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cincinnatusvirtue · 5 years ago

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On this day: The Sack of Constantinople 1204, The Fourth Crusade damages Christendom and shapes history...

The Christian Crusades of the Middle Ages have a mixed legacy in the the long lens of history. In the modern age, they are reviled by some and still upheld as noble, even holy ventures by others. Depending on the particular Crusade the participants, their motivations and their outcome had varying degrees of impact long term. Perhaps none however had the long term ramifications, though unforeseen at the time of the Fourth Crusade of 1204.

The Fourth Crusade stands out because it saw not only the one time the Crusades were not directed at their original target of removing Muslim powers from the Holy Land in the Levant but instead changed their trajectory to attack a fellow Christian power, the Byzantine Empire or Eastern Roman Empire as it was known as or just Roman Empire. The Byzantine Empire was the successor to Rome, since it was the continuation of the ancient Roman Empire, albeit with its capital in Constantinople, straddling Europe and Asia between the Balkans and Anatolia between the Black and Mediterranean Seas. Overtime it had shifted its language and cultural focus from a Latin one to a Greek speaking one and a religious flavor of Christianity different from the Catholic Church of Western Europe, known as the Greek or Eastern Orthodox Church.

The Fourth Crusade came out a complex mix of ever present Byzantine internal politics and civil war, Western Crusader and Papal idealism and economic opportunism. As well as a mix of cultural and religious differences between the Western and Eastern branches of Christianity. To get a sense of how we get to the events of 1204 we need to look further back to an overview of the Byzantine Empire and the various threats they faced.

The Byzantine Empire was essentially an outgrowth of civil division within the ancient Roman Empire and the subsequent split lead to the founding a new capital in the east, by Roman Emperor Constantine, the first Roman Emperor to become nominally Christian. The city was named Constantinople though this was not initially Constantine’s planned name. It was located on the shores of the Bosporus, a channel that runs between the European continent and Asian Continent in modern day Turkey, where the Balkans and Anatolia meet. A literal crossroads of East meets West. It was located near the site of a former ancient Greek colony called Byzantium, hence the name later attached to describe the Eastern Roman Empire. The Byzantine Empire was name given centuries after its fall, it was only ever referred to by its inhabitants as the Roman Empire, because even though it evolved from Latin speaking Romans to Greek speakers, the political institutions remained very much influenced by the ancient Roman Empire and unlike the Western Roman Empire, it withstood the invasions of the various Germanic and other barbarian tribes in the 5th century and continued unbroken into the Middle Ages. The terms Byzantine Empire and Eastern Roman Empire, Roman Empire are used interchangeably hereafter in this post to mean the same polity.

The Byzantine Empire struggled as a bulwark against various barbarian tribes of differing origins over the centuries and increasingly it turned to its Christian religion as an inseparable component of its culture, which also took on a Greek flavor. The Greek language was the majority of the populace in this part of the world but the political and military elites spoke Latin until the 7th century, after which they too spoke Greek which developed from Koine Greek into Medieval Greek. Simultaneously there were serious differences between the religious authorities and the Emperors. While the Byzantine Empire did reclaim parts of Italy and Western Europe and North Africa, the differences between the Pope in Rome and religious authorities in Constantinople along with the Emperor himself was causing a rift between the East and Western Churches. As a result with these schisms lead to the development of the Eastern Orthodox Church separate from the Catholic or Roman Catholic Church. A particular break came when King of the Franks Charlemagne was crowned Holy Roman Emperor in the 9th century, giving rise to a new “claimant” to the Roman throne among the German speaking peoples of Central Europe who had also converted to Christianity. The Holy Roman Empire was never unified completely in the format of the Byzantine Empire, it was actually a collection of various kingdoms, fiefdoms and principalities among Central Europe, namely in the German, Italian, French speaking regions as well as the Low Countries. However, it too proclaimed itself the successor to the ancient Roman Empire, albeit its formation was really a form of political solidarity with the Roman Pope now at odds with the Roman Emperor in Constantinople, this lead to a break in relations between Rome and Constantinople that never really recovered completely.

In the 7th century a new threat, that of the Arabs and religion of Islam appeared on the Roman Empire’s southern borders in the Levant and North Africa. The Arabs surprisingly and quickly overran much of the Eastern Roman Empire. Taking the Levant including Syria and spreading to North Africa and eventually to Sicily, parts of Southern Italy and even the Iberian Peninsula then part of the Germanic Kingdom of the Visigoths in the coming generations. The Eastern Roman Empire was eventually able to stabilize parts of its eastern borders in Anatolia but had to withstand Arab invasions and even attempted sieges of Constantinople itself, but the city with its famously thick and high walls proved too much for the Arabs to defeat them. Additionally, they were helped by their sometimes rival the First Bulgarian Empire, a synthesis of Slavic tribes who migrated south in the 6th century from Eastern Europe along with the nomadic Turkic Bulgars who ruled over the area known as Bulgaria as the elite. Ultimately, the Islamic Caliphate which spread from Spain to the Middle East was divided by internal rivalries and new dynasties which lead to a fracturing within the Islamic world. This development provided some relief to the Byzantines as time went by, the Byzantines were able to regain parts of their strength in territories lost to the Arabs, at least partially.

The Byzantine Empire also dealt with the issue of various peoples from the north including the aforementioned Bulgarian Empire which originated with the Slavs intermingling with Byzantine citizens and later included the nomadic Turkic Bulgars. However, the Slavs south of the Danube River were the most populous group in this region and eventually the Bulgars were absorbed into their people which now called themselves Bulgarians. The Bulgarians however did adopt Christianity, namely the Orthodox branch of Christianity and spread this among their fellow South Slavs, this worked to occasionally smooth relations with the Byzantine Greeks but the rivalry remained both powers for control of the Balkans. Additionally, various other Turkic tribes and nomadic peoples over the years such as the Avars, Pechenegs, Cumans and Magyars (Hungarians) rode into the areas bordering the Byzantine Empire and variously they battled the Byzantines as well as each other. This was Constantinople’s preference, a paid for form of diplomacy, to play off the various barbarian peoples as soon as a new one showed up, the Byzantine Empire was immensely wealthy due to large amounts of gold, valuable trade routes and territories to tax. By paying off the latest arrivals, they could replace an older threat and work as vassals or allies of the Byzantine Empire at varying times.

Another, people the Byzantines had to deal with was the Kievan Rus, a combination of East Slavic tribes that due to internal strife supposedly invited a group of Vikings, known as Varangians to the Greeks to rule over them. The Vikings founded Kiev, the modern capital of Ukraine and ruled over as a political elite over these Eastern Slavs, in time they were absorbed into the Slavic majority like the Bulgars and their Slavic subjects. They formed a medieval state that served as the later basis for the modern states of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus and their Slavic peoples. The Kievan Rus, raided Byzantine lands including Constantinople but were repelled by the city’s famously impregnable walls and the secret weapon of the Byzantines, a Medieval take on the flamethrower known as Greek fire which destroyed the Rus’s navy. Greek fire’s exact method of deployment is a mystery but suffice to say it was a fearsome weapon that effectively repelled many an enemy. In time, the Rus too converted to Orthodox Christianity, becoming a sometimes ally of the Byzantines. They further assisted the Byzantines by sending Scandinavian mercenaries from Sweden, Denmark and Norway to Kiev and onto Constantinople to serve in the Byzantine army, first as mercenary infantry and later into a specialized elite personal guard of the Byzantine Emperors, the Varangian Guard which were quite fearsome in their reputation. This tradition would carry on for the remainder of the Byzantine Empire’s existence. Though the composition of the Varangian guard switched from Scandinavian Rus to Anglo-Saxons from England and others following the Norman Invasion of England.

The Normans, descendants of Viking raiders who pillaged France and were given their own duchy, Normandy, also spread to different parts of Europe. The Normans named after their Viking ancestors called the Norsemen or Northmen which became Norman. Developed their own distinct subculture of Viking influenced warfare, French dialect along with unique architecture and customs. The Normans most famously attacked and conquered England under William, Duke of Normandy or William the Conqueror. Ending Anglo-Saxon rule of England in 1066, the Normans formed a new political elite in the British Isles in union with Normandy. They also conquered Southern Italy, including Sicily, ending Arab/Islamic rule there and they attacked the Balkan possessions of the Byzantine Empire in raids. To varying degrees both sides were successful.

In the 11th century, the Byzantines can reconquered Bulgaria, ending a threat their but to the east were facing a new threat, the nomadic Turks coming from the steppes of Central Asia. The Turks had converted to Islam along with the Persians and other Iranian peoples of Central Asia and with this brought a renewed threat of Islam to the Roman Empire’s borders. In 1071, the Byzantine suffered a defeat at the Battle of Manzikert from the Seljuq Turks who established the Great Seljuq Empire, the first major nomadic Islamic Turkic Empire to threaten the Byzantines. They quickly settled into the Anatolian heartland of Byzantine lands replacing the previously Greek majority here. During the reign of Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Kommenos (1088-1118), the First Crusades were called by the Alexios working with then Pope Urban II in 1095. Promoting a reconciliation of sorts between East and West Christendom. The goal was to restore Anatolia and the Levant to the Byzantine Empire from the various Muslim rulers since the Seljuqs and their fellow Muslims in the Levant were divided. Eventually a mix of Italo-Norman, French and other Western European armies “took up the Cross” and became the Crusaders hell bent on Christian restoration of the Holy Land. The deal was they were to get help drive Muslims from these lands and restore Byzantine rule to them in exchange for spiritual clean slates from the Pope himself to satisfy their religious fervor and get monetary and military support from a reformed Byzantine army and navy that prior to Alexios had been neglected and underfunded due to corruption, civil war and decreased tax bases. The Crusaders had to swear and oath of nominal fealty to Alexios, even the Normans he previously fought. The First Crusade turned out to be successful though its intention of restoring lands to Byzantium only went so far. In Anatolia, the Crusaders with their heavy armor and weaponry decimated the light cavalry of the Turks and the Byzantines were able to partially restore control over Anatolia. In the Levant however, the Crusaders receiving limited support from the Byzantines decided to take matters into their own hands and create Crusader states in parts of modern Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel and Jordan for themselves, even retaking Jerusalem. Forming the Counties of Tripoli and Edessa, the Princapality of Antioch and the Kingdom of Jerusalem, these states were nominally to become vassals of the Byzantine Empire since their Christian populace was majority Greek but they would be de-facto independent at varying times over the course of their existence.

As the 11th century gave way to the 12th century other Crusades were undertaken, the Second Crusade was more widespread trying to curtail Muslim reconquest of Anatolia and the Levant which resulted in a Crusader failure in Anatolia but a stalemate in the Levant preserving the Crusader states there. Meanwhile, Christians successfully retook the Muslim controlled parts of Portugal and Spain, known as Al-Andalus and the Crusaders in Northern Europe started to locally convert some Western Slavs who had long resisted conversion to Christianity to moderate levels of success. By the end of the 12th century, the Third Crusade was launched to revive the now reconquered parts of the Levant including Jerusalem that fell into Muslim hands of the Ayubid Sultanate, founded by an ethnic Kurd, named Saladin who became Sultan of Egypt and Syria and fought against Richard the Lionheart, King of England. The Crusaders regained partial control of the coastal regions of the Levant but not the interior and a truce was made between Richard and Saladin out of mutual respect and exhaustion.

The dawn of the 13th century saw Pope Innocent III, want to build on the successes of the Third Crusade and launch a Fourth Crusade to complete retaking Jerusalem once more. During the time of the Third Crusade though, tensions with the Byzantine Empire and Western Europeans resumed. Frederick I Barbarossa, Holy Roman Emperor and his army tried to get permission from the Byzantines to cross over into Anatolia but which was granted but saw an early end after Frederick drowned fording a river. The Germans were accused of conspiring with the resurgent Second Bulgarian Empire and Serbia both of which had broken away and reclaimed their independence from the Byzantines once more after a century and half of reconquest. Furthermore, the English took Cyprus from the Muslims but did not return to the Byzantines, instead handing it over to the Knights Templar, one of several Latin (Catholic) Christian military orders founded during the Crusades.

The Byzantines had for centuries been the most dominate city in Christendom in Constantinople, it was the largest and most cosmopolitan city in Europe reaching populations between 500,000-1,000,000 at its peak. It had long retained ancient Rome’s political machinations, as well as cultural innovations, public baths, forums, aqueducts, a racing arena for chariots and other classical Roman monuments and structures. It also housed ornate Christian churches such as the Hagia Sophia and with the Orthodox’s Church’s rich artwork of elaborate mosaics and golden icons it was awe-inspiring to anyone ,Christian or pagan who entered it’s triple set of walls for its sheer grandeur alone. A sense of bringing “Heaven on Earth” was something the Byzantines sought to do for any foreign dignitary.

The Byzantine capital was also the center of commerce in the Mediterranean, where east meets west. Its former vassal, the Italian city-state, the Republic of Venice had over the centuries become independent and became a commercial and naval power on its own and it had sought to become the Byzantine Empire’s biggest benefactor for trade. In time it sought to replace the Byzantine Empire as the commercial power of the region. The Venetians at first were granted favorable trade conditions which actually disadvantaged and further weakened the Byzantine economy and customs-tax revenues, this was the result of short-term convenience the Byzantine rulers often needed to lighten the burden on their treasury, making short term political gains at the expense of long term financial ruin. While Alexios I and his immediate descendants increased Byzantine rule and prestige over the course of the 12th century, they gradually fell back into civil war, corruption and sometimes downright oppressive violence to maintain order. Eventually they were replaced in a coup by the interrelated Angelos dynasty and reigned from 1185 until the events of 1204. Even within the dynasty there was infighting. Isaac II Angelos ruled for years, incompetently until replaced by his brother Alexios III Angelos who had Isaac, ritually blinded and sent into retirement was typical of Byzantine custom. His own reign was marred by financial mismanagement and corruption, outsourcing the navy to Venetian mercenaries and corrupt bureaucrats selling military and religious equipment to for personal gain. Once again the Byzantine Empire found itself virtually bankrupt and unable to pay its armies.

Alexios III was now being plotted against by his nephew Alexios, son of Isaac II. It was his nephew who escaped imprisonment and made his way to the Holy Roman Empire and into the court of his brother in law, the King of Germany Philip of Swabia who was married to Alexios’ sister Irene Angelina. Alexios would play a pivotal role in the events of 1204. Quite separate from his own plans, the Fourth Crusade was already being planned by Pope Innocent III with the typical goal of reclaiming Jerusalem in mind at the same time. The Venetian Republic agreed to provide the naval fleet and some ground support in exchange for a handsome sum from the mostly French and German Crusaders who were to partake in the voyage. The Crusaders were expected to pay the Venetians a large sum for their transport. In part, because the Venetians halted all other naval and commercial development for a year to build a sea worthy fleet with the expectation of being paid upon the Crusaders arrival in Venice which was expensive to a maritime power reliant on seafaring commerce. The Venetian head of state, known as the Doge was at this time a man nearly 100 years old and partially blinded by the Byzantines years before, by the name of Enrico Dandolo. Dandolo and the Venetians were surprised when the French and Germans showed up with limited funds. The Venetians had seemingly built a fleet a great personal expense and now could not expect a reimbursement. As a result the Venetians held the Crusaders hostage and demanded a negotiated payment from the Crusaders since it looked like the Crusade would no longer happen now. They received a partial payment, taking a collection from all the Crusaders but it was not enough to recoup their losses and so the stand off continued. At this point Dandolo proposed a new idea, the Venetians would partake in spoils of the Crusade, not part of the original agreement and the debt could be paid off. Additionally, Dandolo decided the Crusaders could work off their debt in part by helping Venice reclaim the Croatian city of Zara on the Adriatic Sea. This area nominally belonged to the Venetians but a group of Croatian pirates had taken over this port and disrupted Venetian commerce, if the city could be retaken with Crusader help, the Venetians would consider the debt partially restored. This had the added benefit of deescalating tensions with the Crusaders residing in Venice out of fear that their hostage ordeal may lead to violence there and at least in Croatia they could be placed elsewhere.

The planned attack on Zara reached the Pope who threatened excommunication of any Crusader French, German or Venetian or other Italian who attacked Zara since it was a fellow Christian city and already the Fourth Crusade’s purposes were being perverted. A papal sanctioned legate and entourage was sent to oversee the religious aspects of the Crusade and report back to the Pope. The Pope’s threats were intentionally withheld from the bulk of the Crusaders by the Venetians and some of the Crusader leaders who saw profiteering opportunities here. Though some Crusaders, devout in their religious convictions and sworn oaths refused to partake in an attack against fellow Christians the bulk of the army joined the Venetians in November of 1202, despite the Croats displaying the Cross as fellow Catholics, the city was taken after a few weeks. Immediately the Venetians and the Crusaders fought into a violent brawl leaving 100 dead as they disputed the spoils of the conquered city. The Pope receiving the news of the attack, excommunicated the entire army, though news of the excommunication was likewise withheld from the rank and file. However, the Pope would later grant an absolution to the army.

While wintering in the warmth of Croat coast, Alexios Angelos, who had escaped his uncle and reigning Byzantine Emperor, Alexios III to Germany made his way to Zara. He had been plotting to overthrow his uncle and take control of Byzantium for himself but in his exile abroad he needed a vehicle for his plans. The cousin of his brother in law, the German King happened to be the nominal leader of the Fourth Crusade, an Italian noble and soldier of German descent by the name and title of Boniface of Montferrat. Though by the Siege of Zara Boniface was merely a figurehead, the Venetian Doge Enrico Dandolo had more or less usurped the Crusade for his and Venice’s purposes. Nevertheless, Alexios hearing about the Crusader army, arrived at their winter camp in Zara and proposed a new alternative to their venture, instead of going to the Holy Land as planned why not detour to Constantinople and force his uncle give up the throne, in exchange Alexios would be proclaimed the new Emperor and pay off the Crusaders handsomely including the Venetians with promises to more than recoup the Venetians present losses. The timing and machinations of the various Crusaders, the Venetian Doge and the would be Byzantine pretender to the throne could not have been more perfect. Like the planned attack on Zara, Constantinople was a controversial target as a fellow Christian city, albeit one the Catholic or Latin Crusaders as they were known as, saw as still somewhat for their adherence to the Orthodox denomination which was alien and strange to the Catholics. Both denominations had sense of superiority to the other. The Doge was eager to gain riches from Constantinople to recoup his country’s losses and also to avenge an earlier massacre of Venetians and other of Italians in the Venetian Quarter of Constantinople years before by the Greek populace. Some Crusaders who were present at Zara but refused to partake in the attack, including the English noble Simon de Montfort refused to partake in the attack on Constantinople and left for the Kingdom on Hungary and eventually lead a small but unsuccessful contingent to the Holy Land, attempting to complete the original mission of the Crusade as intended.

Alexios additionally promised not only to pay off the Crusaders debts to the Venetians for the Crusade’s assistance in his coup but to resupply and reinforce the Crusade onto the Holy Land. Additionally, he promised to bring the Greek Orthodox Church (nominally subservient to the Emperor) under Papal authority. Unbeknownst to Alexios while his promises were too tempting to the Crusaders and Venetians, the practical reality of implementing them were beyond his reach. Doge Dandolo however, had spent time in Constantinople as a diplomat for Venice years before and was well aware of the complex and fluid politics of Byzantium and likely doubted the veracity of Alexios’s promises. Nevertheless by early 1203 the Crusader and Venetian flotilla were en-route to Constantinople. When Pope Innocent caught wind of this plot he warned against further attacks against Christian cities, at least nominally, but did not outright condemn this specific venture for reasons not exactly known, though probably for political reasons.

