorted facts, that our conscious minds can't quite grab hold of.)

The most egregious disinformation in this article is as follows: "Tensions between Venezuela and Colombia have increased over Colombia's base negotiations and the recent disclosure that three Swedish-made anti-tank weapons found at a rebel camp last year had been purchased by Venezuela's military in the 1980s".

Truth: Weapons from the 1980s from some twenty other countries were also found in rebel camps! The article does disclose the 1980s vintage of the weapons--a clever bit of 'truthiness'--although it doesn't hint at the absurdity of this Colombian accusation (that Chavez is somehow responsible for the whereabouts of 30 year old weapons). But far worse, it fails to disclose that many countries' weapons have made it into rebel camps. In truth, the world is awash in weapons, and it would be remarkable if the FARC guerrillas didn't have them from many sources. I'm sure they have Colombian weapons as well! (--paid for by U.S. taxpayers--$6 BILLION in U.S. military aid to Colombia!).

AP's failure to put this Colombian allegation into proper perspective--its withholding of critically important facts--creates the impression that Colombia's crazy allegation against Chavez has some legitimacy, and, further, that Venezuela is supplying arms to leftist guerrillas in Colombia. The average readers' rational minds cannot fight off this subliminal message because they probably lack the highly relevant information needed to understand Colombia's bullshit. The article doesn't supply it. You would have to do research (or be a frequent visitor to DU's Latin American Forum).

Of course, the other explanation--for AP's failure to disclose that many other countries' weapons were found--is that the AP reporter gets her 'facts,' her spin and her 'talking points' from the CIA or from John McCain's U.S. taxpayer funded "International Republican Institute." She herself may not even know that she has been lied to, and doesn't bother to find out.

I favor the first explanation--that it is part of a rather intense, anti-Chavez psyops/disinformation campaign. We are being played.

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Here is a subtler bit of disinformation. (If you know the facts about the weapons found in rebel camps, you know that the above item is not subtle.)

"The proposed base treaty has been questioned since it was revealed a few weeks ago, with the strongest attacks coming from some of Colombia's neighbors, whose leftist governments are in ideological conflict with its conservative administration."

Chavez and Correa are "leftists" but Uribe is "conservative"? How often do you see Uribe described as "the rightwing president" of Colombia? How often did we ever see Bush described as "the rightwing president" of the U.S.? Never, in either case. But Chavez and Correa are "leftists"? Think about this. Arguably, both Uribe and Bush are not just rightwing, they are fascists--radically disruptive, violent, lawless SOBs. But AP (and a lot of other corpo/fascist 'news' monopolies) gives them the mantle of "conservatism"--a word that I associate with carefulness and caution, and, in my youth, with safe Savings & Loan institutions, for instance, and with environmental conservation (the California Republicans of my youth were conservationists). People who think about the future. People who are careful with taxpayers' money. People who are cautious about change. Reliable people.

In Colombia, thousands of union leaders, human rights workers, peasant farmers, community organizers and political leftists have been murdered--often in horrible ways--by rightwing paramilitary death squads with close ties to the Uribe government and the Colombian military. Is this "conservative"? They are also spraying toxic pesticides on small peasant farms to eradicate a few coca leaves, polluting human DNA and killing animals and food crops. Is this "conservative"? Bush slaughtered a hundred thousand innocent people, during the bombing of Baghdad, to steal their oil--and ran up trillions of dollars in debt that the poorest of us will be paying for unto the 7th generation. "Conservative?"

Chavez and Correa, leftist. Uribe, conservative. This may be unthinking absorption of "memes" created by rightwing 'think tanks,' on the part of the reporter, or it may be deliberate disinformation. Hard to say. This misuse of the term "conservative" is pervasive in our political culture. I would guess that it is unthinking (on the part of the reporter). But it is something to look out for--this discrepancy in the description of presidents--the ones who are actually truly conservative, in their policies*, are described as "leftists" and the ones who are radical fascists are described as "conservative."

