Regime Change Amnesia in Washington

by Michael Sweeney Posted on January 25, 2019

https://original.antiwar.com/Michael_Sweeney/2019/01/24/regime-change-amnesia-in-washington/

The decline of Venezuela finally came to a head on Wednesday when the opposition leader Juan Guaidó swore himself in as interim president, igniting a crisis of uncertainty about support for Guaidó among the Venezuelan military and eliciting the passionate support of the Trump administration. With the notable exception of Congressman Ro Khanna, a California Democrat, Washington appears to have forgotten the long and sordid history of US-backed regime change around the world.

In 1953 the US supported a coup against Iranian Prime Minister Mohammed Mosaddeq, resulting in the installation of the pro-US Reza Shah Pahlavi. The abuses of the Shah ultimately led to the rise of the today’s theocratic Islamic Republic of Iran, failing to benefit us or the Iranian people in any way. This coup initiated half a century of CIA involvement in regime change around the world, often with terrible unforeseen consequences. Our policy of toppling foreign governments is, at least in theory, meant to make the world a better place by spreading liberal democracy and capitalism. We were supposed to be spreading democracy and promoting global safety in 2003 when we took a month to topple Saddam Hussein and eight years dealing with the consequences. I doubt Iraq would be substantially worse off today had we left them alone a decade ago.

Intervention in foreign civil conflicts has an equally bad track record of making life worse for people around the world. Libya, Egypt, and Syria were all the subject of US-backed opposition movements, resulting in an authoritarian regime in Egypt, an ongoing civil war in Libya, and an ongoing civil war in Syria. Despite this history, Washington continues to use a combination of sanctions and political pressure to provoke further regime change around the world.

Regime change is simply a tool for undermining our global rivals by eliminating governments friendly to them, and to impute any noble intentions upon the actions of the Trump administration in Venezuela is unwise and unrealistic, especially when one considers Trump’s recent eagerness to invade Venezuela. Continued US support for Saudi Arabia, especially considering the horrors of their war in Yemen, completely exposes the Trump administration’s support for this coup as a strategic measure against our opponents abroad. To ignore what Washington is doing in Venezuela as simply promoting democracy is to risk the possibility of a long, deadly ground war in South America which would be a disastrous response to the already terrible crisis in Venezuela.

What is missing from the national conversation about Venezuela, and foreign policy generally, is a realistic and pragmatic non-interventionism. We only need to look to countries like Mexico, which decided to respect Venezuelan sovereignty by leaving its internal affairs alone, for guidance. The civil conflict of another nation shouldn’t be the concern of the United States, any more than our domestic issues should worry the world. Considering he claims to consider America’s problems first, I wonder why Trump doesn’t understand the value of noninterventionist foreign policy.

Michael Sweeney is a peace activist with a BA in political science concentrated in international relations. He blogs primarily using his twitter feed.

Russia says 'arbitrary' Israeli air strikes on Syria must stop

https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-mideast-crisis-syria-israel-russia/russia-says-arbitrary-israeli-air-strikes-on-syria-must-stop-idUKKCN1PH1JV

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia said on Wednesday that Israel should stop carrying out what Moscow called arbitrary air strikes on Syria, days after the Israeli air force targeted what Israel said were Iranian forces there.

Israel has repeatedly attacked what it describes as Iranian targets in Syria and those of allied militia, including Lebanon’s Hezbollah. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu describes the effort as an open-ended campaign to push back arch-foe Tehran.

The strikes have long caused friction between Israel and Russia, which apart from Iran is Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s other major foreign backer.

Israeli officials have spoken in the past of an agreement with Moscow under which they have made clear their strikes on Syria would not threaten Assad, while Russia has promised to help limit Iranian influence near the Israeli frontier. A hotline set up since 2015 is aimed at ensuring Russian forces in Syria are not surprised by Israeli attacks.

“The practice of arbitrary strikes on the territory of a sovereign state, in this case, we are talking about Syria, should be ruled out,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said, in answer to a question from Russian news agency TASS about recent Israeli air strikes on Syria.