The Crusader-Venetian army arrived on the outskirts of Constantinople in June of 1203, having left Croatia in April. The city had a population of half a million and a permanent garrison of 15,000 regular troops, including 5,000 of the Varangian Guard. The sudden appearance of a fellow Christian army caught the city off guard and indeed the Byzantines could not call for reinforcements from other parts of the Empire in a timely manner. They sent an emissary to the Emperor Alexios III, stating the goals were to depose him peacefully if possible. Indeed that was the primary goal of the venture, depose Alexios III and replace him with his nephew and then be paid off rather handsomely before continuing onto the Holy Land as envisioned. The first fight between Byzantine troops and the Crusaders was an easy Crusader victory as heavily armored Frankish knights from France easy outperformed their Byzantine counterparts. Nevertheless, taking the city itself was going to be a daunting task and not something they initially thought who be necessary, though they came prepared just in case.

In July, the Crusaders began the siege proper by trying to cross the Bosporus and take the suburb Galata, the Crusaders would break into the sub channel of the Bosporus, known as the Golden Horn, which would allow the Venetian navy to park their fleet there and they could assault the sea walls of the city proper. Indeed, the Crusaders launched an amphibious landing onto Galata and took routed the Byzantine defenders, though a mercenary force of English, Danish and Italian troops held the strategic Tower of Galata. Eventually the tower fell and many attacks and bloody counterattacks. The Golden Horde itself was defending by a large chain but by taking Galata, the chain was cut and the Venetian fleet was allowed entry into the Golden Horn. At this point, Alexios Angelos was indeed paraded outside the city walls as if he were to be the Emperor, but to his and the Crusaders’ surprise they were jeered by the Greeks. Constantinople had been accustomed to coups and changing reigns in their emperors over the years and they cared little about the exiled prince or his blinded and retired father, they felt Alexios III was adequate as a ruler, he may not have been especially popular but he wasn’t so disliked that the city would depose him for his nephew, not at foreign coercion. This in turn soured the mood of the Crusaders and built resentment, thinking they would be hailed as liberators.

Now the assault on the city was absolutely necessary to achieve their goals, even if it was limited in scope. The Crusaders and Venetians made several attempts but were repulsed by the Byzantine troops. Though in July 11th, the Venetians captured some portions of the sea walls and towers before the Varangian Guard dispersed them, but the Venetians set off a fire to cover their retreat, this fire damaged a good portion of the city and left 20,000 people homeless. Finally, Alexios III personally lead a force to confront the Crusaders but before a fight could commence, he lost heart and retreated even though he outnumbered the Crusaders at that juncture. The fire and the disgraceful retreat prior to a right disheartened the city, Alexios III abandoned the city in disgrace, fearful of the implications of this, the city’s nobility actually brought back his deposed brother, the blinded former emperor, Isaac II out of retirement and declared him the Emperor once more in the hopes this would dissuade further conflict and allow them to save face.

The Crusaders had achieved the goal of deposing Alexios III, though they had not placed his nephew on the throne which meant no guarantee of pay. To remedy this, the Crusaders demanded that Alexios be made co-emperor alongside his restored father, a tradition that had occurred on occasion throughout Roman history. Alexios Angelos was now Alexios IV Angelos and he realized upon taking the throne that the imperial treasury was in fact far more depleted than he thought, meaning he could fulfill his promises to Crusaders so easily. His uncle had made off with precious jewels, further depleting the treasury. The result was a demand to the citizenry and the Church to provide their religious icons and melt them down to make silver and gold coins with which to pay his mercenary army, it was only a partial payment. It was viewed as a sign of desperation and weakness, making the populace have disdain for their new emperor and his army of mercenaries. Alexios IV then asked the Crusaders to renew their contract for another six months until April 1204 to gather more time to collect their payment and to help him secure his rule against his uncle who was regrouping elsewhere. Taking 6,000 Crusaders he marched to fight his uncle Alexios III near Adrianople, a nearby large city. The remaining army of Crusaders and Venetians stayed in outskirts of the city sort of holding the city in an hostage situation. During this time a riot broke out killing some Venetian merchants in the Venetian quarter once more. The Venetian marines and sailors retaliated by setting another fire to the city, greater than the first leaving 100,000 citizens homeless.

Upon Alexios IV’s return from facing his uncle the tensions with his Crusader army lead a decline in relations between him, his subjects and the Crusaders. His own father resented his co-ruling and began to denounce him. He declared his refusal to help the Crusaders after December 1203 and lead at least an attempt to force the Crusaders away which failed. The Crusaders were incensed at having been shortchanged in their promises. Meanwhile, the Byzantine senate tried to declare a noble the new emperor in early 1204, following Isaac II’s death from natural causes. Their appointee declined and instead another Byzantine nobleman who apposed the Crusaders, named Alexios Doukas, from a previously imperial and noble family was declared emperor after he launched a coup in which he paid the Varangian Guard to arrest Alexios IV, Alexios IV was strangled to death in prison by the Varangians. Doukas was now declared Alexios V and he was committed to ridding himself of the Crusaders like he had just deposed his predecessor.

In fact, Alexios V personally lead several attempts to attack the Crusader encampment and forays to find food and supplies outside the city, though many Byzantine troops were killed and Alexios V nearly lost his life. His also raised funds to help the common citizenry endearing him to the populace. Nevertheless, that February he attempted to negotiate with Doge Enrico Dandolo. The terms were deemed to harsh and to no avail. It was around this time, Alexios IV was in fact killed, since his restoration to the throne was a demand of theirs. News of his death angered the Crusader encampment further, though relations had been strained they still saw him as the one negotiator within Byzantium who could pay them off. In March, all Catholic Westerners who resided in the city were expelled. Though the Muslim populace was allowed to reside and had in fact helped the Greek Orthodox citizens and troops in their fights. At this point, the Crusaders and Venetians planned to take matters into their own hands, they would take the city by force and the Byzantine Empire with it, dividing the spoils among themselves.

April 1204 saw the final siege begin which Alexios V resisted until April 12th when the Crusaders managed to penetrate the city walls, altogether, a first in the nearly 900 years of the city. Alexios V fled by boat. Another emperor was declared briefly in the form of Constantine Laskaris but when the Varangian Guard refused to fight further, the siege was over. The Byzantine capital fell for the first time, for the next three days a plundering phase took place, riches religious icons were stolen and melted down for coin, the Hagia Sophia, the most sacred cathedral was desecrated by the Crusader army, the Crusaders murdered and robbed every day citizens and raped Greek women including nuns. After three days, the pillaging was ceased and division of the spoils was made.

A treaty partitioning the empire was made between Venice and the Crusaders. The Venetians were given advantageous trade rights, a collection of spoils including Four Bronze Horses taken from the Hippodrome, known now as the Horses of St. Marks in Venice. The also acquired many Greek islands in the Aegean Sea. Meanwhile, the Crusaders got Constantinople and its environs declaring a new Catholic empire, known to them as the Empire of Constantinople but known to history as the Latin Empire. The Hagia Sophia became a Catholic Church during this time. The Latin Empire would exist for another 57 years. Baldwin of Flanders was elected its first Emperor, while Boniface of Montferrat was made King of a vassal state, the Kingdom of Thessalonica, based in northern Greece. Meanwhile, various Byzantine noble refugees established Byzantine rump states which claimed to be the true successors and continuation of the Byzantine Empire: The Empires of Nicaea and Trebizond and the Despotate of Epirus in various parts of Greece and Anatolia. These states over the next several decades would engage in civil war and fights with the Latin Empire and its vassal states. Meanwhile, the Latin Empire found itself at odds with the neighboring Second Bulgarian Empire and indeed in short time, the Bulgarians would defeat both Baldwin and Boniface in battle, killing them both and Dandolo would die of old age. Eventually in 1261, the Palaiologos dynasty which ruled Nicaea reclaimed Constantinople after the Latin Empire was weakened due to infighting and losses to the Bulgarians and other Byzantine rump states, was conquered. The “reunified” Byzantine Empire was partially restored for another two centuries but it never reclaimed its former glory and gradually gave way to more internal fighting and external threats such as the Bulgarians and eventually the Ottoman Turks whose empire eventually conquered Constantinople and later Trebizond officially ending the last remnants of the Byzantine and Roman Empire in 1453 and 1461 respectively, renaming the city Istanbul in the 20th century.

The Fourth Crusade increased East-West tensions and unknowingly paved the way for the Turkish takeover of the Balkans and rise of the Ottomans centuries later. The impact could not have been experienced at the time and the events leading to 1204′s Sack of Constantinople developed out of a complex and at times reactionary web of intrigue with multiple actors that lead to its happening, the ripple effects of which would help shape the modern world.

#on this day #byzantine empire #latin empire #constantinople #fourth crusade #venetian republic #the crusades #military history #east west schism

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expatimes · 4 years ago

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Refugees allege physical, sexual abuse by Croatian authorities | Europe

Refugees and migrants have sustained “severe injuries” after having allegedly been whipped, beaten and sexually abused at the hands of Croatian authorities during their attempts to reach western Europe for asylum.

Last week, the Danish Refugee Council (DRC) collected testimonies from more than 70 refugees and migrants at the Miral camp in western Bosnia who said they experienced violent pushbacks by Croatian authorities.

The route through the Bosnia-Croatia border is popular with refugees attempting to cross into EU-member Croatia from Bosnia, with the aim of reaching Western Europe.

Human rights groups have long accused Croatian authorities of violent pushbacks, while many say refugees have also been robbed of their belongings in the process.

But the latest testimonies collected by DRC, sent to Al Jazeera on Wednesday, mark an escalation with reports of sexual abuse and “extreme violence”.

The victims include refugees from countries including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Morocco.

Victims say Croatian authorities beat them with metal batons, wooden sticks, belts, their own fists and kicked them with their boots [Handout/Danish Refugee Council]

According to their testimonies, four Afghan victims aged 16 to 24 crossed the border and were detained by Croatian police. They were transported on October 14 to an unknown location in Croatia and handed over to 10 armed people, dressed in black with their faces fully covered with balaclavas.

They were ordered to strip down to their underwear and their belongings were set on fire. They were ordered to lie on the ground, face down.

“Midway during the beating, one of the men in black penetrated M.K's anus forcefully with a branch. The penetration was done over the underwear. During this particular moment, the rest of the men in black were laughing, ”DRC said ,ing to the 24-year-old Afghan.

Croatian authorities continued to beat the victim all over for about eight minutes. The penetration caused bleeding.

After the victims pushed to retreat to Bosnia, a doctor who examined them in Bihac said what had been inflicted on them amounted to "severe injuries."

A spokesperson from Croatia's Ministry of Interior told Al Jazeera its border police has been accused of inhumane treatment “without providing any kind of facts, proof or at least basic information which could be verified”.

“Once these accusations were made, the Ministry of the Interior certainly initiated urgent procedures to verify the allegations since it is our objective and in our interest to, on one hand, remove any suspicion of actions taken by Croatian police officers, and, on the other hand, sanction and eliminate irregularities if, by chance, any have occurred, ”the spokesperson said.

In an email to Al Jazeera, Charlotte Slente, secretary-general of DRC, called the claims “horrifying”.

“We need to see action to put a stop to the systematic use of violence. Treating human beings like this, inflicting pain severe and causing unnecessary suffering, irrespective of their migratory status, cannot and should not be accepted by any European country, or by any EU institution, ”Slente said.

"There is an urgent need to ensure that independent border monitoring mechanisms are in place to prevent these abuses, and to ensure that all reports of abuse are transparently and credibly investigated - and those responsible are held to account."

A man shows bruises on his back, allegedly the result of being beaten by Croatian authorities [Handout/Danish Refugee Council]

'Naked and beaten'

Refugees and migrants recounted to DRC that after being caught and detained by Croatian police, they had their valuables confiscated - mobile phones, power banks and hundreds of euros.

Like the four Afghans, others said they were ordered to strip naked and saw their essential belongings, including shoes, jackets and backpacks, thrown into a fire.

Beatings were described as “severe” with Croatian authorities using metal batons, wooden sticks, belts and their fists to beat them.

They used their boots to kick them, not watching which part of their bodies were hit, according to the testimonies.

In some instances, a Croatian official would immobilise the refugee by standing on his neck while the victim endured the beating.

In other testimonies, police were said to have taken selfies with naked victims or ordered naked refugees to lie on the ground next to and on top each other to be beaten.

One refugee from Balochistan said: “We lay next to each other, naked and beaten and the other four were ordered to lie on us, like when trees are stacked, so we lay motionless for 20 minutes.”

These testimonies all correspond to a section of the Bosnian-Croatian border in the jurisdiction of the Cetingrad Border Police Station pic.twitter.com/h0fldqPPer

- Border Violence Monitoring Network (@Border_Violence) October 21, 2020

A refugee from Balochistan said a child refugee who was beaten fainted, and was then beaten again.

“A minor ... fainted after many blows. His friends took him in their arms and one of the police officers ordered them to lay him down, on the ground. Then, they started hitting them with batons.

“The minor soon regained consciousness and the officers ordered him to get up on his own.

“Before the deportation, police told us, 'We don't care where you are from and whether you will return to Bosnia or to your country, but you will not go to Croatia. Now you have all your arms and legs because we were careful how we hit you and next time it will be much worse '. ”

Medical teams operating at Miral camp in Velika Kladusa, western Bosnia, said these victims suffered the most severe injuries they have witnessed to date.

One victim was hospitalized as his calf bone was fractured; He had to undergo surgery.

Another victim's nose was broken.

One victim had a confirmed fracture of the nose [Handout/Danish Refugee Council]

'Tacitly encouraged by the EU'

The Border Violence Monitoring Network (BVMN), a network of NGOs in the Balkan regions, published an investigation on Wednesday, corroborating DRC's findings.

Since October 3, BVMN records show 36 people were pushed back from Croatia, with “extreme physical assaults” involved in each incident in the Cetingrad area, BVMN spokesman Jack Sapoch told Al Jazeera.

Sapcoh noted that, according to the Croatian Interior Ministry, Damir Butina of the Karlovac police station which has jurisdiction over Cetingrad, spoke last month at a training event for 36 new Croatian border police leaders on “Frontex certified” procedures.

Human rights groups have previously questioned Frontex, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, saying it was failing to respect its mandate to ensure the protection of human rights.

“This is only one of many examples of how this violence is tacitly encouraged by the European Union, which has supplied the Croatian state with hundreds of millions of euros of technological equipment to secure the EU's external border in the last decade,” Sapoch said.

Clare Daly, an Irish MEP, has raised the alarm over refugee abuse in parliament in Brussels.

European values? What European values ?? The blood of these people, so horrifically mistreated on the Croatian border, is on the hands of @SuperheroGame. When are people going to be held to account for the sickening crimes against migrants happening daily in Croatia? @DRC_ngo pic.twitter.com/mrrxWFohaD

- Clare Daly (@ClareDalyMEP) October 21, 2020

Daly told Al Jazeera that that the fact that the EU was informed of the abuse previously and yet continued to finance Croatian border authorities makes the EU just as responsible “as those who carried out these atrocious actions”.

“It exposes the nonsense that we hear from the commission about European values… We have been given the run-around by the commission, who have ignored our evidence and continued to financially reward the Croatian authorities in the full knowledge that they had not established a human rights monitoring mechanism which they had been required to do so under the funding they were given, ”Daly said.

"In possession of this knowledge the commission not only didn't reprimand them, but gave them an even bigger grant the next time."

Dunja Mijatovic, commissioner for human rights at the Council of Europe, late on Wednesday called the allegations “extremely worrying” and called on Croatian authorities to stop pushbacks and border violence, and end impunity for human rights violations.

“Disturbingly, these reports suggest that violence and dehumanising acts accompanying pushbacks are increasing, and it seems that Croatian law enforcement officers continue to enjoy impunity for such serious human rights violations,” Mijatovic wrote on Facebook, noting she had called on authorities to conduct an investigation two years ago.

#world Read full article: https://expatimes.com/?p=12402&feed_id=11200

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manieresdedire · 5 years ago

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Un bain dans la Drina

Légende : panneau de bienvenue

Voici un homme blanc, dégarni, la soixantaine replète, qui prend un bain seul dans une rivière. A sa demande, sa compagne restée sur la berge, prend des photos au portable.

Légende : le baigneur

Prudemment, claudiquant sur le lit de galets, il parvient à mi-distance ; la profondeur n'excède pas le demi mètre ; dès qu'il l'estime suffisante, il plonge et nage sur le dos, à contre-courant ; le fond de l'air en ce mois d’août serbe est chaud, l'eau frisquette, son débit puissant ; parvenant à remonter le courant d' une dizaine de mètres, il a maintenant juste pied ; levant la tête vers sa compagne qui prend la photo, il observe leur motel, en surplomb.

Du balcon lui parviennent des applaudissements, sans qu'il puisse identifier leurs auteurs. Des enfants sans doute. Sa nage n'a rien d'un exploit, alors pourquoi cette salve d'enthousiasme ?

Puis, il tente la traversée vers la rive opposée, maintenant à portée de quelques brasses : couverte d'une frondaison dense, opaque et muette.

La veille, ils ont déposé leurs valises dans une petite chambre du motel " Odmor na Drini", sis entre la rivière Drina et une route bruyante de jour comme de nuit. Du balcon de l’hôtel où ils ont pris leur premier repas du soir, des truites pêchées dans la rivière même (la pêche, passion collective de toute la région - comme en témoignent les clichés de prises monstrueuses qui tapissent l'arrière-bar) que le petit hôtelier zélé, aimable, infatigable, leur proposera avec la même identique évidence comme "le menu du soir", sans autre choix explicite et sans qu'ils s'en lassent -, il a pu constater combien la circulation sur l'autre rive est quasi inexistante : c'est à peine si, la nuit, une fois par paire d' heures en moyenne, les phares d'un véhicule percent le feuillage.

D'emblée ce contraste entre les deux rives l'a intrigué, lui a donné la curiosité d'aller voir en face. Car il n'est pas sans ignorer qu'ici, la Drina est la frontière : du côté de l’hôtel, la Serbie, en face la Bosnie.

Aujourd'hui, aux trois quarts de la Drina, alors que quelques brasses lui suffiraient pour rejoindre l'autre rive quelque chose le retient d'accomplir la traversée...

Le baigneur croit deviner le sens des applaudissements : féliciter le touriste venu de l'Union Européenne, une espèce plutôt rare en Serbie, banaliser par son usage estival la "rivière-frontière" ; la traverser pourrait être une transgression de portée symbolique (bien plus tard, il découvrira qu'il se trouve à moins de 10 kilomètres de Srebrenica et de ses charniers, que des brigades génocidaires la parcouraient à la nuit il y a seulement vingt ans).

Et décide qu'il ne traversera pas la Drina, n'accomplissant que la moitié d'une promesse faite la veille à Belgrade.

Légende : Ivo Andrich et le pont sur la Drina

Car le Français est venu ici en pèlerinage, ce bain est sa manière de célébrer un ouvrage qui l'a transporté dès la première lecture, reprise cent fois : le "Pont sur la Drina", immortalisé par Ivo Andrich, le seul prix Nobel de littérature qu'ait jamais eu la Yougoslavie, en 1961. A l'opposé du "message" de tolérance multi confessionnelle que délivre son auteur, ce grand écrivain humaniste Bosniaque, est aujourd'hui récupéré par les nationalistes Serbes, (comme Emir Kusturica dans son "musée cinématographique slavophile" de Mokra Gora).

