US Builds Up its Bases in Oil-Rich South America

[IndianaGreen]

Published on Sunday, November 22, 2009 by The Independent/UK

US Builds Up its Bases in Oil-Rich South America

US builds up its bases in oil-rich South America From the Caribbean to Brazil, political opposition to US plans for 'full-spectrum operations' is escalating rapidly

by Hugh O'Shaughnessy

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. The development - and the reaction of Latin American leaders to it - is further exacerbating America's already fractured relationship with much of the continent.

The new US push is part of an effort to counter the loss of influence it has suffered recently at the hands of a new generation of Latin American leaders no longer willing to accept Washington's political and economic tutelage. President Rafael Correa, for instance, has refused to prolong the US armed presence in Ecuador, and US forces have to quit their base at the port of Manta by the end of next month.

So Washington turned to Colombia, which has not gone down well in the region. The country has received military aid worth $4.6bn (£2.8bn) from the US since 2000, despite its poor human rights record. Colombian forces regularly kill the country's indigenous people and other civilians, and last year raided the territory of its southern neighbour, Ecuador, causing at least 17 deaths.

President 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 in a military putsch, warned this month that the bases agreement could mean the possibility of war with Colombia.

In August, 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 and initially exiled, has complained that US forces stationed at the Honduran base of Palmerola collaborated with Roberto Micheletti, the leader of the plotters and the man who claims to be president.

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2009/11/22

[imdjh]

1. Wow, to read this, you would think we were invading these countries where we have bases.

We aren't. We only hold one base in a hostile situation, and that's in North America and our authority to do that is righteous.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

3. Which base to you refer too?

[imdjh]

7. Cuba, and it's arguably hostile when you consider the mileage Castro has gotten out of it.

He'd have been an idiot to get rid of us willingly or otherwise.

[bertman]

5. I don't understand what you're saying, imdjh. Please explain.

[yurbud]

15. and you don't think those bases in South America will be used to destabilize neighboring countries

that have wrestled their economic destinies away from the lethal, corrupt hands of Wall Street and international bankers?

[jwirr]

2. That is also probably why there is trouble between Venezuela and

Colombia. I suspect the US has their spoon stuck in there someplace. Control of the world's oil is the biggest interest our nation is pursuing. Not alternatives but stealing.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

4. Much of that is clearly Chavez saber rattling to distract the populace

A recent diatribe where he praised Mugabe and others was priceless

[Peace Patriot]

6. It's South Vietnam all over again, in my opinion. Haunting similarities--

including the sneaky buildup ('just a few hundred advisors") while American sleeps; the corrupt, totally US-dependent, puppet government (South Vietnam = Colombia, as to being propped up by US tax dollars--$6 BILLION to Colombia); and the lies and disinformation about the "enemy." We could EASILY have had detente with Ho Chi Minh--he wanted it--but our war profiteers wanted war, and have created this next "enemy" out of nothing, Hugo Chavez, who's not even a communist--democratically elected, mixed socialist/capitalist economy, has harmed no one and in truth is very peaceful and into social justice and Latin American independence. There are a lot more similarities--all very disturbing to anyone who lived through the Vietnam War.

But there is one big difference, and that is the additional motivator (besides war profiteering) of OIL. One way or another, Iran was denied to the war/oil profiteers (Rumsfeld forced to resign over it), and our humungous war machine and globalized "free trade for the rich" require lots and lots of oil.

Now, South Americans are perfectly willing to supply the US with oil. Venezuela already provides 15% or so of our oil supply. And they have lots more where that comes from. So does Ecuador. So does Brazil (another big find, recently). But they have put restrictions on the transnationals who contract with them to drill for the oil--fair contracts that respect the country's sovereignty and fair terms, with goodly portions of the profits going to benefit the poor in their countries. And Exxon Mobil doesn't want any such arrangement. They want rightwing governments in charge who will crush dissent and who will shovel most of the profits into their pockets (with a little trickle to the rich elites), while they charge US taxpayers $500/gal or some such outlandish figure, to fuel the US war machine, as well as profiting from the "free trade for the rich" tanker traffic.

Other oil corps are working in South America, amicably, with leftist governments. Exxon Mobil--whose profits I think already exceed all the profits of all corporations going back 500 years (and I don't think I'm exaggerating)--wants all the marbles. So it isn't just a matter of a fair trade with South America. It's a matter of crushing them and TAKING their oil, as the Bushwhacks did in Iraq.

You may think that Obama wouldn't be on board for another oil war. (Myself, I'm not sure yet.) But that doesn't mean that the real rulers of this land--entities like Exxon Mobil, and the Pentagon--are not planning one. I am fairly convinced that they are. And South American leaders are very worried about it as well, particularly the two likely targets, Venezuela and Ecuador (both with big pots of oil, both adjacent to Colombia, both with leftist, social justice governments).

