All that is necessary for evil to Triumph... Part 2

Following up on my last post let's move on to Mitt Romney's statement:

"The president also claimed on Arabic TV that America has dictated to other nations," Romney said. "No, America has sacrificed to free nations from dictators."

Let's avoid the current hotbed of the Middle East and take a brief tour of the Caribbean.

I mentioned the Spanish-American War of 1889 in my previous post. This might easily fall into Romney's category of "freeing nations from dictators". Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines were Spanish colonies. Any cursory reading of the US Revolutionary War is sufficient to show that colonies are bad. Colonies are exploited by the colonizing nation and should be free. So the US determined to gree these island nations from Spain. In turn these became US Territories, which they remain with the exception of Cuba.

What is a Territory?

U.S. Territory. The term U.S. Territory means the Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and Palau, until the Compact of Free Association with Palau is ratified.

-Code of Federal Regulations

Some time I would like to get a more detailed explanation of the differences between States and Territories, but as I understand it a territory is controlled by the US, but lacks elected representation on Capitol Hill. They may or may not have taxes and their governments are always subject to US approval. Hm. This sounds suspiciously like a colony.

So how has being a US Territory helped Cuba?

Cuba:

• 1898 US takes control of Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines from Spain via Spanish-American War.
• 1901 Platt Amendment declares undisputed US right to intervene in Cuba. This caused an awful lot of discontent across Cuba, where people did not want foreigners that didn't even speak their own language to syphon off their resources and change the way they live. Wait a minute, is this 1900's Cuba or 2000's California? Hm...
  
• The next 50 years saw a series of US-backed leaders, both from elections and from military coups. Batista being one of the most consistent figures. These governments were rife with corruption and alternatively recriminated their opponents' excesses and restricted the freedoms of the general populace.
  
• 1953 Fidel Castro, who had worked with Batista and other political leaders becomes disgusted with the rampant corruption in the government and begins his revolution.
  Castro implements his idea of a socialist government, though remains as a de facto tyrant. He suspends due process, freedom of speech, property rights. He also implements mandatory military service and education, leading to a 90% literacy rate in the nation today.
  
• 1961 Bay of Pigs: Kennedy's failed attempt to overthrow Castro's government with US-trained and backed Cuban exiles.
• Embargo, Cuban Missile Crisis, Cuba / Soviet Union relations, Etc.

So Cuba didn't fare so well as a US Territory. What about some of the other sovereign nations, Those that liberated themselves from Spain without any US aid or obligation?

Panama:
Panama was part of the nation of Colombia (and Nueva Granada) after Simon Bolivar liberated it from Spain. This was done without any help from Washington DC, though it was solicited at the time. The US decided to stand back and see who would come out on top rather than risk angering Spain by aiding a neighboring colony. Panama also happens to contain the narrowest strip of land between the Pacific and the Caribbean. For centuries ships docked at either end of this land and paid mule teams or trains to pack their stuff over the mountains to avoid the time and danger of sailing all the way around South America.

Many international businessman had their eye on building a canal across Panama, but several attempts failed due to the harsh geography and malaria. In 1903 US Secretary of State John M. Hay tried unsuccessfully to get a 99 year lease to the canal zone from Colombia. When the Colombian government refused the US "happened" to hear about a disgruntled Colombian that was interested in liberating Panama. The US coincidentally sent a couple large ships into the area "on exercises" at the very time this revolt happened. The US formally recognized the new country three days later and Phillipe Bunau-Varilla (Chief Engineer of the French canal company and newly appointed ambassador from Panama to the US) signed the agreement that the US was unable to do previously.

The Canal was completed, though the locals saw very little benefit from it. The workers were shipped over from the West Indies because they spoke English and the US engineers could not be bothered to learn Spanish so the locals could work on the project. After the canal was completed tens of thousands of English-speaking West Indies natives were left for Panama to deal with.

The glut of labor caused severe depression and massive poverty among the general populace, though the new elite benefited richly from their association with the US efforts.

Rutgers has put together a fairly comprehensive Timeline of US Intervention in Panama. Anyone that thinks Panama was an unsullied American success needs to review it.

Nicaragua:
Nicaragua endured years of tyranny until Daniel Ortega (leading the FSLN) overthrew the government with the help of the military. Like many of its neighbors, Nicaragua suffered from extreme social stratification. The few elite controlled nearly all of the nation's arable land and reaped riches by leasing the land to foreign fruit companies. Ortega enacted many reforms to bring basic rights to the nation. Rights we take for granted in the US, such as due process and access to land (90% of which was controlled by 10% of the population). In 1981 Reagan branded Ortega a Marxist for his efforts, but in 1984 Ortega was democratically elected by his people, capturing 63% of the vote.

Reagan and his cronies decided it was time to replace this government so they sold weapons to Iran to raise funds for backing guerrilla 'Contra' groups to overthrow Ortega. The Tower commission appointed by US Congress to investigate the issue, leading to many convictions of criminal acts (including Oliver North). Most of those convicted were pardoned by Reagan or George HW Bush and reinstated. Reagan managed to evade impeachment because though they hinted that Reagan kind of knew and would have approved, he did not directly order his underlings to do these sales.