Légende : la rue Andrich du village cinématographique de Kusturica

Ce bain, le Français l'a promis-juré à son nouvel ami Ljubomir, géant serbe, rencontré la semaine précédant leur périple au Sud-Est de la Serbie. Au cours de leurs conversations quotidiennes en francoglobish (ses parents se sont connus à Paris mais le français se perd ici ; il est plus francophile que francophone) il lui a délivré de précieuses clés de compréhension de la Serbie de juillet 2017, en échange d'innombrables pintes de bière locale.

Toujours sous pression, posant hâtivement sur leur table sa mince serviette en cuir de retraité en semi-activité, Ljubo, s'excuse abondamment de son retard d'une heure, puis la discussion s'engage, et les voilà partis pour refaire le monde et les Balkans au XXIe siècle. L'ami serbe corrige l'optimisme pan-européen du Français macronien : hélas, il y a lieu d’être pessimiste, " la guerre reprendra" assène-t-il comme une évidence. Car la guerre n'a pas tué les démons identitaires, ni en Serbie ni en Bosnie ajoute-t-il, la partie obtuse de la population (les plus âgés, les ruraux, les moins instruits, précise -t-il) vient de porter au pouvoir Aleksandar Vučić, un politicien longtemps ultra-nationaliste (il fut le ministre de l'information de Milosevic dont il parle aujourd'hui encore comme d'un "grand Serbe" dont les intentions étaient les meilleures, même si ses résultats ont été les pires). Ljubomir a suivi la visite de Macron en Europe centrale et dans dans les Balkans, et sa tentative louable de contrer le bloc "illibéral" conduit par le président hongrois Victor Orban ; mais malgré les efforts et les crédits de l'Union Européenne, celle-ci reste moins influente que la Russie.

Pour accomplir son "pèlerinage littéraire", le Français confie son projet de louer une voiture pour aller de Belgrade à Višegrad en Bosnie, d'y contempler le pont sur la Drina, ce bel ouvrage aux onze arches, édifié au XVIe siècle par le Grand Vizir d'Istambul, Mehmed Pacha Sokolović, reliant alors Sarajevo à Belgrade, bombardé en 1914, puis restauré et rendu fameux par la fiction éponyme d'Andrich. Aux yeux des lecteurs de ce roman culte, le pont est parvenu jusqu'à nous comme un symbole de la coexistence fragile mais possible des communautés, perpétuellement menacée par les courants furieux de l'Histoire.

Impossible ! Répond Ljubo : tout véhicule immatriculé en Serbie traversant la partie musulmane de la Bosnie court le risque d’être caillassé par de jeunes Bosniaques musulmans. Aussi ne trouveront-ils aucun loueur pour cette destination.

Légende : sur le quai de la gare de Mokra Gora

"Si vous voulez aller visiter Visegrad, il faut prendre un train jusqu'à Sarajevo. Attention ! muni des visas nécessaires, et... sans garantie d’être réadmis en Serbie. De là, louez une voiture immatriculée en Bosnie".

Légende : un jeune ami de Voïvodine

Du coup, il a conseillé ce petit hôtel au bord de la Drina qu'il a bien connu dans ses déplacements professionnels :

- "Very good, beautiful place, proche Mokra Gora, visitez le village cinematographique recréé par Kusturica - you know, the cineast, bad ideology, mais belle réalisation, and take le petit train historique (qui reliait autrefois Sarajevo à la ville industrielle serbe d' Uzice). Very interesting ! Absolument nécessaire !

- Mais pourrais-je me baigner dans la Drina ?

- Yes, yes, yes, you must do it!" lance-t-il comme un défi.

- Promis je vous enverrai par SMS une photo témoin" !

Ljubo téléphone derechef à son ami le restaurateur pour leur réserver quelques trois nuitées. Une chambre est libre. Une chance en cette saison. Dès lors, plus moyen de reculer.

Christian Branthomme

#Drina #Pont #Pont sur la Drina #Ivo Andrič #Ivo Andrich #Christian Branthomme

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mariacallous · 9 months ago

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New regulations on the screening of non-EU nationals at the bloc’s external borders, which come into force this week, could have major implications for migrants and asylum seekers’ privacy rights, campaigners warn.

Ozan Mirkan Balpetek, Advocacy and Communications Coordinator for Legal Centre Lesvos, an island in Greece on the so-called Balkan Route for migrants seeking to reach Western Europe, says the new pact “will significantly expand the Eurodac database [European Asylum Dactyloscopy Database], creating overlaps with other databases, such as international criminal records accessible to police forces”.

“Specific provisions of the pact directly undermine GDPR regulations that protect personal data from being improperly processed,” Balpetek told BIRN. “The pact only expands existing rights violations, including data breaches. Consequently, information shared by asylum seekers can be used against them during the asylum process, potentially leading to further criminalization of racialized communities,” he added.

The European Council confirmed the deal in May, and it should start being implemented in June 2026.

This legislation sets out new procedures for managing the arrival of irregular migrants, processing asylum applications, determining the EU country responsible for these applications, and devising strategies to handle migration crises.

The pact promises a “robust” screening at the borders to differentiate between those people deemed in need of international protection and those who are not.

The screening and border procedures will mandate extensive data collection and automatic exchanges, resulting in a regime of mass surveillance of migrants. Reforms to the Eurodac Regulation will mandate the systematic collection of migrants’ biometric data, now including facial images, which will be retained in databases for up to 10 years. The reform also lowers the thresholder for storing data in the system to the age of six.

Amnesty International in Greece said the new regulation “will set back European asylum law for decades to come”.

“These proposals come hand in hand with mounting efforts to shift responsibility for refugee protection and border control to countries outside of the EU – such as recent deals with Tunisia, Egypt, and Mauritania – or attempts to externalize the processing of asylum claims to Albania,” the human rights organisation told BIRN.

“These practices risk trapping people in states where their human rights will be in danger, render the EU complicit in the abuses that may follow, and compromises Europe’s ability to uphold human rights beyond the bloc,” it added.

NGOs working with people in need have been warning for months that the pact will systematically violate fundamental principles, resulting in a proliferation of rights violations in Europe.

Jesuit Refugee Services, including its arm in Croatia, said in April in a joint statement that it “cannot support a system that will enable the systematic detention of thousands of people, including children, at the EU’s external borders.

“The proposed legislation will exponentially increase human suffering while offering no real solutions to current system deficiencies,” JRS said.

Despite criticism, the European Parliament adopted the regulation in April.

Individuals who do not meet the entry requirements will be registered and undergo identification, security, and health checks. These checks are to be completed within seven days at the EU’s external borders and within three days for those apprehended within the EU.

Under the new system, EU member states can either accept a minimum of 30,000 asylum applicants annually or contribute at least 20,000 euros per asylum applicant to a joint EU fund.

After screening, individuals will be swiftly directed into one of three procedures: Border Procedures, Asylum Procedures, or Returns Procedures.

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noturgrrrl · 5 years ago

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Immediate aid on the Balkan route

My dear 3000 followers, I want to use my reach to introduce you to a project that is very close to my heart: the NoNationTruck. NoNationTruck is a German Berlin-based collective that wants to support people on the move along the balkan route with mobile infrastructure in its converted truck. They’ll provide basic & urgent needs in form of hot meals, first aid & a mobile charging system. The truck is currently being converted so that it can start its mission in summer. Please follow the truck, share the news on all available channels and donate if you can. Together we can change things!

https://nonationtruck.blackblogs.org/ https://www.facebook.com/pg/nonationtruck/ https://twitter.com/NoNationTruck https://www.betterplace.me/soforthilfe-auf-der-balkanroute-no-nation-truck

Comradely, noturgrrrl

#NoNationTruck NNTruck NNT BalkanRoute Refugee Support RefugeeSupport

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mattkennard · 5 years ago

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The War on Hope: How the US tried to stop Evo Morales

In the middle of the night on April 16, 2009, an elite Bolivian police unit entered the four-star Hotel Las Americas situated in the eastern city of Santa Cruz, a hotbed of opposition to the President Evo Morales’s government. Flown in from the capital, La Paz, the commandos planned to raid a group of men staying in the upscale lodgings. What happened in the early hours of that morning is still disputed, but at the end of the operation, three men who were asleep in bed had been killed in cold blood. Some say they were executed, while the Bolivian government claims its officers won out in a 20-minute firefight. In the aftermath, the story gained international attention when it was revealed that two of the dead were not even Bolivian. One was Michael Dwyer, a 26-year-old Irishman from County Cork, where he had been a bouncer and security guard before moving to Santa Cruz just six months earlier. Another, Árpád Magyarosi, was Hungarian-Romanian, and had been a teacher and musician before relocating to Bolivia at the same time. The third person killed in the operation was the ringleader of the group, Eduardo Rózsa-Flores, an eccentric Bolivian-Hungarian who had been born in Santa Cruz before fleeing the country during the US-backed dictatorship of Hugo Banzer in the 1970s. His family moved to Chile before the ascent of another US-backed dictator in that country, General Augusto Pinochet, and resettled finally in Hungary. Rózsa was a supporter of Opus Dei, the right-wing Catholic sect, and fought in the Croatian independence war in the early 1990s, founding the paramilitary International Platoon that many believed was aligned with fascistic elements. Two journalists, including a British photographer, died in suspicious circumstances while investigating the platoon. In Santa Cruz on that night, two others, Mario Tadic, a Croatian, and Elöd Tóásó, also from Hungary, were arrested and remain in a high- security La Paz prison to this day. Two more suspects, both with Eastern European connections, were not at the scene and are still missing.

It transpired that the government had acted on intelligence indicating that these men comprised a cell of terrorists who were planning a program of war and violence in the country, which included a somewhat bizarre plan to blow up Evo Morales, the president, and his cabinet on Lake Titicaca, the biggest lake in the Andes and a major tourist attraction. The intelligence services, after a tip-off from an informer close to the group, had been following them for a number of months. They decided to act soon after a bomb exploded at the house of the Archbishop of Santa Cruz, Cardinal Julio Terrazas. The government appointed a seven-person committee to investigate the plot, headed by César Navarro, deputy minister for coordination with social movements and civil society, which spent the next five months until November 2009 looking into it. Among the items seized during the raid was Rózsa’s laptop in which investigators claim to have discovered emails between ex-CIA asset and Cold War double-agent István Belovai. “There are emails between Rózsa and Belovai, he was the brains behind it,” Mr Navarro told me in his office in the presidential palace in La Paz. “He would ask them logistical questions about escape routes, about whether the government or police would be able to get to them.” Belovai, who died in 2010, was a spook who called himself “Hungary’s first NATO soldier”. Rózsa is thought to have become friends with Belovai in the 1990s during the Balkan war.

At the time of the attacks, the attitude of the US embassy, revealed through the cables sent from La Paz to Washington, was one of incredulity at the government’s claims and worry about persecution of the opposition. One comment was headlined ‘“Terrorism” excuse for mass arrests?” The US embassy was concerned about “raising fears of possible arrests of members of the Santa Cruz-based political opposition”. Another cable did admit that in “an interview released posthumously, the group’s leader [Rózsa] advocated the secession of Santa Cruz department, Bolivia’s largest and most prosperous state”. The reaction from the opposition was no less sympathetic. The right-wing governor of Santa Cruz, Rubén Costas, accused the Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS) government of “mounting a show” in the aftermath. The photos released by the government afterward told a different story. Rózsa and Dwyer can be seen posing with large caches of heavy weaponry including pistols and sub-machine guns, and a large rifle with telescopic sights. President Morales said the cell was planning to “riddle us with bullets”. A US embassy official met with a public defender assigned to alleged terrorist Tadic. She told the official that “the Santa Cruz leaders named by the government are most likely linked with the group” – these leaders were in fact intimately involved with the US embassy. Tadic, she said, had been stockpiling weapons and carrying out military training on rural properties outside Santa Cruz. She confirmed they were responsible for placing the explosive device in front of the cardinal’s house, while Tadic had testified that the next target was going to be Prefect Rubén Costas’ residence, and that Rózsa had advised Costas to strengthen his security gate to minimize the damage. The intent in targeting the cardinal and the prefect was to make it look like MAS supporters were carrying out the attacks.

The fact that the alleged terrorists were staying in a four-star hotel with no discernible day job suggested they must have had money coming from somewhere. The pictures of these foreigners partying in Santa Cruz – subsequently released – also show they were accepted and welcomed openly by some powerbrokers in the city – it seemed to go all the way to the top, even the prefect of the department. But none came more powerful than Branko Marinkovic, a local oligarch of Croatian origin, who had been a long-time friend of the US embassy and is now in exile in the US after being identified as one of those “most likely” to have been involved with the terrorist group. Juan Kudelka, Marinkovic’s right-hand man, said in March 2010 that he had been asked by Marinkovic to pass envelopes of money to Rózsa as part of the plan to support this terrorist group, called, he said, “La Torre”. Another suspect, Hugo Achá Melgar, a keen friend of a strange human rights group in New York, also soon fled to the US, where he was also welcomed with open arms. “[T]here are several factors that could induce the [government of Bolivia] to connect us to suspected extremist groups in Santa Cruz,” noted one US embassy cable released by WikiLeaks. “The petition of political asylum from alleged terrorist Hugo Acha and his wife, allocation of USAID assistance to a Bolivian organization suspected of funding a terrorist cell in Santa Cruz, and an implied [US Government] role based on the [Government of Bolivia’s] assertion that the Santa Cruz cell leader organized meetings and had contacts in Washington.” All of these assertions turned out to be true; in fact, the situation was worse than that. The US planned to bring the opposition from all over the country together in a supra-departmental business lobby in an effort to rid Bolivia of its socialist government.

At the time, the US embassy “reassured” Vice President Álvaro García Linera “that there was no US government involvement”, and President Obama vouched for that too when asked by President Morales soon after. But Mr Navarro, the investigator, still didn’t believe it. “The US didn’t not know,” he told me. When I brought Vice President Linera into the Financial Times office in London to speak to the union at the paper, he told me: “Nothing like this happens in Bolivia without the US knowing something about it.” Even if we assume the US embassy didn’t know of the cell, why would the US then provide a sanctuary to alleged funders of “terrorists” whose own public defender was telling the embassy that they were “most likely” guilty? The answer is long and complex and reveals the lengths to which the US has gone to undermine the democratically elected government of Evo Morales since it came to power in 2005.

Turning the tide

The raid and the deaths came at a pivotal moment in Bolivian history. At that time the poorest country in South America, it also had the highest proportion of indigenous people in the continent – 60 percent. In December 2005, there was a tectonic shift in the power structure of the nation, unheard of since independence from Spain, when the country elected its first ever indigenous president, the socialist trade union leader Evo Morales. It wasn’t a sudden development but followed decades of confrontation and public protests that had escalated in the previous five years. In 2000, the so-called “Water Wars”, centered in the city of Cochabamba in the middle of the country, had pitched the local communities en masse against the government and the World Bank which had overseen the privatization of the water industry and resultant soaring prices. Police had been instructed to arrest people collecting rainwater to avoid the new prices they could not afford. Over the next years, the indigenous movement, which is based around small micro-democratic communities, grew stronger. In 2003, mass protests spread and thousands of demonstrators went on to blockade La Paz before troops, allegedly under orders of the government, shot dead a score of protesters.

The presidential incumbent, Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, more commonly known as Goni, was forced out and fled to Miami, where he lives to this day. It was in this ferment that Morales, a former cocalero (coca picker) turned trade union leader, and his party, MAS, came to power with a huge take of the popular vote. This turn of events, however, was not greeted kindly by the traditional elites in Bolivia and their international backers. The US had been sending its own political “experts” for years to try to avoid exactly this scenario: a 2005 documentary, Our Brand is Crisis, shows a team of slick campaign managers from Greenberg Carville Shrum, the political consultancy, successfully running Goni’s campaign as he defeated Evo Morales in the 2002 presidential elections. This time it was different: the US was powerless to stop Morales, causing serious worry among planners. Bolivia remains one of the most unequal societies in the western hemisphere, but the established state of affairs had made some people very rich. As the New York Times put it when describing Santa Cruz: “Scenes of extreme poverty stand in contrast here with the construction of garish new headquarters of corporations from Brazil, Europe and the United States.” On top of this, the land distribution has led some analysts to describe the set-up as akin to “semi-feudal provinces dominated by semi-feudal estates”. Five percent of the landowners control over 90 percent of the arable land. When MAS came to power it sought to deal with this egregious inequality, which is marked pretty consistently along race lines, with the poor landless peasants largely comprising the indigenous population. As always, the US supported the oligarchy, which in turn supported the continued slavery of the country to US corporations.

A land reform program was started by Morales to break up the huge rural estates that had long been controlled by a small elite and to redistribute land that was fallow to landless indigenous peasants. The government stipulated that private ownership of huge estates would only be acceptable if put to “social use”. But a plan like that was going to engender vociferous opposition from an entrenched elite that felt it was being usurped. One particularly illustrative case is that of Ronald Larsen, a 67-year-old American from Montana, who came to Bolivia in 1968 and who, by the time President Morales came to power, owned 17 properties throughout Bolivia (along with his sons), comprising 141,000 acres, or three times the size of the country’s biggest city. The new Bolivian government accused Mr Larsen of keeping indigenous Guarani farmers as “virtual slaves”, and tried to deliver seeds to them to help them escape from servitude. Mr Larsen responded: “These people, their main thing in life is where they’re going to get their next bowl of rice. A few bags of rice buys a lot of support.”1 The government reported that it was fired on as it tried to deliver the said rice.

The reaction to land reform from the east of the country, where the majority of natural resources and wealth is located, was near hysterical. A class of magnates – most of European descent – own many of the businesses there and, over the next three years, with their allies in the media luna (the crescent-shaped “opposition” area of the country) worked to bring down the new President Morales. The US government and its agencies, which had for decades exercised overwhelming economic and political power over Bolivia in tandem with these newly displaced elites, was not a benign player in this period. It actively worked to help the opposition and undermine the democratically elected government. The spider web of US control was, and is, extensive, with many US agencies created at the height of the Cold War still in place, civilized language hiding their use, first, as a tool against Soviet influence in the region, and now to undermine the democratic socialism of MAS. Despite vast natural gas reserves, these agencies, alongside transnational corporations and their local compradors in government, have conspired to keep Bolivia the second-poorest country, and among the most unequal, in South America.

When the MAS government threatened to upend that social order, it was logical that the US would be nervous. One of President Morales’ first acts in power was to shutter the CIA office that had until then, he said, been operating in the presidential palace. Morales’ claims that the various agencies that make up the US foreign policy apparatus have been giving covert support to the opposition are dismissed by the US government as “conspiracy theories”. Alongside the US government, a score of non-governmental institutions, some headquartered in New York, or US-ally Colombia, have been working to undermine the democratic government in Bolivia and continue to this day.

Paying clandestine visits

When I interviewed César Navarro, who headed the investigation of the April 2009 incident, in his office lined with pictures of Che Guevara and prominent members of Bolivian civil society, he spoke at 100 miles an hour, desperate to get all the information out as quickly as possible. “Rózsa didn’t come here by himself, they brought him,” he told me. “Hugo Achá Melgar brought him.” The prosecutor in the case had charged that one of Achá’s business cards was found in the backpack of one of the alleged terrorists. Further, it was claimed that Achá met with Rózsa on at least three occasions, while testimony from other terrorist suspects in custody implicated Achá as a financial supporter of the group. The Bolivian government has tried to request the extradition of Achá, who is currently in the United States, to no avail.

