Mon. Mar. 21, 2022
Our little Jewel, Belize, has made some major strides towards economic stability over the past year of the new PUP government; give PM John Briceno and his party their due. Some breaks have been in their/our favor – like the recent dwindling presence of Covid-19 that has allowed a gradual reopening of economic activity; and the patience and perseverance of public servants and teachers who have endured the 10% salary cut even while the economy was reeling in the throes of Covid-induced stagnation of commercial activity. But they must also be credited with positive and productive initiatives, especially in agriculture, land distribution, infrastructure, Blue Economy/Nature Conservancy negotiations, etc. There seems to be more progress on the horizon, despite the crippling grip of rising oil/commodity prices attendant with the Russia- initiated “war” against Ukraine; but as a small nation in a world of big giants, it makes sense for our leaders to continue on the path of constructive and cordial international relations that suit our country’s best interests. The big powers all do the same, and so must we if we are to achieve the goal of health and happiness for all our people. In that regard, a word of caution may be pertinent at this time to those of us who are tempted to go overboard in our condemnation or praise of one side or the other when powerful nations are squared off against each other, or even when their representatives happen to visit our shores.

It’s not that we should not express support for our allies, or disagreement and disapproval of the actions of their opponents in any conflict, but we should always remember that these nations are concerned first and foremost about their own national interests, and it is no longer just as simple as one ism is bad (communism) and the other ism is good (capitalism). In fact, a closer scrutiny may reveal that the personalities in leadership of nations have a lot to do with the level of human rights and welfare of the masses of people, regardless of the particular political system. For example, a review of history very close to home will show how the bogeyman of “communism” has been used by our good big-brother up north to inflict great suffering among the Guatemalan people in the name of protecting “democracy”. Targeted propaganda has been used by the giants in action to pursue their intended goals and self-interests; and that propaganda often results in a distortion of understanding among ordinary people, who are deceived into equating communism with dictatorship, and capitalism with democracy. And it is just not that simple. Democracy is a principle which must be defended and guarded every step of the way. And while a number of communist countries are led by dictator presidents, there are enough examples of capitalist countries that have slipped into dictator-style rule, where the president wields seemingly unlimited power, as is the case now in Russia, which adopted the capitalist system after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Wikipedia provides a good, brief explanation of how anti-communist propaganda was used to justify the CIA overthrow of Guatemalan president Jacobo Arbenz in 1954, when his popular and democratically elected government was replaced by a military dictator with the support of the American CIA, resulting in 30 years of civil war and hundreds of thousands of casualties. (Google “Jacobo Arbenz” or “1954 Guatemalan coup d’etat.”)

Many folks forget that the communist Soviet Union was one of the allied forces (allies with Britain, USA and France) in World War II against Nazi Germany, Italy and Japan; but this was followed by the so-called “Cold War,” where the two former superpower allies, the capitalist U.S. and the communist Soviet Union, began to vie for world dominance. Signs of the rift became evident after two important conferences near the end of the war among leaders of the “big three” – Britain, the US and the Soviet Union, in the Yalta Conference, February 4-11, 1945, featuring Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin; and the Potsdam Conference, July 17 to August 2, 1945. At the root of the problem was a deep personal distrust between then U.S. president Harry Truman (who replaced the deceased Franklin D. Roosevelt after the Yalta Conference) and the Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, who ruled the Soviet Union from 1932-1952. And that distrust was further enhanced by the U.S. first gaining the advantage of nuclear capability, as demonstrated in their atomic bombing of Japan near the end of World War II.

“Absolute power corrupts absolutely,” and dictators, whether in so-called capitalist states like Guatemala under a series of military dictators, Haiti under “Papa Doc” Duvalier and Iran under the Shah, or in communist states like North Korea under Kim Jung-un, or the Soviet Union under Stalin, have tended to endorse a very small, wealthy and privileged elite class at the expense of the masses of oppressed people.

The so-called “Truman Doctrine,” which led to the formation of NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) in 1949, made no bones about its objective “to contain the spread of communism” in Europe or around the world; but this drive to maintain and increase their “sphere of influence” may have had as much to do with the big powers trying to secure markets for trade and sources of raw material for their economies, as with enhancing true democracy or spreading communist ideology.

Following his annexation of the Crimean Peninsula in 2014, it was well known that Putin still had his eyes on the wealthy Ukraine, a former Soviet republic which had expressed a desire to join NATO, a military alliance of some 28 European countries along with the U.S. and Canada, membership in which would have effectively made Ukraine “untouchable” by Russia.

For what he claims as Russia’s national security interest, since U.S. president Biden and European allies had refused to guarantee that Ukraine would not be admitted into NATO, Putin has now preemptively directed the military might of Russia against neighboring Ukraine, and neither country is communist. The wealthy Ukraine is said to be corrupt; but so is Russia, which, under Putin since 2000, has gone from “crony capitalism to state capitalism.”

Thankfully, there were more sober minds facing off in the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, when Soviet Union leader Nikita Khrushchev and American president John F. Kennedy found a way to maintain the peace and avoid nuclear Armageddon. The problem right now is that this Russian president Putin reportedly idolizes former Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, and that totalitarian Stalin character was most soundly condemned by Khrushchev himself in a secret speech “‘On the Cult of Personality and Its Consequences,” which he delivered in 1956 at the Twentieth Party Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. (Google “Khrushchev’s Secret Speech.”) The same despotic qualities he decried in Stalin are now being displayed by Putin.

Would-be dictators and individuals who enlist unethical or even fraudulent means to grasp and entrench themselves in positions of great power and authority, whether it be in government, NGOs or in sports associations and federations, can undermine peace and progress due to selfish motives and egotistic ambitions, and need to be keenly monitored and restrained by freedom- loving Belizeans and people the world over. Democracy is energized when those who are denied their right to vote, fight to get it; and those who already have a vote, prepare themselves to use it.