Honduras at the Tipping Point?
BySeveral Guatemalans I spoke to over the weekend were very concerned about the situation next door, and so I thought I would continue to post updates for the benefit of readers.
Yesterday former President Zelaya attempted to return to power in Honduras, but fortunately his aircraft was not permitted to land. This was a good choice, because once on the ground he could coordinate the revolution that Raul Castro and Hugo Chavez are pushing for. I’m beginning to wonder if the Honduran government didn’t know exactly what it was doing when it deported him, instead of putting him in jail as others had suggested; instead of being an ousted former President, he’d be a martyr.
Anyway, Ms. O’Grady summarizes the situation in an article publshed today, and it is so closely aligned to my own views on the matter I’m just going to quote from her article.
Hondurans have good cause for calling on divine intervention: Reason has gone AWOL in places like Turtle Bay and Foggy Bottom. Ruling the debate on Mr. Zelaya’s behavior is Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chávez, who is now the reigning international authority on “democracy.”
Mr. Chávez is demanding that Mr. Zelaya be reinstated and is even threatening to overthrow the new Honduran president, Roberto Micheletti. He’s leading the charge from the Organization of American States (OAS). The United Nations and the Obama administration are falling in line.
Is this insane? You bet. We have fallen through the looking glass and it’s time to review how hemispheric relations came to such a sad state.
The story begins in 2004, when Mr. Chávez was still an aspiring despot and the U.S. pursued a policy of appeasement toward him. Not surprisingly, that only heightened his appetite for power.
Mr. Chávez had already rewritten the Venezuelan Constitution, taken over the judiciary and the national electoral council (CNE), militarized the government, and staked out an aggressive, anti-American foreign policy promising to spread his revolution around the hemisphere.
Many Venezuelans were alarmed, and the opposition had labored to collect signatures for a presidential recall referendum permitted under the constitution. As voting day drew near, Mr. Chávez behaved as if he knew his days were numbered. The European Union refused to send an observer team, citing lack of transparency. The OAS did send observers, and in the months and weeks ahead of the vote mission chief Fernando Jaramillo complained bitterly about the state’s intimidation tactics against the population. Mr. Chávez gave OAS Secretary General César Gaviria an ultimatum: Either get Mr. Jaramillo out of the country or the referendum would be quashed. Mr. Chávez was appeased. Mr. Jaramillo was withdrawn.
The Carter Center was also invited to “observe,” and former President Jimmy Carter was welcomed warmly by Mr. Chávez upon his arrival in Venezuela.
A key problem, beyond the corrupted voter rolls and government intimidation, was that Mr. Chávez did not allow an audit of his electronic voting machines. Exit polls showed him losing the vote decisively. But in the middle of the night, the minority members of the CNE were kicked out of the election command center. Shortly thereafter, Mr. Chávez claimed victory. There was never a credible audit of the paper ballots against the tallies in the voting machines.
Mr. Carter’s approval notwithstanding, the proper U.S. and OAS response was obvious: The process had been shrouded in state secrets and therefore it was impossible to endorse or reject the results. Venezuelan patriots begged for help from the outside world. Instead, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for the Western Hemisphere, Roger Noriega, and the OAS blessed the charade.
There was never any explanation for the blind endorsement, but behind the scenes there were claims that Mr. Chávez threatened to call his militia to the streets and spill blood. The oil fields were to be burned. To this day, the opposition contends that the U.S. and Mr. Gaviria made a cold calculation that caving in to Mr. Chávez would avoid violence.
Predictably, Washington’s endorsement of the flawed electoral process was a green light. Mr. Chávez grew more aggressive, emboldened by his “legitimate” status. He set about using his oil money to destabilize the Bolivian and Ecuadorean democracies and to help Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega and Argentina’s Cristina Kirchner get elected. Soviet-backed Fidel Castro was able to intimidate his neighbors in the 1960s and ’70s, and Mr. Chávez has done the same thing in the new millennium. This has given him vast power at the OAS.
Hondurans had the courage to push back. Now Chávez-supported agitators are trying to stir up violence. Yesterday afternoon airline service was suspended in Tegucigalpa when Mr. Zelaya tried to return to the country and his plane was not permitted to land. There were reports of violence between his backers and troops.
