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May 02, 2008
The Modern Global Revolutionary Movement
As Ahmadinejad likes to tell his Latin American hosts: The Americans are going, the Iranians are coming.
Posted by Tina Grazier
Another domino, Paraguay, has fallen into the Ahmadinejad/Chavez camp...and congressional democrats continue to diddle:
“Iran’s Winning Latin Power Play,” by Amir Taheri
May 1, 2008 -- 'A MAN of God and an enemy of the Great Satan": That's how Iran's official media described Fernando Lugo - the Paraguayan ex-priest who just won his country's presidency in a hotly contested election. ** Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - among the first foreign leaders to congratulate Lugo on his win - hopes that Paraguay will now become another link in what he calls "the counter lasso" - the chain of anti-US regimes he's supporting with the help of his "brother," Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. ** Since the late '80s, the Iranian-run Hezbollah, a global movement of Khomeinist militants, has built a base in Paraguay by recruiting in the Shiite community, about 15 percent of the population. That base played a key role in ensuring Lugo's victory, especially via a big fund-raising campaign backed by Iran and Venezuela.
At the start of the new century, Brazil already had a moderate leftist regime under President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Since then, Bolivia also elected a leftist firebrand, President Evo Morales. ** Chile, Argentina and Uruguay have all opted for moderate-leftist governments. Even in Peru, the return of Alan Garcia as president has revived the left's corpse. ** Ecuador's new president, Rafael Correa, has suspended talks for a free-trade pact with the United States and threatened not to renew the lease for the US air base at Manta. Ecuador has also returned to OPEC, increasing Iranian/Venezuelan influence there. ** In Nicaragua, the Sandinistas have regained power under President Daniel Ortega - who highlighted his alliance with Ahmadinejad by making Iran the first non-Latin country he visited after taking office. ** Lugo's win in Paraguay completes the leftist takeover in the region. South of Mexico, the only puzzle piece still tilting rightward is Colombia under President Alvaro Uribe.
Is the current leadership in Congress eager for Columbia to go the way of her neighbors? Refusing to sign the free trade agreement almost ensures that it will, which begs another question: Has the democrat party moved so far to the left that it now feels more closely allied with the likes of Chavez than it does with GWB? Or perhaps that has been the case for many years now going back to the days of Ronald Reagan. When they say they are for the working man perhaps what they mean is they are for a more socialist government...a Marxist regime of "fairness." The new creed will go something like...we the comrads of the former United States, in order to form a more perfect Marxist regime, do hereby throw in with Chavez, Ahmadinejad, et al...
Tehran has signed contracts worth $40 billion with Caracas - a huge sum considering the modest size of Venezuela's economy. And it has negotiated $30 billion more in contracts with Bolivia, Nicaragua and Ecuador. (Iran's business relations with Cuba, Brazil and Peru are also booming.) These contracts come in four areas: Energy: Iran's aim is to replace as many US companies as possible in the Latin American oil and gas industry. A joint Irano-Venezuelan consortium hopes to dominate the natural-gas sector in Bolivia while launching new exploration schemes for oil and gas in Nicaragua, Ecuador and Peru. * Arms: No Latin country has a credible weapons industry; Iran hopes to fill the gap. It has sold $4.5 billion worth of armaments to Venezuela and is training hundreds of Venezuelan military personnel. * Security: Iranian and Venezuelan security services have set up a coordination committee and developed a system of exchanging information. Nicaragua is expected to join soon, as are Cuba, Bolivia and Ecuador. * Media: The first step here has come in a $1 billion Iranian investment in developing a Spanish-language TV network to compete with the major US satellite channels.
Freedom is precious my friends. Please vote wisely in November.
Posted by Post Scripts at May 2, 2008 09:30 PM