Achá’s story reveals a long trail that leads all the way to a set of plush offices in the midtown area of Manhattan. The husband of a prominent opposition congresswoman, Achá was the founder and head of a Bolivian version of the Human Rights Foundation (HRF), an American non- governmental organization (NGO) based in New York. Not very well known – but boasting Elie Wiesel and Václav Havel on its “international council” – the HRF was founded in 2005 by a character atypical of the NGO and human rights world. A rich playboy-cum-political talking head, Thor Halvorssen could be spotted on the Manhattan party scene, as well as giving his two-pennies-worth on Fox News.

His foundation is not typical either – Mr Halvorssen told The Economist in 2010 that he wanted his organization to break from the traditional NGO mold. First his group had an overt agenda, the magazine said, focusing “mainly on the sins of leftist regimes in Latin America”. But his tactics were different, too. “With the confidence of a new kid on the block,” the article continued, “he argues that the big players in human rights have become too bureaucratic, and disinclined to do bold things like pay clandestine visits to repressive countries.” From his midtown Manhattan office, Halvorssen said: “They work in these big marbled offices, where’s the heart in that?” It was in the dusty streets of La Paz that he wanted to be. In many ways, Halvorssen was merely a chip off the old block. HRF’s obsession with the “repressive” governments of, particularly, Venezuela and Bolivia was not something new to the family. Neither were clandestine activities. Halvorssen’s father, Thor Halvorssen Hellum, is a Venezuelan businessman, the head of one of the richest families in the country. In 1993, he was arrested and charged with homicide and other counts after a group of terrorists set off a series of six bombs around the capital, Caracas. It was named the “yuppie” terrorists plot because its planners were allegedly bankers and other gilded elite who hoped that the panic caused by the bombs would help them speculate on the stock market. The Houston Chronicle noted at the time: “Police have identified one alleged mastermind as Thor Halvorssen, a former president of telephone company CANTV, former presidentially-appointed anti-drug commissioner, and, according to officials, a former operative of the US Central Intelligence Agency in Central America.” Halvorssen Hellum eventually spent 74 days in prison before a superior court judge found him innocent of attempted homicide and all other charges related to the bombings. Many found the decision murky. And two hours after his release, another “human rights” NGO, the International Society for Human Rights, appointed him director of its Pan-American committee. During a CIA “anti- drug” campaign in Venezuela, which saw a ton of nearly pure cocaine shipped to the US in 1990, Mr Halvorssen Hellum, in his position as narcotics chief, was again in trouble. The New York Times reported that “[t]he DEA discovered that Halvorssen, who had his own links to the CIA, was using information from DEA cases to smear political and business rivals”.

Like father like son. Halvorssen Jnr’s own human rights project, the HRF, was set up, he said, to help in “defending human rights and promoting liberal democracy in the Americas”. HRF “will research and report on human rights abuses” and “produce memoranda, independent analyses, and policy reports”. But it is clear that the organization is set up, primarily, to malign the governments of Venezuela and Bolivia. It did have sizeable funds to carry out its tasks. The group’s financial accounts make interesting reading. In the year ending December 31, 2006, the first full year of operations, the group spent $300,518 on its programs. By the next year, ending 2007, this had more than doubled to $644,163. In 2008, this had gone down to $595,977, but it surged again in 2009 to $832,532, as political violence was reaching a head in Bolivia. Interestingly, in the year ended 2008, “general programs”, which was the highest spending category, was $85,525, or 14.4 percent of total spending on “program services”. By 2009, “general programs” spending was up 813 percent to $458,840, and comprised 55 percent of total spending. In the four years from 2006 to 2009, HRF has spent nearly $2.6 million on running costs. But where was the money going? We do know thanks to the WikiLeaks cables that when Branko Marinkovic, the oligarch, fled to the US from Bolivia, one of his first ports of calls was the HRF office in Manhattan. Unfortunately, we don’t know what they talked about. In its six years of operations, the group has released two 30-odd page annual reports, and 16 other reports on varying topics related to “repressive governments”. To be fair, the group did organize an Oslo human rights conference which, one Wall Street Journal journalist noted, was “unlike any human-rights conference I’ve ever attended”, because “there was no desire to blame … the US or other Western nations”.

In the same article, Mr Halvorssen laughed off claims that he, like his father, was in cahoots with the CIA, calling such claims “conspiracy theories”. But links between his group and Achá, the man accused of buying the tickets for the terrorists in Santa Cruz, were closer than he let on. Mr Halvorssen maintained that the Bolivian group was “inspired by HRF’s work” but is “a group of Bolivian individuals … a wholly independent group with a board of directors made up entirely of Bolivian nationals”. Really? Achá was briefing the US embassy on his problems all through the period and officers from the embassy met with him in “his capacity as head of Human Rights Foundation – Bolivia”, which the embassy was told was tightly linked to the New York-based organization. One cable notes that Achá’s outfit is “an affiliate of the larger Human Rights Foundation group” – the one headed by Mr Halvorssen.

The HRF group in New York naturally still denies any wrongdoing by Achá, and is, according to some, likely helping him in his efforts to remain in the US. Its spokesperson told the press that “Human Rights Foundation in Bolivia has carried out extraordinary work denouncing human rights abuses in that country, and unfortunately the response of Morales comes in the form of insults and unfounded accusations … We have carried out an internal review and have found no evidence that Mr. Acha is linked to the group that the government claims is carrying out separatist activities.” As WikiLeaks cables reveal, the group further accused President Morales of “vilifying the reputation” of HRF due to HRF–Bolivia’s reporting on the “destruction of democratic institutions, the grand human rights violations in Bolivia” and the “anti-democratic character of the Morales Administration”. It was a typical response. The Bolivian human rights ombudsman (Defensor del Pueblo) Waldo Albarracin, referring specifically to the Human Rights Foundation, told the US embassy: “they do not have the facts and so any opinion they have is just that, an opinion.”

Achá was at one point arrested on suspicion of being involved in the plot. The cables reveal the concern of the embassy over the arrest of this “Embassy contact and leader of a human rights NGO”. Achá had even given the embassy a copy of the warrant for his arrest, which he linked to his “investigations” into a massacre in the Pando department of Bolivia (carried out, in fact, by far-right elements of the opposition). But, like many of the opposition figures, he was successful in persuading the US to grant him political asylum. The cable ends by saying that “Acha is currently in the US”. Providing a sanctuary for Bolivian suspects would become a theme of US policy. In fact, the US had been active in his alleged terrorist education. According to the WikiLeaks cables, Achá had actually participated in a Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies “Terrorism and Counterinsurgency” course in Washington in late 2008 – one assumes to gain knowledge for his own violent “counter-insurgency” terrorism back in Bolivia. Included in the course’s mandatory reading were “Left Wing Terrorism in Italy” by Donatella della Porta and “Lenin on Armed Insurrection” by Tony Cliff.

Roger Pinto, a senator for the opposition party, Podemos, told the US embassy that the government “has evidence that Acha was involved with the alleged Santa Cruz cell”. He added that Achá was involved in trying to solicit funds for the group from opposition leaders in the media luna, the opposition stronghold, but only in order to “set up a self-defense force for the Media … not to assassinate the President”. Pinto contended that, among others, Achá had approached the mayor of the central city of Trinidad, Moises Shriqui, with Rózsa to enlist his support. Pinto said that Shriqui flatly refused to get involved and discounted the group as “a really bad idea”. Another opposition Podemos deputy, Claudio Banegas, told the US embassy that the congressional investigation into the Santa Cruz group had revealed that Achá did in fact have a relationship with the cell. His colleague said his involvement was “not at the top of the lighthouse, just at the bottom”. In another cable from La Paz, Achá is called a “human rights lawyer” and it is noted that political officers from the embassy met twice with him in Santa Cruz while he was investigating the September 2008 massacre of indigenous peasants in the Pando department of Bolivia. “He was preparing a report detailing a high degree of Morales administration involvement to provoke violence in Pando,” the cable added. Halvorssen never mentioned whether this “wholly independent group” had received funding from the HRF for the task, but his own group came to similar politically motivated and erroneous conclusions about the Pando massacre. Incidentally, Thor Halvorssen contacted the Financial Times soon after I asked for an interview with a résumé of my apparent “radicalism” and precipitated my departure from the paper. These “believers in freedom”, as mentioned, only believe in freedom when it benefits them.

La España Gloriosa

Bolivian people, and particularly the business community in the country, have always had a strong disdain for a central government they see as interfering and stifling. To this purpose, in most areas of the country, there are institutions called civic committees, which organize and represent business interests. They have become especially important in the opposition stronghold of the media luna. In Santa Cruz, where the Rózsa group was foiled, the civic committee has become the major non-governmental voice of opposition to Evo Morales. Its presidency has been held by some of the most powerful businessmen and politicians in the country, including Rubén Costas, the current governor of Santa Cruz. Its funding comes from 220 businesses in the department. In its internal report on civil society in Bolivia (which I obtained through the Freedom of Information Act), the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) reported that the two main columns on either side of the state are “the civic committees […] on the right, and the large labor organizations on the left”. There have been accusations that the Santa Cruz civic committee (SCCC) has members with fascist leanings involved in violence against indigenous citizens, particularly in the affiliated youth branch. Ignacio Mendoza, a senator in Sucre, who is part of the left-wing opposition to MAS, told me: “Against us there is the Santa Cruz Civic Committee and the Youth Union, which is a neo-fascist group. These groups always threaten.” In the New York Times, correspondent Simon Romero noted: “It is no surprise that many Bolivian supporters of Mr. Morales view Santa Cruz as a redoubt of racism and elitism.” He added: “This city remains a bastion of openly xenophobic groups like the Bolivian Socialist Falange, whose hand-in-air salute draws inspiration from the fascist Falange of the late Spanish dictator, Francisco Franco.”

This would appear to include the SCCC. At the conclusion of a series of interviews at SCCC’s offices, the group’s spokesperson inexplicably allowed me to download a tranche of files from the computer in the main office. These included racist cartoons of Evo Morales, as well as a poem lauding the old colonial country, Spain.

One reads (my translation):

The grand Spain with benign fate.

Here he planted the sign Of surrender.

And it did in its shadow An eminent people

Of clear front A loyal heart

There is also a letter titled Filial Espana (Spanish affiliate) sent by the president of the committee to the president of the far-right civic committee in Spain, Carlos Duran Banegas, thanking him for his support and help. Another folder includes a coat of arms for Germán Busch who was a president of Bolivia in the 1930s and was believed by many Bolivians to have Nazi tendencies. Reports by the fascist- linked grouping UnoAmerica also feature prominently on the SCCC computer. In fact, among the documents there are photos taken, one must assume, by an SCCC photographer of UnoAmerica delivering its report on Pando to the Organization of American States (OAS) in New York.

The computer files I retrieved were also full of unhinged documents calling Chávez and Morales terrorists. One reporter accurately noted that the SCCC is “a sparkplug of separatist agitation in the East”. Despite these leanings, the US taxpayer, through USAID, is funding members of this group. In the WikiLeaks cables, under the subtitle “Blowing Smoke”, an August 2007 dispatch makes fun of Bolivian government claims about USAID activities being used to help the opposition. But inadvertently this proved it. It noted: “[a]nother USAID contractor, Juan Carlos Urenda (a Santa Cruz civic leader) described the MAS accusations as an attempt to cast a smokescreen over the ‘serious problems in this country’.” A search in the trove of documents from the SCCC’s computer turns up the same Mr Urenda, USAID contractor, as the author for the SCCC of a long article lauding the history of the department’s autonomy struggle. A prominent lawyer in the east, in 1987 he published a book called Departmental Autonomies, which, he noted, “outlines what will be the fundamental doctrine of the process of autonomy”. He went on: “Conscious of the error of having structured the country in a centralized way, [Santa Cruz] has not ceased in its attempt to decentralize the state throughout its republican history.”

It turns out that Mr Urenda was actually one of the founders of the SCCC’s pre-autonomy council and one of the area’s most prominent ideologues. This finding makes a mockery of USAID’s claim to be apolitical. As its own report noted: “it is clear that Bolivian civil society in the first columns on both sides [civic committees and labor organizations] are playing roles that are less social and more political and governmental.” Although they shy away from talking about direct aid, the top brass of the SCCC were full of praise for USAID when I talked to them. Documents from the computer also show extensive preparations for the Ferexpo 2007, a business show in the city, which US ambassador Philip Goldberg would attend. “USAID in Bolivia was supporting democratic organizations and tourism and fairs,” said Ruben Dario Mendez, the spokesperson. “They were interested in fomenting political participation. Evo doesn’t like that, he doesn’t like there to be freedom.”

It’s not just USAID that helps out. Mr Mendez noted that the Journalists’ Association of Santa Cruz has an agreement with the US embassy that helps them print books and put on events, an agreement which is not in place in other parts of the country. “In some cases the US helps us,” he said. “Anyone can submit a proposal to get help. I have attended events about political governance, about freedom of expression, human rights,” he added. “There was a new penal prosecution code, and a workshop on that has been carried out by USAID for years.” He was still optimistic about the ability of USAID to go about its work: “There are still organizations and people in Santa Cruz who believe in democracy. This was proved the other day when I went to the opening of a center for the support of democracy, USAID helped fund this, they work with the university president, and the vice-president of the civic committee helped set this up.” He obviously thought that USAID believed in his type of democracy. “We have a totalitarian system here, if there was a democratic government there wouldn’t be a problem here. The biggest problem in Bolivia is centralism.” (A view echoed in USAID’s reports.) The extensive cache of reports from both organizations on the office computer also reveals the links between the SCCC and the NGOs HRF and UnoAmerica. These were evidently being sent out as primers on the situation in Bolivia.

I found more evidence of US support for these right-wing opposition forces in Sucre, the judicial capital of the country, where in August 2006 President Morales announced the opening of the constituent assembly. It would spend six months redrafting the constitution with enhanced rights for indigenous communities, more economic control of the country’s resources, as well as land reform. It was eventually passed by a referendum in 2009. “Sucre is like the dividing line between the east and the altiplano [poorer indigenous west] so the idea was it was a place that could bring peace between the two peoples,” Mr Mendoza, the left-wing senator, told me as we sat in the local government headquarters. “But radical groups here connected themselves with Santa Cruz and all of a sudden it became about something bigger.” The whole process was marred by violence, as the opposition set out to scupper the process. “It all comes down to racism,” he added. “The constituent assembly was largely made up of indigenous farmers and that prompted racism. People were saying, ‘Whoever doesn’t jump is a llama’, acting superior to indigenous people and calling them llamas because they are from the altiplano.”

As the killings and lootings got under way, the US made no statement of condemnation. “They are setting fire to gas pipelines, and the US government does not condemn that?” asked Morales at the time. “Of course, they know they [the opposition groups] are their allies. So why would they denounce them?” He was right.

The tactics used by the SCCC mirrored those used in Chile when the US was trying to destabilize the government of Salvador Allende in the early 1970s; he was eventually taken out in a US-backed anti-democratic coup. In Bolivia, there was the violence from the local youth groups but also strikes – this time organized by the business elites – designed to bring the country to its knees and keep goods from being delivered to the west of the country. The Confederation of Private Businesses called for a national shutdown if the government refused “to change its economic policies”. Altogether this was called a “civic coup”. It failed, but around the same time the US was trying to rejuvenate the opposition, according to evidence uncovered during my time there. While in Sucre, I talked to the civic committee for the department of Chuquisaca, in which the city sits, still an opposition stronghold. Félix Patzi, the president, described the civic committee’s role as keeping “an eye on government projects to make sure they follow through on their promises”. But the US embassy had been in contact with a staggering request, he recalled. “They made an offer years ago. They wanted to finance a meeting of all the civic committees in the country to bring them together in 2007,” he said. The idea was “to bring together the works of the different civic committees to encourage communication between them”. He added: “I don’t know why the US did it, but we heard from Santa Cruz that the idea was to create a national civic committee.” The US obviously knew (from its own internal documents) that such a national civic committee would be right wing and take on a political and governmental role. That must have been its intention. Mr Patzi said the Chuquisaca committee refused because it doesn’t receive outside funding, but, he added, “I don’t how many other civic committees have accepted money from the US.”

Back at the SCCC I talked to other officials who gave the impression of a tight relationship with the US. “We’ve always tried to work so that civil society in Bolivia has its own place to develop,” said Nicolas Ribera Cardozo, vice president of the SCCC. “We’ve always had a conversation with the US about it.” He said that in the past year-and-a-half as vice president he had had two conversations with the head of communications and publications at the embassy. “What they put across was how they could strengthen channels of communication,” he said. “The embassy said that they would help us in our communication work and they have a series of publications where they were putting forward their ideas.” But things were even better under Bush. “There were better programs under Bush; there were programs from USAID and DEA [the US Drug Enforcement Administration] to deal with narco-trafficking.” He added that the US-funded National Endowment for Democracy had “held informative workshops for young people about leadership”. For him it was not controversial that these programs were designed to help the opposition. “Of course they were opposition, it’s a liberal train of thought, you train people to be more aware, productive.”

The most controversial aspect of the SCCC is its youth branch, the Unión Juvenil Cruceñista (UJC), who have been called by one Bolivia analyst “paramilitary shock-troops”. They roam the streets of Santa Cruz in times of unrest and have been involved in violent attacks and atrocities against indigenous peasants, as well as damage to government buildings. The US embassy noted that the UJC “have frequently attacked pro-MAS/government people and installations”, adding, “Their actions frequently appear more racist than politically motivated. Several months ago, a group of mainly white Youth Union members attacked an altiplano migrant … The Youth Union has boasted to the press that it has signed up 7000 members to participate in the [civil defense militias] – the number is likely inflated but many of those who have signed-on are militant.” Another cable noted: “the Santa Cruz youth union seems to be radicalizing: one group waving Santa Cruz flags drove through town in a jeep emblazoned with swastikas.” In the aftermath of the Rózsa plot, the police apprehended Juan Carlos Gueber Bruno, reportedly an advisor to the UJC, and former SCCC activist, who was known as “Comandante Bruno”.

“Youth Union violence was basically in retaliation to a threat,” Mr Cardozo told me. “The youth groups did participate in these things but because they thought it was a threat and MAS started it.”

I also talked to Samuel Ruiz, president of the UJC, at the SCCC headquarters, surrounded by photos of previous presidents, including Marinkovic and Costas. “The committee was formed in 1952 as a means to protect this region, it was under attack from other regions and felt it needed to protect itself,” said Mr Ruiz. “The civic committee existed but it was felt it could do with a youth branch too.” Now the UJC has 3,000 passive members, and 500 active, according to its president. Asked three times if it has any indigenous people as members, he avoided the question twice. On the third time of asking, he replied: “What percentage? I don’t know. There are 20 representatives in different provinces that represent areas with indigenous people.” He complained that when Morales came to power he got rid of USAID and other US groups – a false claim. “It has had a huge impact,” he said. “When there were international agencies, Bolivia was much more peaceful, now we see loose arms and legs about the streets, there are kidnappings, it’s violent and dangerous whereas it wasn’t before.” The UJC had taken matters into its own hands. He said that the government was bringing people from Chile and Peru to train farmers in military combat, and that Venezuelan and Cuban doctors were actually providing military training. His paranoia about Cuban and Venezuelan influence was similar to that shown in the cables from US officials. He claimed that Morales sent campesinos to Santa Cruz to start violence at the height of the tension, even though the cables noted that Morales went out of his way to avoid casualties. “[M]ilitary planners have told us that President Morales has given them instructions not to incur civilian casualties,” one noted. “Field commanders continue to tell us they will require a written order from President Morales if asked to commit violence against opposition demonstrators.” Another said: “A senior military planner told [an embassy official] December 13 that President Morales wants the military to be careful to avoid violent confrontations with demonstrators if called upon to support Bolivian police.”

