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NATO to bolster forces in eastern Europe against threat from Russia

Tell you what, criticise this, and you and I can call a truce! And please, whatever you do, do not dare to attempt any justification of this!

1954

Guatemala — CIA overthrows the democratically elected Jacob Arbenz in a military coup. Arbenz has threatened to nationalize the Rockefeller-owned United Fruit Company, in which CIA Director Allen Dulles also owns stock. Arbenz is replaced with a series of right-wing dictators whose bloodthirsty policies will kill over 100,000 Guatemalans in the next 40 years.

One of the paradoxes of legislative oversight of intelligence in the early Cold War period was that the United States Congress could give strong, if de facto, support of aggressive covert action while, with the exception of a few leaders, not really knowing which such policies were being carried out. Guatemala is a perfect example. Following its 1944 revolution, which brought democratically elected leftist governments to power, this Central American government faced an increasingly hostile neighbor to the north, the United States. Guatemala's treatment of US-based corporations, especially the United Fruit Company, in expropriating land and other assets, did nothing to improve relations.

https://www.cia.gov/library/center-...lligence/kent-csi/vol44no5/html/v44i5a03p.htm


There IS NO END to this type of US aggression all the while mouthing the merits of democracy, quite filthy. And your worried about Putin, lol.

While I fully agree this is wrong it has no bearing on the situation today in Ukraine.
Putin is the aggressor he orchestrated the whole thing. How does bad behavior of the US govt in the past in any way excuse Putin's wrongs today?
 
While I fully agree this is wrong it has no bearing on the situation today in Ukraine.
Putin is the aggressor he orchestrated the whole thing. How does bad behavior of the US govt in the past in any way excuse Putin's wrongs today?

Wrong doing isn't to be excused. I'm not advocating that. You and I have a disagreement on the matter of Russia's response to US interference in Ukrainian politics in the fall of 2013. My other point would be that even if we did agree that Russia was the provocateur in this crisis, until the US dispenses with its own provocative foreign policy, we haven't credibility in raising hell when we perceive others engaged in the same activity. This isn't just past behavior either. The US has more covert "operations" being conducted by special ops forces around the world, then at any other time.
 
Tell you what, criticise this, and you and I can call a truce! And please, whatever you do, do not dare to attempt any justification of this!

1954

Guatemala — CIA overthrows the democratically elected Jacob Arbenz in a military coup. Arbenz has threatened to nationalize the Rockefeller-owned United Fruit Company, in which CIA Director Allen Dulles also owns stock. Arbenz is replaced with a series of right-wing dictators whose bloodthirsty policies will kill over 100,000 Guatemalans in the next 40 years.

One of the paradoxes of legislative oversight of intelligence in the early Cold War period was that the United States Congress could give strong, if de facto, support of aggressive covert action while, with the exception of a few leaders, not really knowing which such policies were being carried out. Guatemala is a perfect example. Following its 1944 revolution, which brought democratically elected leftist governments to power, this Central American government faced an increasingly hostile neighbor to the north, the United States. Guatemala's treatment of US-based corporations, especially the United Fruit Company, in expropriating land and other assets, did nothing to improve relations.

https://www.cia.gov/library/center-...lligence/kent-csi/vol44no5/html/v44i5a03p.htm


There IS NO END to this type of US aggression all the while mouthing the merits of democracy, quite filthy. And your worried about Putin, lol.


Arbenz was a Marxist attempting to set up a totalitarian communist state and it had absolutely nothing to do with UFC:

{I}n the past 18 years, researchers have gathered and analyzed new evidence, refining the interpretations of the Guatemalan revolution. Piero Gleijeses uncovered Guatemalan documents and interviewed prominent actors, most notably María de Arbenz, the widow of the deposed president. His book, Shattered Hope: The United States and the Guatemalan Revolution, 1944–1954, focused on the internal dynamics of the revolution, providing the intellectual counterpart to Immerman’s analysis of the Washington foreign policy apparatus. Gleijeses, an admirer of Arbenz, produced irrefutable evidence of Arbenz’s gravitation toward the Communist Party and ideology, shattering previous portrayals of Arbenz as an economic nationalist or reformer. He also reassigned a portion of responsibility to the Guatemalan military, which ultimately betrayed Arbenz and allowed Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas to march unopposed into Guatemala City. Jim Handy mined the archives of Guatemala’s Agrarian Reform Institute to produce a sophisticated analysis of Arbenz’s agrarian reform. Revolution in the Countryside demonstrates how Arbenz’s agrarian reform triggered conflicts far beyond the United Fruit Company (UFCO) and the United States government. The agrarian reform generated conflict within and between indigenous communities, alienated Guatemala’s landowners, and disturbed the Guatemalan military because it disrupted the order that had long prevailed in the countryside...

...While some of Bitter Fruit’s general conclusions may remain intact, recent research calls into question Schlesinger and Kinzer’s characterization of important events and people. They maintain their original position on Arbenz’s ideology, arguing that Arbenz’s primary ideology was nationalism and that accusations that Arbenz was a communist “dupe” were “farfetched”(pp. 60– 61). Their characterizations of Arbenz’s ideology and his program lose credibility in the wake of Piero Gleijeses. Based on interviews with Arbenz’s widow, José Manuel Fortuny and other Communist leaders, Gleijeses concluded that although Arbenz did not join the Guatemalan Communist Party until 1957, he considered himself a communist during the last two years of his administration.


<continued below>>>
 


Arbenz apologists have long felt compelled to deny Arbenz’s communist inclinations to maintain the case against the CIA. Yet Gleijeses, an open admirer of Arbenz and his program, explains how and why Arbenz believed that the triumph of communism in Guatemala and around the world was both inevitable and desirable. To reach that stage, Arbenz and other Latin American communists believed that Guatemala had to pass through a capitalist stage in its inevitable evolution toward socialism. Hence, the agrarian reform was indeed designed to make Guatemala into a modern capitalist state, as Schlesinger and Kinzer argue, but that did not make Arbenz a capitalist. Arbenz’s long-term objective, as his opponents in UFCO and the CIA alleged, was the creation of a communist state.

Schlesinger and Kinzer maintain some positions that are no longer tenable. They argue, for example, that the Czech weaponry carried on board the Alf hem and confiscated by the Guatemalan Army in May 1954 was “intended solely for the Guatemalan Army”(p. 153). However, Arbenz’s closest political associates have confirmed that a portion of the Alfhem weapons were to be used to arm workers’ militias. Schlesinger and Kinzer insist that the Americans trumped up the charges about the workers’ militias in order to prove their case about a communist conspiracy. But the Americans did not lie in this case; at least a portion of the arms were intended for the workers.

None of this justifies the American intervention, but assessing responsibility for the collapse of the Arbenz regime hangs in the balance. In the Bitter Fruit account, the CIA orchestrated the counterrevolutionary movement on behalf of “The Overlord,” or the United Fruit Company. After an inept and bumbling covert campaign, spearheaded by a poorly trained army of only 150 men, Arbenz simply resigned. According to Schlesinger and Kinzer, Arbenz did not fight because “he was never more than he seemed to be—a bourgeois reformer whose ideology did not extend beyond basic precepts of nationalism and the stimulation of domestic industry and agriculture” (p. 19. It is now clear that Arbenz was a communist who did not fight because he did not have an army or workers’ militias to lead into battle. He failed in his gamble to arm the workers’ militias, and the army, even knowing that it would win, refused to fight because the officers did not want a direct military confrontation with the United States...

...Cullather also concluded that the United Fruit Company played a minor role in the decision-making process. He argues that the CIA recognized Guatemala as a serious threat even before Arbenz expropriated the company’s property. According to Cullather, “the threat to American business was a minor part of the larger danger to the United States’ overall security” (p. 37). In Cullather’s account, United Fruit is not the “overlord” of the operation but a tool used by the CIA to remove a perceived security threat. Once the company’s usefulness expired, the Eisenhower administration proceeded with its suspended antitrust action, which ended in 1958 with a consent decree that forced the company to divest of its Guatemalan holdings (p. 11.