She said such strikes added to tensions in the region, which she said was not in the long-term interests of any country there, including Israel.

“We should never allow Syria, which has suffered years of armed conflict, to be turned into an arena where geopolitical scores are settled,” TASS cited her as saying.

Her comments follow Israeli strikes in Syria on Monday. Israel did not immediately respond.

Earlier on Wednesday, Netanyahu signaled that the Syria sorties would continue.

“The IDF (Israel Defence Force) is the only military that is fighting the Iranian army in Syria,” he said during a visit to an Israeli army base. “I am certain in our ability to defeat the enemy.”

Reporting by Tom Balmforth and Dan Williams; editing by Andrew Osborn

INTENTO DE GOLPE DE ESTADO EN VENEZUELA

Durante años los gobiernos demócratas o republicanos de Estados Unidos intentaron derrocar a Hugo Chávez en Venezuela (en 2002, durante unos días lo lograron, pero la movilización popular y los militares nacionalistas lo impidieron), pero fracasaron. Desde la muerte de Chávez, han intentado derrocar a su sucesor Nicolás Maduro, sin conseguirlo.

La reelección de Maduro como presidente de Venezuela y su toma de protesta el pasado 10 de enero detonaron un nuevo intento de golpe de Estado en su contra, coordinado y dirigido por el gobierno de Donald Trump, con el objetivo de imponer como supuesto presidente de transición, a un títere de Washington y del golpista dirigente opositor (en prisión domiciliaria), Leopoldo López, de nombre Juan Guaidó, quien encabeza la golpista opositora Asamblea Nacional.

Hoy 23 de enero, que se conmemora el derrocamiento del dictador Marcos Pérez Jiménez en Venezuela, se escogió como el día para “desconocer” (aunque ya lo habían hecho desde su triunfo electoral en mayo del año pasado) al gobierno de Maduro por parte de Estados Unidos y sus lacayos europeos y latinoamericanos, y dar su “reconocimiento” al presidente de pacotilla que estos gobiernos y los fascistas venezolanos, intentan imponer.

En los últimos días, las fuerzas armadas venezolanas desarmaron y aprehendieron a un grupo de 27 soldados que seguramente perpetrarían asesinatos contra los opositores de Maduro, para que de esa manera la prensa y los medios de comunicación que forman parte del establecimiento político-militar estadounidense, se lanzaran a acusar a Maduro de “genocida” y así justificar una intervención militar “humanitaria”. El mismo esquema que los servicios de inteligencia estadounidenses e israelíes y el Pentágono han utilizado en los cambios de régimen en Ucrania, Libia y el que fracasó después de años de financiar a terroristas y mercenarios, en Siria.

Pero la actuación oportuna de los servicios de inteligencia venezolanos y de las fuerzas armadas leales a Maduro, detuvieron esa matanza que realizarían los testaferros de Washington.

Como ese plan se les vino abajo, ahora sin ambages, están apoyando abiertamente al golpista Guaidó, “reconociéndolo” como gobernante de Venezuela; y al mismo tiempo, este títere, ha hecho aprobar en la Asamblea Nacional golpista, un decreto de amnistía para todos los militares, con objeto de que se pasen al lado opositor, y así no teman persecución alguna, una vez logrado el derrocamiento de Maduro. Evidentemente, una vez que se lograra su objetivo, los principales generales que han apoyado a Maduro, serían pasados por las armas; y ellos lo saben perfectamente.

Toda la maquinaria propagandística de Occidente se ha puesto en funcionamiento para acusar a Maduro de estar aliado con “terroristas” como Hezbollah; de estar detrás del atentado contra la academia de policía en Bogotá (por cierto, el derechista gobierno de Duque, aprovechando este ataque, está solicitando la extradición de los dirigentes del Ejército de Liberación Nacional que están en Cuba, que seguramente se negará, y eso será el pretexto para un nuevo aislamiento internacional del gobierno de La Habana; otra pinza más para acorralar a Maduro); y, de “proteger y estar coludido con narcotraficantes”; además de ser “aliado” de Irán, Rusia y China.

