KAMALIKA PIERIS

The US is well known for its political and military interventions. USA started to meddle in the politics of other countries in the 1950s.  The first coup was in 1953. This was in Iran where the duly elected and highly popular Mossadegh was removed and the Shah of Iran installed. Mossadegh was going to nationalise British oil assets in Iran. Anglo Iranian Oil Company   had full control of all the Iranian oil, which it was pumping and taking away. The coup was carried out by U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) with Britain’s MI6 helping.  The Shah was very unpopular. He ruled cruelly using the secret service SAVAK. USA eventually had to come and take him and his family to USA.

The matter did not end there. In 2013, Iran’s parliament approved a bill to asking the Iranian government to sue the US for its involvement in the 1953 coup that overthrew Iran’s democratically elected Prime Minister, Mossadegh and replaced him with Mohammed Reza Pahlavi.  Media reported that USA and UK are now trying to hide the documents related to this.

The second coup was in Guatemala in 1954. This was a covert operation carried out by CIA that deposed the democratically elected Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz and  installed the military dictator  Carlos Castillo Armas. This was the first in a series of U.S.-backed authoritarian rulers in Guatemala.

The coup was pushed through due to the United Fruit Company, an American company which owned all of Guatemala’s banana production and banana exports. UFC also owned Guatemala’s telephone and telegraph system, and almost its entire railroad track. President Árbenz engaged in land reform and granted property to landless peasants. The United Fruit Company   feared that this would affect their highly profitable business. They contacted USA.

 USA President Eisenhower authorized the CIA to carry out the operation. The CIA armed, funded, and trained a force of 480 men.  US also launched a heavy campaign of psychological warfare. A radio station broadcast anti-government propaganda and a version of military events favorable to the rebellion. The psychological warfare and the fear of a U.S. invasion succeeded in intimidating the Guatemalan army, which refused to fight.

 The coup was widely criticized internationally. It helped to strengthen the long-lasting anti-U.S. sentiment in Latin America. Castillo Armas quickly assumed dictatorial powers, banning opposition parties, imprisoning and torturing political opponents, and reversing the social reforms of the earlier ruler. Nearly four decades of civil war followed in Guatemala.

There is a third well known regime change carried out by USA, that of Chile.By 1973 Chile had enjoyed 41 years of peaceful democratic rule and the popular Allende was leading the country. Allende was going to nationalize the copper mines which USA was eyeing. CIA had tried and failed to stop Allende becoming President. 

Allende was over thrown by a covert CIA operation. His successor, Pinochet ran a military dictatorship for 17 years. Pinochet kidnapped, tortured and killed nearly 13,000 citizens. Pinochet cut government expenditure and removed price control. Pinochet abolished the public school system, privatizing even kindergartens and cemeteries. He got rid of free milk for school. Pinochet was deposed in 1998.

 There were suspicions about the death of Pablo Neruda as well in connection with Chile. He had been planning to leave for Mexico to lead the opposition to Pinochet regime when he died in 1973.

US bolstered repressive and murderous military dictatorships all over Latin America.  Bolivia was ruled for nearly two decades by military dictatorships. Bustamante, president of Bolivia had in the mid 1990s,    sold off the national oil company, railway, electricity and phone companies to foreign firms. There were also plans to privatize water. Carlos Menem sold Argentinean assets.

Venezuela said in 2014 that US wants our oil and that is why they are encouraging a Ukraine like coup against the government. Analysts noted that in Venezuela, US had moved from its usual strategy of supporting opposition parties and NGOs to obtaining the support of the youth. US funding in Venezuela was directed towards youth and student groups.

Student leaders were sent to US for workshops and conferences on internet activism and media networking.  They were trained in the use of social networks to mobilize political activism. They were trained in tactics to promote regime change via street riots, also the strategic use of media to portray the government as repressive. In 2007 these student groups took to the streets in Caracas. The protests were composed mainly of middle and upper class youth and opposition politicians.

 US are opposing the current Venezuela President, Maduro. Washington tried to oust Maduro with economic sanctions, including an oil embargo in April 2019.  In 2019 USA recognized opposition leader Juan Guaido as the President. Guaido’s wife was invited to Washington where she was photographed with President Trump. Guaido was also recognized by some countries, with others opposing. 

But Maduro had in 2017, sidelined the opposition controlled National Assembly by creating in 2017 an all-powerful Constituent Assembly stacked with his supporters. The Supreme Court   declared legislation passed by the National Assembly null and void.

Then, in 2020, Maduro seized total control of Venezuela’s political institutions with a sweeping victory in the 2020 elections. The elections were boycotted by the main opposition parties  and turnout was low with 69 percent abstaining. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo denounced the polls as a fraud and a sham” engineered by Maduro. Canada and the Organization of American States said they would not recognize the election result.

