[R-G] Fidel: Pax romana

[Anthony Fenton]

http://machetera.wordpress.com/2008/07/07/pax-romana/



As usual, Fidel is right on the money with his observations about  
recent and not so recent events in Colombia. First of all, as he  
points out, the Colombians and the United Statesians (not to mention  
their Mossad friends) can’t get their stories straight. But of course,  
Defense Minister Santos contradicted himself in his very own press  
conference where he explained that the United States was contacted  
before the hostage liberation show, “because President Uribe promised  
President Bush that he would inform him whenever Americans were  
involved.” (It can be assumed that he was not using “American” in the  
correct sense of the word, but as a good subordinate should, meaning  
that U.S. Americans are the only Americans who matter.) Also, Santos  
mentioned the AWACS plane flying overhead during the operation - well,  
it would have to be an AWACS plane, wouldn’t it? U-2’s are so passe.

Machetera has slightly revised a couple of awkward word constructions  
by Fidel’s translator (revising is a piece of cake compared to  
translating) and highlighted two other points of interest.

* * *

Pax Romana - Fidel Castro Ruz

I basically drew these data from statements made by William  
Brownfield, US ambassador to Colombia, from that country’s press and  
television, from the international press, and other sources. The show  
of technology and economic resources at play is impressive.

While in Colombia, the senior military officers went to great pains to  
explain that Ingrid Betancourt’s rescue had been an entirely Colombian  
operation, the US authorities were saying that “it was the result of  
years of intense military cooperation of the Colombian and United  
States’ armies.”

“’The truth is that we have been able to get along as we seldom have  
in the United States, except with our oldest allies, mostly in NATO,”  
said Brownfield, referring to his country’s relationships with the  
Colombian security forces, which have received over $4 billion US  
dollars in military assistance since the year 2000.”

“…on various occasions it became necessary for the US Administration  
to make decisions at the top levels concerning this operation.

“The US spy satellites helped in locating the hostages during a month  
period starting on May 31st until the rescue action on Wednesday.”

“The Colombians installed video surveillance equipment, supplied by  
the United States. Operated by remote control, these can take close- 
ups and pan along the rivers which are the only transportation routes  
through thick forests, said the Colombian and US authorities.”

“US surveillance aircraft intercepted the rebels’ radio and satellite  
phone talks and used imaging equipment that can break through the  
forest foliage.”

“’The defector will receive a considerable sum of the close to one-  
hundred-million-dollars reward offered by the government,’ stated the  
Commander General of the Colombian Army.”

On Wednesday, July 1st, the London BBC reported that Cesar Mauricio  
Velasquez, press secretary at Casa de Nariño (Colombian Government  
House) had said that delegates from France and Switzerland had met  
with Alfonso Cano, chief of the FARC.

According to the BBC, that would be the first contact with  
international delegates accepted by the new chief after the death of  
Manuel Marulanda. The false information of the meeting of two European  
envoys with Cano had been released in Bogota.

The deceased leader of the FARC was born on May 12, 1932, according to  
his father’s recollection. Marulanda, a poor peasant with a liberal  
thinking and a follower of Gaitan, had started his armed resistance 60  
years ago. He was a guerrilla before us; he had reacted to the carnage  
of peasants carried out by the oligarchy.

The Communist Party he later joined, the same as every other in Latin  
America, was under the influence of the Communist Party of the USSR  
and not of Cuba. They were in solidarity with our Revolution but they  
were not subordinate to it.

It was the drug-traffickers and not the FARC that unleashed terror in  
that sister nation as part of their feuds over the United States  
market. They caused powerful bomb blasts and even blew up trucks  
loaded with plastic explosives, destroying facilities and injuring or  
killing countless people.

The Colombian Communist Party never contemplated the idea of  
conquering power through armed struggle. The guerrilla was a  
resistance front and not a basic instrument for taking revolutionary  
power, as had been the case in Cuba. In 1993, at the 8th FARC  
Conference, they decided to break ranks with the Communist Party. Its  
leader, Manuel Marulanda, took over the leadership of that Party’s  
guerrillas who had always excelled in their narrow sectarianism when  
admitting combatants as well as in their strong and compartmentalized  
methods of command.

Marulanda, a man with remarkable natural talent and a leader’s gift,  
did not have the opportunity to study when he was young. It is said  
that he had only completed the 5th grade of grammar school. He  
conceived a long and extended struggle; I disagreed with this point of  
view. But, I never had the chance to talk with him.

The FARC became quite strong, with over 10 thousand combatants. Many  
had been born during the war and had known nothing else. Other leftist  
organizations rivaled the FARC in the struggle. By then the Colombian  
territory had become the largest source of cocaine production in the  
world. Then, extreme violence, kidnappings, taxes and demands from the  
drug producers became widespread.

The paramilitary forces, armed by the oligarchy, basically drew from  
the great amount of men enlisted in the country’s armed forces who  
were discharged from duty every year without a secure job. This  
created a very complex situation in Colombia, with only one way out:  
real peace, albeit remote and difficult as many other goals humanity  
has set itself. This is the option that, for three decades, Cuba has  
advocated for that nation.

While our journalists meeting in their 8th Congress debated on the new  
information technologies, the principles and ethics of social  
communicators, I meditated on the above-mentioned developments.

I have expressed, very clearly, our position in favor of peace in  
Colombia; but, we are neither in favor of foreign military  
intervention nor of the policy of force that the United States intends  
to impose at all costs on that long-suffering and industrious people.

I have honestly and strongly criticized the objectively cruel methods  
of kidnapping and retaining prisoners under the conditions of the  
jungle. But I am not suggesting that anyone lay down their arms, when  
everyone who did so in the last 50 years did not survive to see peace.  
If I dared suggest anything to the FARC guerrillas that would simply  
be that they declare, by any means possible to the International Red  
Cross, their willingness to release the hostages and prisoners they  
are still holding, without any precondition. I do not intend to be  
heard; it is simply my duty to say what I think. Anything else would  
only serve to reward disloyalty and treason.

I will never support the pax romana that the empire tries to impose on  
Latin America.


Fidel Castro Ruz
July 5, 2008
8:12 p.m.