"The United States is Terrified" - Noam Chomsky on Latin America's Move To

"The United States is Terrified" - Noam Chomsky on Latin America's Move Towards "Independence and Integration"

NOAM CHOMSKY: Now remember, the U.S. is a global power, so you can't just look at one region. You have to look at what's going on everywhere. So if we go back, say, to the last intelligence projection of the Clinton administration, National Intelligence Council, year 2000, their projection for the next 15 years, they -- just keeping to energy, but there's a lot more. They took it as a matter of course that the United States would control Middle East oil. They don't discuss that much. And then they say the United States, though it will control Middle East oil, because that’s a lever of world control, nevertheless it, itself, will rely on what were called more stable Atlantic Basin resources, meaning West African dictatorships and the western hemisphere. That's what the U.S. will rely on.

Well, what's been going on in Latin America since then significantly threatens that. For the first time in its history, first time since the Spanish colonization, Latin America is moving towards a degree of independence and also a degree of integration. The history of Latin America -- Latin America is very sharply split between a tiny rich elite and huge poverty, and the rich elite have been the only active ones politically. They were oriented towards the colonial power. So that's where they ship their capital. That's where they have their second wealthy homes, you know, send their kids to school, this whole business. Very little integration internal to Latin America. I mean, even the transportation system shows that. It's beginning to change. They are moving towards a degree of independence and towards a degree of integration.

And the United States is terrified. Just keeping to oil alone, it means that the energy resources -- I mean, the major energy producer in the hemisphere is Venezuela. The U.S. kicked the British out under Wilson, Woodrow Wilson. It’s known as Wilsonian idealism. They kicked the British out as soon as the oil age began, because they knew that Venezuela had enormous oil resources. That meant supporting a bunch of utterly brutal dictators, while Venezuela became by 1928 the leading oil exporter in the world. It’s remained very high. Venezuela is now going towards independence, and the United States is frantic. That's why you have this hysteria about Chavez. It’s not because he's attacking anyone or anything like. It's hysteria because he's not following orders. It’s kind of like Serbia, but much more serious, because this is a big energy producer.

Furthermore, it influences others. The major energy producer in South America second to Venezuela is Bolivia. Well, you know what just happened there. They're moving towards independence, as well. And, in fact, the whole region from Venezuela down to Argentina is pretty much out of control, not totally, but pretty much.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/06/06/1337219

There's an awful lot of chickens waiting to come home to roost--even if they don't have bird flu, things will get really nasty!

Kissinger better hope he dies before he gets taken to the ICC.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/06/06/1337219
<snip>
The U.S. in the past has had two fundamental mechanisms for controlling Latin America: one is violence, the other is economic strangulation. They're both weakening. The last exercise of violence was in the year 2002, when in its dedication to democracy promotion the U.S. supported a military coup to overthrow the elected government of Venezuela. Well, had to back down, for one thing, because there was a popular uprising in Venezuela. But another reason was just the reaction in Latin America, where democracy is taken a lot more seriously than it is in North America and Europe and people don't think it's amusing anymore to have elected governments overthrown by a military coup. So the U.S. had to back down and turn to subversion instead, which is what’s going on now. That's the last major use of violence.

And so, the U.S. is preparing for more use of violence. If you take a look at the number of U.S. military personnel throughout Latin America, the military bases, the training of Latin American officers, that's all going up very sharply. In fact, for the first time ever, there are now more U.S. military personnel in Latin America than personnel for the major federal aid organizations. That never happened during the Cold War. Also military training for Latin American officers, and you know what that means.

Military training is being shifted from the State Department to the Pentagon. That's important. The State Department is under congressional supervision, and there are conditionalities, human rights and democracy conditionalities. They're not imposed very much, but they're there, you know, and they have some effect. You switch it to the Pentagon, there's no controls. Do whatever you want. And the whole region is surrounded by bases, and I suspect there will be secessionist movements coming along in Venezuela and Bolivia and possibly Iran. So the military option has by no means been abandoned, but it’s nothing like what it was before. I mean, in the past, you just overthrew governments, you know, didn't think twice about it.

Also from the article:

.... A lot of these policies are gaining significant popular appeal. Just read a scholarly paper by a very anti-Castro Cuban American scholar, who reports -- I don't know where he got it from, but he said about 170,000 Latin Americans have been, in the last couple years, have been treated in Cuban medical facilities, and most of them restoring sight under Cuban-Venezuelan programs, where Venezuela pays for it and people -- blind people, others who need medical care in the U.S. dependencies, where they can't get it, of course -- are sent to Cuba, where they come back seeing. They were blind. You know, okay, that has its effects on countries. Called Operation Miracle.

And within Venezuela, as far as -- you can like it or hate it, but the interesting question is what Venezuelans think about it. Okay, well, a good knowledge of that. There's extensive polls taken, Latin American and North American polls. It turns out that the popularity of the government has shot way up in the last -- since 1998, and it now is the most popular elected government in Latin America; in fact, in the hemisphere, because this government is not popular. So it's the most popular elected government in Latin America, and it keeps going up. Well, reasons not too obscure, but, sure, it's driving the United States berserk. That's why you have the constant hysteria from the government and the media about the terrible things in Venezuela and Bolivia.
(snip)

We've already seen a steady stream of visitors who prove almost daily there are gullible people out there taking in the _Bush-designed propaganda message on Latin America.

Thanks for the great information.

Fuck Chomsky and the horse he rode in on...he's in bed with the Holocaust Denial crowd, and he defended Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge long after the rest fo the wrold knew they were committing genocide.

Chomsky merely pointed out that his ac casualty total was 500,000 rather than 2 million. 500,000 was bad enough.

And you aren't really saying we shoul d stay with the U.S. status quo position of always supporting the rich against the poor
and the workers in Latin America, are you? That's what insisting on "free trade" down there means. It means consigning the poor to eternal misery.

I'd like to connect the dots.

The US didn't willingly let this happen in Latin America. It's not like they WANTED Chavez and others rise to power and start sassing back at the US. The United States has had Latin America in a headlock for generations....here's why we let go of our grip....

1) The US has been distracted in Iraq and Afghanistan for the past 5 years. We've been draining our treasury to fund these wars. We've spent over $375 billion by now....we're broke....we spent our wad on the wrong war it seems. We're so short-handed, we don't even have enough for Iraq. US troops have been there on 2 or 3 rotations.

2) The Bush administration has been struggling for survival in Washington. They haven't had a lot of time to focus on other issues besides surviving in November. It'll be this way for another 5 months.

3) The price of oil has shot up. When the price of oil goes up dramatically, it shifts power away from the user to the supplier. Billions get drained out of the US economy, and it goes straight into Chavez and Ahmadinejad's governments. They can now make big plans for their people. Money = power.