  However, the election gave Maduro’s ruling Socialist Party control of an expanded 227-seat National Assembly, which had been the only official body held by the opposition. This further weakened the position of Juan Guaido.

USA said Central America came under USA’s ‘sphere of influence’ and was a special concern for the US. Instead of helping Central America blossom, US installed corrupt regimes and crime syndicates in Central American countries. These regimes crushed progressive social movements, unleashed death squads, and killed peasants, students and workers.

Three of these Central American interventions are well known. The most prominent is the case of Cuba. The animosity between Cuba and USA is well known. In the 1960s, US had approved Operation Mongoose, a secret plan aimed at creating a rebellion in Cuba that the United States could support. While the Kennedy administration planned Operation Mongoose, Soviet Premier Khrushchev secretly introduced medium-range nuclear missiles into Cuba. Cubans later used these to shoot down a U.S. reconnaissance plane.

Kennedy wrote to Khrushchev asking him to remove the missiles otherwise USA would remove them. There was an exchange of letters between Russia and USA. Russia said it would remove its missiles provided USA pledged not to invade Cuba and promised to remove its medium range ballistic missiles from Turkey. USA agreed. Russia removed its missiles, including medium-range Il-28 bombers, from Cuba.

This was presented to the world as a great victory for USA. It was nothing of the sort. Khrushchev’s intention was to get US missiles out of Turkey. His strategy was successful, said analysts.

In Nicaragua, the US created and funded a rebel group known as Contras. Contras were active from 1979 to 1990. They used terrorist tactics and committed numerous human rights violations. The Contras were heavily dependent on the US. After US support for Contras was banned by Congress, the Reagan administration covertly continued the support.

CIA had a successful coup in Honduras against President Zalaya in 2009. In the predawn hours of June 28, 2009, heavily armed Honduran soldiers descended upon the Tegucigalpa residence of the nation’s president, Manuel Zelaya, and carted him off to Costa Rica in his pajamas.

Zelaya had been sympathetic to those affected by mining and other toxic operations of international corporations. He had raised the monthly urban and rural minimum wages to a whopping $290 and $213. The capitalists wanted him removed. This military-led ouster of Honduran President Manuel Zelaya was condemned by the UN and most other countries, as illegal. They said US was behind the coup.

The Middle East was relatively peaceful till US started meddling, said analysts. US support for Saddam Hussein initially in Iraq and the story of the weapons of mass destruction is well known.  US thought that the removal of Saddam Hussein would destabilize the entire Middle East.  The governments in Syria, Iran, Lebanon would fall. Palestine leaders like Arafat would also fall and US would be able to re-draw the map of the Middle East and reshape it to the benefit of Israel.

The ongoing US intervention in Syria is also becoming well known. US supported the rebels in the Syrian Civil war which started in 2011. US gave arms and training to the rebels. Pentagon and CIA were involved in this. Then from 2017, there were a series of direct military actions by U.S. army against the Syrian government. In 2019, the head of U.S. Central Command stated there was no “end date” on the U.S.’s intervention in Syria. Bashar al-Assad, President of Syria, said that peace would come to Syria only when the west and its Middle Eastern allies stopped interfering. 

Libya was a country without a national debt and her people were socially and economically much better off than people under similar regimes in the region. Muammar al-Gaddafi was head of state in Libya from 1969-2011. Libya attained the highest standard of living in Africa during Gaddafi’s rule. Gaddafi was planning to establish a Middle Eastern currency when he was removed from power. 

Gaddafi also encouraged African unity, African culture and African solution to African problems. He pointed out that African traditions are being replaced by western culture and multiparty politics. Africans, including those from South Africa, went to live in prosperous Libya.

Gaddafi also co-funded the African investment bank in Libya, the African monetary fund, in Cameroons and African Central bank in Nigeria. This latter move angered France as it affected its control over 13 West African countries.  The west turned against Gaddafi at this point and froze the money which was going into these projects.

A rebellion was engineered in Libya. The Libyan army was defeated by US and allies .Gaddafi was forcibly removed, tortured and murdered. US had destroyed a country which was a buffer against Islamic terrorists, and instead created another haven for them, observed Sriyan de Silva.

Questions are asked regarding the ‘revolt’ in Libya, and the Gaddafi killing. Who provided the heavy artillery and sophisticate weapons used by the rebels? Who armed them against the state army. Rebel groups cannot afford such expensive weapons, said the media. There was a CIA unit in the US embassy at Benghazi.

There is general agreement that US was wholly or partially responsible for the creation of militant Islamic groups in the Middle East. The creation of militant Islamist groups and movements such as the Taliban, al-Qaeda and ISIS were encouraged by US. The groups that the US armed and trained in Afghanistan to fight the Russian forces became the Taliban.  US armed both Bin Laden and the Muhajideen in Afghanistan, creating al-Qaeda.