“We are monitoring government to see what they are doing,” Ruiz claimed. “But for example they are getting people from Peru to come and train campesinos who kill my friends, and they are training campesinos in war, what are we meant to do?” On the resulting violence against indigenous people, Ruiz said it was self-defense. “After last elections, Evo sent campesinos to Santa Cruz to start aggression; our organization sent out its people but only to defend itself … It’s not a direct threat,” he admitted, but it worried him because they were “training campesinos who can’t even read or go out and feed themselves”. Ruiz claimed the UJC has never had any weapons – which is also demonstrably false.

The cables also revealed US suspicions in the same period that “some Crucenos are reportedly forming fighting groups”. They would know, as they were funding them. “Sources reported that Crucenos are developing fighting/defense groups and are equipped with weapons such as long rifles and hand guns.” Ruiz claimed that fighting campesinos caused the Pando massacre. “The Venezuelans killed the indigenous people. There are photos … The Venezuelans infiltrated by entering through the Cuban doctors,” he said. “They went to Pando to form military strategy for organization, so it wasn’t chaos, but all the campesinos, armed people, were drunk, and the Venezuelans killed them by mistake because they didn’t know what side they were on, and they also shot in the leg a Bolivian journalist because they wanted them to stop filming.” The SCCC were also implicated in the Rózsa plot by Ignacio Villa Vargas, a local fixer and driver for the group, who said that a number of their members had been involved. But the SCCC believed that the Morales government organized the Rózsa plot. They did, though, admit to me that Rózsa had been to their offices, but they claimed that he was trying to infiltrate the committee on behalf of the government, disguised as a journalist. I was shown screenshots of supposed emails between Rózsa and Vice President Álvaro García Linera, which were clearly faked, dating from August 2008 and March 2009, just before the raid in the Hotel Las Americas.

The cables revealed by WikiLeaks noted that the opposition “are nervous to the point of paranoia”. They were also trying to cover their tracks with delusional conspiracy theories. As noted above, one of those suspected of involvement in the terror cell was retired president of the SCCC, Branko Marinkovic, one of the wealthiest men in Bolivia, who owns a vast soybean business and large tracts of land in the east of country. His parents were emigrants from the former Yugoslavia in the 1950s and Marinkovic became a successful businessman before moving into politics, a well-trodden route in the east of Bolivia. When the Morales government came to power and embarked on a land reform program that took fallow lands from their owners to give to landless peasants, men like Marinkovic had much to lose. In a 2007 interview with the New York Times, Marinkovic predicted that Bolivia would soon be like Zimbabwe “in which economic chaos will become the norm”. (The head of the International Monetary Fund’s western hemisphere countries unit in the same year praised the Morales government for what he referred to as its “very responsible” macroeconomic policies.) But Marinkovic continued – “speaking English with a light Texas twang he picked up at Southern Methodist University” – with a veiled threat: “If there is no legitimate international mediation in our crisis, there is going to be confrontation. And unfortunately, it is going to be bloody and painful for all Bolivians.” This was just before the Rózsa-Flores plot was scuppered.

The New York Times also noted that Croatian news services had investigated claims that Marinkovic “sought to raise a paramilitary force with mercenaries from Montenegro, where his mother was born”. Marinkovic denied the claims, but there is no doubt he was pushing for a break-up of the country in the same way Yugoslavia had been split in the 1990s. On September 1, 2008, Marinkovic flew to the US, and when he came back just a week later the east of the country was in open revolt. At around the same time, US ambassador Philip Goldberg met in secret with the governor of Santa Cruz, Rubén Costas (the meeting was captured by a news organization). Initially Marinkovic filed a lawsuit against two government officials for “slander” for linking him with the Rózsa-Flores plot. His attorney declared that he “is in Santa Cruz, will stay in Santa Cruz, and will remain in the country”, to prove he had no links to the terrorist cell. Except now he is in hiding. The UJC president divulged that he was in the US. “The government has already cast him as guilty and he can’t defend himself from here so he asked the US for political exile and they granted it to him.” Like Achá. He added that he didn’t know if Marinkovic had ever met Rózsa. Maybe it’s not so surprising. “The US has had a very good relationship with Branko Marinkovic,” said Mr Navarro, MAS minister. “When he was head of civic committee they shared their opposition to the president.” Marinkovic once jettisoned plans to visit Argentina due to distrust of the Morales-allied Kirchner government, fearing that he might be arrested there and extradited to Bolivia. During one of Marinkovic’s trips to the US, he, contrariwise, participated in strategy meetings with political consultants Greenberg Quinlan Rosner and other polling and consulting firms, according to WikiLeaks cables.

When I had finished talking to the SCCC, I asked if there was anyone else I should speak to. The spokesperson recommended former general Gary Prado, who is infamous for being the man who captured Che Guevara and handed him over to his executioners. At the time Prado was a young captain in the Bolivian army. “Where do I find him?” I asked. “He usually has coffee over there in a little café about 4pm every day,” I was told. I subsequently found out that Gary Prado is under house arrest, but as it is not enforced he moves around freely. I head along to his house in an upmarket neighborhood of Santa Cruz. “I am under house arrest but I go to work every day so there’s not much point in that,” he said. Mr Navarro had told me there was “a group of retired generals who have advised the civic committee in the event of a government attack on them”. Prado is alleged to be among them. The government has drawn attention to a meeting Prado had with Rózsa at his house. “I gave an interview to Rózsa- Flores just like I’m giving to you, he came here to this same room, we had an interview about the guerrilla Che Guevara in Bolivia, he took a picture with me here, and that’s all the contact I had with him.” Rózsa apparently thought he was the new Che Guevara, as well as the new Hemingway. But from what Prado does know, he doesn’t believe that Rózsa planned to assassinate Morales. “There was no intent of assassination, never, absolutely not,” he said. Asked why they bought in foreigners, he replied: “They were brought to Santa Cruz by some people probably to try to create a group of mercenaries to defend Santa Cruz.” Then he added that the cell was “probably created to justify political repression”. He would not offer a guess on who bought the mercenaries in. The US, he added, merely “promote seminars about democracy and freedom”.

The massacre that wasn’t

In May 2008 political turmoil rocked Bolivia and threatened civil war. Santa Cruz held an autonomy referendum, which the government claimed was a move to secession by the eastern province. Rubén Costas, the governor of Santa Cruz, had said in the run-up that the vote – which was not legally sanctioned by the National Electoral Court or recognized by the OAS – would “give birth to a new republic”. (This is the same governor whom terror suspect Mario Tadic told authorities had met with the terror cell’s leader three times and vaguely discussed “organizing something”.) As things hurtled out of control with mass protests and violence, President Morales refrained from annulling the plebiscites which took place in other departments and called a recall referendum on his own mandate. He won resoundingly, with two- thirds of the national vote. At this point, desperate and bewildered, the opposition went on strike, and sent out the UJC (the far-right youth group) to attack government buildings and local indigenous people. The defeat at the polls led the opposition to unilaterally declare “autonomy” in four of the country’s eastern provinces. One of the platforms of the autonomy movement was the rejection of central government control over profits from the country’s natural gas reserves concentrated in the region. In the Bolivian context, therefore, the term was used as a euphemism for increased control over taxation, police and public works. If autonomy was granted in the form Santa Cruz wanted, Morales’ extensive reforms would be impossible – which was obviously the aim of the request.

The strategy of the autonomy movement was to take complete control of the media luna, provoke a national crisis to destabilize the government, and convince the army to remain neutral or move against Morales. The mayor of Santa Cruz, Percy Fernández, had already called on the military to overthrow Morales’ “useless government” just before the August referendum. In this heady tumult, in September 2008, 13 indigenous peasants in the Pando department of Bolivia were massacred in violence erupting across the region between pro- government and opposition forces. The atrocity remains relatively uncontroversial – unless you are the HRF, Achá, or the Bolivian opposition. A report by the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) placed the blame for the killing of the peasants at the hands of people working for the local prefecture, which was led at the time by the opposition politician Leopoldo Fernández. Fernández is still in jail in La Paz, after being arrested, in the aftermath, on charges that he was involved in ordering the attack. The US embassy, in the WikiLeaks cables, noted that he was being held “under dubious legal pretext”.

The UN report unequivocally called it a “massacre of peasants” and a “grave violation of human rights”, concluding that the massacre was committed by personnel from the local road service office, members of the Pando civic committee and others linked to the prefecture. The Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) also sent a delegation to investigate, headed by Argentina’s undersecretary for human rights who concluded that the Bolivian government had acted fairly and it was the opposition that was responsible for the murders. Chilean President Michelle Bachelet called an emergency meeting in Santiago of UNASUR to discuss the Bolivian crisis. The resulting Declaration of La Moneda, signed by the 12 UNASUR governments, expressed their “full and decided support for the constitutional government of President Evo Morales”, and warned that their respective governments “will not recognize any situation that entails an attempt for a civil coup that ruptures the institutional order, or that compromises the territorial integrity of the Republic of Bolivia”. Morales, who participated in the meeting, thanked UNASUR for its support, declaring: “For the first time in South American’s history, the countries of our region are deciding how to resolve our problems without the presence of the United States.”

But men like Achá and his “affiliate” HRF saw it differently. In October, a month after the massacre, HRF dispatched their own team to Bolivia to investigate – not the massacre but the “arbitrary detention” of “opposition members and at least one journalist”. HRF’s sources in Bolivia, presumably Achá, were telling it how serious the situation was. “Preliminary research done by our staff and reports sent to us from Bolivian civil society advocates suggest that the recent arrests of journalists and members of the opposition in Bolivia are politically motivated,” said Sarah Wasserman, chief operating officer of HRF. The report from Achá, as mentioned by the US ambassador, posited that the MAS government had actually initiated the murders. And the HRF went on to link the massacre to a speech by government minister Ramón Quintana exhorting government sympathizers to take Pando governor Leopoldo Fernández “to the end of the world” and “give him an epitaph: Prefect, rest in peace and live with the worms. “The speech preceded violence that erupted on September 11, 12 and 13 in Pando, where more than 20 people were murdered for political reasons,” they noted. The report by the Bolivian “affiliate” of the HRF blames the massacre on Morales and his national executive officers. “The deterioration of the rule of law, individual rights … do not allow the existence of a democratic system,” the report concluded. “In Bolivia, with this background, it outlines the installation of a regime despotic and dictatorial presided by Evo Morales.”

To be fair, there were other NGOs which came to a similar conclusion. One was the aforementioned UnoAmerica, another “human rights” group based in Colombia, whose logo shows crosshairs in the ‘o’ in their name. It was founded in 2008 by Alejandro Peña Esclusa, who is now detained in his home country, Venezuela, for allegedly being found with detonators and 2lb of explosives in his home. The Venezuelan government claims he has close ties to the CIA, and was involved in the 2002 US-backed coup that temporarily deposed Hugo Chávez. In one video, Esclusa is seen insisting on a plan for massive protests across Venezuela, making the government unable to control it. “It is a more efficient mechanism that generates a political crisis and a crisis of instability that forces the regime to withdraw the reform,” he says. UnoAmerica became heavily involved in Bolivia after the Pando massacre, sending a team on a five-day mission to investigate what had happened. To conduct the investigation they partnered with NGOs from Argentina, Colombia, Uruguay and Venezuela (whose names read like a Who’s Who of fascists in Latin America). Taking part from Argentina was El Movimiento por la Verdadera Historia, or Movement for the True History, a group which seeks to bring to justice “subversives” working against the US-backed fascist junta that ruled from 1976 to 1983 and murdered an estimated 30,000 people. One of its Argentina delegates was Jorge Mones Ruiz, an intelligence officer of the Argentine army in Bolivia during last dictatorship. (The government also claimed that the Rózsa cell had links with fascist groups in Argentina, which go by the name of carapintadas or “painted faces”.)

The joint report concluded that “the government of President Evo Morales had planned and executed the violent acts”. It claimed it had “sufficient information to demonstrate the responsibility of the Evo Morales administration in the so called Pando Massacre”. The WikiLeaks cables revealed that the US embassy was receiving highly questionable intelligence like this from Achá and other contacts in the opposition, without applying the constant cynicism it reserved for MAS statements. In conversation with a political officer from the embassy, one contact “alleged the MAS deliberately fomented unrest in Pando in September to justify a military siege, depose Prefect Leopoldo Fernandez, and arrest opposition-aligned leaders to swing the balance of power to the MAS in the Senate”. It is not countered. Another cable noted after the September 2008 violence in Pando: “the government illegally jailed Prefect Leopoldo Fernandez and violently detained over forty more, many of them prominent political opposition members.” The UN had said that Fernández’s jailing was not illegal.

We’ll take care of him

The most active of the many US agencies working in Bolivia is USAID, the main foreign aid arm of the US government. USAID poured money into the country: between 1964 and 1979, it contributed more than $1.5 billion, trying to build a citizenry and investor climate conducive to US corporate needs. For nearly half a century it has carried out its ostensible goal of providing “economic and humanitarian assistance” – a gift “from the American people”. The agency operates around the world in a similar capacity, and invests billions of dollars annually on projects that span from “democracy promotion” to “judicial reform”.

Its operations are controversial. The Morales administration has continually said that it uses its money to push the strategic goals of the US government under the cloak of “development”, claims denied by the US government. The Bolivian government also derides the lack of transparency, in comparison with EU aid money, for its programs. Mark Feierstein, USAID assistant administrator for Latin America and the Caribbean, put its raison d’être bluntly in December 2010 when he said: “USAID’s programs are not charity … they are not only from the

American people, as the agency’s motto says, they are for the American people.” As an aside, Mr Feierstein was a key campaign consultant to the former president Lozada (Goni) who fled to the US to avoid facing trial for the massacre of protesters in La Paz. There is now an attempt to prosecute him under the Aliens Tort Statute for his role in the murders. (Feierstein has never expressed regret about the campaign; in fact, the same firm did polling for Morales’ opponent, Manfred Reyes Villa, in 2009.)

Like other methods and agencies used to control democracies in Latin America and around the world, it is hard to pin down USAID. But on-the-ground interviews, documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act and the WikiLeaks cables have made it possible to unearth the strategies this agency uses to keep its stranglehold on Bolivia, at the same time providing a template for how it is used across the region to undermine left-wing democratic governments. There is no doubt how USAID personnel felt about Morales before he came into power, and one young American student heard first-hand their plans for him. In the summer of 2005, he found himself in La Paz learning Spanish on a break from university when the powder keg of political resistance in the city blew up. President Carlos Mesa – who had taken over from Goni in 2003 after the massacre of protesters in La Paz – had just stepped down. The student decided to go on a bike trip. “Basically I went down the ‘Death Road’, the world’s most dangerous road, with some other gringos,” he said, not wanting to be named. “There were some folks from the US embassy and USAID on the trip. I remember them having a discussion on the road down to [the city of ] Coroico, talking about not wanting Evo to get into power. They said something along the lines of, ‘We can’t let Evo get into power’.”

In fact, the officials went further. “There were two things that were said, one was ‘We can’t let Evo get into power’, and then something along the lines of, it struck me, it was harsher than that, it was something along the lines of, ‘We’ll have to take care of him’. It was ambiguous enough that it could be interpreted that we have to take him out, which I don’t think is what they meant. But when they said it I thought, ‘Whoa, I can’t believe they are saying this, they don’t even know me’.” The conversation continued as the group descended the mountain. “I’m assuming they thought I was sympathetic,” he said. “This was right in the middle of the protests and the president resigning, so a lot of the tourists had fled Bolivia, so perhaps they thought I was there because I was working for some sympathetic capacity, maybe working for an international corporation, or related to the embassy or something. It shocked me at the time. One, it seemed weird to have this conversation in public, because not everybody is sympathetic. And two it seemed like they were meddling in democracy, people that shouldn’t be involved in those things, the US embassy and USAID shouldn’t have anything to do with voting a president into power or not.”

But involved they were and would remain as Morales eventually did take power.

Much important work has been carried out on this topic by the investigative journalist Jeremy Bigwood in the period before MAS came to power, but his Freedom of Information Act requests stopped being answered when he asked for information about projects after the election of 2005. What Bigwood unearthed from before 2005 supports the testimony of the American student. Early on, the MAS party was fingered as a problem for the US that had to be dealt with. In a declassified July 2002 letter from the US embassy, a planned USAID political party reform project was outlined which aimed to “help build moderate, pro- democracy political parties that can serve as a counterweight to the radical [MAS]”. The next section, presumably more open on details, was redacted. A series of emails from USAID functionaries in Bolivia also detailed attempts to form relationships between the US government and indigenous groups in the coca growing region of the Chapare (the sector from which Morales emerged) and the eastern departments, aiming, as Bigwood explained, to “create a common USAID-guided front against … the MAS”. A few years into the MAS government, USAID made itself so unpopular in the Chapare region that its local leaders in 2008 suspended all projects funded by the agency. They said they would replace the funding with money from Chávez’s Venezuela. In Pando, the mayors signed a declaration in 2008 also expelling USAID. “No foreign program, least of all those from USAID, will solve our problems of poverty, physical integration, family prosperity and human development while we ourselves don’t decide the future,” it said.

I managed to procure documents that relate to the operations of projects since 2005, and they show a similar effort to weaken the power and popularity of the MAS government. The USAID tactic is not the overthrow of the government, but the slow transformation of Bolivian society from its participatory democracy to the type of democracy it had before: controlled by the US and good for investors. The Bolivian example is important because it provides a template of how USAID tries to control Latin American democracies that have “got out of control” and make them work “for the American people”, or American business interests.

Of course, USAID pitches itself as something completely different. In one cable from La Paz, the ambassador wrote: “We will continue to counter misunderstandings about USAID’s transparency and apolitical nature with reality.” But the reality is that the agency is not transparent or apolitical. And its own internal documents reveal as much. USAID maintains it is transparent with the money it invests in the country, but the Bolivian government claims large sums are being handed out without its knowledge, in contravention of usual aid etiquette. In the WikiLeaks cables, Morales tells the US he wants to start an “open registry to monitor aid”, but it was not supported by the US. The Bolivian government’s estimate that 70 percent of aid money is unaccounted for appears overstated, but there is clear evidence that money was being spent without the knowledge of the government.

After one spate of criticism of USAID programs by Morales, the US ambassador noted that the country “cannot afford to risk USD120 million in assistance” from the agency (it works out as about $12 for every Bolivian). In another, it is noted: “we’re spending about $90 million annually to further social and economic inclusion of Bolivia’s historically marginalized indigenous groups and to support democratic institutions and processes, including decentralized governance.” But an American journalist living in La Paz was present at an emergency meeting called by the US embassy to explain USAID’s activities to foreign journalists, after another round of criticism. She was given a breakdown of spending by USAID. “This information was given to the small group of reporters gathered to use as background in stories,” she told me. It outlined $16.8 million to USAID health programs, $19.2 million to integrated alternative development (alternative to coca production), $15.3 million to environmental and economic development programs, and $22 million to counter-narcotics. It added up to $73.3 million. But the ambassador had said in the cable that $120 million was invested in Bolivia per year. Where was the other $50 million going?

Internal evaluation documents give an indication of why some projects are best kept secret. I procured a host of documents on USAID “democracy promotion” programs in Bolivia in the period after the Morales government was elected. In one, outlining the goals and success of its “administration of justice” programs which have run in the country for 17 years – “among the largest in Latin America” – the group was explicit about where its money was going. “USAID/ Bolivia programs include support to promote decentralization and municipal strengthening, support to Congress and political parties,” it noted. There is no mention of which political parties it is “supporting” but this is candid language that the group and the US embassy have never used in public. (Morales has said that one mayor told him that USAID offered him $15,000 to $25,000 to oppose the president.) Decentralization in this context is also a euphemism for strengthening the opposition. One of USAID’s central functions in Bolivia, ramped up since 2005, has been moving power away from central government, an effort which clearly chimes with the interests of the opposition in the east.

