Ricardo Pascoe Pierce
Vladimir Putin faces the Frankenstein he has created. The dictator has been confronted by the military method of governance he has deified. Brute force as a raison d’état. The rebellion of the Russian mercenaries has unmasked the most elaborate of the Russian political regime recycled by Putin.
It is said “recycled”, because from the reign of the Russian Czars, passing through Stalin’s Bolshevik regime and arriving at Putin’s State monopolist capitalism, there is an absolute continuity, despite the apparent discontinuities.
The elements that have guided that country in its innumerable wars of conquest and defense are despotic authoritarianism in internal governance, the appetite for territorial expansionism, and the ideological fusion of State and Church propagating an official myth about a supposed historical mission that Russia has as a ” nation “.
The invasion of Ukraine fits perfectly into these assumptions. Putin has created a State of exception internally, with strict police control, imprisoned or exiled opponents, and State captured media. On the other hand, he designed a justification for the “historical” importance of Russia dominating Ukraine to avoid “hostile invasions” from the West. The Orthodox Church fully endorses and supports Putin’s imperial aspirations.
What does this have to do with Latin America? Apparently, nothing, but at the same time, some Latin American leaders think that “Putin’s thing” fits perfectly with their own aspirations. From the “leftist wave” that predominates in the region, there have appeared leaders who call themselves leftists and, therefore, consider that their historical mission is to confront and defeat the Yankee empire. The historical imperative, they think, coincides with Putin’s. Does the method matter? No. The end justifies the means. These Latin American leaders want to break with the West despite being Westerners. There is a new fascination not only with Russia but also with China. They are pro-statists but not socialists. They believe in the market economy and do not promote the expropriation of the means of production.
AMLO repeats a soundbite every chance he gets that some advisor or consultant put in his head. “The United States is a power in decline, and China is the new hegemon of the world. Let’s go with Beijing”. It is in that trite and conceptually false phrase that he finagles his penchant for admiring Putin and the (therein altogether) false Russian narrative that its invasion of Ukraine is justified because the West ( i.e., the U.S. and Europe) were in a position to place rockets on the Ukrainian border with Russia. Before the invasion, that hypothesis existed only in Putin’s head. Following the war, this hypothesis has all the signs of becoming a reality.
Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, Bolivia, and Argentina have teamed up to confront the inter-American organization, the Organization of American States (OAS), with the narrative of its necessary reformulation or restructuring. And some aspects of the inter-American body may need to be reformulated. But several countries have an underlying narrative that the OAS should even disappear to create an exclusively Latin American body. Of course, they forget that CELAC exists and meets regularly with the stinkers of the earth, notoriously Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua. These three countries have things in common; for example, they are police dictatorships, they profess (although they do not practice) socialism as an economic model, they define themselves as “leftist”, and they do not believe in free elections as a method to select the authorities of their respective countries.
Besides these small details, CELAC does not function as an instance of decision and action because they have not created a stable and credible institutionality. Instead, the region’s countries have embassies at the OAS, pay dues, and it is functional for most countries to have permanent representation in Washington to lobby for investments, tackle conflicts, and influence the opinions of U.S. legislators when they vote on measures that could affect their countries.
CELAC is a typically Latin American forum. It is a forum for ideological debate, lacking any intention of reaching agreements (because ideological differences make the difference). The OAS, on the other hand, votes on resolutions and implements them. For example, it reviews the electoral processes of various countries and judges them by the quality of their processes and by the degree of respect for the rule of law of each actor, including governments, of course. It has just overwhelmingly approved an overwhelming condemnation of the Nicaraguan dictatorship.
In dissent, Mexico and Bolivia, for example, have raised three central issues. First, to eliminate electoral observation by the OAS, considering it a form of interventionism by the empire. They do not want the OAS to be a forum to analyze and evaluate the degree of development of democracy in the Americas. Second, all the region’s countries resign from the OAS to replace it with an “exclusively Latin American” conglomerate. (It has already been mentioned that they forget that CELAC exists). And finally, the region must reorient its interests to coincide with the countries of the “anti-imperialist bloc” of China and Russia.
Brazil, Colombia, and Argentina tend to do the same as Mexico and Bolivia. Lula’s trip to China and his talks with Putin place him as an interested party, not a neutral one, especially when he presents his “peace plan” for the region. His claim to be an interlocutor between Russia and Ukraine is not viable, nor can AMLO presume neutrality in that conflict. Mexico’s peace plan was immediately rejected by Ukraine, considering that, in form and substance, it endorses the Russian occupation of a part of Ukraine.
Part of the Latin American left is fascinated by the supposed Russian “anti-imperialism”, which is nothing more than a disguise to hide the authoritarian character of the Russian regime. They prefer to be Putin’s friends than to be consistent with the democratic aspirations of their people. That regime that today saw its Frankenstein awaken in the form of an irregular army on its territory. We would do well to ask Latin American “leftist” leaders to beware of their Frankensteins, who are also coming for them. Being Putin’s friends puts them in the same line of fire.
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