This is a moment when the U.S. ought to be on the side of the rule of law, which the Honduran court and Congress upheld. If Washington does not reverse course, it will be one more act of appeasement toward an ambitious and increasingly dangerous dictator.
Update: A blogger who understands the Communist gameplan in Latin America analyzes the situation in Honduras.
Update 2: A lefty Guate blogger with the Chavez/Zelaya talking points. Notice how the ‘mainstream media’ is described as being supportive of the new government. Anyone seen a single media outlet not supporting Zelaya? In the US we call this straightfaced, total detachment from reality ‘propaganda’.
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11 Comments
July 6th, 2009 at 12:29 pm
Mark, you’ve got to see the photos from yesterday’s events in Honduras from James Rodriguez, a Guatemalan-American journalist who travel to Honduras on Saturday.
Each photo is worth more than a thousand words:
http://mimundo-jamesrodriguez-esp.blogspot.com/2009/07/tragedia-en-toncontin-ejercito-ispara.html
July 6th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
Mark, by the way, here’s another entry in English from James Rodriguez. Check it out!
http://mimundo-jamesrodriguez.blogspot.com/2009/07/mel-our-friend-people-are-with-you.html
What do you think now… do you still think it was disingenuous to call it a coup?
July 6th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
This sounds like a wikipedia entry regarding Hugo Chavez but has very little to do with the actual situation on the ground in Honduras.
They’re all bad guys and the new de facto bosses are most likely going to be worse than Zelaya. You don’t mention the rampant corruption throughout the gov’t. of one of the poorest, small countries in L.A.,the abject poverty most Hondurans find themselves in, and the real golden egg in this fairy tale which is the narco money and who controls it. (don’t get me started on conspiracy theories).
This was a coup to get things back to the old-boy networks “status quo”. If you have any doubts watch for the coming excuse of why they can’t have the scheduled elections in November. “The situation is too unstable, so we’ll stay in control.”
They don’t want to go anywhere. This is only beginning and I hope the region is spared the potential world of hurt the Hondurans will now have to put up with for no one knows how long.
Mark, I gather from your writing that you have not been around here for very long and I know you can’t speak the language but there is a reason why the Guatemalans you talked to this weekend were concerned. They’ve been down this road too many times to want to see it again.
Coups are bad, people die and disappear and there is nobody to answer for the actions taken because no one is legitimately in control. It is a scary place to be and a road Guatemala (and the region) definitely thought they had left behind. God save us from the defenders of the Honduran constitution, (who, by the way, have suspended same).
I’ve learned from a slew of bad presidents starting in the 80’s that you let these guys run their course and go away, so far (in Guate)there has been 1 good one and 5 bad ones since I’ve lived here. Some much worse than others.
Zelaya wasn’t going to carry his “encuesta” and even if he did, so what. He’s not Chavez and has a completely different situation on his hands. The reason Micheletti grabbed power is because he moved from third to second in line, following the vice presidents resignation to run for pres in November (having beaten Micheletti in the primary, no sour grapes there, I’m sure).
Zelaya should have been allowed to run his course or arrested and by the police forces and tried. Not what happened on Sunday morning.
What happens next causes a great deal of fear in everyone with a memory.
So hey, thanks Honduras for a trip back to the only part of the 80’s I didn’t enjoy.
July 6th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
Rudy, I’ve already updated this post to reflect my thoughts on Jamie’s commentary. I find his sentiment to mirror that reflected by the other leftists throughout the region (which is why I refer to them as ‘talking points’, and disingenuous is the most flattering I can come up with.
If Zelaya were right of center and was replaced by a left of center politician, Obama/Chavez/Castro would be calling it a peaceful revolution by the people which all other governments must respect. Since Zelaya is a protege of the Chavez et al, it is a ‘coup’, and the cabal threatens invasion.
If I were President I’d fly the 10th Mountain division to Tegucigalpa for “combined forces training”, and maybe put a battleship and destroyer off the coast. Communists only understand force, and it would send a message that the march across Latin America has come to an end (all in humble Honduras; who would have guessed?).
I bet the democrats in Venezuela and elsewhere are looking to the developments in Honduras and plotting their next move.