Cullather’s account is in line with recent research on the Guatemalan revolution. It is significant that Piero Gleijese wrote the afterword to Secret History, giving the account his approval by praising Cullather’s intellect and integrity. Cullather’s research in the CIA files confirms that the UFCO played a minor role in the Guatemalan tragedy. He prefaces his account with a quote culled from Gleijeses’ interview with José Manuel Fortuny, who concluded: “They would have overthrown us even if we had grown no bananas” (p. 7). For those who want to believe that the CIA overthrew Arbenz simply to protect a banana company, Bitter Fruit is required reading, and a great read at that. For those who want a full account of the complex array of factors involved in the Guatemalan affair, Cullather’s Secret History has now been added to the required reading list.


Dosal, Paul J. (Paul Jaime), 1960-

Bitter Fruit: The Story of the American Coup in Guatemala, and: Secret History: The CIA's Classified Account of its Operations in Guatemala, 1952-1954 (review)

Hispanic American Historical Review - 80:3, August 2000, pp. 633-635


http://hahr.dukejournals.org.proxy.usf.edu/cgi/reprint/80/3/633
 
Whether you're pro or anti-Russian, the link in my signature explains why NATO may soon become irrelevant. What people don't understand is that Putin is winning, he's gone incognito, funding into power radical parties across the EU. A united European front against Putin is impossible, and the Minsk conference on Wednesday will determine whether or not Germany and the US remain united against Russia. See the link for further details.

Make no mistake, Putin is a threat to be stopped, but a severely underestimated one. His strategy may end up resulting in a dictator far worse and far more dangerous than any the world has before seen. This could get bad.
 
Whether you're pro or anti-Russian, the link in my signature explains why NATO may soon become irrelevant. What people don't understand is that Putin is winning, he's gone incognito, funding into power radical parties across the EU. A united European front against Putin is impossible, and the Minsk conference on Wednesday will determine whether or not Germany and the US remain united against Russia. See the link for further details.

Make no mistake, Putin is a threat to be stopped, but a severely underestimated one. His strategy may end up resulting in a dictator far worse and far more dangerous than any the world has before seen. This could get bad.

I disagree. It is logical for Putin to defend what he perceives as his country's legitimate security interests in countries like Ukraine, Georgia, etc. There is zero chance of him actually attacking (in any way) legitimate current NATO member states (he wouldn't really be able to anyway). The only thing that can make this really dangerous is if irresponsable Western leaders seek to expand NATO and or the EU beyond its current maximum limits and seek to drive Russia to the wall.
 
There is zero chance of him actually attacking (in any way) legitimate current NATO member states (he wouldn't really be able to anyway).
If Putin posed zero threat to NATO, why would they be making such a big deal out of his ties to ultranationalist political parties attaining and currently in power in various NATO countries such as the Netherlands, Belgium, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Austria, Bulgaria, and others... ?
 
If Putin posed zero threat to NATO, why would they be making such a big deal out of his ties to ultranationalist political parties attaining and currently in power in various NATO countries such as the Netherlands, Belgium, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Austria, Bulgaria, and others... ?

First of all, these ties exist more in the imagination of some than in reality.
Second, this is purely for domestic political consumption in the countries you mention.
 

What I'm saying is that collating some internet pages is no substitute for critical thinking and real information. With the technique you are using one can provide "sources" for "proving" that everything is controlled by little green men from outer space.
I prefer real facts.
 
Okay, but that's not what I'm doing, you said;

The only thing that can make this really dangerous is if irresponsable Western leaders seek to expand NATO and or the EU beyond its current maximum limits and seek to drive Russia to the wall.

And I'm just expanding upon your scenario with other possibilities from an unbiased perspective, just what I've noticed in the news as of late.

As far as facts go, what we know is that Russia annexed Crimea, NATO was provoked, the EU and US began to split over sanctions, Le Pen received millions of dollars in Kremlin loans, and that various parties have been meeting in Moscow and Moscow allies.

