Do you remember the Domino Theory? Do you remember strategic hamlets and destroying the village to save it? How about napalm and Agent Orange and the Christmas bombing campaign? It all seems pretty stupid now, doesn’t it? How could have been so convinced we were right? What could we have been thinking? It’s easy to be sanctimonious with the benefit of 40 years of hindsight, but what’s happening now?
Two weeks ago, a hearing was held in the House of Representatives called, “The U.S. Response to the Crisis in Colombia.” The crisis, as news consumers are aware, is growing instability in Colombia. Leftist guerillas control an area the size of Switzerland – or Connecticut, depending on which newspaper you read. This is upsetting to the U.S. Congress because Colombia, and the countries which border it, supply 20 percent of America’s daily supply of oil. While the oil lies beneath Colombian soil, much of the drilling and pumping is done by American companies. Occidental Petroleum is a big player in Colombia and at the Congressional hearing Oxy Vice President Lawrence Meriage said Colombian oil is vital to reduce our dependence on oil from the volatile Middle East. The volatile Middle East where the national leaders don’t let the American oil companies take the lion’s share of the profits, that is. Welcome instead to volatile South America, where Oxy Petroleum uses the Colombian military to force the U’wa people from their ancestral lands so Oxy can drill for more oil. Mr. Meriage defended the assault on the U’wa by claiming leftist guerillas are coercing the U’wa to resist oil development.
An oil executive tells Congress that the military of a client state is used to seize native lands for oil drilling in order to save that land from undue influence by left-wing guerillas. Starting to sound familiar?
The next witness was General Barry McCaffrey, the Clinton administration’s drug czar. He told the committee the U.S. must give Colombia one billion dollars’ worth of Black Hawk helicopters to fight drug running by the left-wing guerillas, whom Gen. McCaffrey calls “narco-terrorists.”
Of course, the helicopters are not going to the Colombian police, who are delegated to stop the flow of drugs; the Black Hawks are going to the military. Congressman John Tierney of Massachusetts found this odd, because the Colombian military is allied with right-wing paramilitaries, who are famous for — running drugs. Human rights groups report the paramilitaries are responsible for 80 percent of the atrocities committed in Colombia.
So the U.S. government wants to take a billion dollars of military hardware and give it to Colombia to stop the flow of drugs, but we’re putting those weapons into the hands of people allied with drug-running thugs and torturers. It’s deja vu all over again.
The great unanswered question is: If the unstable region around Colombia provides one-fifth of America’s daily oil fix (I mean, talk about drugs… ), then why is that region so unstable? If there’s that much oil, why do people turn to the dangerous occupation of growing drugs? With all that oil money, the people of Colombia (and Venezuela, Peru, Ecuador and Brazil) should all be well-fed and well-educated, with a car in every garage and a satellite dish on every roof. Instead, the region is ruled by a despotic minority through ruthless militaries and the vast majority of people live in squalor. All of this is propped up by the U.S. government for the benefit of the oil companies. It was no coincidence that the military drug czar and the oil executive should testify at the same hearing.
How can they be so convinced they’re right? What can they be thinking?
Clinton’s Vietnam
Do you remember the Domino Theory? Do you remember strategic hamlets and destroying the village to save it? How about napalm and Agent Orange and the Christmas bombing campaign? It all seems pretty stupid now, doesn’t it? How could have been so convinced we were right? What could we have been thinking? It’s easy to be sanctimonious with the benefit of 40 years of hindsight, but what’s happening now?
Two weeks ago, a hearing was held in the House of Representatives called, “The U.S. Response to the Crisis in Colombia.” The crisis, as news consumers are aware, is growing instability in Colombia. Leftist guerillas control an area the size of Switzerland – or Connecticut, depending on which newspaper you read. This is upsetting to the U.S. Congress because Colombia, and the countries which border it, supply 20 percent of America’s daily supply of oil. While the oil lies beneath Colombian soil, much of the drilling and pumping is done by American companies. Occidental Petroleum is a big player in Colombia and at the Congressional hearing Oxy Vice President Lawrence Meriage said Colombian oil is vital to reduce our dependence on oil from the volatile Middle East. The volatile Middle East where the national leaders don’t let the American oil companies take the lion’s share of the profits, that is. Welcome instead to volatile South America, where Oxy Petroleum uses the Colombian military to force the U’wa people from their ancestral lands so Oxy can drill for more oil. Mr. Meriage defended the assault on the U’wa by claiming leftist guerillas are coercing the U’wa to resist oil development.
An oil executive tells Congress that the military of a client state is used to seize native lands for oil drilling in order to save that land from undue influence by left-wing guerillas. Starting to sound familiar?
The next witness was General Barry McCaffrey, the Clinton administration’s drug czar. He told the committee the U.S. must give Colombia one billion dollars’ worth of Black Hawk helicopters to fight drug running by the left-wing guerillas, whom Gen. McCaffrey calls “narco-terrorists.”
Of course, the helicopters are not going to the Colombian police, who are delegated to stop the flow of drugs; the Black Hawks are going to the military. Congressman John Tierney of Massachusetts found this odd, because the Colombian military is allied with right-wing paramilitaries, who are famous for — running drugs. Human rights groups report the paramilitaries are responsible for 80 percent of the atrocities committed in Colombia.
So the U.S. government wants to take a billion dollars of military hardware and give it to Colombia to stop the flow of drugs, but we’re putting those weapons into the hands of people allied with drug-running thugs and torturers. It’s deja vu all over again.
The great unanswered question is: If the unstable region around Colombia provides one-fifth of America’s daily oil fix (I mean, talk about drugs… ), then why is that region so unstable? If there’s that much oil, why do people turn to the dangerous occupation of growing drugs? With all that oil money, the people of Colombia (and Venezuela, Peru, Ecuador and Brazil) should all be well-fed and well-educated, with a car in every garage and a satellite dish on every roof. Instead, the region is ruled by a despotic minority through ruthless militaries and the vast majority of people live in squalor. All of this is propped up by the U.S. government for the benefit of the oil companies. It was no coincidence that the military drug czar and the oil executive should testify at the same hearing.
How can they be so convinced they’re right? What can they be thinking?