The UN International Court of Justice tried the US and found it guilty of numerous wrongs, but the US refused to accept the court's authority. Here are a few notable findings:

• By twelve votes to three: Decides that the United States of America, by training, arming, equipping, financing and supplying the contra forces or otherwise encouraging, supporting and aiding military and paramilitary activities in and against Nicaragua, has acted, against the Republic of Nicaragua, in breach of its obligation under customary international law not to intervene in the affairs of another State;
• By fourteen votes to one:Decides that, by the acts referred to in subparagraph (6) hereof the United States of America has acted, against the Republic of Nicaragua, in breach of its obligations under Article XIX of the Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation between the United States of America and the Republic of Nicaragua signed at Managua on 21 January 1956;
• By fourteen votes to one: Finds that the United States of America, by producing in 1983 a manual entitled Operaciones sicológicas en guerra de guerrillas, and disseminating it to contra forces, has encouraged the commission by them of acts contrary to general principles of humanitarian law;
• By twelve votes to three: Decides that the United States of America, by the attacks on Nicaraguan territory referred to in subparagraph (4) hereof, and by declaring a general embargo on trade with Nicaragua on 1 May 1985, has acted in breach of its obligations under Article XIX of the Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation between the Parties signed at Managua on 21 January 1956;
  

It amazes me how quickly the US public has managed to forget these things. The countryside was ravaged by war for years because of Reagan's campaign against Ortega. Entire villages were decimated; peaceful people accused of government collaboration and murdered. Ironically this situation is not just a "past mistake". George Washington University has assembled a surprising overview of Iran-Contra ties today.


Guatemala:
Now it is true that the US did not install a dictator in Nicaragua, so Mr. Romney might be technically proven correct there. The case of Guatemala completely destroys his argument, though. Here the nation's elite (5% of the population) had allowed foreign companies like the United Fruit Company in the US to control 90% of the arable land in the nation. This means that 90-95% of the people had neither the ability to raise their own food as the had done for generations nor access to support themselves any other way. These people were rounded up and compelled to work on foreign-controlled fruit plantations in inhumane work conditions, often paying back half of their wages for the right to stay in plantation barracks while they worked.

In 1945 Juan Jose Arevalo was democratically elected president and was democratically succeeded by Jacobo Arbenz. Both attempted to enact land reform and basic human rights for the unlanded poor. His plan was to revoke the contracts granted to the UFC on land that they were not using and to divvy that land out to the poor so they could return to subsistence farming. The UFC sent representatives to Capitol Hill, complaining about a communist incursion in Central America.

The official record from State.gov tells us what happened next:

"U.S.-backed group led by Col. Carlos Castillo Armas invaded the country from Honduras in 1954 and quickly took over the government. Gen. Miguel Ydigoras Fuentes took power in 1958 following the murder of Colonel Castillo Armas."

Armas began more than thirty years of bloody dictatorships, backed by CIA money and US military. Tens of thousands of Guatemalans became Desaparecidos. This term refers to those who simply disappear. They are sometimes taken to prison. Sometimes they are killed outright and left in the jungle. These atrocities are well-documented, though generally ignored by the general US public.

In 1992 On the eve of the 150th anniversary of Columbus's journey to the new world Rigoberta Menchu was awarded Nobel prize for her efforts to document the true plight of the native peoples in Central America. She learned Spanish, since her native language was Quechua, in order to publish her story to the outside world. To anyone interested in the actual situation of the poor in Guatemala I strongly recommend her book Me Llamo Rigoberta Menchu (I, Rigoberta Menchu in English).

This era of US intervention is criminally cruel. We overthrew a peaceful, democratically-elected government whose sole crime was to purge its nation of the extreme abuse and tyranny that had plagued it for generations. In its place we directly instituted and supported dictators of the worst sort. The government of Guatemala is still plagued by corruption and violence. Would Arevalo and Arbenz have successfully brought the population of Guatemala to anywhere near the standard of life that the poorest sectors of the US enjoy? I don't know, but I do know that they had zero chance with US weapons, soldiers, and money stacked against them.

El Salvador:
From colonial times until the 1970s a very small group (approximately a dozen Criollo/Mestizo families) ruled El Salvador and controlled 100% of the land and money. tens of thousands of native inhabitants relied on subsistence farming and government neglect (not asserting their ownership of arable land) to survive. After the travesties of US policy in Guatemala and Nicaragua during the 40s and 50s and with the rise of the Soviet Union, the United States became ever more paranoid about "Marxist movements" in Latin America.

A civil war broke out in El Salvador as natural consequence of the higly stratified population. The few ruling parties relied on monopolizing income from leasing arable land to foreign fruit companies to support them. When commodity prices dropped they tried to pass on the pressure to the other 99% of the population who lived barely above starvation levels. General revolt ensued which the ruling families labeled "Communist Uprising" and received hundreds of millions in money and weapons from the US.

During to the carnage that ensued thousands were murdered and half a million Salvadorans fled the violence to the US. Note that none of these refugees were afforded the same asylum granted to Cambodians fleeing the Khmer Rouge or Cubans fleeing Castro because the government dictators killing and raping them were the "Good guys".

Now the US holds discussions about how best to get rid of all these illegal aliens. We complain that our schools and social services are being overrun by them. We claim that just because they can't earn a livable wage in their country doesn't make it our responsibility to support them here.

Here's a visual for you. If we set off a nuclear bomb in Vancouver, BC. Does it make sense for us to complain about the nuclear fallout that drifts over our border? The US was directly responsible for decimating thousands upon thousands of people in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nicaragua (I haven't even touched on Argentina, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico or Brazil). Now we complain about the few survivors that made it through the destruction to seek some kind of peaceful existence in the US.

So Mr Romney.

"I take issue with President Obama's recent tour of apology," Romney said. "It's not because America hasn't made mistakes -- we have -- but because America's mistakes are overwhelmed by what America has meant to the hopes and aspirations of people throughout the world."

Obama has expressed regret while traveling abroad for America's leadership failures and other past conduct.

-Fox News

You need to pick your battles better. Anyone having gone through AA can tell you that the first step in recovery is admitting you have a problem. That said Obama appears to be one step ahead of you in this regard. It's time we admitted our mistakes and began the process of changing our actions to meet our stated beliefs.