No to US Orchestrated Coups!

by Cullom McCormick at No Wall No State of Emergency Protest on 2/2/2019 organized by MN Caravan Solidarity

Honduras is just one example of how U.S.-backed regime change has never improved the livelihoods of its victim nations. The fascistic Shah of Iran, the brutal murderer Pinochet in Chile, the string of leaders in Colombia and Honduras who have disappeared labor unionists, extirpated indigenous peoples, and assassinated environmental activists like Berta Caceras – these are the United States’ legacy of political manipulation across the globe. And the list is far from complete.

These regime changes create the refugees that the Trump administration is hellbent on portraying as vicious invaders. They would have us believe that thousands of people fleeing repression and climate change, people who have little more than the clothes they’re wearing, people who are willing to trek across Central America for what they know is a slim and dangerous chance at a better life – that these people are, in fact, murderers, terrorists, and rapists.

But how murderous was it when Hillary Clinton’s state department allowed a Honduran president to be forcibly exiled? Amid international cries of foul play and questions of legitimacy, we remained silent aside from some sentimental grandstanding from President Obama, whose School of the Americas trained many of those involved in the coup. Clinton’s state department quietly planned to replace this man, who was democratically elected under a constitution that the U.S. helped a military dictator draft at the end of the 70’s. That’ll show him for nationalizing transportation, trying to make school lunches free, and daring to ask if the people wanted to rewrite that constitution. Didn’t he know that America’s claim to Honduras’ industry, to its land, and to its resources is apparently far more important than the lives of its people? Berta Caceras would learn the same lesson in 2015 at the hands of still more graduates from our School of the Americas. And we can see for ourselves how many favors our country continues to do for Hondurans.

How terroristic was it when, after around two decades of classing them as our comprador ally in the Middle East, we invaded Iraq on false pretexts of weapons of mass destruction and a war on terror as soon as Saddam Hussein decided to nationalize even some of its oil industry to build infrastructure for the Iraqi people? For most of my life, we have been in Iraq, and it is plain to see that the only weapon of mass destruction in that country is U.S. imperialism.

Or we can turn to Syria to see that our preferred response to a refugee crisis in an oil rich country is to xenophobically close ourselves off and continue bombing that country until we get our way. America says, “How dare those people flee from the bombs we’re dropping on them! Won’t they think of our economy?”

And what about Venezuela, a country which Ramsey Bolton has flatly stated that we are interested in for its incredible oil reserves – I’m beginning to see a pattern here – which the Chavista government has dared to nationalize and put toward public housing instead of offering up as tribute to U.S. oil magnates. Should we invade Venezuela, its refugees would again be turned away from our border due to the Muslim ban which for some reason includes their country and not our ally and valued weapons buyer, Saudi Arabia.

What we think of the democratically elected leaders of other countries is, quite frankly, irrelevant. Because it is, quite frankly, none of America’s business to control the self-determination of other peoples. And even if we suspect misdoings in these electoral processes, are brown countries not perfectly capable of revolution? Why should we think they need us? Why should we think that invading them and bombing them will help them to self-determine in ways we chauvinistically decide to be more legitimate? Again: U.S.-backed regime change has never improved the livelihoods of its victim nations.

Solidarity with the people of Honduras! Solidarity with the refugee caravan! Say it with me: No ban! No wall! Refugees are welcome here!