US is definitely blamed for ISIS. (Islamic state of Iraq and Syria)  The US government armed and trained rebel fighters in Syria who became the formidable ISIS. ISIS leader Abu bakr al Baghdadi set up IS training camps In Jordan under the supervision of the US marines. US sent USD 500 million to the Free Syrian Army to fight ISIS, knowing that the FSA was one of the biggest suppliers of fighters and weapons to the ISIS. US  also sent the FSA  powerful weapons such as anti-aircraft missiles, knowing that  they would soon be in the hands of the ISIS, said analysts.

ISIS is part of the western strategy, said Kamal Wickremasinghe.    Otherwise how could such a powerful organization as ISIS spring up so suddenly? Kamal Wickremasinghe said that ISIS is used for several purposes. Launching aerial attacks against Syria under the pretext of tackling IS, dividing Iraq into Kurdish, Sunni and Shiite enclaves, and the formation of a Kurdish homeland that would include parts of northern Iraq, Syria and Turkey, i.e. the balkanization of the Middle East. Iraq, Turkey and Syria will lose, Israel will benefit.

The West underestimated the threat from ISIS. It was more intelligent and dangerous than the West realized. It was much stronger and was supported by an almost ecstatic enthusiasm. Each day hundreds of new recruits arrived from around the world. Within months ISIS had conquered in Iraq an extent of territory larger than Great Britain and became a greater power than Al-Qaeda.

Through its intervention in the Middle East, the US created a power vacuum enabling terror groups to move in to fill the vacuum. Al-Qaeda and Taliban moved into the breach created in Afghanistan. The US armed the freedom fighters who, after the ouster of the Russians, transformed into the Taliban.

After the ouster of Saddam Hussein in Iraq in 2003 there was an unstable central government and strife amongst the Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds. This enabled a splinter group of al-Qaeda to entrench itself in Iraq. Al-Qaeda was itself originally armed and trained by the US. Israel gave birth to Hamas by crippling the PLO and Arafat’s dominant Fatah faction. Hezbollah emerged from the power vacuum in Lebanon.

There is a tight relationship between the Israel-U.S. partnership and the Middle East policy of the US, said analysts. Israel wants the fragmentation of any Middle Eastern state that might be a threat to Israel.  Israel also wishes to weaken Palestine by knocking off its allies, one by one, making it easier for Israel to finish off the Palestinians.  Cuba said    that   Mossad, the secret service of Israel, was responsible for creating the ISIS.

In Asia, the main US aggression which comes to mind, apart from bombing      Hiroshima, is the Vietnam War. That is well known and needs no discussion here. In addition to Vietnam, USA also dropped 2 million tons of bombs on Laos over nine year period up to 1973. US wanted to crush the communist forces in Laos and break the Ho Chi Minh supply line. The Laos war was conducted by the CIA and kept secret from the American public.

 In Laos US enlisted the help of the Hmong a stateless minority in Laos. CIA promised that if they fought for CIA, USA would take care of them. Even perhaps helping them to gain a homeland. But after the war CIA abandoned them, taking only a small number to USA.

In Africa, USA played a key role in promoting the South Sudan secessionist movement, using American evangelical groups. USA has been quietly playing a key role in engineering the breakup of Sudan, said the media. South Sudan’s Christian secessionist movement has long been advised and finance by British and US Christian Missionaries. American evangelical groups including ones which are fiercely anti- Islam have been playing an important role in promoting South Sudan secessionist movement, the media said .

The US has engineered electoral changes in countries important to them. There was the Tulip Revolution in Kyrgyzstan, the Orange revolution in Ukraine and Rose revolution in Georgia. None of them were genuine, they were all engineered by US and they all failed.

The Tulip revolution was clearly Washington inspired, it showed the same characteristics as the Orange revolution it promoted in Ukraine.  The US ambassador to Kyrgyzstan had a detailed plan of the Kyrgyzstan revolution. Kyrgyzstan was strategically important for US. Its Manas airport was vital for the war in Afghanistan.

It is argued that the Ukraine political change was a USA backed coup. This is been openly announced in several western sources. This was not a peaceful revolution, it was a violent terrorist action, and armed guerrillas took over government buildings. It could destabilize the entire Caucasus region, said analysts in 2014.

Russia said that what happened in Ukraine was a US, EU backed conspiracy. The Ukraine is yet another example of Neo-con influence creating chaos rather than stable democratic governments, said Sriyan de Silva.

The strategy in the colour revolutions was to sow popular discontent with the existing regime and then engineer a protest which overthrows the regime. Hundred of citizens were mobilized to gather in city canters after the election, allege fraud and vote rigging, and demand the resignation of the government. USA used this strategy to take out east European governments, such as Czech, Bulgaria, Serbia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan.  NGOs organized the resistance.

Hong Kong’s Occupy Central is also US backed color revolution.  Every ‘occupy’ leader is directly or indirectly linked to the US state Department or is an agent of a person who is, said an analyst. Names were given.  (continued)