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news here, but then my political consciousness was formed in an era when a thousand U.S. military 'advisors' in Vietnam WAS a Big Deal, and politicians had to lie about what they were there for, and of course about the escalation to tens of thousands of U.S. soldiers and a full scale war.
Since then, and especially with the Bush Junta, U.S. military presence at numerous bases in a foreign country and the larding of BILLIONS of U.S. taxpayer dollars on a foreign military have become ROUTINE and hardly merit a headline, even when that foreign military is accused, by numerous human rights groups, of killing thousands of trade unionists, political leftists, human rights workers and others, and engages in policies that encourage commanders to kill civilians.
Big yawn.
I can still be shocked by this. Maybe that's a good sign.
And I think I know what this black hole in the 'news' is about: The "military-industrial complex" has been joined together with the "corpo-fascist media complex" in furtherance of the war profiteering goals of both. Thus, we have the New York Times, a once respected newspaper that, in 1971, published the "Pentagon Papers" in defiance of the Nixon government, which was prolonging the Vietnam War, turning around in 2002 and publishing outright lies about WMDs in Iraq on behalf of the Bush Junta and yet another horrible, unjust, illegal, mass murdering war. One can only presume that the New York Slimes' owners are now benefiting from war, as is the entire corpo-fascist press. They have forfeited respect as journalist--and their coverage of the amazing leftist democracy movement in Latin America over the last decade only confirms that view. They have become warmongers and tools of the "military-industrial complex."
This U.S. military buildup in Colombia and in the region, and U.S. fostering more of a 70 year civil war in Colombia, and opposition to a peaceful settlement of it, and larding billions on a country and its military with one of the worst human rights records on earth, is quite possibly the most important U.S. news story of this century, thus far, outside of the on-going horrors in Iraq and Afghanistan and how those horrors began. This OP about the Colombian Supreme Court declaring the latest U.S./Colombia military agreement unconstitutional is likely only a hiatus in this important story. As the author points out, the U.S. military ALREADY occupies at least seven military bases in Colombia, and it already has at least 1,500 military personnel in the country and is already at the least advising, aiding and abetting the Colombian military's slaughters of Colombians, including armed FARC guerrillas, political dissenters, trade unionists and others, and including ordinary people doing nothing at all--the "false positives" murders and murders of peasant farmers. WHAT IS THE U.S. MILITARY DOING IN COLOMBIA with all this killing is going on? When did this become OUR civil war?
The only surprise to me in this article is the information--if true--that U.S. military personnel including U.S. military 'contractors' did not have total diplomatic immunity in Colombia prior to the secretly negotiated military agreement of last year, signed by U.S./Bushwack ambassador to Colombia, William Brownfield, and Bush Jr. pal, Alvaro Uribe. I had presumed that there was informal immunity, and had wondered why Brownfield was so anxious to get an official SIGNATURE on this immunity before Uribe got booted out (--cut loose by the CIA, except for personal protection guarantees?). The promoters of this agreement, in Colombia and in the Pentagon, argued that this latest agreement merely ratifies "existing arrangements," and I presumed that one of those "arrangements" was immunity. This author says otherwise--that the immunity was unique to this agreement.
If U.S. soldiers and U.S. 'contractors' now revert to a status of no immunity, this adds more urgency to Brownfield's motives in getting that signature, especially if U.S. soldiers/'contractors,' or any other U.S. military operatives and/or their commanders--up to and including the "commander in chief"--get charged with crimes in Colombia. Whether the Supreme Court's ruling changes the status of U.S. soldiers/'contractors' or others, as to immunity, or not, this agreement can be used in legal proceedings, should legal action be brought for crimes committed by the U.S. military in Colombia, and it can be argued that it is a "fuzzy area" of the law. It was the law for about a year until it was ruled unconstitutional.
It's quite interesting, in this context, that the U.S. State Department recently 'fined' Blackwater for "unauthorized" "trainings" of "foreign persons" (don't know who) in Colombia, "for use in Iraq and Afghanistan." Did those acts fall within the last year, while this total diplomatic immunity was in effect? If so, lawyers could certainly argue that, if Blackwater committed crimes during that period, they are immune--by signature of the president of Colombia. And the "fuzzy area" would include questions about its application while it was in effect, and questions about whether or not it was/is retroactive to crimes before that period (especially if there was an informal immunity--say, a handshake between Uribe and Bush that Blackwater could train assassins in Colombia).
I think the question is, quite literally, what was the U.S. military DOING in Colombia, that required "total diplomatic immunity," as well as what the hell IS the U.S. military doing in Colombia? What is its presence there for?
The U.S. military is also now in supposedly de-militarized Costa Rica. They are in Honduras, with the U.S. military's bases there having been secured by a righwing coup d'etat. (Ecuador, also a member of ALBA--the Venezuela-organized trade group--as Honduras was before the coup, recently threw the U.S. military out of Ecuador. None of the Bolivarian countries permits the U.S. military to operate in its territory. Honduras may well have been next to evict them.) The U.S. military is in the Caribbean (with the newly reconstituted U.S. 4th Fleet). It's in Panama. It's in Haiti. And it's operating a prison and a torture dungeon under no one's law on the other end of the island of Cuba, at Guantanamo Bay.
Aside from Colombia's civil war--stoked by $7 BILLION in U.S. military aid--Latin America is one of the most peaceful regions on earth. It has no enemies (except those in Washington DC). It is under no threat. It has undergone a quite remarkable, peaceful transformation to democracy--after decades of U.S.-supported heinous dictators and rightwing, "neo-liberal" looters--and it is peacefully trading with countries all over the world. WHY is the U.S. trying to militarize Latin America? Is it for more than keeping billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars flowing to war profiteers in the corrupt, murderous, failed U.S. "war on drugs"? WHY has that "war" become a MILITARY war? What is all this militarism FOR?
These are questions that the New York Slimes and brethren will never ask. But they NEED asking--because what we may be looking at is Vietnam II--a sneaky buildup, amidst demagoguery about "communism," all sorts of U.S. covert ops going on--psyops, disinformation, dirty tricks, destabilization ploys--to prepare the ground, and, once all the pieces are in place, the American people may find themselves in another war--wondering, as in Iraq, as in Vietnam: How did that happen?
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