I'll have to continue this discussion tomorrow, its about 5 AM where I'm at and I need sleep.
 
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Okay, but that's not what I'm doing, you said;



And I'm just expanding upon your scenario with other possibilities from an unbiased perspective, just what I've noticed in the news as of late.

As far as facts go, what we know is that Russia annexed Crimea, NATO was provoked, the EU and US began to split over sanctions, Le Pen received millions of dollars in Kremlin loans, and that various parties have been meeting in Moscow and Moscow allies.

I'll have to continue this discussion tomorrow, its about 5 AM where I'm at and I need sleep.

As far as facts go:

Russia has indeed annexed Crimea and Sevastopol, two areas that were pretty much under its military control in any event and that are very much outside the NATO area.
The EU and the US are not split over sanctions and have actually cooperated and synchronized their efforts in this regard.
The allegation that Le Pen received money from the Kremlin is an allegation, made for part-political reasons.
The "mmetings" of political parties in Russia you are referring to are a complete myth.
 
Okay well, I'll concede that Putin may not be behind it, but they are there, they do exist, and they pose a threat, however insignificant it may be. (And yes, the EU and US are coming to a head over Germany's economic reliance upon Russia - stone cold fact). Germany I thought this one would be fairly obvious after the NSA scandal (spying on Angela Merkel), US support of Greek concessions over Germany's policy involved therein and that abhorrent torture report. (Don't get me wrong, I stand by the US through-and-through but our government is not particularly wise.)
 
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Okay well, I'll concede that Putin may not be behind it, but they are there, they do exist, and they pose a threat, however insignificant it may be. (And yes, the EU and US are coming to a head over Germany's economic reliance upon Russia - stone cold fact). Germany

The "stone cold fact" is that Germany is in no way economically Reliant on Russia. It does import a lot of energy from Russia, but that is going down. The countries that depend most on Russia for energy are those that are most anti-Russian in the current crisis.
 
In some ways, yes (read the article section) which may not be a big issue but an issue nevertheless preventing a united front against Russia. (I would like to point out that Italy has also been quite vocal in the anti-sanctions pulpit.)
 
In some ways, yes (read the article section) which may not be a big issue but an issue nevertheless preventing a united front against Russia. (I would like to point out that Italy has also been quite vocal in the anti-sanctions pulpit.)

The fact is that Italy (and all other EU countries) have joined the US in taking sanctions (pretty stupid ones in my opinion, but that is another discussion) against Russia.
 
The fact is that Italy (and all other EU countries) have joined the US in taking sanctions (pretty stupid ones in my opinion, but that is another discussion) against Russia.

This is true to an extent, and you don't think ANY leader in the EU feels the same way. :p With that I bid you goodnight.
 
Wrong doing isn't to be excused. I'm not advocating that. You and I have a disagreement on the matter of Russia's response to US interference in Ukrainian politics in the fall of 2013. My other point would be that even if we did agree that Russia was the provocateur in this crisis, until the US dispenses with its own provocative foreign policy, we haven't credibility in raising hell when we perceive others engaged in the same activity. This isn't just past behavior either. The US has more covert "operations" being conducted by special ops forces around the world, then at any other time.

Putin was the one interfering in Ukraine.
DUH!!!!!!!!
 
Quag! So was the US and European countries, DUH!!!!!!!!

BS stop lying your ass off!!!
Political overtures and negotiations are not interfering it is normal.
Bribing coercing and secretly invading are. In other words what Putin is and has done.
DUH!!!!!
 
BS stop lying your ass off!!!
Political overtures and negotiations are not interfering it is normal.
Bribing coercing and secretly invading are. In other words what Putin is and has done.
DUH!!!!!

Putin's helping the eastern Ukrainians fight for self determination and autonomy, something the hypocrites support elsewhere.
 
The world must be so exciting for libertarians and alt-righters. Everyone is out to get you, World War III is always just around the corner, and the fiat dollar oligarchy consolidates itself more each passing day.
 
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