Leftist Imperialism In Latin America

Leftist Imperialism In Latin America / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenchea
Posted on September 4, 2015

14ymedio, Jose Gabriel Barrenchea, Santa Clara, 24 August 2015 –One
morning, I had just arrived at the Cabaña Fort during the days of the
2014 Havana International Book Fair, and on consulting the daily program
discovered that at this very moment the Bolivian vice president Alvara
Garcia Linera was offering a videoconference in the Lezama Lima Room.
The room was full of Bolivian civilians and Cuban military, who in a
state of excitement not very common to a book fair, were cheering with
the veins in their necks bulging every time Linera showed on a map a
piece of territory which, according to him, one of his neighbors had
grabbed from Bolivia.

According to Linera, absolutely all the countries bordering Bolivia had
participated in this plundering. In fact, according to his speech,
almost half of South America legally belonged to his country which, more
than Andean – and in this he was explicit – was by right Amazonian.

The truth is that, despite all the supposed integrationist advances in
Latin America, territorial or maritime claims are the order of the day.
This persistence is due to the Latin American tendency to use the
differences that these claims generate to divert public attention from
domestic policies. There is no Latin American government, elected or
imposed, of the left or the right, which in the face of a scenario of
enormous popular disapproval doesn't immediately look at a piece of
territory that, supposedly or truly, some neighbor grabbed at some time
in their history.

No Latin American government in the face of massive popular disapproval
fails to remember the piece of land that a neighbor grabbed at some
point in its history

The most emblematic case is the invasion of the Falkland Islands by
Argentina's military dictatorship which was foundering in a difficult
economic and social internal situation. Emblematic because not only did
it go beyond threats and rhetoric, but because the opponent was nothing
more than one of the nations with the strongest fighting traditions and
most prominent navies in human history: the United Kingdom.

The most recent, and the most pathetic (not to say cowardly), is the
Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, with its pretension to claim from a
much poorer country a piece of its territory rich in petroleum. A piece
that, incidentally, represents half of Guyana. Thus, after the
Chavez-Maduroism of the last two decades launching continuous and daily
diatribes against imperialism, now takes off the mask and behaves like
it actually is: a deeply ideological imperialist.

Thus, we can see the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela now practicing a
blackmail diplomacy throughout the Caribbean, in a manner more unsubtle
than almost anything Washington has done in its entire history.

How can we reconcile the integrationist Venezuelan discourse with this
despicable and cowardly act? It does not make demands of the power of
Great Britain, but rather of the poorest country that emerged through
independence from that colonial power. Nothing changes, they shout to
the four winds, with the resources in dispute in Venezuelan hands as
they will also be available to the Guyanese people thanks to the
extensive cooperation with the country "in solidarity." On the contrary,
this justification better shows the true nature of the "integrationism"
and the Chavez-Maduro solidarity. It is Maduro's Venezuela that decides
and has the last word. In the end is it not our oil? Well do and think
as we dictate from the Caracas fascism… I'm sorry, the socialism of the
21st century.

The ultimate reasons for this infamy are the same ones that led Galtieri
to assault the Falklands in 1982. With a barrel of oil under 38 dollars,
and with increasingly meager support, Chavez-Maduroism seeks to distract
attention from the difficult internal situation and, at the same time,
put Venezuela in a state of war that gives it a free hand to close the
few remaining spaces for democracy in the country. Because something
that must be understood by the opponents to Chavez-Maduroism who,
however, support this imperialist adventure: the principal objective is
nothing more than to annul them as opponents, presenting the opposition
attitude as treason "at such difficult times."

The fear is that attitudes like that of Chavez-Maduro's Venezuela are
being repeated by other leftist regimes in these difficult times for
them in the region. It should not surprise us when very soon the
president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa, sitting on an erupting volcano,
remembers the half of the country that Peru snatched from Ecuador more
than a hundred years ago. As for the land of the "Great Indian Chief of
the South," Bolivia, we have already mentioned where the ideas of Linera
have currency, his Great White Brain: a guy to be reckoned with and a
bomb thrower.

Source: Leftist Imperialism In Latin America / 14ymedio, Jose Gabriel
Barrenchea | Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/leftist-imperialism-in-latin-america-14ymedio-jose-gabriel-barrenchea/