The big US military buildup in Colombia and the region is just emerging into national consciousness here, but South Americans have known about it for some time--though they were all taken by surprise by this secret deal with Colombia for SEVEN new US military bases, which has alarmed the region. Last year, Lulu da Silva, president of Brazil, said that the US 4th Fleet (mothballed since WW II, reconstituted by the Bushwhacks) is "a threat to Brazil's oil" (everybody south of the border knows that it is a threat to Venezuela's). Early last year, the danger of US "South Vietnam"-type militarization of Colombia became quite evident, when the US/Colombia dropped ten 500 lb US "smart bombs" on a FARC guerrilla camp just inside Ecuador's border--an incident that nearly started a war, then and there.

The US has used the excuse of the US "war on drugs" and Colombia's 40+ year civil war with the FARC guerrillas for all this US militarization, but nobody really believes them any more. The US "war on drugs" is a colossal failure. And in the above incident (the bombing) the US/Colombia destroyed all hopes for a peaceful settlement of Colombia's civil war. They killed the FARC's hostage negotiator, Raul Reyes, who was trying to broker a peace, and 24 other sleeping people. And they knew who they were killing. They did it deliberately, with no immediate cause (it wasn't a fight) and no thought as to its lawlessness.

Ecuador kicked the US military out of its base in northern Ecuador this year. Bolivia kicked the DEA out late last year. Paraguay has ended joint US/Paraguayan military maneuvers. This is the trend. The US is dangerous and unpredictable, and is known to have slaughtered one million innocent people to steal their oil, even if our own people (or at least the media) have obliterated that reality from consciousness.

When asked about the US military base in Ecuador, at a news conference, Rafael Correa, president of Ecuador, said that he would agree to a US military base in Ecuador when the US agrees to an Ecuadoran military base in Miami.

That is typical of this new independent attitude in Latin America. It is an attitude that Exxon Mobil & brethren find intolerable, and they want to destroy it. The recent rightwing military coup in Honduras was about this as well. The elected president, Mel Zelaya, proposed converting the US military base in Honduras to a commercial airport. And he soon found himself kidnapped at gunpoint and being flown out of the country, with a refueling stop at that very US military base.

Why should the US have extensive military bases and personnel and contractors (in the Colombian deal, totally immunized from local laws) in Latin America? What is the threat in Latin America?

There is NO threat, except the one the US is creating--because our worst global corporate predators want free and tyrannical access to Latin America's resources, as well as dictatorial powers over labor laws, envirronmental laws and any assertion of sovereignty that gets in their way. They call Chavez a "dictator"--a completely substanceless charge, contrived to create an "enemy." THEY are the dictators. And they have hijacked the US military to enforce their tyranny.

That's what I think we're looking at: An extremely corrupt puppet government inviting us in, using pretenses and falsehoods, a proxy army as a front for US operations, a sneaky buildup (the Colombian agreement has no limit on US troops and contractors), several covering excuses and justifications, a compliant Congress, more jungle warfare with our troops far from home in unfamiliar terrain, hated by almost everyone there, more mayhem and horror that benefits no one but the super-rich. And I think we will lose.

[imdjh]

9. It's a good thing this ink is cheap.

[Peace Patriot]

11. I gather you know nothing about the subject. nt

[Joe Chi Minh]

13. I doubt if he's even knowledgeable about ink.

[timeforpeace]

8. I have faith that President Obama knows what he's doing here.

[cutlassmama]

10. Why?

[IndianaGreen]

12. Obama is as clueless about Latin America as he is about the Middle East

and we got the pictures of Bibi Netanyahu pulling Obama's chains to prove it.

[Peace Patriot]

16. Obama may know what he's doing, but does he know what others are doing, and

does he have any control over them?

I think Obama's a pretty smart guy, but the actual policies of the US government right now--threatening Latin America with this dramatic US military buildup in Colombia, larding Colombia--a country with one of the worst human rights records on earth--with $6 BILLION in military booty, betraying President Zelaya in Honduras (a leader with a 67% approval rating, and the backing of virtually every leader in Latin America, as well as the EU)--tell me that either, a) he does not know what he's doing, or b) his stated policy of peace, respect and cooperation in Latin America is bullshit, or c) he hands are tied, he is unable to implement his policy--he is, in President Chavez's words, "the prisoner of the Pentagon."

In a democracy, you don't "have faith" in your leaders. You question them. You hold them accountable. Faith is for church.

[prestonPjr21]

14. Was it W.Bush?

Who said "Americans way of life will never be in jeapordy", if that is true then anything goes. Oil is are way of life...