Juan Almendáres on the military threat to Bajo Aguán

THREE EIGHTS (I / III)
Juan Almendares

The number eight in the vernacular means mess, three eights are three tangles, a horizontal eight in math represents infinity and three eights asleep and aligned imply an infinite maze.

On 28 February 2010, three days after the appointment of new Chief of the Armed Forces, a story of 888 words highlighted in the newspaper La Prensa: "Guerrilla cell arms itself in Lower Aguan" whose source is, according to the article, a report from the Honduran military intelligence agency.

Since this is a document with profound implications, threatening the lives of individuals and organizations, it is necessary to reflect on the position of the report itself.

Our analysis is based on four questions:

• What is the purpose of publishing this document, as news, in the current political situation?
• What are the arguments, premises, assumptions and conclusions that are proposed?
• What are the implications of the report within the context of the National Security Doctrine, the War of Low Intensity Conflict and Irregular War?
• What impact will this report have on human rights violations?

The partial publication of the document only in one newspaper is an indicator of the confidence of the "military intelligence" in the print medium whose headline reads "armed guerrilla cell in the Lower Aguan," immediately labeling the farmer in this area as a rebel or an enemy to be eliminated.

We point out some relevant aspects of the arguments of the military report:

"Several members of these unions organized, the most radical, have formed a strategic alliance with drug traffickers in the area for protection, economic resources, weapons for their activities; in return, the drug traffickers invest in a successful political project that will give them complete freedom of movement in Honduras ... a structure mounted in the region by non-governmental socialist organizations, priests of the Jesuit order who preach liberation theology in every community, teachers, teachers, union leaders and radical left, even local media biased with communist ideologies."

Any reader with common sense or using the simplest of logic will conclude that according to the military, three groups or cells exist in the Aguán area, which we can call "N. R. G. "

The whole "N" (Drug or "Narco" Trafficking) is composed of the drug dealers. The set "R" (Resistance) corresponds to the peasants, teachers, students, NGO workers, Jesuit priests, and "Communists" supposedly armed and financially supported by drug traffickers. The "G" (golpista) contains elements of the military, police, oligarchy and religious hierarchies that are immaculate and blessed because supposedly they have no connection with drug trafficking or with the Resistance.

It follows from this that military intelligence, in concluding that the Resistance has links to all "N," drug trafficking, must have full knowledge of who in R and N have colluded. However, the reader may wonder why the members of G have concentrated their target on R and not N?

The military report directs its attack on the COAPALMA cooperative movement and celebrates the success of the multibillion-dollar gain of the oligarchy "COAPALMA sold mostly to companies Agropalma of Rene Morales and Nicaraguan Atlantic Exporter Miguel Facussé. From recent years due to the great success of this crop and raising its price by 500 percent in the last 15 years, members of the old peasant cooperatives seek to recover their lands claiming that they were paid very little for them ... "

The military report describes peasants and squatters as reckless and manipulative and accuses farmers and organizations such as MUCA, Rafael Alegría-top leader of National Front of the Popular Resistance and Via Campesina, of having links with the FARC in Colombia. The indictment against peasant leaders immediately puts their lives at risk.

Since the military coup on 28 June 2009, the coup forces unleashed a million-dollar media xenophobic campaign characterized by noting that the majority of participants in the marches of the Resistance were Nicaraguans, Cubans and Venezuelans who wanted to take away their homes and destroy families.

Their militarized religious discourse has as its motto, "Praying to God while clubbing the masses." The word "democracy" is a joke in a country occupied by the United States of America. The Security Officers have short legs like their lies and long tongue of informers. The National Plan is devoid of popular participation and of credibility. The Truth Commission begins with a lie. It is the world of the new heroes of clay who swim in the murky waters and drown in the mud of corruption.

In this theatrical performance are the sinister plans of the "ogre fuels." African palms are stained with the blood of suffering peasants. The sinister plans of lead and arsenic poisoning from the mining industry, the corruption of dams on Nacaome, San Francisco Opalaca is the Colombianization of our country. In this emergency the new military bases in Panama, Colombia, Haiti, and throughout Lower Aguan and the whole Atlantic Fleet are part of irregular warfare against life, liberty and the historic dignity of the peoples of Latin America.

We express our solidarity with Rafael Alegría, the peasant leaders of Aguán, and with the National Front of the Popular Resistance who may at any time be subjected to assassination attempts.

Against this terrifying scenario—in which a military intelligence report does not mention or seek out those responsible for the crimes against women, against gays, lesbians and transsexuals and against leaders of the Resistance—hope grows for solidarity with the peoples of the ALBA nations, the peoples of the United States, Canada, Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin America and Australia.

The unity of organized and mobilized peoples of the nations of the world is the only force capable of untangling the endless maze of violence of international military and religious financial capital in Latin America and transforming the essence of the colonial power and the new global criminal order for peace, social justice, climate stability and love to prevail on Mother Earth.

Tegucigalpa, March, 2010.

.