The United States: Orchestrating a Civic Coup in Bolivia

Bolivian President Evo Morales is visiting the United Nations and the
Organization of American States this week to report on the recent US
coup attempt against his government. He will also meet with members of
Congress to deal with ?the worst diplomatic crisis? in the history of
the two countries, and hopes to open a dialogue to normalize relations
once Pressident-elect Barak Obama takes office.

Below is the story of US efforts over the past three years to topple
Morales.

The United States: Orchestrating a Civic Coup in Bolivia

By Roger Burbach

Evo Morales is the latest democratically-elected Latin American
president to be the target of a US plot to destabilize and overthrow his
government. On September 10, 2008 Morales expelled US Ambassador Philip
Goldberg because ?he is conspiring against democracy and seeking the
division of Bolivia.?

Observers of US-Latin American policy tend to view the crisis in
US-Bolivian relations as due to a policy of neglect and ineptness
towards Latin America because of US involvement in the wars in the
Middle East and Central Asia. In fact, the Bolivia coup attempt was a
conscious policy rooted in US hostility towards Morales, his political
party the Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) and the social movements that
are aligned with him.

?The US embassy is historically used to calling the shots in Bolivia,
violating our sovereignty, treating us like a banana republic,? says
Gustavo Guzman, who was expelled as Bolivian ambassador to Washington
following Goldberg?s removal. In 2002, when Morales narrowly lost his
first bid for the presidency, US ambassador Manuel Rocha openly
campaigned against him, threatening, ? if you elect those who want
Bolivia to become a major cocaine exporter again, this will endanger the
future of US assistance to Bolivia.? Because he led the Cocaleros
Federation prior to assuming the presidency, the US State Department
called Morales an ?illegal coca agitator.? Morales advocated ?Coca Yes,
Cocaine No,? and called which for an end to violent U.S.- sponsored coca
eradication raids, and for the right of Bolivian peasants to grow coca
for domestic consumption, medicinal uses and even for export as an herb
in tea and other products.

?When Morales triumphed in the next presidential election,? says Guzman,
?it represented a defeat for the United States.? Shortly after his
inauguration, Morales received a call from George Bush, offering to help
"bring a better life to Bolivians." Morales asked Bush to reduce US
trade barriers for Bolivian products, and suggested that he come for a
visit. Bush did not reply. As Guzman notes, ?the United States was
trying to woo Morales with polite and banal comments to keep him from
aligning with Venezuelan President Hugo Ch?vez.? David Greenlee, the US
ambassador prior to Goldberg, expressed his "preoccupation" with
Bolivia's foreign alliances, while Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
and others at the Pentagon began talking about "security concerns" in
Bolivia.

Assistant Secretary of State Thomas Shannon, the highest ranking US
official to attend Morales? inauguration, declared a willingness to
dialogue with Morales. In fact, what followed were almost three years of
diplomatic wrangling while the U.S. provided direct and covert
assistance to the opposition movement centered in the four eastern
departments of Bolivia known as ?La Media Luna?. Dominated by
agro-industrial interests, the departments began a drive for regional
autonomy soon after Morales, the first Indian president in Bolivian
history took office. (About 55% of the country?s population is Indian.)
Headed by departmental prefects (governors) and large landowners, the
autonomy movement has been determined to stymie Morales? plans for
national agrarian reform, and bent on taking control of the substantial
hydro-carbon resources located in the Media Luna.

The Bush administration has pursued a two-track policy similar to the
strategy the United States employed to overthrow the
democratically-elected government of Salvador Allende in Chile in 1973.
The diplomatic negotiations initiated by Shannon centered almost
exclusively on differences over drug policies, with the Bush
administration continually threatening to cut or curtail economic
assistance and preferential trade if Bolivia did not abide by the US
policy of coca eradication and criminalization. At the same time, the
United States through its embassy in La Paz and the Agency for
International Development (USAID), funded political forces that opposed
Morales and MAS. The US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), with 37
in- country agents, appears to have acted like the CIA in Bolivia,
gathering intelligence and engaging in clandestine political operations
with the opposition.

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