The justice project was conceived by USAID and Bolivian officials before the 2005 election that brought Evo Morales to power, and coordinators admit that “the personnel changes at the higher echelons” of the government “completely changed the atmosphere” in which it worked. The project hoped to open a training school for public defenders, but in mid-2007 it was suspended, “a prime example of the project being ‘overtaken by events’ that were completely outside the control of … USAID,” the evaluation noted. Internally, USAID was very critical of the Morales government on the subject, commenting that the Bar Associations of Bolivia have been “significantly weakened in the past few years” by the government’s policies. As is customary in projects of this kind, USAID paid subcontractors to carry out their functions, enhancing the already intricate web of institutions and clouding accountability. This project was run by Checchi and Company Consulting, set up in 1973 by economist and Democratic donor Vincent Checchi, which then brought on board the State University of New York and Partners of the Americas. One of the main ways USAID exerts influence – in this justice program but also through its other activities – is through training programs. These programs school young Bolivians in the “American way”.

In Sucre, I spoke to Ramiro Velasquez, an administrator in the local government offices who has worked for a USAID-funded program in the city. He said it was set up by a consultancy firm, funded by USAID, which has a subsidiary called Fortalecimiento Identidad de Democracia, or FIDEM. “They were looking for Bolivian operators in every department to do their work,” he said. “FIDEM was looking for an NGO to do the work and they would look for operators. They were in La Paz, Oruro, Potosi, and Sucre.” Mr Velasquez was asked to be an operator and told they wanted him to run courses on “democracy and participation”, a program eventually shut down by the Morales government. “This project was aimed at young people,” he said. “So to get young people, you had to get into universities and social movements and state institutions, even the church.” In the end 600 young people signed up. The courses took on two phases with the first workshops an opportunity to select around 20 young people to move on to La Paz for the second phase, carried out by FIDEM and another NGO. It was called “leadership training”, ostensibly to create a new generation of Bolivian leaders. But they had to have the right opinions. “They were teaching about democracy but not the type of democracy Evo and Bolivians have,” he said. “They were teaching them about representative democracy not participatory democracy … It was clearly to create leaders for the opposition.”

The cables from La Paz support such a conclusion. One visiting official went to a “civic education project funded by USAID through the NGO FIDEM and implemented by the Santa Cruz binational center”. Its aim was to grow a “civic responsibility” arm in addition to its educational and cultural activities. “The project was reaching 21,000 (out of 150,000) residents in the marginalized neighbourhood ‘Plan 3000’ which is widely thought to be a MAS stronghold,” it added, as if to explain why it was a good thing. The local residents were “enthusiastic” about the initiative, it noted. The same cable registered that Santa Cruz residents were “determined as much as possible to halt democratic back-sliding. Their main request to us is to report accurately to Washington and the international community what is really happening in Bolivia.” Vice President García Linera repeatedly told the US embassy he opposed democracy programs like FIDEM’s, because they strive to “win the hearts and minds”, presenting a vision of democracy that differs from the government’s. It was true. FIDEM works in eight of the nine departments in Bolivia (three of which are governed by democratically elected MAS prefects) providing the kind of state-building training and technical assistance that USAID and other donors provide worldwide. The work – regional development planning, service delivery, financial planning and more – is technical and non-political. Its focus on departmental authorities was planned to weaken MAS, as was admitted in the cables: “MAS’s goals [is] strengthening municipal governments to the detriment of departmental governments, thus weakening one of the MAS’s main sources of opposition.”

Also in Sucre, I talked to the MAS mayor, Verónica Berrios Vergara, who has been under concerted attack since taking her position in 2008. The city had been the venue of intense violent unrest in 2007 when the constituent assembly, given the responsibility of writing a new constitution, was placed there. In 2008, an opposition candidate was voted into the position of mayor in Sucre, but was disqualified because he was under a criminal charge. Ms Vergara took his place on a decision of the municipal council, causing an outbreak of violence and unrest. “Vested interests were behind the anger of the opposition and that led to us living the most difficult moment in Sucre in many years,” she told me. She said various explosives were thrown at the mayor’s headquarters and the dissidents tried to kill her on a number of occasions. “One of the questions we asked ourselves at the time is where these students got the money from, because they had the money to buy lots of explosives. They don’t even usually have enough for rent and food, where did they get the money for them from?” She began to cry as she recounted her experiences at the sharp end of the turmoil in Bolivia. “I do fear that these groups are still waiting in the wings and at any point they could come out and do something to me,” she said. “This is really about racism and also that this local government and national government are threatening business interests.” She believed that USAID was behind the funding to some of these groups: “The fact that the Rózsa affair was taking place at the same time and there were question marks over USAID’s work and suggestions they were trying to overthrow the government leads me to question where the money was coming from.” At the time it sparked violence in the streets of the city, which Ms Vergara thinks USAID was behind. “They are in union with the opposition and media to stand in the way of the government’s development plans in the country.”

Building democracy an investor-friendly business climate

USAID had another reason to dislike President Morales and his government: they weren’t good for business. The investment climate in Bolivia, which had been open for business to US transnationals for decades, was turning into a more hostile place. Their fears were shared by their natural allies among the oligarchy of European descent in the east of Bolivia. Both were increasingly scared of the economic

program of the Morales government, which has provided a model for developing countries around the world: achieving high growth, as well as reductions in poverty, while part-nationalizing key industries. The Bolivian government, even when composed of ruthless dictators, maintained an investor-friendly business climate, which saw US mining companies, such as Coeur d’Alene Mines Corp, take advantage of the vast natural resources in the country as the Spanish had done before them. Bolivia’s major exports to the United States are tin, gold, jewellery and wood products. For a long time, foreign investors were accorded national treatment, and foreign owners of companies enjoyed virtually no restriction. Foreign direct investment (FDI) in Bolivia grew to $7 billion in stock during 1996–2002, nearly all of which went to the business interests in the east.

Concern about nationalization crops up frequently in the cables from La Paz. “There is … rampant speculation about President Morales’ traditional May 1st speech, in which he is expected by many to announce nationalization of companies based in Santa Cruz, potentially including Cotas or food industries,” one reads. “If the latter, many expect Branko Marinkovic’s cooking oil and other companies to be taken in the name of ‘food security’.” The cables from La Paz do not pull punches when outlining their opposition to the economic thinking of the MAS government. One advisor to Morales, an economics professor is, one cable notes, “steeped in out- dated socialist economic theories and has yet to accept the practical realities of a globalized economy”. It adds that he “may be beginning to understand the real impact of free trade on job creation”, but, unforgivably, “he appears to believe that markets in Venezuela and China serve as alternatives to US markets. He has told Bolivian exporters to seek markets outside the United States, unconvinced that the US is crucial to their trade.” It notes that he recently returned from Venezuela after negotiating an agreement to buy Bolivian soy. “Additionally, he has regularly antagonized other businesses, telling them that the President’s Dignity Tariff, a new lower price meant to provide cheap electricity to Bolivians is a done deal, remarking that the private sector should either get on board or suffer.”

USAID had a plan to deal with this. One of the most important components of the justice project is “promotion of legal security”, through which “it was hoped that the business and investment climate in Bolivia would be improved”. The principal donor for this purpose was USAID and the project was budgeted $4.8 million over five years. It chimed with the sentiment in cables from La Paz, one of which noted, the “key areas of concern in Bolivia currently are democracy, narcotics, and protection for US investments”(my emphasis). The justice project sought “reforms in the commercial and administrative law areas” as well as “business organization assistance and training”. For this purpose, USAID funding would help develop a civil, commercial and administrative law curriculum for law schools in Bolivia. In a sign of the penetration of USAID into the highest echelons of the justice system, USAID and the Bolivian Supreme Court jointly published a document called Civil and Commercial Justice in Bolivia: Diagnosis and Recommendations for Change, which urged the creation of a specialized commercial law jurisdiction. It would “enhance the investment climate of Bolivia”, while the “establishment of a good business climate is essential to attracting investment” and will “maintain and improve its competitiveness”. It noted: “This component was important to the overall success of the … project due to the fact that it enlisted enthusiastic support from many private sector actors, while also furthering the goal of improving the investment and business climate in Bolivia.” The agency worked with its “partner organization”, the National Chamber of Commerce, in order to replicate and strengthen arbitration centers through local chambers of commerce (big donors to civic committees). “If Bolivia wants to attract foreign investment … then it will need legal security for investors,” it noted. “Should there be an opportunity to continue the work in this area, it would be of high importance for the development of Bolivia.” Their natural allies in this task were organizations like CAINCO, a business confederation in Santa Cruz. In the aftermath of the Rózsa shoot-out, another suspect, Alejandro Melgar, who was a key figure in CAINCO, fled the country. Eduardo Paz, the president of CAINCO, was also an investor in the Santa Cruz civic committee. One cable noted that “The main impact [of nationalization] has been to halt new investment in the [energy] sector, which Bolivia needs to meet domestic demand and fulfil contractual obligations to Brazil and Argentina.” It added that “[as] a political measure, however, the ‘nationalization’ remains wildly popular.” It was also successful. In June 2011, Standard & Poor’s, the rating agency, raised Bolivia’s credit ratings by one notch, praising President Evo Morales’ “prudent” macroeconomic policies which allowed for a steady decline in the country’s debt ratios.

The truth was that the US embassy was fearful for US mining investments, despite high-level Bolivian officials giving “repeated assurances that the Morales administration will respect existing US mining interests”.

Threats that the Bolivian government would nationalize the mining industry – including taking over a smelter owned by Swiss company Glencore (which had been sold by ex-president Goni) – scared them. “We continue to urge the [Government of Bolivia] to respect existing mining concessions and to limit tax and royalty hikes,” one cable noted. In other words, create a good “business climate” at the expense of the population. The US embassy viewed the Morales administration as contrary to its interests. “Strengthening and supporting democracy in Bolivia is our mission’s primary concern,” notes another cable. But in the next line it says: “Although the ruling MAS party and President Evo Morales were elected with a clear majority in fair and open elections, their actions since assuming power have often displayed anti-democratic tendencies.” Elsewhere the cables note the “overwhelming victory” of MAS in elections. Despite this, the US called Morales a “leader with strong anti-democratic tendencies” who “manipulates the media”. His closest advisors were compared to “back alley thugs”.

In fact, the democratic credentials and popular mandate of the MAS government are among the most stellar in the world. First elected to the presidency in December 2005 by 54 percent of the popular vote, nearly double the 29 percent of his nearest rival, Morales was re-elected in December 2009 by 67 percent of the public vote, more than double the percentage won by his nearest opponent, Manfred Reyes Villa. In between these landslides, Morales won the recall referendum called in the face of the “autonomy movement” in August 2008 with 67 percent of the public voting for him to be returned. Just five months later, in January 2009, Morales won the constitutional referendum with 61 percent voting in favor, to 39 percent against. In 2014, he won yet another landslide. But the embassy was disparaging of these achievements, saying Morales was “like a struggling student in the areas of economics and international relations decision-making”. It also noted his apparent desire to become a dictator: “[As] an admirer of Cuban President Fidel Castro and Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, Morales probably is drawn by the longevity of their time in power and seeks to emulate their ‘success’.” It was rubbish. The referendum in 2009 stipulated a two- term limit for the presidency. On the occasion of a foreign dignitary visiting, the ambassador pushed him “to encourage Morales to follow a democratic path”, alongside, of course, pushing him “to respect US mining interests to take advantage of free trade”.

The cables are full of fear about US investments. “One US investment which is vulnerable is San Cristobal mine, which is 65 percent owned by Apex Silver,” said one cable. “San Cristobal would be particularly hard-hit by a bill currently in Congress, which would increase mining taxes. Although the Bolivian government claims to want a fifty-fifty split of profits, the proposed tax increases actually result in, on average, a 60 percent government take of profits.” Although fantastically rich in silver and other mineral wealth, in the past the Bolivian people had never benefitted and stayed poor.

Trading bribes

The US was also using trade deals as leverage in trying to get MAS to change its economic outlook. In September 2008, President Bush suspended the crucial trade preferences that Bolivia enjoyed – alongside Colombia, Ecuador and Peru – under the Andean Trade Promotion and Drug Eradication Act (ATPDEA). The country has lost millions of dollars in exports because of this punitive action. The ostensible reason was Bolivia’s uncooperative attitude to coca eradication in the country, but political and economic motives were thought to be highly relevant. A Reuters article written a few weeks afterward noted that “the decision came one day after five leading US business groups urged the Bush administration and Congress to consider ending trade benefits for both Bolivia and Ecuador because of what they described as inadequate protections for foreign investors in both countries”. The next month, in November, President Morales announced that the DEA would be expelled from the country. For decades, hundreds of DEA agents swarmed the northern Pando and Beni regions, destroying coca crops and, in the process, becoming implicated in massacres of the indigenous cocaleros. Largely given a free rein to carry out military operations or eradication by successive governments eager to please their masters, the former cocalero Morales wasn’t so easy to convince. He charged that the DEA was carrying out “political espionage”, and “financing criminal groups so that they could act against authorities, even the president”.

The goal of the DEA, one cable noted, “is to provide assistance to achieve US goals while keeping the [government of Bolivia] out in front”. In 2008, Morales suspended DEA operations in Bolivia and expelled its 37 agents in the country. He named Steven Faucette, the regional agent of the DEA in Santa Cruz, as a spy, saying that he had made trips to cities in the media luna provinces of Beni and Pando with the objective of financing the civic committees which were committed to carrying out a “civic coup”. The US was also using its aid as leverage to keep the DEA in Bolivia. “The Ambassador suggested that if eradication is to be stopped and USG involvement in the Chapare ended … we could begin shutting off our multi-million dollar assistance programs now,” one cable noted. Many had long said that the DEA was acting as a front for the CIA in Bolivia. (The agency refused my request for information through the Freedom of Information Act, as did the National Security Agency.) The cables are full of criticism of Morales for failing to heed the US’s call for areas it specified to be cleared of coca. It also called the EU effort “relatively modest and narrowly-focused”.

But the US preoccupation with eradication in Bolivia, evidenced in the cables, is strange. According to one cable, the DEA estimated that “less than one percent of cocaine seized in the US can be chemically traced back to Bolivia”. One percent. The US was also alone in blocking a UN resolution on making the coca leaf sacred in 2011. The tension surfaced even though the Morales government was being largely compliant. The cables present successes like 133 factories being raided in El Alto during the first 10 months of 2008. During the first full year of Morales’s tenure, the amount of coca grown in Bolivia increased around 5 percent. In Colombia, the US ally, it jumped 27 percent in the same period, according to UN statistics.

The opposition I talked to, interestingly, were all in support of the DEA. The spokesperson for the SCCC said that during his time as a journalist working on the topic of narco-trafficking, he saw the DEA and the US embassy dealing with the issue properly: “They were teaching us about how the drugs workers work, how they buy drugs, it helped us.” Another vital US agency which works in Bolivia is the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), created by President Ronald Reagan in 1983 to “promote democracy”, but with a history of doing the opposite. In Bolivia it has focused on potentially recalcitrant indigenous areas, promoting the “American way” to the young. I obtained the proposals for various Bolivian projects granted money by the NED. The tactic of “training civil society” to gain a stranglehold on communities around Bolivia was exactly the same as that used by USAID projects. One project, Observancia, which ran from 2008 to 2009 and cost $54,664, was typical. It worked in eight municipalities in the country and helped in the “training of municipal functionaries and civil society”. The aim was to create future “municipal candidates” who would be “inserted into government programmes”. Another project, from 2006 to 2007 and costing $48,000, focused on Uriondo, Tarija, which sits in the media luna opposition stronghold. The grant was given at a politically tumultuous time. The report mentioned that the area of Tarija has the largest hydrocarbon deposits in the country, and the project wants “to increase the capacity” and “strengthen local government” of Uriondo, particularly by improving how the media communicates with the locals. Other projects look to “encourage political citizenship among young people”.

In one project in Totora, Cochabamba, the proposal notes that the population are mostly Quechua speaking and a lot more “politicized” than in Uriondo, adding that “there exists … an obstinate opposition to what they term as ‘neoliberal’, and they reject any advances from such parties”. Finally, it noted that the people of Totora organize themselves through a model of “corporativism” – the imposition of “a logic of the majoritarianism”, which rejects a form of democracy respectful of any differences. “This prompts us to consider that in the future we should include democratic values, in all sectors of society, not just as a citizen’s exercise when voting for their electoral representatives, but also with the logical respect that democracy has in other contemporary global societies,” the proposal noted. But the fact that the people of Totora organize themselves into collectives and make decisions collectively is common among indigenous groups throughout the country. The organization writing the proposal, however, concluded that this is in fact undemocratic and that they should introduce programs that demonstrate how undemocratic this form of democracy is compared with “other global societies”.

Another project called for better election monitoring. It suggested “revising the referendum votes for 2008 and 2009, where, in some regions, participation is registered at 100 percent and where the vote in favor of President Morales is of a similar percentage, something which does not have antecedents”. This accusation is questionable because in many departments people vote collectively – a tradition within many indigenous groups.

One project awarded $36,450 to the Bolivian National Press Association. Its ostensible aim was to defend freedom of expression “through the supervision and documentation of violations and threats against journalists” and “improve the professionalism and impartiality of Bolivian journalists”. However, its focus is trained on the government, in keeping with US embassy fears about Venezuelan influence. “The [National Press Association of Bolivia] denounces that the action the government of Morales has taken, something which has never happened under a democratic government, total control of the National Company of Bolivian Television (ENTB), when he integrated the directors with state ministers.” In another project, in Totora, it was noted that they were “expecting – in the coming months – the installation of a community radio transmitter, financed by the Venezuelan government, which forms part of a communications network which that regime has been promoting”. A later section called 2008 “the worst year for freedom of expression since the return to democracy” with “one dead and over a hundred attacks”. The Santa Cruz UJC and its allies committed a number of these attacks. In one case: “A police officer sprayed pepper spray at a journalist who approached the Vice President of the Santa Cruz Youth Union.” The NED criticized Evo Morales for denouncing La Razon newspaper, even though coverage of the president Morales in that newspaper has been overtly racist for years, with racist caricatures and racist commentary.

Very measured

As in smaller countries in the region, such as Haiti, the US embassy in Bolivia wielded huge power through the second half of the 20th century, often more than the sovereign government itself. The US embassy in La Paz is the second largest in Latin America (slightly

smaller than in Brazil), despite the country having a population of just 9 million people. Through the last 50 years, the US had supported coups to get “their” dictators in place (Hugo Banzer), lent public relations specialists to get “their” presidents in place when democracy returned (Goni), and sent their brightest economists to “restructure” the economy in their image (Jeffrey Sachs). Now, the US provides sanctuary for “their” presidents wanted for crimes against humanity (Goni, again). But such a situation could give rise to complacency. And the election of the democratic socialist government of MAS in Bolivia marked the first time the country threatened to break free of US control. As such, relationships with ambassadors from the US became increasingly strained as the power dynamic switched around, and the sovereign government issued orders to the embassy, not the other way around. Maria Beatriz Souviron, Bolivian ambassador to the UK, told me: “The US ambassador before Morales had a lot of influence over the politics in our country, even pushing to take domestic decisions at some points.” She added: “We want some sovereignty in our country and to make our own decisions. And of course the former ambassador [Goldberg] was involved with the opposition.”