El gobierno de Trump y la derecha venezolana, esperan que las clases medias de ese país salgan a la calle para protestar; y que las fuerzas armadas, con la amnistía prometida, le den la espalda a Maduro, para con ello lograr su derrocamiento y la toma del poder por parte de los títeres de Washington.

Las próximas horas serán decisivas para saber qué tanto apoyo tiene aún Maduro en las fuerzas armadas para contener esta ofensiva de Occidente en su contra; qué tanto la población que apoya el proyecto chavista, está dispuesta a defenderlo con las armas en la mano; y cuántos gobiernos títeres de Estados Unidos estarán dispuestos a enviar tropas, en caso de que se los ordene su amo, para “terminar el trabajo”, si es que la movilización interna, pagada y organizada por Washington, resulta insuficiente.

Prueba de fuego para el gobierno de López Obrador, ya que Trump ha hecho un llamado a los gobiernos latinoamericanos a “reconocer” al gobierno del títere Guaidó. México deberá insistir en la Doctrina Estrada, y en que cualquier intervención extranjera en los asuntos venezolanos, es inaceptable. Si cambia su posición para avalar el golpe de Estado en Caracas, habrá quedado claro que en términos de política exterior no hay, ni habrá cuarta trasformación. Ojalá no sea el caso.

Can US disrupt Sino-Israeli cooperation?

By Han Jianwei Source: Global Times

Published: 2019/1/22

On January 15, US Deputy Secretary of Energy Dan Brouillette urged Israel to implement stringent screening procedures for foreign investment, especially from China, during his visit to the country. A few days ago, US President Donald Trump's national security adviser John Bolton raised US concerns about Israel's decision to allow the Shanghai International Port Group to run the Haifa Port for 25 years when meeting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. 

Repeated warnings by senior US officials cautioning Israel against economic and trade cooperation with China have demonstrated the US' growing concern over enhancing China ties with the Middle East nation, which is an important US ally.

Since the Trump administration launched the trade war against China, China-US relations have been imperiled. The US has identified China as a strategic competitor and the trade war is a crucial means to contain China's rapid rise. In addition to hitting China with tariffs, Washington has also put "Made in China 2025" in its crosshairs, trying to prevent China's high tech sector including artificial intelligence, chip manufacturing, and 5G technology from developing. 

With the arrest of Meng Wanzhou, Chinese tech giant Huawei's chief financial officer, the arrogance and hegemony of the US has been exposed. Washington has also requested its allies to restrict exchanges and cooperation with China in the high-tech sector, trying to block Beijing's access to advanced technology to the greatest possible extent. 

Israel and US as close allies have long shared intelligence. Despite shared security interests, there are differences in the perception of external security between the nations. Washington has taken China as a major threat to the US' overseas security interests, but from Israel's perspective, Beijing is an ideal economic and trade partner rather than a security threat. 

Israel has had hostile relations and lackluster economic ties with neighboring countries. It needs to expand economic and trade relations with the broader world. Israel's high-tech, artificial intelligence, and other fields are highly complementary to China's industrial transformation and upgrade. Given a limited size and population, Israel has to seek external partners for economic development and has thus attached great importance to cooperation with China, the second largest economy in the world. It has taken a pragmatic and rational stance in cooperating with China, focusing aspects of bilateral cooperation on the economy. 

As China's involvement in the Middle East is mainly about economic interests, Israel believes Beijing attaches importance to developing relations for the latter's economic interests. Therefore, so far, Israel has given a cold response to US warnings and criticism. The cooperation between China and Israel cannot be compared to that between the US and Israel which is carried out at higher levels, and it will not jeopardize the interests of the US.

However, with the US attempt to contain China and impede its technological progress, Washington is likely to throw a spanner in Israel's cooperation with China in the future, which may affect normal economic, trade and investment activities between China and Israel.  

