[HNA] Fwd: [Presente-Honduras] Fwd: Hard Choices: Hillary Clinton Admits Role in Honduran Coup

Tue Sep 30 16:17:13 PDT 2014

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From: Alexander Main <main at cepr.net>
Date: Tue, Sep 30, 2014 at 5:36 PM
Subject: [Presente-Honduras] Fwd: Hard Choices: Hillary Clinton Admits Role
in Honduran Coup
To: Presente-Honduras <Presente-honduras at lists.mayfirst.org>

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<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=W2t34Da2uFah3djpyjpT%2BcrYQrtK8jnr>
Hard Choices:
Hillary Clinton Admits Role in Honduran Coup

By Mark Weisbrot
------------------------------

This article was originally published by Al Jazeera America
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=KHgwdA%2FJYyOU1TCD1nC58MrYQrtK8jnr>
onSeptember 29, 2014.
------------------------------

In a recent op-ed in the *Washington Post*, former Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton used a review of Henry Kissinger’s latest book, “World
Order,”
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=8FoJc7YTGlwf27X8Rg%2B4f8rYQrtK8jnr>
to lay out her vision for “sustaining America’s leadership in the world.”
In the midst of numerous global crises, Clinton called for return to a
foreign policy with purpose, strategy and pragmatism. She also highlighted
some of these policy choices in her memoir, “Hard Choices,” and how they
contributed to the challenges that the Obama administration now faces.

The chapter on Latin America, particularly the section on Honduras, a major
source of the child migrants currently pouring across the border, has gone
largely unnoticed. In letters to Clinton and her successor John Kerry, more
than 100
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=18e9ooUWllwMAL2Q6G9gKsrYQrtK8jnr>
members of Congress have repeatedly
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=Awh7CNJmMcQlPF1qNX4JK8rYQrtK8jnr>
warned about the deteriorating security situation in Honduras, especially
following the 2009 military coup that overthrew the country’s
democratically elected president, Mel Zelaya.

As Honduras scholar Dana Frank wrote in *Foreign Affairs*
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=sO0Ezj76TB8GxMnbdEkEHcrYQrtK8jnr>,
the post-coup government “rewarded coup loyalists with top ministries. They
opened the door, in turn, for worsening violence and anarchy … as the
United Nations, Amnesty International, the Organization of American States,
and Human Rights Watch have documented…” The homicide rate, already the
highest in the world, increased by 50 percent from 2008 to 2011; political
repression, the murder of opposition political candidates, peasant
organizers and LGBT activists increased and continue to this day. Femicides
skyrocketed. The violence and insecurity were exacerbated by a generalized
institutional collapse. Drug-related violence has worsened amid allegations
of rampant corruption
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=6%2FjmhHwNNtJF4Kz%2BkJLmE8rYQrtK8jnr>
in Honduras’ police and government. While the gangs are responsible for
much of the violence, the Honduran security forces have also engaged in a
wave of killings
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=69rSUTypFtuqaZP0otvcU8rYQrtK8jnr>
and other human rights crimes, with impunity.

Despite this, however, both under Clinton and Kerry, the State Department’s
response to the violence and continued military and police impunity has
largely been silence, along with continued U.S. aid to Honduran security
forces. In “Hard Choices,” Clinton describes her role in the aftermath of
the coup that brought about this dire situation. Clinton’s first-hand
account is significant both for the confession of an important truth and
also a crucial false testimony. We won’t accuse anyone of lying; like the
Houyhnhnms in Jonathan Swift’s “Gulliver’s Travels,” who didn’t have a word
for lying, let’s just say she has said “the thing which is not.”

First, the confession: Clinton admits that she used the power of her office
to make sure that Zelaya would not return to office. “In the subsequent
days [after the coup] I spoke with my counterparts around the hemisphere,
including Secretary [Patricia] Espinosa in Mexico,” Clinton wrote. “We
strategized on a plan to restore order in Honduras and ensure that free and
fair elections could be held quickly and legitimately, which would render
the question of Zelaya moot.”

This may not come as a surprise to those who followed the post-coup drama
closely (see my commentary from 2009 on Washington’s role in helping the
coup succeed here
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=7PnwVq0Wn6pdNwNHkjL%2F8MrYQrtK8jnr>,
here
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=58TtXCBAydUsDQSfMO45HcrYQrtK8jnr>
and here
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=OSjwD28xOommuAT4p3Osr8rYQrtK8jnr>).
But the official storyline, which was dutifully accepted by most in the
media, was that the Obama administration actually opposed the coup and
wanted Zelaya to return to office.

The question of Zelaya was anything but moot. Latin America leaders
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=q5EeaftEMJx4F3zb2nfQFMrYQrtK8jnr>,
the United Nations General Assembly
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=3v9HMruTlKRTzwNk3iPrBMrYQrtK8jnr>
and other international bodies vehemently demanded his immediate return to
office. Clinton’s defiant and anti-democratic stance spurred a downward
slide in U.S. relations with several Latin American countries, which has
continued to date. It eroded the warm welcome and benefit of the doubt that
even the leftist governments in region had offered to the newly installed
Obama administration a few months earlier.

Now for the “thing which is not”: Clinton reports that Zelaya was arrested
amid “fears that he was preparing to circumvent the Constitution and extend
his term in office.” This is simply not true. As Clinton must know, when
Zelaya was kidnapped by the military and was flown out of the country in
his pajamas on June 28, 2009, he was in fact trying to put a consultative,
non-binding poll on the ballot. The poll was supposed to ask voters whether
they wanted to have a real referendum on reforming the constitution during
scheduled elections in November. It is important to note that Zelaya was
not eligible to run in that election. Even if he had gotten everything he
wanted, it was chronologically impossible for Zelaya to extend his term in
office. But this did not stop the extreme right in both Honduras and the
United States from using false charges of tampering with the constitution
to justify the coup.

In addition to her bold confession and Clinton’s embrace of the far-right
narrative in the Honduran episode, the Latin America chapter is
considerably to the right of even her own record on the region as Secretary
of State. This appears to be a political calculation. There is little risk
of losing votes for admitting her role in making most of the hemisphere’s
governments disgusted with the United States. On the other side of the
equation, there are influential interest groups and significant campaign
money to be raised from the right-wing Latin American lobby, including
Florida Cuban Americans and their political fund-raisers.
Like the 54-year old failed embargo against Cuba, Clinton’s position on
Latin America in her bid for the presidency is another example of how the
far-right exerts disproportionate influence on U.S. foreign policy in the
hemisphere.As we have also seen
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=VtA73nNZlu669dCJqDmo%2BcrYQrtK8jnr>
in the case of Argentina’s ongoing fight with the vulture funds, these
influences can be substantial at certain moments when even the majority of
the political establishment would prefer to let reason prevail. Not to
mention the electorate, if it had a voice in these matters.

Mark Weisbrot
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=iRn%2BaqF%2FNOW9R0lu9CbGocrYQrtK8jnr>
is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, in
Washington, D.C. He is also president of Just Foreign Policy
<http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=pMcynaRdrkNBpTV2eEfnAcrYQrtK8jnr>.

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