The MAS government accused ambassador Philip Goldberg of “subversive actions” which included a “disinformation campaign” in the lead-up to the recall referendum, as he tried to unite the opposition. In late 2007, the US embassy began moving openly to meet with the right-wing opposition in the media luna. Ambassador Goldberg was photographed in Santa Cruz with a leading business magnate who backed the autonomy movement, and a well-known Colombian narco-trafficker who had been detained by the local police. Morales, in revealing the photo, said the trafficker was linked to right-wing paramilitary organizations in Colombia. In response, the US embassy asserted that it couldn’t vet everyone who appeared in a photo with the ambassador. Goldberg was expelled because of his meetings with opposition figures at the most on-edge period of the battle with the MAS government. In 2008, he was photographed having a secret meeting with opposition governor Rubén Costas. The US embassy liked Costas. In one cable it was noted: “Costas’ willingness to work with the United States would make him a solid democratic partner.” It also praised his “politically savvy use of the media to advance the interests of the media luna”.

This government anger at US embassy interference culminated in September 2009 when ambassador Goldberg was expelled from the country. He has still not been replaced, the US embassy having to make do with the diplomatic downgrade of a chargé d’affaires. The US retaliated by expelling the Bolivian ambassador to Washington. “The US embassy is historically used to calling the shots in Bolivia, violating our sovereignty, treating us like a banana republic,” said Gustavo Guzman, the ambassador who was expelled from Washington. Goldberg had an interesting history, which made him a curious appointment by President George W. Bush in October 2006. Between 1994 and 1996 he had served as State Department desk officer for Bosnia and as special assistant to the late Richard Holbrooke, who had been instrumental in brokering the Dayton Accords and then the NATO military campaign against Serbia in 1999. From 2004 to 2006, Goldberg served as chief of mission in Pristina, Kosovo. In other words, he was used to dealing with countries that were breaking up into their constituent parts.

The leaders of the Santa Cruz Civic Committee certainly liked him. “My overall impression of Goldberg is that he was very measured politically,” said its vice president. “Compared to the two ambassadors that preceded. They were very openly political, they got involved a great deal, and compared to them Goldberg was measured.”

The US embassy had been overtly hostile to Morales from the start, and the previous two ambassadors had openly tried to halt his rise to power. In 2002, when Morales narrowly lost his first presidential bid, US ambassador Manuel Rocha, the first Bush appointment, openly campaigned against him, threatening: “If you elect those who want Bolivia to become a major cocaine exporter again, this will endanger the future of US assistance to Bolivia.” In 2003, the second Bush appointment, David N. Greenlee, was put in place, and he had a long history with Bolivia. He served in the Peace Corps in Bolivia, 1965–67, and met his wife in the country. Later he served as a political officer at the US embassy in La Paz, 1977–79, dealing with issues, one think-tank noted, such as communism, military coups and Operation Condor, the continent-wide terror network set up by General Pinochet with the help of the US government. He returned as deputy chief of mission, 1987–89. When back as ambassador, Greenlee openly tried to scupper MAS’s ascent. In March 2003, for example, he sent a letter to Carlos Mesa, then president, alleging, falsely, that MAS was planning a coup in the summer. The MAS government hoped that things would change with President Obama’s election, but MAS officials say it has been no different. In fact, President Obama is now thought to have deployed special operations forces to Bolivia, while he supported the illegitimate post-coup election in Honduras. “President Obama lied to Latin America when he told us in Trinidad and Tobago that there are not senior and junior partners,” said President Morales in 2009.

While in La Paz I arranged an interview with the US chargé d’affaires, John S. Creamer, who has served in embassies in Nicaragua, Argentina and Colombia. I was not allowed to record the interview, but took notes. “The Bush administration took a heavy toll on perceptions of the US, that’s an empirical fact,” he said. He denied knowing of the various foundations – HRF and UnoAmerica – but is “sceptical” they were involved in the Rózsa plot. It became clear later that the US embassy is aware of these groups, and is being briefed by them. Mr Creamer told me there was “growing opposition” from within MAS against the leadership, an interesting observation, as it is a strategy that the government itself is increasingly wary of. “Evo is now scared that the new tactic is the opposition infiltrating the government and MAS, in order to take power from within,” Mr Mendoza, the Sucre senator, had told me. The embassy is obviously still in close contact with the radical elements in the east, as Mr Creamer defends the violence of the UJC and other radical opposition elements, arguing self-defense. “It’s natural to defend yourself,” he said, as we finish.

The international community have also been accused of supporting the break-up of the country. I talked to the British ambassador, Nigel Baker, in La Paz, who seemed to agree with the autonomists. “I think the long-term destiny for Bolivia … is some form of federalist structure,” he said. “The topography of the country, the different character of different peoples in different parts of the country, different economic structures, all work in favor in Bolivia of greater autonomy.” He thought the US had entirely benign intentions: “I think historical record will show that the US was operating correctly in Bolivia and trying to work with all political groups, people of all political colors, to work with and strengthen Bolivian democracy.” The WikiLeaks cables reveal that opposition politicians were openly approaching the US embassy for support in elections. One opposition politician “stands out as a potential national opposition leader,” one cable noted, before adding that in a meeting with embassy officers he had “privately expressed his interest in obtaining US support to run for the presidency”.

One the major concerns for the US after Morales came to power was Bolivia moving out of its traditional sphere of influence and making alliances and economic deals with other countries: thumbing its nose at its traditional patron. Among the people consulted by USAID for one its projects was Eduardo Rodríguez Veltzé, a former president of Bolivia who controversially decommissioned the country’s only air-defense system, purchased from China, putting Bolivia under the basic military control of the US. It was people like this the US was used to dealing with. But Morales no longer countenanced such servility. At the same time, China embraced the MAS government openly (largely because of the lithium reserves, no doubt), and did not seem as intent to undermine the democratically elected government as the US was. They also provided an alternative source of investment, worrying US planners. And it wasn’t just China. In 2008, it was announced that Bolivia had signed a deal with state-owned Russian gas company Gazprom to explore and produce natural gas in the country. State-owned oil and gas company, YPFB, which was nationalized by the MAS government, signed the deal to exploit South America’s second-largest reserves, concentrated in the southeast.

Bolivia also announced more military purchases from China and Russia, after the US blocked Bolivian purchases of Czech aircraft. Most worryingly for the US, Venezuela and Cuba were also increasing their presence, a fear constantly discussed in the cables. One cable from La Paz noted: “Cuban and Venezuelan advice, interference, and assistance continue to be a serious concern.” The concern is listed as “Cuban doctors and newly inaugurated hospitals bring medical care to isolated communities”, while Venezuela provided micro-credit financing to small businesses. Unlike USAID, of course, “Venezuelan funding is pouring into the country with no transparency or accountability, further damaging the democratic process.” Venezuelan funding for the media was a particular “issue of concern”, which, we have seen, was being fought as a proxy war through the NED’s programs. One cable worried “that media will be sold without public knowledge, changing the opinion-leader landscape in the country”, i.e. the anti-Morales bias. The cable even noted that the main newspaper, La Razon, has a “generally anti- [government of Bolivia] stance”.

In February 2008, a story broke about a Fulbright scholar in Bolivia who had been asked to spy on Cubans and Venezuelans in the country. John Alexander van Schaick said that he was told by regional security officer Vincent Cooper at the US embassy “to provide the names, addresses and activities of any Venezuelan or Cuban doctors or field workers” he came across while he was in Bolivia.7 His account was supported by similar testimony from Peace Corps members and staff who were all told by Mr Cooper to gather information on Cuban and Venezuelan nationals. Three days after the story broke, it was announced that Mr Cooper would not be returning to Bolivia. Morales called it the “expulsion” of a “man who conducted North American espionage”, an accusation with some justice. Many believed it was the tip of the iceberg. “We had a mutual friend, and [van Schaick] approached me in December 2007,” Jean Friedman-Rudovsky, the American journalist living in La Paz who broke the story, told me. “It took a couple months to get a hold on the Peace Corps angle, I had heard lots of rumors, but hadn’t been able to substantiate them. The Peace Corps duty director went on record at the time saying Vincent Cooper came and gave these inappropriate instructions to the group.”

The volunteers were in a moral quandary about what to do. “Some kids were worried about the message coming from the embassy, one girl was planning on living with a Cuban family; she wondered if she would have to collect information on them,” said Friedman-Rudovsky. The director and the Peace Corps staff complained to the US embassy, remonstrating that they couldn’t act like an intelligence service for the US government. Four months later, however, van Schaick received the same instructions. “In general, not much has changed in terms of US-Bolivia since Obama came into power,” said Friedman-Rudovsky. The ambassador never admitted it had happened; he merely commented that if these instructions had been given, it went against US policy. But it was the first ironclad proof of the US using its agencies to gather information in the country. “Every time Morales speaks on US-Bolivian relations in terms of US meddling in Bolivian affairs, he refers to this story, it’s the only story with definitive proof of spying,” said Friedman-Rudovsky. In the aftermath, the Bolivian foreign minister asked the US to establish exchange programs because the current US programs “are not transparent and we are suspicious when scholarship students are asked to spy on us”. The US did not comply.

Another controversy erupted in 2008 when a police unit called the Special Operations Command (COPES) was implicated in a domestic surveillance scandal after it was revealed that the unit had been used to collect intelligence on areas outside its remit of narco-trafficking. The unit was funded by the US, and was ultimately answerable to the US embassy. The idea that no one there knew what was going on is hard to countenance. It was disbanded soon after.

There had been a long lineage for this kind of subterfuge. In 1997 testimony to Congress, James Milford, deputy administrator of the DEA, said: “The Intelligence and Special Operations Group (GIOE) is one of Bolivia’s most successful drug enforcement programs. It was developed four years ago as a result of cooperation between DEA and the Bolivian National Police [and was] responsible for handling sensitive intelligence and conducting the most important complex criminal investigations in Bolivia.”

The US had long-established law enforcement agencies in Bolivia operating under the guise of drug enforcement; these agencies could be used for different purposes, and no one could actually verify whether they were gathering intelligence. Later, President Morales alleged that the CIA had tried to infiltrate state-run oil firm YPFB through marketing director Rodrigo Carrasco, who had attended a number of “training courses” in the US, which involved intelligence, security and politics. Carrasco had been a member of COPES. In the aftermath, the US embassy still complained that the “threat to expel the CIA from Bolivia means that any one of us can be (mis)identified as a spy and kicked out should we do – or be falsely accused of doing – anything that displeases Evo”. Spying was definitely taking place on a large scale. All through the cables there are allusions to “sensitive reporting” which is a euphemism for spying. One cable noted that a MAS official whom “many political analysts” consider “a radical” is “railroading controversial legislative measures”, before adding: “Sensitive reporting indicates that Ramirez may be very vulnerable on corruption and human smuggling charges.”

Being a softy

When in Sucre, I talked to Enrique Cortes, a professor at one of the universities in the city and a specialist in US-Bolivian relations. “Bolivia is still dependent,” he said. “This position of dependency was from the beginnings of when the nation was created, we were always dependent on an international monetary system lately led by the US.” He added: “There was a triangular relationship between the state, oligarchs and transnational organizations and these oligarchs responded to international money. When they lose power they use force to stop history from developing. Within that fits Rózsa-Flores and the Pando massacre, and Leopoldo.” The move to democracy, he said, may not be permanent, and could be scuppered. “There was the fascist process, dictatorship, but it’s not over. With Carter began the phase of controllable democracies, but now we think a new phase has opened. And this new phase is characterized by vital resources, and wanting control over these vital resources. So that’s the central conflict with the US.” He thought that the US could still put a brake on the process initiated by MAS to greater independence. “A coup is not the only way to put brakes on this. History shows there are other strategies, such as penetrating the popular organizations, and social movements using agencies like USAID.” But coups have been the traditional US tactic in the country.

Declassified documents released in 2008 exposed US financial and political support for the military coup led by right-wing general Hugo Banzer in 1971, who ruled until 1978 (before making a comeback, democratically elected this time, from 1997 to 2001). The State Department at the time denied supporting the three-day coup that left 110 dead and hundreds more wounded. Banzer’s dictatorship was a nightmare for organized labor and anyone who disagreed with his restructuring of the economy in the interests of foreign capital. He arrested 14,000 Bolivians without due process, and 8,000 more were tortured. Some 200 people were thought to have disappeared. Banzer had been trained at the notorious School of the Americas in Panama (Fort Gulick) and at Fort Hood in Texas, before becoming a military attaché in Washington. The declassified documents show that the Nixon administration had signed off $410,000 to be made available for politicians and military officers willing to take out the left-leaning dictator Juan José Torres. At a meeting in July 1971, the 40 Committee – chaired by the then Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and overseeing covert operations around the world – discussion focused on giving this money to opposition figures who, the understanding was, would undertake a coup. Under-Secretary of State Alexis Johnson said: “What we are actually organizing is a coup in itself, isn’t it?” The plan was approved and the same day that the coup began in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, a National Security Council staffer reported to Kissinger that the CIA had transferred money to two high-ranking members of the opposition.

A month earlier, Nixon and Kissinger had discussed the possibilities for dealing with the Bolivian leader who was leaning too far left.

Kissinger: We are having a major problem in Bolivia, too. And –

Nixon: I got that. Connally mentioned that. What do you want to do about that?

Kissinger: I’ve told [CIA Deputy Director of Plans, Thomas] Karamessines to crank up an operation, post-haste. Even the Ambassador there, who’s been a softy, is now saying that we must start playing with the military there or the thing is going to go down the drain.

Nixon: Yeah.

Kissinger: That’s due in on Monday.

Nixon: What does Karamessines think we need? A coup?

Kissinger: We’ll see what we can, whether – in what context. They’re going to squeeze us out in another two months. They’ve already gotten rid of the Peace Corps, which is an asset, but now they want to get rid of [US Information Agency] and military people. And I don’t know whether we can even think of a coup, but we have to find out what the lay of the land is there.

Fast-forward 40 years and not much had changed. The WikiLeaks cables reveal that as the political turmoil was peaking, the US embassy was contemplating the eventuality of a military coup. One noted that “there are strong indications the military is split and could be reticent to follow orders”. Another complained that: “A strong commitment to institutionalism would require a rock-solid constitutional argument before commanders would participate in any action that could be considered ‘political’.” There is no doubt that these feelings were being communicated from within the military to the US embassy. “[Armed Forces Commander General Wilfredo] Vargas had been, publicly and privately, a supporter of US-Bolivian military relations,” one cable noted. “Although he continues to cooperate enthusiastically with us at a working level, even giving awards to three [Military Group] officers December 13 his public comments in the last few months have irritated Bolivian military officers and raised eyebrows within the Embassy.” (The Military Group is part of the US Department of Defense.) But there were reasons for optimism. “Evo does not have a network of personal friends within the military (although his Presidency Minister Juan Quintana does),” one cable noted. “[T]he military is leery of taking on any role considered remotely political. The military fears above all a repeat of the bloody military- civilian conflicts in El Alto in 2003, which brought down the Goni government.” The Goni government – supported by the US, where he is now in exile.

Finally, we are told that Commander Vargas is too unreliable to count on. “Vargas remains an enigma,” the cable noted. “Some commanders suspected, at least before his December 8 comments, that he might be sympathetic to a coup. He is widely characterized as an ‘opportunist’”. The cable added wryly: “We cannot expect him to stand behind his assurances.”

In a piece of bare-faced historical revisionism, USAID said that between 1985 and 2003 “fundamental economic and political rules of the game were liberalized”, adding, “organizations with a pluralistic view of democracy grew and flourished – especially in response to the availability of donor assistance”. It noted that, “Corporatist civil society organizations dominated citizen participation in the public sphere between 1952 and 1985”, which was the moment when the Bolivian government “began to change the direction of Bolivia’s economic policies and democratic practices”. Soon, as the fairytale went, “Pluralistic civil society then emerged, and was active – especially at the level of communities.” What that period, in fact, describes is the “Shock Doctrining” of the Bolivian economy and wider society. President Víctor Paz Estenssoro, who had been a supporter of US- backed dictator Hugo Banzer, ruled from 1985 to 1989 and instituted a neoliberal recipe to help put the staggering economy back on its feet. He repressed labor unions, sacked 30,000 miners, and privatized most of the state-owned companies. The broken society he and his successor Goni created would provide fertile ground for the Morales administration to grow in.

As its framework for the definition of civil society, USAID uses the work of Larry Diamond, a professor at Stanford University and fellow at the Hoover Institution where he coordinates the project on Democracy in Iran. He was a senior advisor on governance to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq and the founding co-editor of the National Endowment for Democracy’s Journal of Democracy. He has worked for the State Department, World Bank and USAID. In other words, the perfect intellectual to design democracy in Bolivia.

US weapons and military had been found in Bolivia. In June 2007, Donna Thi Dinh, a 20-year-old American woman, was detained at La Paz airport after arriving on a flight from Miami. The authorities found 500 rounds of .45-caliber ammunition in her luggage. Ms Thi had initially claimed to customs that she was carrying cheese. She was met at the airport by the wife of a military liaison at the US embassy in La Paz. US ambassador Philip Goldberg said that the bullets were for training and sport shooting and she did not realize that she had to declare them. This might be true, but at the very least it shows the impunity with which Americans felt they could act in Bolivia. Bolivia’s director of migration, Magaly Zegarra, noted: “the fact that a North American citizen, related to the embassy, is carrying ammunition on a North American aircraft coming from Miami, a city where terrorists from all over Latin America are protected by the government, especially their teacher, as [Luis] Posada is called by the terrorists, and make a mockery of all [justice] mechanisms, is questionable.” In another incident, in March 2006, Triston Jay Amero, a 25-year-old from California, set off 300 kilos of dynamite at two hotels in La Paz. He was carrying 15 different identity documents. Two years later, security services uncovered the presence of two fake American journalists photographing presidential vehicles.

The US military itself was also using Bolivia as a base. In June 2010, it was revealed that the Obama administration was expanding the role of US special operations forces around the world in a “secret war” to combat al-Qaeda, with the Washington Post noting that they were placed in 60 to 75 countries, with about 4,000 personnel available in countries aside from Iraq and Afghanistan. Jeremy Scahill reported in The Nation, based on “well-placed special operations sources”, that Bolivia was one of those countries. The role of the joint special operations command forces was to launch “pre-emptive or retaliatory strikes”, but this was ambiguous. “While some of the special forces missions are centered around training of allied forces, often that line is blurred. In some cases, ‘training’ is used as a cover for unilateral, direct action,” Scahill wrote. A special forces source told him: “It’s often done under the auspices of training so that they can go anywhere. It’s brilliant. It is essentially what we did in the 60s,” adding, “Remember the ‘training mission’ in Vietnam? That’s how it morphs.” US armed forces did occasionally pop up in Bolivia. In 2008, just weeks before the raid on Hotel Las Americas, Iraq war veteran Lieutenant Commander Gregory Michel was arrested after he pulled a gun on a prostitute in Santa Cruz. The US embassy managed to secure his release on grounds of “diplomatic immunity”. The WikiLeaks cables also show that C-130s and helicopters owned by the Narcotics Affairs Section (NAS) at the US Embassy were being used to transport “eradicators and troops”. Elsewhere, the embassy noted allegations that the DEA, US military and Bolivian national police headed Bolivian anti-narcotics efforts “from a US military base” in the Cochabamba department. In reference to this, the cable noted: “The US supports Bolivian anti-narcotics efforts at the Chimore Airport and has offices there, but there are no US military bases per se in Bolivia.” Per se. The WikiLeaks cables reveal an embassy concerned about renewing “mil- mil” (military to military) cooperation and establishing a “Status of Forces” agreement. But the Bolivian government was reticent about signing up – also refusing to ratify an “Article 98” which excuses US nationals from the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court, a common demand made by the US, a rogue nation intent on not abiding by international law.

