[Marxism] Re: Lula and Haiti.

[David Quarter]

  I agree 100% with Greg's point below.  

 Still, the excerpt -- if we are to take the General's words at face 
value -- is interesting from the standpoint of a represenative of client 
state disobeying the orders of his western imperialist bosses.   It 
shows the way that cracks can arise within western/client state 
alliances. I'd be very suprised if what the General's expressed  is in 
line with Lula intentions behind agreeing to deploy troops there. 

DOQ




From:           	gdunkel at mindspring.com

> Consider this:  foreign troops occupying one of the poorest countries in 
> the world, a country without an army, are foreign soldiers whether they are 
> wearing blue helmets -- from the UN -- or khaki helmets from the US.
> 
> Here's what Reuters had to say:
> 
>     Brazil rejects U.S. call for Haiti crackdown
>     02 Dec 2004 23:22:41 GMT
>     Source: Reuters
>     By Andrew Hay
> 
>    [....]
> 
>     "We are under extreme pressure from the international community to use 
>     violence," General Augusto Heleno Ribeiro told a congressional commission 
>     in Brazil. "I command a peacekeeping force, not an occupation force ... we 
>     are not there to carry out violence, this will not happen for as long as 
>     I'm in charge of the force."
> 
>     He cited the United States, France and Canada among countries pressing for 
>     the use of force against armed groups.
> 
> 
> 
> Den Dupuy, who is sec general of the National Popular Party in Haiti and 
> editorial director of Haiti-Progres, a newspaper I occassionally write for, 
> feels that the United States and France called in the UN because their 
> military was being chewed up in Iraq and the Ivory Coast, respectively.
> 
> He doesn't really bother about why the Brazilians did it -- and what Cuba 
> thinks -- but wants to analyze the effects of UN intervention on Haiti and 
> why France & the US acted the way they did.
> 
> I personally think that one of the tasks of the anti-imperialist movement 
> in this country is figuring out how to aid Haiti in removing its foreign 
> occupiers, no matter which helmet they are wearing.
> 
>Greg