Honduran army officers against golpista general Romeo Vázquez??

[rabs]

I heard about this two days ago and it appears to be true. The document is reported being put on the Internet by the Frente Nacional and others resistance groups/bloggers.

It is from a movement calling itself MOSUSU (Superior and lower-ranking officers of the Honduran Armed Forces.)

Main points:

-- The document criticizes Romeo V. for "politicizing" the army.

-- The politicians in step with the top generals have damaged the favorable image the armed forces had in the eyes of the Honduran people.

-- Romeo V. has politicized the institution, contravening the constitutional mandate of being apolitical.

-- Romeo V. at first had vowed the armed forces would remain loyal to Zelaya.

-- Afterwards, Romeo V. put the armed forces at the disposal of the politicians who are using them.

-- Business leaders raised 1.5 million dollars (20 million lempiras) which were divided among the top commanders, violating the military's standards.

-- The armed forces are not the gendarmes of any elite economic group ... the majority of the officers and soldiers come from the people, we are not an army of caste.

-- The officers say Romeo V.'s time to retire was two years ago and that under him there were irregularaties in the promotion of generals who did not meet the necessary requirements.

-- The officers did not sign the document "for obvious reasons and not cowardice."

----------------------------


Difunden pronunciamiento de militares opuestos a golpe en Honduras

Caracas, 29 Jul. ABN. Un Movimiento de Oficiales Superiores y Subalternos de las Fuerzas Armadas de Honduras (Mosusu) criticó hoy la politización de la institución por parte de su jefe, general Romeo Vázquez.

Un pronunciamiento del Mosusu comenzó a ser distribuido esta tarde por las redes de correos de Internet por el Frente Nacional contra el golpe de Estado y otras fuentes cercanas a la resistencia pacífica, según informó Prensa Latina.

En el texto, los militares explican que hacen la declaración porque 'los políticos en contubernio con la junta de comandantes han involucrado a las Fuerzas Armadas y han deteriorado la buena imagen que teníamos ante el pueblo hondureño'.

Señalan que 'el Señor Jefe del Estado Mayor Conjunto Gral. Vásquez politizó la institución, contraviniendo el mandato constitucional de ser apolíticas'.

Añade que el general Vázquez comprometió a las fuerzas armadas en un principio por apoyar al presidente Manuel Zelaya (derrocado el 28 de junio por un golpe militar comandado por Vázquez).

Y después cambió de ámbito político en vez de retirar sus tropas a sus respectivos cuarteles y mantenerlos al margen de los políticos que sólo las están usando, agrega.

Se menciona, aseguran, que un grupo de empresarios reunió 30 millones de Lempiras (más de 1,5 millones de dólares) y los repartió a la junta de comandantes, algo que va en contra del decoro y principios del militar.

Declaramos que las Fuerzas Armadas no son gendarmes de ningún grupo económico elite, sino que estamos con el pueblo porque la mayoría de sus miembros tanto oficiales como tropa venimos de las entrañas del pueblo, no somos un ejército de casta, sostiene el documento.

Los oficiales acusan al general Vázquez, quien -aseguran- desde hace dos años debe estar de baja, de varias irregularidades en los ascensos, y promover a militares al grado de general sin tener las condiciones para ello.

El documento es la primera declaración de ese grupo de oficiales, que no se identifican, por razones obvias, no por cobardía, aclaran.

http://www.abn.info.ve/noticia.php?articulo=192775&lee=16

[Judi Lynn]

1. That's a magnificent list. It's honest, it's honorable. Do you think it has been widely read?

They should take pride in such a tremendous statement.

Sure hope the coup leaders don't decide to start torturing people to find out who's responsible. If they even made a move in that direction, I would hope and pray the entire place would become a conflagration and turn that dirty group of criminals on their heads.

I'll remember reading this for a long time. Thank you. Hope many people all over the world will finally see it, too.

[Peace Patriot]

2. "we are not an army of caste." Important statement!

Vazquez, by corruption--accepting this bribe from businesspeople--by permitting the army to be used by a righwing elite putcsh, and by promoting unqualified people to be generals (the implication is promotion due to caste), certainly has made it clear that the army doesn't belong to the people; it belongs to the upper class, to multinational corporations operating in Honduras and to the U.S. rightwing.

Re: The point about him extending his term. Vasquez is the one that Zelatya fired--one of the important events immediately leading up to the coup. The Honduran Supreme Court (so like our own--utterly corrupt and in the service of multinational corporations)--overruled Zelaya--the civilian head of government--and reinstated Vazquez. Vazquez then sent troops to shoot up Zelaya's home and remove him from the country at gunpoint.

This would be comparable to Obama firing Betray-Us, and the Supreme Court overruling Obama. ('No, you can't fire a general. Who do you think you are?')

Something similar may have occurred here, but it wasn't the Supreme Court's doing--more likely the secret government vetting committee, when they were deciding whether Obama was acceptable for the White House, or should be Diebolded. Obama's agreement to continue the Forever War seems to have been part of the bargain (including permanent US military protection of the oil contracts that were extracted from the US puppet government of Iraq). I originally thought there was only one deal--immunity for the Bush Junta principles (for their mind-boggling list of crimes), which had been offered to Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld, and possibly a few others (Rove?), by Daddy Bush, Leon Panetta, some top military brass and others (Nancy Pelosi--"impeachment is off the table"--may have been in this loop) in exchange for their not nuking Iran, and for their agreeing to leave the White House peacefully when the time came--a deal that Obama had to agree to to become president. Now I think there were more deals than this. Pretty obviously there was a deal with the Clintons and the DLC regarding the Financial 9/11 bailout, insurance corp-run health care, etc., but even worse, Obama appears to have consented to continue Bushwhack preparations for Oil War II-South America. These include leaving Brownfield in Colombia (possibly to run the war out of the US embassy "war room" in Bogota), leaving in place many other Bushwhack appointments in Latin America (including in Honduras), building five US military bases in Colombia (adjacent to Venezuela and Ecuador--the two targeted oil producers), continuing to lard Colombia with $6 BILLION (so far) in military aid--a country with one of the worst human rights records on earth--the continued reconstitution of the US 4th Fleet in the Caribbean (most of Venezuela's oil is on its Caribbean coast), and the continued and intensifying lies, psyops and propaganda campaign against Chavez, against Correa (Ecuador) and against democracy and leftist (majority) rule in Latin America.

