Canada's support for Bolivian coup regime part of century long imperialist bent in Latin America
Nicaraguan dictator Somoza was supported by Canada.
Written by: Tyler Shipley
Election results from Bolivia reflected an overwhelming victory for the MÁS party, a deeply embarrassing outcome for Canada’s Deputy PM Chrystia Freeland, whose government aggressively supported a coup against MÁS a year ago on the premise that it was an unpopular dictatorship.
After a year of violence, intimidation, and effectively military rule in Bolivia, the regime felt it needed to shore up legitimacy with an election. But the popular socialist movement ruined the party, defying the regime and winning more than 50% of the vote.
Canada, with Freeland leading the charge, was bullish in support of the coup last year that deposed MÁS and its president Evo Morales. Encouraged by Freeland, the Canadian media called Morales a tyrant, and celebrated his departure as a return to democracy, against all available evidence.
This has been covered well in The Canada Files, and was one more case of Canada being an aggressive booster of far-right and fascist goernments around the world (Honduras, Colombia, Brazil, India, Ukraine, etc.) The MÁS victory is surely a tough pill for Freeland and Trudeau to swallow and, two days after the election, they have yet to acknowledge it.
But Canadian interference in Latin American politics is nothing new. This piece offers an incomplete scan of a century of manipulation, with each case deserving more detail than it receives. That detail can be found in Canada in the World (and in the more detailed sources it draws from). https://fernwoodpublishing.ca/book/canada-in-the-world
Early Canadian Imperialism
Google Porfirio Díaz, Mexico’s most despised dictator, and you’ll find a close friend of Canadian bankers and businesses. In fact, as the Mexican Revolution broke out in 1910, Díaz turned to his Canadian friends to act as his advisors in crushing the rebellion. They failed, and he fled in 1913, finding haven in Montreal on the way, where he promised BMO executives that his replacement dictator Victoriano Huerta would protect Canadian money. Huerta, too, was overthrown within a year.
But Canadian capital had plenty of other opportunities. Elsewhere I detailed Canada’s intervention in El Salvador to support its dictatorship in the massacre of 40,000 people rebelling in part against a Canadian electricity company. After the massacre, the Canadian commander played golf and had lunch with the dictator.
The largest company in Brazil in the 1920s was a Canadian company: Brascan, nicknamed the ‘canadian octopus,’ because it monopolized so many industries. It relied on bribery and manipulation of the Brazilian government and planted spies to undermine its organizing workers. It’s executives included members of the Brazilian fascist party like Antonio Gallotti.
Brazilian officials increasingly argued that the company “extorted the people to benefit foreign shareholders,” but the government of João Goulart - likely to take action against Brascan - was overthrown in a coup in 1964. Canada celebrated the coup and worked closely with the new dictatorship.
In fact, Pierre Trudeau’s government told the Brazilian military - which ruled for two decades and killed thousands of people - that Canada would “avoid drawing attention to this problem” as nearly $1 billion in Canadian investment flowed in. Business booms when people are terrified.
Canada’s Central American Dream
In Nicaragua, Canada was so close with the dictator Anastasio Somoza that it orchestrated a complicated plot to save Somoza when Nicaraguans tried to overthrow him in 1947. This case was remarkable because even the US wanted Somoza out.
Somoza was an embarrassing ally: he had pictures of Hitler and Mussolini on his desk and he ruled like a tinpot monarch. When revolution broke out, it began at La Luz, a Canadian-owned gold mine which poisoned the water and sucked profit out of the country and was closely associated with Somoza.
The Americans were ready to let Somoza fall, but the Canadian company, Falconbridge, funnelled him weapons while the Canadian government ran interference in Washington. The rebellion was crushed and Canada remained tight with the Somoza family until it fell in 1979.
In 1948, Canada helped overthrow the elected government of Costa Rica. The fascist José Figueres seized power alongside Canadian war hero Alex Murray, who promised to help “lick these communist bastards.” Thousands were killed, and the Murray family remains wealthy and prominent to this day.
Canada also assisted the infamous coup against Guatemala’s elected president Jacobo Árbenz in 1954. This was planned in Washington but Canada played a key role, spreading absurd propaganda claiming Árbenz was a “ruthless, sadistic, drug addict.” He was a teacher.
Canada’s support for the coup, acknowledged by Lester Pearson, was partly in support of Inco, which was granted a nickel mining concession on Lake Izabel after the coup. This would be significant because it was the region Guatemalans chose as a base for rebellion against the dictatorship.
Canadian and Inco officials worked closely with Col. Carlos Arana in a campaign of violence in the area around the mine that left some 6000 people killed. Arana, the “Butcher of Zacapa,” would take the presidency in 1970 promising to “turn the country into a cemetery.”