But in general, there is vast potential for cooperation between the two countries that cannot be disrupted by the US. Besides, although Israel's diplomatic strategy is highly dependent on the US when the country's major economic interests are concerned, it's believed Israel will stick to a nationalist stance. 

China must be vigilant about US' suppression of China's economic, trade and investment activities on a global scale. China-Israel relations are unlikely to be substantially hit by groundless allegations by some senior US officials, but China should act more cautiously when trading with or investing in Israel. Chinese enterprises and staff, in particular, must comply with local laws and regulations in the Middle East nation. 


The author is an associate professor of Middle East Studies Institute in Shanghai International Studies University.opinion@globaltimes.com.cn
Newspaper headline: Can US dampen China-Israel cooperation?

Border Traffic

Jessica Loudis 22 January 2019

www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2019/01/22/jessica-loudis/border-traffic/

While in Washington, DC, negotiations over a border wall remain at an impasse, a case is unfolding in a federal district courtroom in Brooklyn that casts President Trump’s ambition in a new light. Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzman stands accused of running Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel and trafficking billions of dollars’ worth of drugs into the United States. A veteran of two previous prison escapes, Chapo – the nickname means ‘shorty’ – was arrested in Sinaloa in 2016 and extradited to the US a year later. The trial has been both a master class in the logistics of running an illegal international organization – in addition to its operations in the Americas, Sinaloa has a presence in more than a dozen countries in Africa and throughout Europe – and a detailed look at the way the US-Mexico border structures one of the world’s most lucrative businesses.

In the 1980s, Chapo commissioned a 200-foot underground tunnel that connected his lawyer’s home in the Mexican town of Agua Prieta to a cartel warehouse in Douglas, Arizona. Three decades later, he escaped from a maximum security prison through a tunnel that led straight to his cell. In 2011, only a few days after a sophisticated fence was completed along part of the Mexico-Arizona border, Sinaloa operatives showed up with a catapult to lob bales of marijuana into the US. When the US Coast Guard began seizing the go-fast boats that the cartel had been using, it shifted to tuna boats, which could travel farther into international waters to avoid detection. In 2008, a Sinaloa submarine was seized off the coast of Guatemala carrying 5896 kilos of cocaine.

Yet over 80 percent of the drugs that cross the border, according to US government estimates, do so through legal checkpoints. Earlier this month, Vicente Zambada, the son of another cartel boss, Mayo Zambada, spent two days on the witness stand describing how the cartel would buy up to fifteen cars and build special compartments in them that could hold up to thirty kilos of cocaine. (This has been a preferred tactic for traffickers for over a century – during Prohibition, border patrol agents would rock cars back and forth to listen for sloshing liquor.) Sinaloa would hire people who lived on one side of the border and worked legally on the other and have them use the cars to make multiple cross-border trips a day. Once in the US, shipments would be held in safe houses until new drivers came to pick them up. (One of Sinaloa’s US couriers, an 87-year-old professional flower hybridizer arrested in 2011, is the subject of Clint Eastwood’s most recent movie.) The drugs would be taken on by truck, often stashed between pallets of beef, vegetables or chicken. Money was moved back across the border using the same vehicles.

Edgar Ivan Galván, a US citizen and hapless low-level narco who testified after Zambada, said he met ‘El Jaguar’, a notoriously violent hitman, in a nightclub in Mexico. Jaguar convinced Galván to act as a testaferro, a frontman who could use his status as a US citizen to rent safehouses for the cartel in El Paso. According to Galván, Jaguar also bribed Mexican customs officials so he could smuggle guns into Mexico. A report last year found that as many as 70 percents of the guns in Mexico came from the US.