*(Chavez, for instance, has managed to "conserve" $143 billion in international cash reserves--money for a "rainy day" (i.e., drop in oil prices; Bushwhack Financial 9/11). That is "conservative." He and his government think of the future. By careful management of Venezuela's economy, they produced nearly 10% in economic growth, steadily, over a five year period, most of it in the private sector (not including oil). That is "conservative." The Great Depression II that we are experiencing, on other hand, is the result of radical fascist thievery and mismanagement. That is NOT "conservative.")

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"While in the moderate camp, Silva underlined the region's suspicions of the United States by saying he was concerned over 'information we receive about (U.S.) ambassadors that still intervene in internal electoral processes' in their host countries."

Where is the follow-up on U.S. ambassadors "intervening in internal electoral processes"? What is Lulu referring to? Does the reporter know? And, if not, did the reporter ask? This is NEWS! And it is just dropped into the article, unexplained. I was going to say I'm amazed. But really I ceased being amazed at our corpo/fascist press with Judith Miller's WMD lies in the NYT in the leadup to the Iraq slaughter. What is Lulu talking about? What information? Which ambassadors? Which countries? What kind of interference?

Jeez.

Also to be noted, this phrase "while in the moderate camp...". What does being a "moderate" have to do with objecting to U.S. interference in Latin American elections? Does being a "moderate" bar you from objecting to such a thing? Only "leftists" care about the integrity of elections?

I find this attempt by the AP reporter to "position" South American leaders on some kind of political spectrum kind of amusing, actually. Presumably, according to her, "moderates" are not supposed to give a crap if the U.S. interferes in their elections; "leftists" are expected to raise unseemly rows about it; and "conservatives," well, they'd sell their grandmothers for U.S. approval and booty.

It's as if the reporter had been instructed to stress whatever "divide and conquer" aspects she could find, in this story--pitting the "moderate" camp against the "leftist camp." But she had some difficulty with Lulu, who has the same concerns as Chavez, Correa, Morales and the other "leftists." She makes the dividing line the resolution proposed by Bolivia (to condemn the seven new U.S. military bases in Colombia), and divines the "moderate camp" as those opposed to the resolution, though they agree with Bolivia on the substance (and have said so) and simply have a different notion on strategy.

"But there was no consensus on issuing a statement rejecting U.S. use of Colombian bases, as proposed by Bolivia and backed by its ally and strong critic of Washington's influence, Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez."

Right up front. Third sentence of the article.

It must have been a struggle to get "no consensus" in there, when South Americans are virtually unanimous in their condemnation of this further U.S. militarization of their region. And the Chavez bogeyman--built up over the last several years, in a massive disinformation campaign--helps as well. Impression: kneejerk leftists, always against the U.S., causing trouble for "the moderates."

Lulu may make biofuel deals with the U.S., but he is not a "moderate" when it comes to the sovereignty of Latin American countries, the Bolivarian goals of social justice and regional independence, and his close friendship with Hugo Chavez, and, indeed, his friendly alliances with all of the leftist leaders--Morales in Bolivia, Correa in Ecuador, Lugo in Paraguay, Vasquez in Uruguay, the Kirchners in Argentina. Nestor Kirchner's reply--when the Bushwhacks sent down their dictate that South American leaders must "isolate Chavez"--might have been Lulu's reply as well: "But he's my brother!"

Our corpo/fascist press doesn't want us to know this. They want us to think that there is "no consensus," not because it is true, but because that is the goal of our Corporate Rulers. Divide. And. Conquer.

They must be pretty frustrated these days, though, because the more they try to "divide and conquer," the more unified does Latin America become. Maybe that's why they're insulting the "moderates"--leaving them in the dark, giving them the finger, sending "military personnel" to explain how seven new U.S. military bases is not war-like. They've nearly given up on "divide and conquer" and are planning a war.