Regular readers of Mercury Rising may have been puzzled to see economic and other international coverage dwindle and page after page of detailed news of what was going on in Honduras appear. Honduras is a small, poor country, not to be noticed. Well, one of the features of the analytical work that I publish at MercRising is to identify hinge moments, which have the potential to substantially alter the future course of events.
I see a hinge moment in what is going on in Honduras, one that will substantially alter the direction of our lives over the next ten years. While the far left fears that the coup in Honduras is a trial run for coup attempts in Venezuela, Cuba, Bolivia, Nicaragua, and Guatemala, I think it’s more likely that this coup will inflict fatal damage on the United States. This is because American dominance of Latin America has been a primary source of American economic strength. They are a major supplier of raw materials and cheap labor, as well as a market for finished goods. Take those away and the US would be in dire straits. A region that has to be governed by terror is not one that would strengthen the United States.
There are good historical reasons for the Latin American fear of coups. Presidents that we think of as great, men like FDR and Ike and JFK did terrible things in Latin America, leading to the deaths of 200,000 Guatemalans alone. And yet, unlike Reagan and the Bushes, our better presidents also provided the region with hope and a path for development. So the United States is at the same time admired and hated in Latin America… and we were forgiven many wrongs.
But two things have happened lately. First, the fortunes of the United States are in steep decline thanks to Reagan’s destruction of our industrial dominance and the Reagan-Bush I-Bush II gutting of the federal budget. Second, a new pole of economic power has emerged in Latin America in Brazil and in Venezuela. While tiny compared to US power, and based on a fragile foundation, it seems to be on the upswing. It offers hope. That draws other countries to it.
I am, I have to confess, a political troglodyte. I see the past sins of the United States as the unremarkable actions of a Great Power. If Lichtenstein or Palau suddenly became Great Powers, they would kill millions to sustain their own selfish lifestyle. It is in the inherent nature of terrible imbalances of power to lead to horrible crimes. If they, in the course of doing these terrible things, also do something positive like inventing algebra or aqueducts or the printing press, those good deeds will in some measure expiate their sins.
But the actions of the United States with regard to Honduras have been petty, contemptible, and destructive to American power:
* there are reasons to think that this coup had origins in the US government, even though probably not with Obama.
* if the coup succeeds, the rest of the world will assume that the US was its progenitor and American credibility will follow the path Bush set it on
* unlike the Cold War era, there was no cause sufficient to justify putting a small and impoverished country through this wringer
* US diplomacy through Oscar Arias has not met the laugh test, another blow to American credibility
* the muddled response of the American government has left other would-be dictators wondering whether the US will really back them
* the rise of effective resistance, especially alternative media, has meant that only those who want to be lied to can be fooled. While that regrettably includes most Americans, Latin Americans are learning very fast
* the immediate consequence of the coup is that the ALBA nations are coalescing into an anti-US bloc.
So, as Honduras goes, so goes the American union. Maybe the Administration will recognize what folly it is embarked upon and take a more honorable course. I certainly hope so. I love my country and cannot stand to see it sink into such debasement. Scripture, however, describes the state in which nations, corrupted within, destroy themselves by wasting their power on unworthy and unrighteous goals. This smells like such a moment:
This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, said to me: “Take from my hand this cup filled with the wine of my wrath and make all the nations to whom I send you drink it.
When they drink it, they will stagger and go mad because of the sword I will send among them.” Jeremiah 25