HRC's State Dept contracted w/Blackwater while BW was being prosecuted for Libya arms deals

[Peace Patriot]

39. This reminds me of a little blip in the 'news' about Blackwater that I saw...

...circa 2010 (Clinton was Sec of State) that quickly disappeared from the 'news' and I never saw it again. There wasn't much but what there was set my alarm bells ringing, cuz I was following events in South America very closely at the time. It went like this (I remember some of the exact wording): Blackwater was being fined by the U.S. State Department for "unauthorized trainings of foreign persons in Colombia for use in Iraq and Afghanistan." I also seem to recall that the fine was a slap on the hand.

A lot of resonant items in this disappeared 'news':

--training "foreign persons"
--training them IN COLOMBIA
--"for use in Iraq and Afghanistan"!
--"unauthorized".

There were many murders including mass murders occurring in Colombia at the time, fueled by $7 BILLION U.S. tax dollars to the Colombian military, in a country overseen by a 'mafia don' president (Alvaro Uribe), pal of Bush Jr. About a hundred of Uribe's closest associates, including family members, are in jail or under investigation for ties to the RW death squads, drug trafficking, arms dealing, illegal domestic spying (likely aided by the Bush junta), election fraud, ponzi schemes and other crimes. Also, the Colombian military was hit with a scandal of atrocious proportions at that time: they would lure young men with promises of jobs, murder them, and dress their bodies up like leftist guerrillas, to up their body counts, to earn bonuses and to impress U.S. senators.

So, in this cauldron of bloodshed and depravity, Blackwater was "training foreign persons" "for use in Iraq and Afghanistan," and all that happened to them, at the hands of Sec of State Clinton for failing to hold a State Dept. permit for whatever they were actually doing in Colombia, was a small fine.

The Colombian military and their closely tied RW death squads were driving 50 MILLION Colombian peasants from their small farms--killing and brutalizing many, poisoning their children, their animals and their food crops with aerial spraying of some Monsanto crap or other, and destroying their lives and communities--I figure to create a slave labor force in the cities for "free trade for the rich."

My guess as to what Blackwater was actually doing was engaging in "turkey shoots" of the peasants--maybe even participating in mass murders--to harden their "trainees" for similar shooting in Iraq and Afghanistan. (There was a particularly bad mass grave found in La Macarena, Colombia, during this period. U.S. military base nearby. USAID plan being implemented for "pacifying" the area. (Very similar to such plans in Afghanistan.) But whether this is true or not--that Blackwater was killing peasants, like the Colombian military was doing and like their RW death squads were doing--it's just my guess at the level of atrocity they are capable of--Colombia certainly presented ideal U.S.-fostered conditions for the "training" of private armies.

I mostly blamed the Bush junta for this rogue army's murky operations in Colombia, and thought, at the time, that Clinton was merely covering it up, like everything about Bush junta crimes was being covered up. Bush and particularly Rumsfeld were involved in some really dark dealings in Colombia, including dirty tricks trying to get the presidents of Venezuela and Ecuador accused of terrorism, promotion of war between the U.S./Colombia and Venezuela/Ecuador, murderous sabotage of early peace efforts in the Colombia civil war and god knows what else. There was a lot to cover up.

But now, when I think of how Clinton handled the fascist military coup in Honduras (she supported it; it was probably originally planned by the Bush junta--it occurred in June 2009)--and in view of the above--I suspect that Clinton was doing more than covering up Bush junta crimes. It is more like she was actively encouraging this rogue army and its crimes, by ensuring no serious consequences.

A bit later in her tenure as Sec of State, Clinton intervened in the Drummond Coal case (relatives of victims murdered by Drummond Coal death squads--that's how they handled their labor problems in Colombia) sued Drummond Coal, an Alabama corporation, in the U.S. and subpoenaed Alvaro Uribe for a deposition. Clinton wrote to the judge urging him not to allow Uribe to be deposed, and hinting that it was a "national security" matter. (The judge did not permit the Uribe deposition.)

More cover up. More impunity for the rich and powerful. More death for the poor--especially the uppity poor, the labor organizing poor, the poor who dare to speak up for themselves and demand their rights as human beings.

I feel the need to add one thing: I think that President Obama is currently trying to undo the damage that Hillary Clinton did to U.S./Latin American relations, when she was Sec of State. The U.S. supported fascist military coup against the elected president of Honduras, in June '09, gravely damaged Obama's state purposed of improving relations. All of Latin America was outraged by that coup and blamed the U.S. (rightfully so). It has taken an unprecedented U.S. presidential trip to Cuba (U.S. non-recognition of Cuba has pissed off LatAm for decades) and John Kerry's support of the Colombia peace talks, to start putting things on a better footing. I applaud them for this. And by this it becomes increasingly clear that it wasn't Obama who messed over Honduras; it was Clinton.

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See Naaman Fletcher's comment on the Blackwater case (#5) here: (11/7/12)

http://www.democraticunderground.com/11086782

Some further discussion from my DU Journal: (11/22/10)

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/Peace%20Patriot/206
(Much of this post is about Maria Hurtado's escape from Colombia to Panama, when Colombian prosecutors were seeking her testimony about Uribe's illegal domestic spying. She was Uribe's spy chief.)