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Coup Attempt in Bolivia

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Re: Coup Attempt in Bolivia

#101

Post by tptacek »

thiagoharry wrote: post #96
tptacek wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anez was another in a long line of Bolivian heads of state that terribly abused their power. If you're trying to position me to defend the right-wing elite of any country in South America, you're barking up the wrong tree. But Anez assumed the role of interim president after a constitutional crisis, promised prompt elections, and peacefully transferred power back to Morales party, which then immediately had her impri…

All recent coups in Latin America (and several coups outside) follows the exact same script: overthrown the government and say that is temporary and you will organize new elections. During this time, use propaganda, media, repression and sometimes new laws to weaken the overthrowned group so that they will lose the elections. Foreign countries that support the coup can just initially say that they are worried with th…

That's exactly what didn't happen here!

Re: Coup Attempt in Bolivia

#102

Post by tptacek »

thiagoharry wrote: post #100
tptacek wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again: the only reason Anez, who occupied the same spot in the Bolivian line of succession that Anthony Blinken does in ours, assumed power was that 3 of Morales supporters higher in the order than her resigned. That's an awfully elaborate coup design!

I wonder why they resigned... Just because they were being attacked, their houses burned, with family members being kidnapped, all while they were prevented from entering government buildings....

Linera left with Morales. The President of the House apparently left to Argentina. but Salvatierra didn't flee? Resigned of her own accord.

And, again: Anez called prompt elections and peacefully handed power back to MAS less than a year later. She had every opportunity to avoid that: the election took place during the start of the COVID pandemic.

Anez is not good. I don't dispute MAS appears to be the better steward of Bolivia. But Morales had plenty of time to set up a constitutional succession and build a long-term movement (note that Morales and Arce hate each other, and there are rumors that the coup has more to do with that relationship than anything else). Instead, he tried to secure an unprecedented 4th term, after his unprecedented 3rd term, after his unprecedented 2nd term. Is it any wonder that there was chaos in 2019? If Morales had just annointed a successor, MAS would have won in a walk.

Re: Coup Attempt in Bolivia

#103

Post by thiagoharry »

tptacek wrote: post #102
thiagoharry wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why they resigned... Just because they were being attacked, their houses burned, with family members being kidnapped, all while they were prevented from entering government buildings....

Linera left with Morales. The President of the House apparently left to Argentina. but Salvatierra didn't flee? Resigned of her own accord. And, again: Anez called prompt elections and peacefully handed power back to MAS less than a year later. She had every opportunity to avoid that: the election took place during the start of the COVID pandemic. Anez is not good. I don't dispute MAS appears to be the better steward…

> Linera left with Morales. The President of the House apparently left to Argentina. but Salvatierra didn't flee? Resigned of her own accord.

Salvatierra explicitly tells in interviews that one of the reasons for her resignation was the threat of the coup violence. That in the moment of her resignation there were already outside her house a violent mob ready to attack if she did not resign. In a context where other MAS members already had their houses attacked, their relatives kidnapped and tortured.

> And, again: Anez called prompt elections and peacefully handed power back to MAS less than a year later. She had every opportunity to avoid that: the election took place during the start of the COVID pandemic.

She tried to avoid the elections during pandemic, but was forced to retreat the proposal.And as I said, all recent soft coups in Latin America involve making elections some time later, just after ensuring that the overthrown group would not win (which failed in Bolivia because of MAS popular support).

Yes, Morales should have annointed a successor. But even his extra terms were more democratic than what the opposition did in response. And it is a little naive thinking that this would have prevented a coup or some other reaction if the parties that Morales defeated in the elections still were defeated by his successor.

Re: Coup Attempt in Bolivia

#104

Post by tptacek »

thiagoharry wrote: post #103
tptacek wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linera left with Morales. The President of the House apparently left to Argentina. but Salvatierra didn't flee? Resigned of her own accord. And, again: Anez called prompt elections and peacefully handed power back to MAS less than a year later. She had every opportunity to avoid that: the election took place during the start of the COVID pandemic. Anez is not good. I don't dispute MAS appears to be the better steward…

> Linera left with Morales. The President of the House apparently left to Argentina. but Salvatierra didn't flee? Resigned of her own accord. Salvatierra explicitly tells in interviews that one of the reasons for her resignation was the threat of the coup violence. That in the moment of her resignation there were already outside her house a violent mob ready to attack if she did not resign. In a context where other M…

What the opposition did in response was appoint, through the documented constitutional line of succession, an interim president who immediately called elections and peacefully transferred power to their opposition, which promptly imprisoned them. I understand pretty well the competing narratives about 2019, but it is very difficult for me to get past that basic fact pattern.