Obama says one thing--he wants a new, peaceful, respectful and cooperative Latin American foreign policy--but the actions of his government are beginning to scream something else. Same old, same old oppression, exploitation, torture and death.

Another signal that Obama may have made a deal about the Bushwhack-planned Oil War in South America: his appointment of Eric Holder as Attorney General. Holder was Chiquita International's attorney, when a civil suit (representing the victims) accused Chiquita executives of paying millions of dollars to rightwing paramilitary death squads in Colombia, to rid their corporate farms of unions, by killing thousands of union leaders. The Chiquita executives admitted that they made the payments, and then appealed to the Bushwhacks to get them off the hook. Holder negotiated this with the Bushwhacks. (I would like to have been a fly on the wall at that bargaining table). The upshot is that Chiquita would pay $25 million to the Bushwhacks for immunity from all charges.

This was Obama's choice for chief law enforcement officer of the US. Chiquita, until that time, was perhaps more notorious for similar activities in Honduras, first as the United Fruit Company, later Chiquita Banana. (Like Diebold, they had to change their name due to their deservedly evil reputation--but they didn't change their stripes). I have little doubt that Chiquita is in on the Honduran coup. (Zelaya had raised the minimum wage, specifically because of the slave labor wages that were being paid by Chiquita and others--that's what the US means by "free trade"). Eric Holder is not only a corporate lapdog--he is an apologist for, and front man for, the rich killing the poor to make themselves even richer, in Latin America.

Honduran military officers understand very well what this coup means for them. Honduras was the "lily pad" country from which the U.S. launched aggression against Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala during the Reagan "reign of terror." The Honduran military of that era not only cooperated with Reagan's "dirty wars" in Central America, they tortured, killed and oppressed their own people in furtherance of these "dirty wars" and for corporations like Chiquita. This current coup means their being coerced on pain of demotion, ostracism and even death into slaughtering other Latin Americans on behalf of the US and its global corporate predators. Some top Honduran military brass, such as Vazquez, clearly want a return to the "old days," when the Honduran military was nothing more than a death squad itself. He may also have ambitions to lead a military junta in Honduras under the guise of a highly corrupt political scene (as Colombian Defense Minister Santos--the 'Donald Rumsfeld' of Latin America-would like to do. Santos is running for president in a country where voting the wrong way can get you a bullet through your head).

There are infinitely better models for the role of the military in a democracy. One model is that they go away. Our own Founders opposed any kind of standing army, and would be appalled at our war profiteer-run government of today. Another is that they stand ready to defend the country from foreign invasion, but are entirely subject to civilian authority and have no say in political matters, as well as being barred by the Constitution from any military or police action against their own people, no matter who gives the order. This is the model--but not the practice--in the US, since WW II. (And it was the general who won WW II, later elected president--Dwight Eisenhower--who warned against our present disaster of the "military-industrial complex" running the country.) Another model is Venezuela, in which the military is more like our National Guard--not our current National Guard, which caved to fighting in Iraq, but the pre-Bushwhack National Guard, which was called up for natural disasters or civil unrest, as when southern white racist governors refused to obey federal law on black civil rights. Venezuela's military is even more National Guard-like than our own is now. They help with community projects, such as building schools or medical clinics, or local flood control. They live closer to the people. And they have a tradition of leftist and democracy activism within the military (a tradition that produced Hugo Chavez).

This communique sounds like the latter--especially democracy activism--is the model that these dissident officers want for Honduras. They don't want their military to be run by a foreign power for its corporations. They want a real military which supports the people of Honduras in their democracy and social justice aspirations. They want proper, democratic rule. They want to be helpers, not killers; they want to be defenders, not warmongers.

I am joyful that there is such a contingent within the Honduran military. I hope--and strongly suspect--that it is quite large, since the military of course recruits from the poorest classes--including many people (like Chavez) who never forget where they came from, and who identify with the poor majority.

[rabs]

3. Where is the colonel ...

Blurb below is from the "Follow the Money" posting from magbana this morning. Imagine the full text in English is out there somewhere. Resistance leader Alegria, who was detained then released, mentioned the officer's communique on Radio Globo three days ago, but I had been unable to find the text until last night.

--------------------

LATEST UPDATES FROM THE HONDURAN RESISTANCE
July 30, 2009 (as of 11:20 AM EDT) UPDATES FROM APPOREA.ORG►Lower ranking officers of the Honduran military have issued a communique stating their disagreement with the “militarization" of the coup by its commander, General Romeo Vasquez Velasquez►

----------------------------

Thought it was interesting that it came from Prensa Latina. That tell me that the Cuban G-2 intelligence service is on top of what is happening within the ranks of the Honduran army officers.

The dissident officers' communique reminded me of a saying in the Southern Cone:

"Donde esta el coronel cuando lo necesitamos?"

"Where is the colonel when we need him?"

Honduras is in dire need of such a colonel right now.