July 6th, 2009 at 1:56 pm
Korey,
I’m not under any allusions about any of the governments in the region. I try to maintain an objective opinion while learning, and I hope that my general attitude about governments is proven wrong. To date (I’ve been studying the region since 1993), I’ve yet to be wrong.
The Guatemalans I spoke with this weekend were, to a man, concerned not by the new government but about what the ‘Communistas’ were going to do in retaliation. They insisted, as I have come to believe, that the people are glad to have Zelaya gone, were frightened by his abuse of power, and want a return to democracy (no doubt a sentiment shared by Venezuelans). This ‘coup’ seems to be unlike any other in recent memory in that all sides of the government were in favor of the action, there have been no brutal acts by the armed forces, and things have been peaceful.
I would have agreed with you before regarding the preference over an arrest and trial, and certainly that would be better on paper. However, I suspect the leadership in Honduras knew that Zelaya’s people in Tegucigalpa, Caracas and Havana (and no doubt Moscow), would have preferred such a development as a pretext for a foreign military intervention which would have been launched to free him and topple the government. Lots of people would have been killed who ‘resisted’, and Zelaya would be able to purge the government of dissenters. (This is all right out of the old Soviet textbook, by the way).
As it is, it seems to me a model of peaceful change of government when an executive attempts to rule extra-constitutionally.
July 6th, 2009 at 5:18 pm
People didn´t have to die. When you go to a demonstration, you know the risks you are taking.
Zelaya´s supporters move to take control of the airport was pretty stupid. How do you defend a property the size of an airport? You can´t have the whole perimeter flanked by soldiers. Once there was tear gas, these people should´ve gotten out of there.
One thing I´m terrified of is being governed by people who can´t even read and write, led by a bunch of opportunistic leftists that end up living in Europe with all sorts of comforts.
July 6th, 2009 at 7:28 pm
Cristina wrote:”…One thing I´m terrified of is being governed by people who can´t even read and write, led by a bunch of opportunistic leftists that end up living in Europe with all sorts of comforts…”
Hey are you posting from the USA, sounds like Washington DC these days?
FMLN, FLSN, ALBA…pura mierda
Viva la revolucion!
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July 6th, 2009 at 7:47 pm
You ask if anyone has seen a single media outlet not supporting Zelaya. Here is a surprising (to me) link to something not supportive of Mel that seems to be a collaborative effort involving NPR and The New Republic, two outlets that are usually reliably leftish.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106085412
I’d also call your attention to National Review, Christian Science Monitor, Wall Street Journal, Investor’s Business Daily, and I’m sure there are more.
From the context of Jamey’s comment about media support for the new gov’t, though, I think he may be referring to Honduran media like La Prensa, La Tribuna, El Heraldo–altho CNN Espanol can hardly has escaped his notice.
(Univision online poll is running 69-31 in favor of the new govt, by the way.)
July 6th, 2009 at 7:57 pm
In actuality I hate to see the pendulum swing this way in LATAM. I cut my teeth during 1980s in the insurgencies in El Sal (FMLN), Nicaragua (FSLN), Guate (FAR/ORPA), and (to a smaller extent) the Darien border area (FARC/NT).
Such an incredible waste and yet another testament to man’s inability to learn from mistakes of the past. As long as pervasive ignorance rules the day, we will see these cyclical resurgences of leftist despots – the associated media hype, posturing, etc is almost boring in its predictability. Unfortunately real people pay the price during these periods and find their countries set back even further from enjoying realized potential.
Call it a coup, or whatever you want…just looks like someone was paying attention to the current situation and thought they might try to forgo some asspain and bloodshed by addressing a problem early – get the cancer (Zelaya) while it’s small, beats the treatment required once it entrenches and spreads (a la Chavez, Ortega, et al).
These countries deserve better.
Vaya con Dios.
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July 6th, 2009 at 8:01 pm
And Rudy–I looked at the pictures you linked. They show a big crowd at the airport on Sunday, but don’t really speak to the issue of whether the expulsion of Zelaya was a ‘coup’ or not. (My Honduran-born wife says a lot of these pro-Mel demonstrators are being paid–250 Lempiras a day–by Venezuelan and Nicaraguan ‘community organizers.’)
July 6th, 2009 at 8:30 pm
An angry Twitter user just sent this to me. It appears Guatemala lost $30 million USD by shutting down the border (for two days) with Honduras. Very smart.