Re: Coup Attempt in Bolivia

#105

Post by Aloisius »

thiagoharry wrote: post #38
tptacek wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arce is the formal head of MAS, which is Morales' party. MAS won a fair election in 2020 after the "coup" in which Jeanine Anez assumed power after Morales fled the country along with the constitutional line of succession after widespread violent protests following an unprecedented 4th term election (which in turn followed his unprecedented 3rd term election, which in turn followed his unprecedented 2nd term election…

> if you care what OAS says, officially deemed fraudulent. I do not care. Later studies contradicted and criticized OAS conclusion. OAS was a player in the 2019 coup: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/02/26/bolivia-d... https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3621475 > Anez, an unapologetic right-winger appointed by standard constitutional succession rules, What rules? She was not Evo Morales s…

> Later studies contradicted and criticized OAS conclusion.

They criticized the statistical analysis which was not actually the main evidence OAS gave. It's just what everyone focused on.

The main evidence was someone replaced the servers used to transcribe/verify tally sheets bypassing auditing and accessed the machines while they were counting and a they found changes in the minutes and the forgeries of poll officials' signatures.

Re: Coup Attempt in Bolivia

#106

Post by tptacek »

Aloisius wrote: post #105
thiagoharry wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if you care what OAS says, officially deemed fraudulent. I do not care. Later studies contradicted and criticized OAS conclusion. OAS was a player in the 2019 coup: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/02/26/bolivia-d... https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3621475 > Anez, an unapologetic right-winger appointed by standard constitutional succession rules, What rules? She was not Evo Morales s…

> Later studies contradicted and criticized OAS conclusion. They criticized the statistical analysis which was not actually the main evidence OAS gave. It's just what everyone focused on. The main evidence was someone replaced the servers used to transcribe/verify tally sheets bypassing auditing and accessed the machines while they were counting and a they found changes in the minutes and the forgeries of poll offici…

Eh, there's a lot of criticism of the OAS report, and a lot of it is persuasive. It's hard to argue that Morales should have been allowed in the race in the first place, though.

Re: Coup Attempt in Bolivia

#107

Post by deciplex »

aredox wrote: post #95
deciplex wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> each coup "masterminded" by the USA has found more than willing accomplices in each country Really? You mean every time we've tried to overthrow a foreign government we've been able to find locals who were willing to give us a hand if they could personally benefit from the arrangement? That's amazing! What are the odds?

If in a country, one can easily find enough people in positions of authority ready to backstab the whole country, then "foreign interference" is only half the problem...

but you agree it is 50% of the problem

Re: Coup Attempt in Bolivia

#108

Post by dluan »

vintermann wrote: post #14

Apparently a general, Juan José Zúñiga was removed as commander of the Bolivian army yesterday, and he responded with this. Makes it a bit understandable why they would want to get rid of him.

but steve gets celebrated when he did it

Re: Coup Attempt in Bolivia

#109

Post by hulitu »

karma_daemon wrote: post #12

From the article "Bolivia is among the world’s most politically turbulent nations, having had nearly 200 coups and revolutions since it won independence from Spain two centuries ago. Morales was ousted by the army as recently as 2019 after a disputed election."

And how many of them were with the support of CIA ?

Re: Coup Attempt in Bolivia

#110

Post by lenkite »

lottin wrote: post #54
localfirst wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

im noticing lately that comments critical of America is routinely downvoted here. All of what you wrote holds true.

I think blaming the US every time a developing nation screws up is a little bit of a tired trope.

Not a trope when its true and factual. Hell, ex-CIA directors have even admitted it in books and TV! Most Americans don't like hearing that their government can be one of the "bad guys".
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