ColOmbia (was Re: Re: Fwd: Columbia)

["Nestor Miguel Gorojovsky" <Gorojovsky@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

En relación a [PEN-L:22191] Re: Fwd: Columbia,
el 25 Jul 00, a las 15:22, Carrol Cox dijo:
>
> This will be the first revolutionary war of the last century in which
> the insurgent forces have no external support. So "experts" in
> Washington may believe that the precedent they are following is that
> of the successful crushing of insurrections in Malaya and the
> Philippines during the 1950s. However it turns out the U.S.
> intervention guarantees huge losses of life.
>
> Carrol

This list does not verse on geopolitics, or the geography of warfare,
but I believe Carrol's point is very interesting and worth a couple
of words of commentary.

Malayan and Phillippine revolutionaries of the 40s were MORE, not
less, isolated than the Colombian guerrillas. On the one hand, there
was an open reluctancy from the expected foreign backup (the Soviet
Union) to stir the international situation after the World War II
ended. Not only in Western Europe did the Comintern act as a wing of
the Yalta agreements, which certainly did not assign either Asia-
Pacific state to Soviet influence.

So that the supposed help they may be receiving from abroad turned
out to be an absolute isolation, while the existence of the Soviet
Union served to strengthen reaction against the guerrillas. Ho Chi
Minh (as well as Mao Zedong) knew how to skirt the issue, but this is
a different story. Once they took power they were not isolated, but
they received little help (and were sometimes abandoned) before that.

On the other hand, geography and anthropology, so to say, make the
Colombian situation an entirely different one.

First and foremost, the Malayans and Phillippino were actually
insulated from any neighboring country. The latter, obviously being
islanders, could not expect to receive much support from abroad. The
former, were almost as isolated if one looks at the maps, only
separated from (more than connected with) the rest of Asia by a
narrow strip of land that was easy to patrol and control.

The Colombian, conversely, lie at a crossroads and extend their
country over a vast, thickly forested lowland where the frontiers
with Brazil become fuzzy and blurred. Venezuelans and Colombians,
oligarchic propaganda nonwithstanding, do not hate each other, and
same runs for Equatorians. History and popular usages make them part
of a single unity, the three share a common origin, and there are no
ethnic or national differences across the borders. So that it will
not be so easy to isolate the guerrillas from their own
countrypeople, unless the USA decide to enter into Venezuela and
Ecuador as the war escalates.

Consider now the international situation in the area. On Venezuela
and the Bolivarian Revolution suffice to say that it is esentially a
popular movement led by a group of patriotic and revolutionary
military, who would not accept American intervention easily, and
would probably attempt to dillute the Colombian situation and, if
things get tough, WILL fight back. But what about Brazil? Let me put
an example: what would have been the situation in Malaysia if an
independent India, with a sense of its own importance in world
affairs, had shared thousands of miles of permeable rainforest
frontier with Malaysia by the time the guerrillas were fighting? Most
probably, we would have seen Pandit Nehru at the United Nations
claiming against the war in the neighboring country, just for the
sake of the interests of the Indian bourgeoisie (though in
"socialist" words). Well, same can be expected from Brazil, who, on
the other hand, seems to have a clear sense of  the menace that an
eventual "internationalization" of Amazonia represents. Finally,
Brazilian ruling classes, now that Argentina has faded from the
horizon of any foreseeable future influence on Latin America, watch
themselves as the champions of Latin America. This is clear,
particularly, in the ideology of the military and the diplomatic
body.

Besides all this, Colombia is a huge country, more than 1,000,000 sq.
km crossed by high mountains, with a thick tapestry of rainforest and
high paramos intersecting it. Not an easy place to invade, from
outside or from within. Invasion, finally, will most probably have
most Colombian urban population side with the guerrillas. So that the
situation would become a new Viet Nam.

No Latin American country (and I am even thinking of De La Rúa's
Argentina, or Fujimori's Perú) would accept this. The isolation of
the Colombian guerrillas may well prove a strong connection with
Latin America, where the attempt at invasion may become pivotal.

>


Néstor Miguel Gorojovsky
gorojovsky@xxxxxxxxxxx
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