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Next Left Notes Is A News Magazine Devoted To Direct Action
Editor's Note: June 9th, 2004
Amidst all of the well choregraphed hoopla surrounding the passing
of one of our most corrupt "leaders", something truly inspiring happened
in the nation's capital. Radical historian Bill Blum handed out a
brochure to attendees at Reagan's funeral procession...a brochure he had
prepared especially for this event.
One man against a media onslaught, Blum endured quite a bit of
hositility as he attempted to pass out his flyers to funeral attendees.
As the horsedrawn carriage rolled by, Reagan's physical passing mirrored
his existential death which had occurred decades earlier. Blum's flyer
appears here as a small funeral mass card, listing only a few of the
worst offenses in the life of a career criminal. - Thomas Good
Some information about the man you honor today which you may not know about:
By William Blum
Nicaragua
For eight terribly long years, 1981-1989, the people of Nicaragua were under
attack by Ronald Reagan's proxy army, the Contras, formed from Somoza's
vicious National Guardsmen and other supporters of the dictator. It was all-out war
from Washington, aiming to destroy the progressive social and economic
programs of the government, burning down schools and medical clinics, raping,
torturing, mining harbors, bombing and strafing. These were the charming gentlemen
Reagan liked to call "freedom fighters".
El Salvador
Salvador's dissidents tried to work within the system. But with US support,
the government made that impossible, using repeated electoral fraud and
murdering hundreds of protestors and strikers. When the dissidents took to the gun
and civil war, the Carter administration and, more so, the Reagan
administration responded with unlimited money, military aid, and training in support of
the government and its death squads and torture, the latter with the help of CIA
torture manuals. US military and CIA personnel played an active role on a
continuous basis. The result was 75,000 civilian deaths; meaningful social
change thwarted; a handful of the wealthy still owned the country; the poor
remained as ever; dissidents still had to fear right-wing death squads; there was
to be no profound social change in El Salvador.
Guatemala
In 1954, a CIA-organized coup overthrew the democratically-elected and
progressive government of Jacobo Arbenz, initiating 40 years of military-government
death squads, torture, disappearances, mass executions, and unimaginable
cruelty, totaling more than 200,000 victims -- indisputably one of the most
inhumane chapters of the 20th century. For eight of those years the Reagan
administration played a major role.
Perhaps the worst of the military dictators was General Efraín Ríos
Montt, who carried out a near-holocaust against the indians and peasants, for which
he was widely condemned in the world. In December 1982, Reagan went to visit
Ríos Montt. After the meeting, referring to the allegations of extensive
human-rights abuses, Reagan declared that the Guatemalan leader was receiving "a
bad deal".
Grenada
Reagan invaded this tiny country in October 1983, an invasion totally illegal
and immoral, and surrounded by lies (such as "endangered" American medical
students). The invasion put into power individuals more beholden to US foreign
policy objectives.
Afghanistan
After the Carter administration provoked a Soviet invasion, Reagan came to
power to support the Islamic fundamentalists in their war to eject the Soviets
and the secular government, which honored women's rights. In the end, the
United States and the fundamentalists "won", women's rights and the rest of
Afghanistan lost. More than a million dead, three million disabled, five million
refugees; in total about half the population. And many thousands of
anti-American Islamic fundamentalists, trained and armed by the US, on the loose to
terrorize the world.
The Cold War
As to Reagan's alleged role in ending the Cold War ... pure fiction. He
prolonged it. Read the full story in the Introduction of the book mentioned
below.
William Blum - bblum6@aol.com is the author of:
Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War 2
Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower
West-Bloc Dissident: A Cold War Memoir
www.killinghope.org
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