All the while, the Canadian government poured money into the Inco mine, while Guatemalan researchers reported that the exploitative project would pay no taxes and harm the environment and local communities. The lead researchers were assassinated a month before Arana finalized the deal with Inco.
As if this weren’t enough, Canada was an active player in the regional war in Central America in the 1980s, a dark piece of history that still scars its survivors. Canada provided weapons, aircraft and mechanics to the paramilitary force known as the Contras, the US-trained terrorists who were at the heart of the conflict, as popular left wing movements in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala were liquidated in campaigns that often reached genocidal proportions.
The Beat Goes On
The endless list of examples can grow overwhelming, but we cannot forget two of the most famous and important popular movements of Latin America’s 20th century - one in Cuba and the other in Chile - both of which Canada opposed.
Canada supported the overthrow of Dr. Salvador Allende’s elected government in Chile in 1973. Allende has come to power peacefully and with tremendous support, but the northern powers promised to bury him. Canada cut off all aid and isolated Allende while the CIA orchestrated a campaign of terror and sabotage. The Chilean tragedy, and the horrendous violence of the Pinochet dictatorship that replaced Allende, was received with glee by Canadian officials in Santiago.
Many Canadians believe that Canada fostered a close relationship with Cuba, mostly due to a highly publicized but somewhat meaningless visit by the Trudeau’s to Cuba. But for all the glamour of the visit - classic Trudeau grandstanding - Canada actually used its position in Cuba to spy on behalf of the US.
Canadian officials called Fidel Castro an “infection” and Canada provided the intel that nearly led to nuclear winter in the 1962 missile crisis (and likely provided info used in the many CIA assassination attempts of Fidel). Canadian Ronald Lippert was caught smuggling weapons into Cuba for the CIA.
And when Cuba sent troops to Angola to support the popular movement there that was defending itself from an attack by Apartheid South Africa, Canada reacted “with horror” at the movement of Cuban troops, effectively ending any false niceties between the two countries. (Canada’s ‘horror’ at the prospect of people opposing Apartheid will be a subject for another day.)
Modern Canada, Modern Imperialism
Though it may seem hard to believe, Canada has really stepped up its business of interfering in Latin America in the 2000s, especially following its ubiquitous mining operations. There is no way to adequately cover it all, but it’s enough to say that Canadian mines are widespread, destructive, and Canada regularly acts in their interests, against the wishes of local people.
But some cases deserve specific note. Canada directly participated in the kidnapping of Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 2004, after which Canada assumed control of the Haitian National Police, as they killed more than 3000 people demanding the return of the President.
The coup was hatched in a house in Quebec, where leaders from the US, Canada and France called themselves the “Friends of Haiti” and planned the operation. They funded paramilitary groups wreaking havoc in Haiti and began claiming that Aristide’s election was fraudulent.
From its expensive new embassy, built by SNC-Lavalin, Canada became a semi-permanent fixture in Haiti after that, funding candidates that support the interests of Canadian companies, while Haitians remained mired in deep and endemic poverty.
Only a few years after overthrowing the Haitian government, Canada seized an opportunity to support a coup in Honduras. Falsely claiming that Liberal President Manuel Zelaya was going to stay in power for more than four years, Canada supported a military takeover and lockdown of the country.
The 2009 coup ushered in more than a decade (and counting) of state terror, a dictatorship that has killed and tortured thousands of people, and sent the country into a spiral of poverty and violence. And profits for Canadian companies like Gildan and Goldcorp.
The details of this case are a real eye opener because they illustrate the subtle, effective ways that Canada supports violent governments that are subverting popular will in other countries. Canada’s work in Honduras was masterful. The regime is still in power and escapes most criticism.
It hasn’t always gone so smoothly. Canada has been part of nearly twenty years of efforts to overthrow the Venezuelan government, without success thus far. Their recent failures in Venezuela are reminiscent of the outcome in Bolivia.
Canada’s interference in Bolivia is just another link in a long chain (which includes several important cases not mentioned here, like Colombia and Peru). This article is an overview so it misses a lot of important nuance and detail, but it illustrates that what Freeland is up to is nothing new.
If this is all new information, pick any one of these cases and dig deep. What this article cannot capture are the heartbreaking specifics, the particular and profound injustices that permeate every single case. The millions of personal tragedies inflicted by Canadian policy.
But remember also that Canada does not always get its way. The outcome of Bolivia’s election (itself only possible because of a year of sustained protest and mobilization in the face of extreme violence by Freeland’s friends) is a small victory against the injustice Canada seeks to impose. These victories are possible, and necessary, if we aim to create a better world for all of us.
More Articles
