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probably designed by Donald Rumsfeld, and I'm pretty sure that war assets are being put in place--including the seven new US military bases in Colombia, the securing of the US military base in Honduras by the rightwing coup, the re-constitution of the US 4th Fleet in the Caribbean last summer (mothballed since WW II), and probably the installation of former Defense Minister Santos as president of Colombia. Santos is the 'Donald Rumsfeld' of South America--he is chafing at the bit to invade Venezuela and Ecuador, kill all the leftists and turn their oil over to Exxon Mobil.
And I wouldn't be surprised if Exxon Mobil was helping the war plan out. In circa 2007, President Chavez of Venezuela re-negotiated Venezuela's oil contracts with the multinationals to get a better deal for Venezuela and its social programs. Previous rightwing governments had basically been giving the oil away, and skimming off some for themselves and Venezuela's rich oil elite--in a 10/90 split of the profits, favoring the multinationals. The Chavez government re-negotiated the contracts several times, with the last one resulting in a 60/40 split, favoring Venezuela. Exxon Mobil walked out of the talks--although other companies (British BP, Norway's Statoil, France's Total remained), went into courts in England and the US and tried to freeze $12 billion of Venezuela's international cash reserves (about a fourth of its wealth). Exxon Mobil got thrown out of court. And I think they hate Chavez with a visceral, Cheney-Rumsfeld type of hatred for sticking up for Venezuela and for daring to use oil profits to benefit the poor.
That's the situation. Our greediest, most murderous, most lawless corporations and their operatives in our government have a plan to take Venezuela's and Ecuador's oil by force, probably, as Rumsfeld suggested, in his op-ed in the Washington Post of 12/1/07, by the local fascist politicians in Venezuela's and Ecuador's northern provinces (where the oil is located), declaring their "independence," in a secessionist move, parading as "freedom fighters," and requesting US/Colombian military support. Thus the US will gain entry into these countries. Rumsfeld urges "swift action" by the US in support of "friends and allies" in South America. I think this is what he meant. This scenario was rehearsed in Bolivia, this last September, when the Bushwhacks were still in office, with the white separatist insurrection, funded and organized right out of the US embassy. It failed largely due to the united action of Chile, Brazil and Argentina, through the new South American "common market," UNASUR, in backing up Morales when he threw the US ambassador out of the country.
There was another rehearsal of war systems earlier in the year, with the US/Colombia bombing/raid on Ecuador, in which they slaughtered 25 sleeping people without benefit trial (a FARC hostage and peace negotiator's camp just inside Ecuador's border). This very nearly started a war between the US/Colombia and Ecuador/Venezuela, but again, cooler heads prevailed--among them, Chavez (whom Brazil's president, Lula da Silva, called "the great peacemaker"). This was prior to formalization of UNASUR, so it was taken to the Rio Group (in both cases, to avoid the OAS and the Bushwhacks' obstructionism), and Colombia's current president, Alvaro Uribe, was raked over the coals, and compelled to apologize and promise that Colombia would never do such a thing again. However, his then Defense Minister, Santos, soon afterward threatened to do exactly the same thing to Venezuela. (Colombia can easily use the FARC guerrillas as an excuse to invade their neighboring countries, Ecuador and Venezuela. It's all set up as another potential trigger for the war.) Santos has since retired his office and is running for president of Colombia (--where, if you raise your head in a leftist cause, you can get it shot off by rightwing paramilitary death squads closely tied to the Colombian military).
The evidence for a war plan is pretty overwhelming. The questions are: 1) How do Obama and Clinton fit into this picture, of a war plan that Rumsfeld left on the desk, that seems to be moving forward on its own volition? (Do they agree with it? Will they shut it down, or try to?) 2) Will the people of the US tolerate another oil war? And, 3) Will the South Americans be able to head it off, or, if it comes to that, win it?
I won't go into my thoughts on Nos. 1 and 2 right now. And I am inclined to answer "yes" to No. 3. The South Americans have never been more united and cooperative, and they have a very positive vision of the future to pull them together and inspire them. I think they will be able to head it off. And if the US instigates a war in the region, and they can't head it off, I think the good guys will win it. And I don't mean us. We are not the "good guys" in Latin America and we never have been. And our Corporate Rulers clearly have no conscience whatsoever about slaughtering hundreds of thousands of innocent people to steal their oil. And that is just the problem. These Corporate Rulers are bankrupt in more ways than one, and desperate. They have nothing inspiring to offer. They've looted us blind. They don't even offer the US prosperity any more. And all they offer South Americans is enslavement, torture, death and squalid corruption, and most South Americans know it. South Americans--for all their troubles--are a peaceful people. They don't want war. And they have shown themselves to be very clever and very adroit at avoiding it several times over the last few years. I think that's the path that will end up victorious--the peaceful path toward social justice and South American (and possibly Central America) economic and political integration, forming a powerful trade block, with all the resources and all the creative, democratic energies that we once had--and the 21st century will be theirs, not ours.
Cheney and Rumsfeld and their cabal wrote the "Project For A New American Century," based on war and greed. They meant the US, not all of the Americas. They could not have written the "Project for a New South American Century," based on peacefulness and social justice. They were the operatives of our bankrupt Corporate Rulers, and what they got us was...bankrupt, both morally and financially. That's where this war plan is going--toward our complete degradation, and unfixable bankruptcy in every respect. Hitler, too, thought his war machine was unbeatable. It wasn't.
I want to say something about the tone of these former soldiers' comments. I can understand their anger and their idealism--their desire to find something to defend that is worthy of their youthful ardor and young warrior energy. But we really and truly, as a species, have reached the end of the line, as to our planet's ability to sustain us. War is therefore something that should be avoided at almost any cost. We don't have the "luxury" of war. Our time here is very limited--maybe a couple of decades before the planet is unlivable. Every wily means must be used; every trick; every cleverness; every effort to head this war off, and even if it means temporary humiliation, and backing down on some things, it will be worth it, in the end. This war, which must look so easy to the Pentagon--all this "undefended" oil right in our own "back yard"--will NOT be easy, and will be suicidal for us all. We must stop having resource wars and begin sharing resources and ideas. I said above that it will be South America's century, but, really, if they get drawn into a war with the US, it will be nobody's century. They may well win it, but what will they have won? The South Americans have better democracies than our own, and far more responsive leaders. We have shown that we cannot prevent a corporate resource war on this end. So they must do it. They must prevent it. So I would like to see these young people stop talking of war, and start talking of how to prevent a war, and helping the South Americans, in whatever way they can, to do so. War is hell at any time. They know this. But war now will be the last war. If we do not put all of our energies into saving the planet, it's all over for us. Somehow it must be prevented.
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