After a back-and-forth between the defense and prosecution, the judge ruled that Chapo’s lawyers would not be allowed to discuss the scandal surrounding Operation Fast and Furious, a US government initiative in which officials allowed stores in Arizona to sell firearms to suspected smugglers in the hope they could follow their trail to cartel leaders. Of the more than 2000 guns sold under the programme between 2006 and 2011, fewer than half have been recovered, and more than 150 deaths have been linked to Fast and Furious weapons, some involving Sinaloa members.

For Sinaloa, free movement across the border relies on a variety of factors, including widespread corruption (Zambada testified that the organization had a budget of $1 million a month to pay off police and government workers, not including bonuses and payments to high-ranking officials) and an elaborate network of contacts in the US. Much of the system dates back to the 1980s when leaders of Tijuana’s Arellano Félix cartel ‘created a mystique around trafficking that lured the children of Tijuana’s wealthy elite into their employ as “narco-juniors”,’ as Nathan P. Jones writes in Mexico’s Illicit Drug Networks and the State Reaction. ‘They recruited attractive, affluent youths with dual citizenship because they could cross the border with minimal inspection.’

The public image of the narco as a sexy renegade with a bottomless bank account persists and is perpetuated by pop culture and narcocorridos – pro-narco folk songs – that glorify their escapades. Despite a crackdown on both sides of the border over the past decade and a half, there’s little evidence that either supply or demand has been hampered. In 2012, after six years of President Felipe Calderon’s all-out war on the cartels, a UN study found that the street price of a gram of cocaine in the United States was the same as it had been in 2002.

Cartels continue to find avenues across the border because there is a robust American market for drugs, and money always finds a way. It’s also worth bearing in mind that much of the crime that Trump blames on Latin American migrants – drug trafficking, gang violence – has its origins in the US. The Mara Salvatrucha gang formed in Los Angeles; mass opium cultivation began in California before moving down to Mexico. As for the idea that criminals are clamoring to enter, most cartel leaders want to stay as far away from the border as possible. As Pablo Escobar once remarked, a grave in Colombia will always be preferable to a prison cell in the US.

¿NO HABRÁ IMPUNIDAD?

El presidente López Obrador (AMLO) ha señalado que en relación a la escandalosa corrupción que han encontrado en Pemex, “no habrá impunidad”. Y es que, en medio de la tragedia de Tlahualilpan, Hidalgo, que ha cobrado la vida (hasta ahora) de 88 personas; se ha dado a conocer que en 2013, Pemex entonces dirigida por Emilio Lozoya Austin (involucrado en los sobornos de Odebrecht por 10 millones de dólares, que fueron entregados durante la campaña presidencial de Peña Nieto, con objeto de recibir contratos por parte de quien luego sería presidente de México), pactó la compra de 700 carrotanques de ferrocarril, que no fueron entregados, por 1400 millones de pesos, a pesar de que se pagó a la empresa contratada, Ethan Gas Oil, 400 millones de pesos de adelanto, que tampoco fueron regresados.

Según el presidente, se indagará sobre este asunto hasta dar con los responsables y lograr su castigo, así como la restitución de lo robado a Pemex.

Ojalá así sea, porque durante la campaña presidencial AMLO insistió hasta el cansancio, que él no era partidario de “venganzas” y que por lo tanto no perseguiría a los corruptos de gobiernos pasados. Asimismo, ha señalado que él está a favor de una ley de “punto final”[1] con respecto a los ilícitos en materia de corrupción de sus antecesores en el cargo; y se supone, que de ahí para abajo en la jerarquía.

Pero por lo visto, la perra realidad lo está haciendo rectificar sobre su “perdón” a los corruptos[2], y ahora sí se va a perseguir la corrupción cometida en los gobiernos anteriores; o por lo menos eso hace pensar las últimas declaraciones de AMLO.

Ahora bien, el reciente voto del PRI junto con Morena en la Cámara de Diputados para aprobar los cambios constitucionales para la creación de la Guardia Nacional, desató numerosas versiones extra oficiales de que el partido anteriormente en el poder, apoyó a la nueva mayoría en este tema, a cambio de que en el asunto de la investigación al anterior director de Pemex, Emilio Lozoya -por los varios temas de corrupción y malos manejos durante su gestión (además del caso Odebrecht), se le absuelva de todo delito.

Si en los próximos días o semanas no se sabe sobre la investigación del caso Odebrecht, que fue enterrada por el gobierno de Peña Nieto; o, no se inician en serio averiguaciones sobre los muchos casos de corrupción y robo de combustible en Pemex, entonces esos rumores y versiones de que hubo un pacto Morena-PRI para que pasara por el Congreso la reforma sobre la Guardia Nacional, a cambio de impunidad para Peña y Lozoya en el caso de Odebrecht, el robo de combustible y los carros tanque, tomará visos de ser cierto.

Hay que exigir al gobierno actual que no haga más pactos de impunidad con los corruptos. Que se investigue, se pruebe y se castigue, al nivel que sea y a quien sea, la corrupción del gobierno anterior y de los que lo antecedieron, hasta donde la ley lo permita.

Si AMLO no termina con la impunidad, de nada habrá servido el enorme esfuerzo y sacrificio de la sociedad para cambiar a los gobiernos neoliberales depredadores, que saquearon al país por décadas y cuyos grupos de poder siguen carcomiendo las entrañas del Estado y la sociedad mexicanas.

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[1] Evidentemente confundiendo esta medida legislativa, con  la ley de punto final, que fue una ley argentina que estableció la caducidad de la acción penal (prescripción) contra los imputados como autores penalmente responsables de haber cometido el delito de desaparición forzada de personas, durante la dictadura militar de 1976 a 1983.

https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ley_de_Punto_Final

[2] En el caso de la amnistía, lo está haciendo para aquellos presos considerados como injustamente encarcelados por cuestiones políticas.

Las fuerzas sirias repelen un ataque aéreo israelí contra el aeropuerto en Damasco

Publicado: 20 ene 2019 

El bombardeo de aviones israelíes no logró alcanzar ninguno de sus objetivos.

https://actualidad.rt.com/actualidad/302694-fuerzas-sirias-repeler-ataque-israel

Las defensas aéreas militares sirias repelieron un ataque aéreo israelí en el sur del país, informa la agencia SANAcitando fuentes militares. "Nuestros medios de defensa aérea responden eficazmente a un ataque aéreo israelí dirigido a la región sur y le impiden alcanzar cualquiera de sus objetivos", escribe la agencia.

Los militares rusos informaron que los complejos antimisiles Pantsir y Buk de la Fuerza Aérea siria lograron interceptar siete misiles israelíes. El ataque fue efectuado contra el aeropuerto internacional en el sureste de Damasco. La infraestructura del aeropuerto no ha sufrido desperfectos. Tampoco hay víctimas ni daños materiales.

"El 20 de enero de 2019, cuatro aviones F-16 de la Fuerza Aérea israelí atacaron con misiles guiados el territorio de Siria desde el Mediterráneo", informaron desde el Ministerio de Defensa ruso.

Poco después, las Fuerzas de Defensa de Israel informaron de que el sistema de defensa antiaérea Cúpula de Hierro interceptó un misil lanzado contra los Altos del Golán desde el territorio sirio.

El 12 de enero, un grupo de aviones militares israelíes lanzó un ataque con misiles contra uno de los almacenes del aeropuerto de Damasco, siendo la mayoría de los proyectiles interceptados por los sistemas de defensa aérea de Siria.

En aquella ocasión, el primer ministro israelí, Benjamin Netanyahu, confirmó que Israel atacó almacenes iraníes en el aeropuerto de Damasco.

Un día después, el jefe de personal saliente de las Fuerzas de Defensa de Israel (FDI), el teniente general Gadi Eisenkot, reconoció que su país lleva a cabo desde hace años una campaña no declarada de bombardeos "casi diarios" contra Irán y sus representantes en los territorios de Siria y el Líbano y alcanzó "más de 1.000 objetivos iraníes" en estos países árabes.