But, as the US knows, Bolivia is still captive to the American military. A cable noted: “Bolivia has not spent any money on ammunition in two years, and the capacity to quickly move troops remains in doubt.”

Saying thank you

In early 2006, a cable from La Paz noted “the billions of US dollars of assistance in the past few decades”, and said that the ambassador observed that the US government “would sometimes appreciate a good word or thanks” from President Morales. To this day, the Morales government and his party, MAS, have not “thanked” the US for its support, because since 2005, and before, that support has been designed to finish them, and by extension democracy, in Bolivia. In many ways, Bolivia is the most democratic country in the world now. When you walk around the country you sense the involvement of the citizenry in the politics of their local community as well as on a national level, in a way that is markedly absent in the US or UK. There is a simple formula for US foreign policy in Latin America and beyond: support democracy if the people vote the right way. If they don’t, and the political party threatens to upset the “natural” order of things and with it the business interests of America and other foreign companies, then a program of subversion and destabilization gets under way. This investigation is focused on Bolivia in the specifics, but the general patterns have been replicated from Venezuela to Ecuador, from Brazil to Peru.

Another cable noted: “Evo Morales’ election in December 2005 was a political earthquake in Bolivia, sweeping aside political expectations that have defined Bolivian politics for generations and at the same time breaking open fissures and offering up new possibilities.” It is these new possibilities that scare the US government, the threat of the “virus of a good example”, a government that can provide for its citizens while growing the economy. Even Bolivia’s admirable lead on climate change is dismissed by the US embassy as a “vehicle for raising [Morales’s] and Bolivia’s international political stature”. The US is slowly losing the ownership it has had over Bolivian society for decades. For the first time

in living memory, the Bolivian people are deciding their own destiny according to their needs, ideas and hopes – not those of the US. For this reason, war has been declared on Bolivian democracy, alongside any other democracy that does not see its raison d’être as supporting US interests to the detriment of its own people. But it was not just the indigenous people of Latin America who were proving a problem for the racketeers. When the financial crisis hit, its own indigenous population stopped being so easy to exploit as well. The racket abroad meets the racket at home.v

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mostlysignssomeportents · 6 years ago

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#1yrago China has perfected the internet control playbook and now it's exporting it to the world

After decades of back-and-forth over internet freedom, China has figured out a method for allowing people to use the internet for social and business purposes, but not for political reform -- a combination of huge boiler-rooms full of censors, centralization of internet services under tight government control, and control over standards to ensure that surveillance and censorship are always possible.

At the same time, China's increasing wealth, combined with other large powers' increased austerity and withdrawal from foreign aid, has enabled it to create large and growing spheres of influence over other states in Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas, and these trading partners look to China for examples of how to create their own internet policies.

That's how Tanzania and Vietnam became the vanguard of Chinese-style internet control, creating rules and institutions that closely mirror the Chinese internet ministries and laws, exerting the same surveillance and control over their citizens. They're the first, but won't be the last.

Samm Sacks of the Center for Strategic and International Studies (a key player in the creation and maintenance of American commercial-political foreign policy) documents all of this in an editorial in The Atlantic, but misses out on one key aspect: as the internet's center of power moves towards China, so does China's ability to effect state espionage on the rest of the world.

Think of how the US suborned its telcoms giants to route global traffic through data-centers that it could plant wiretaps in, or how it practiced "third-party collection," "fourth-party collection" and "fifth-party collection" -- where it placed foreign governments' surveillance agencies under surveillance (or placed agencies that were surveilling other agencies under surveillance, etc, etc).

The pivot towards balkanized internets with national firewalls and centralized surveillance points are ripe for Chinese state intervention: once a country opts into being a turnkey surveillance state with a couple of chokepoints for government censorship and surveillance, then any other power that subverts those chokepoints will enjoy total control.

https://boingboing.net/2018/06/21/state-level-honeytraps.html

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voidsettle · 6 years ago

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Summer Junction: Small Balkans

May-June 2018

Chasing the last-August experience of a region-wide country run, we started planning for our next trip, something southern this time. We wanted some history from the old towns, scorching heat of the sun over bright sea, and long vistas of the mountain ranges. Montenegro became the basis for the plan. But why settle for one if you can have more? We were going wild.

Sveti Stefan, Budva, Montenegro

Full 2 weeks were spent in careful preparations. We were throwing in Hungary and Serbia before and Bosnia and Croatia in between. The original plan grew from a tour around one country to five, some of them added (almost) against our wills. We had to fly through Budapest - our airlines had rather cheap tickets to the destination city. From there, it was hit-and-miss travel by every kind of transport you'd imagine. Bus? Plenty. Car? Repeat the hitchhiking experience. Train? Make it two.

First Stop: Budapest, Hungary

Fisherman's Bastion over Danube, Budapest, Hungary

Arriving at Budapest, we had several hours - it was but a short stop before the night train to Serbia.

Whenever I'm in Budapest, there are three things I'm looking forward to: enjoy the vista from the Fisherman's Bastion, visit Szechenyi Thermal Baths and have a taste of Hungarian Tokay.

Last time when I was in Hungary, I got lost somewhere in Pest and ended up deciphering another tourist's instructions in German (which was mutually poor but delivered fun experience nonetheless). This time I finally got to creating a mind map of major sites and attractions. No that I can definitely find Budapest Opera if left at the central train station, but a can guess the general direction at the very least.

Fun at Fisherman's Bastion

Besides, the good thing about traveling on your own (without a guide and a group of whiny tourists tagging along) is that you achieve the level of liberating enlightenment never to be experienced in your own country. It usually takes several days for this skill to kick in. I was all the more surprised as this expanding feeling bubbled in my chest as I descended into Budapest subway.

While in Budapest, you absolutely must visit one of the thermal baths, the relaxing and soothing experience best after a long walk around the city.

I personally prefer the ones in Szechenyi Park because of the sheer scope and variety - inside the pavilions, under the open sky, cooling, warm, hot - whatever you heart desires. Just visiting one by one will take around 2 hours, so better come with some spare time on your hands.

I must say, the Hungarian capital was truly underestimated by me. I definitely plan on going back and add a couple more to-dos to my usual itinerary: visit the Opera, roam through the halls of National Gallery, have a slow stroll on Margaret Island, and taste much more local delicacies.

What to see:

Fisherman's Bastion

Matthias Church

Gellert Hill and the Citadella

Hungarian National Gallery at Buda Castle

Hungarian Parliament

Szechenyi Chain Bridge and its tongueless lions

Margit hid (Margaret Bridge)

Ruins of the Fransciscan church on Margaret Island

Szechenyi Thermal Bath

What to eat:

goulash (thick paprika soup/stew)

libamaj (goose liver)

fried duck

chicken paprikas with dumplings

halaszle (fish soup with paprika and tomato sauce)

langos (basically fast food)

kremes (cream cake)

somloi galuska (biscuit with custard)

chestnut puree

kurtoskalacs (vanilla and citrus pastry)

Tokay wine

palinka (fruit brandy)

Second Stop: Beograd, Serbia

View on the junction of Sava and Danube from Belgrade Fortress, Beograd, Serbia

First things first, a cry of pain to Serbian trains: they are immensely, unbelievably hideous. But such fun!

Truly, after Ukrainian railroads I believed I've seen it all - oh how thoroughly mistaken I was! The compartments are shabby and worn out, nearly everything is torn or broken, just on this side of usability, the wall facing the passageway is made of plexiglass delivering a (not so) beautiful view of your sleeping face to anyone happening to pass by. And the cherry on the top: they have four (which is standard for Ukraine and, I believe, most of Eastern European countries) and six (?!) seat compartments. Preordering the tickets, we were so curious that we couldn't miss the opportunity to travel in a six seat one (aside from it being slightly cheaper).

Three floors of the six-seat compartment on a Serbian train from Budapest

What it meant on practice was literally three floors. The first of which basically was a seat standing on the floor (when sitting, my knees were before my eyes), and the last had only around half a meter to the ceiling. Basically no storage place. It was truly scary sleeping both on and underneath these seats.

I keep wondering if we got lucky that the two middle seats were (obviously) non-functional, so we only had two other poor unfortunate souls to share this sorry excuse of a compartment. On the other hand, the experience was so bizarre and unique that I couldn't keep myself from laughing hysterically. Not sure any of my companions comprehended my mirth.

On the brighter note, Beograd is one of those cities that don't care the least for you as a tourist. One day is pretty much enough to see everything there is to see, the major attraction being, of course, the Belgrade Fortress with its rich history protecting the city (thus the clash of architectural styles), vast park area below leading your eye to the joint of Danube and Sava rivers, and quaint winding passages that lead to different courts, half-hidden castles and fortifications.

Beograd Fortress

Lost somewhere in its area, I caught this wonderfully serene moment of pre-summer heat hammering down the irregular stone-paved trails, deafening crickets and the dizzying smell of grasses and red poppies (that are all over the place, magical beyond belief).

The city shows itself. Walking from the fortress down Knez Mihailova Street, you find yourself at the National Museum. A little to the South, ruins left after the NATO bombing stay proud in the middle of the bustling city. And then there's the Cathedral of Saint Sava, quite the monumental construction to mark the grand aspirations of Serbian nation. It is one of the largest churches in the world, and one that is still being built, starting in 1935. That tells you something about the nation.

If you don't have much time, take the round tram #2 to see all the major sites in city center. You'll miss something, for sure, but it's a good way to start your acquaintance.

And don't forget to get yourself familiar with the people - they're quite the friendly type. My friend's shoe tore at the most inopportune moment, and we were looking for something that'd help keep it together. Asking in one of the shops where we could buy glue, the owner not only told us how to get to the closest place but he personally walked us there. At yet another instance, a woman we asked directions from spent quite some time (and probably missed her bus) to make sure we know how to get to the Cathedral of Saint Sava. Using Serbian and gestures; pure incomprehensible joy.

What to see:

Beograd Fortress

Knez Mihailova Street and the pedestrian area

Ruins of Yugoslav General Staff from 1999 NATO bombing

National Museum (with one if not the largest Impressionist painting collection in Europe)

St Mark's Church

Cathedral of Saint Sava

Church of Saint Alexander of Neva

What to eat:

cevapi/cevapcici (regional delicacy, variations met throughout the Balkans - basically grilled meat in flatbread with chopped onions)

kajmak (cheese)

Karadordeva snicla (meat stuffed with cheese)

sarma (meat rolled in sour cabbage leaves)

musaka (potato and meat casserole)

ajvar (vegetable side dish)

pljeskavica (meat in flatbread)

cvarci (fried pork rinds)

rakia (fruit brandy; do you start noticing patterns yet?)

Third Stop: Underground Train and First Glance at Montenegro

Ruins of Bedem Castle, Niksic, Montenegro

Unlike traditional tourists, we decided to take a whole day off sight-seeing to indulge in traveling at its utmost. Moreover, the whole detour to Serbia was solely for the purpose of catching this train: Beograd, Serbia to Bar, Montenegro. We wanted to get our hands and eyes on mountains as soon as possible - and boy, did we get our fill!

If you get a chance to travel from Belgrade to Montenegro by train, by all means do. You won't regret a moment of it.

Train Beograd, Serbia - Bar, Montenegro

Actually, before the trip, I had my doubts: spending the whole day sitting in train, with nothing but observing natural beauties for over 10 hours; I thought we'd be bored to death by the end of hour 2. I didn't factor in the underground traveling - all in all, after spending the lion's share of the trip counting and noting the time, our route amounted to nearly 200 tunnels and almost hour and a half under ground in Serbia alone.

The longest tunnel is nearly 5 km long. I even counted the speed of underground travel - approximately 15 mph, a lower speed due to the danger of high mountain travel. Curiously, in Montenegro, the speed in tunnels was considerably higher, even though we didn't manage to uncover the reason.

One more thing to note is the considerably higher quality of Montenegrin trains. Compared to that taking us from Budapest to Beograd, this was nearly comfortable. I don't know the reason, but air-con was only available in one carriage (coincidentally, the one we were in), and it wasn't shying away from its function. I was freezing by the end of hour one, and went out in search of something to warm up. In other carriages, people were clustering by the windows, catching air, vistas and smoking.

Smoking right under the sign 'Smoking prohibited'

Thus, I anchored myself in the buffet car (calling it 'restaurant' wouldn't do; they offered no food) with a permanent cup of coffee before me. This was my little yet unforgettable time - the amalgam of beautiful mountain ranges flashing by outside the window, hot coffee and a cozy book that I prudently brought along. Light chatter of the trainmen fought with cigarette smoke in the air, the rattling of the train creating snug and quaint ambiance.

We arrived to Podgorica after sunset. The first glance at Montenegro delivered the unique feeling of living on the roofs - the room we were staying at had an exit right near the red shingles of the neighbor house. While I was having cup of tea before bed, a woman casually strolled on top of the roof nearby to hang the clothes to dry.

Despite the status of the capital and the largest city in Montenegro, Podgorica more often that not creates the feeling of a medium-sized deeply provincial town. Hidden behind the mountainous hills, far from the seaside, the city doesn't enjoy the influx of tourists during summer seasons but also boasts a warmer climate in winter.

And so we followed the route inland, leaving the Adriatic for the last part of our journey. My friend, the terrifyingly stubborn woman, woke me up at 4 in the morning to catch the train to Ostrog.

If I was to advise for Ostrog, I would not. And I'm unlikely to repeat the experience in the future.

Ostrog, Montenegro

That was one of a hellish trip for me - high up in the mountain, hides a Christian Orthodox church shrine. Sounds better than it is in reality. Well. It does look nice, I must admit - the chambers cut out in the sheer rock and all. But I'd argue not worth the effort put in.

Given I'm not religious and a late-sleeper, the way up the mountain trail early in the morning thoroughly irritated me. My mood didn't better at seeing how the 'religious' folks arrived right by the entrance in buses and cars - the hypocritical bastards. I guess we had a fight with my friend, who is much more loyal toward Christian religion and keeping faces. The things we give away.

Besides, the timing was really off - the vistas from high up the mountain are pretty bland early in the morning. The angle of the sun was just not right. The whole place in the morning looks like a refugee camp, with dirty mats and plaids for those willing to spend the chilly night on the monastery grounds. The whole place feels weird.

Camping outside the Ostrog monastery, 900 m above sea level

I was much more cheerful as we were leaving the damned-- I mean, sacred place.

By this time, we were at our basic premise: high in the mountains, half an hour by car to our interim destination, several hours before anything goes the way we need, and a choice between astonishingly hideous weather and heavy backpacks. There was that trip to Crete where we were basically blind and death from the wind, cursing the moment we decided to go through the mountains on foot.

Our fallback is hitch-hiking fellow travelers to take pity on us and give us a lift. This time, we were picked up by a nice couple from Belarus who brought us right to Niksic. Unexpectedly, the city appeared more interesting than we imagined. I loved the ruins of the local castle. At one moment, the atmosphere was distinctly medieval - the lush green pastures outside the half-preserved walls, the grey grim limestone and delicate, full of color flowerheads taking over the reign in this place. That glimpse of centuries long gone sent a shiver down my spine, and was gone as fast as it appeared.

Bedem castle, Niksic

Today, the castle ruins serve as a concert hall for the local youth - naturally, the larger part of the stone is covered in graffiti, and we've met a couple of sturdy young boys at the foot of the castle, unloading what looked like heavy sound equipment boxes. We had to sacrifice half a bottle of water as an entrance fee.

After an ice-cream and a meditation over the neat and apparently old cemetery, we headed for the bus station to catch a ride to Sarajevo. And, oh, did our adventures only begin!

The same way as I was rumbling about Serbian trains - one should be aware of the buses in Montenegro.

The worst part? Not enough seats. The bus we got was tiny, more like a minivan. We were forced to take our bags inside and to stand the whole way to Bosnia (2.5 hours to the border, same to Sarajevo). I wasn't even trying, sitting down in the aisle as soon as we started off. I got through the first hour alright, catching a casual conversation with a guy from Albania sitting beside me. And then the air stopped circulating (at least where I was sitting), and I don't remember most of the way to the Bosnian border.

I got a seat somewhere along the ride. When we arrived in Sarajevo, I was so tired that it was nearly blissful - I don't think I was the slightest bit worried when we got the message from our to-be host that we couldn't be accommodated at their place that night. Fortunately, we caught decent free Wi-Fi in the middle of the Bosnian capital. Last thing I actually remember from that day is reconciling with my friend over the religious matters and thinking before falling into darkness that nothing could surprise me during this trip anymore.

Descending the Ostrog mountain, panorama dipped in morning haze

What to see:

Sahat kula, Podgorica (clock tower)

Ostrog (take this up at your own risk, and, by gods, do not go on foot, you won't be getting out)

Church of Sv Vasilje, Niksic

Bedem castle, Niksic

What to eat:

prshut (dried meat)

cevapcici

pleskavitsa/roshtil (fried and grilled meat)

sopsky salat (vegetable salad with cheese)

ribla chorba (fish soup)

Negusi cheese

meat burek with yogurt

sarma

Vranac (red wine) and Krstach (white wine)

Niksicko beer

desserts: baklava, tulumba, shampita, vanilice, padobranci

Fourth Stop: Two Pearls of Bosnia and Herzegovina

Breakfast at panorama over Sarajevo, Ispod Grada, Bosnia and Herzegovina

For Sarajevo, I was really hyped even before the trip. The primary reason was, of course, the history of this place. Point of focus: the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie triggering World War I. Time: June 28, 1914, 10 in the morning. Place: Latin Bridge.

As I was fangirling over the epic episode, I should also mention the sheer delight of this city. Sarajevo is filled with the distinctly Turkish ambiance (visiting Istanbul three months prior, I could not ignore the similarities between the two cities) - and yet it's a European capital. It has the tiny street teahouses with old men chatting and smoking their days away, muezzins shouting early in the morning, heavily clothed women and bubbling Eastern bazaars. But it also has eclectic architecture, Mediterranean cobbled streets flowing down the mountainous hills to the Miljacka river, and 15th to 19th century Christian churches. Starting at the White Fortress crowning the city, we roamed down the winding streets to the river bank, than had a real breakfast in the labyrinth of Bascarsija (I'm ashamed I still cannot pronounce that) and then made a stop for coffee at Cajdzinica Dzirlo.

Cajdzinica Dzirlo and it's host

I don't usually give personal opinions of places to eat - they change to fast, and TripAdvisor still does it better. But this one is the number and a renown site of its own - people who know Sarajevo will surely know this little teahouse in the city center. Take all the best things you want during your tea/coffee time, and you get this place.

Splendid drinks with plenty of choice. Ambiance and atmosphere supported by great view. Perfect location near Bascarsija. Most welcoming, authentic and fun host.

You feel as the dearest of friends not a random tourist. This place is a must for a perfect trip. I'd come back to Bosnia just to visit here again.

Besides, it's here that I fell in love with Bosnian coffee (a direct take-away from the Turkish coffee of the Ottoman Empire). I was already fond of the Turkish way to drink black thick coffee. In Bosnia, it is served with a sweet refreshing sherbet (ideally; more commonly, it's a glass of cold water) and a bite of Turkish delight on the side - perfect combination for a hot day.

As a side attraction, I learned how to serve and drink Bosnian coffee. Coffee is made in cezve and served along with another cezve of hot water. First comes adding the water to the coffee and some light stirring. Then coffee creme is carefully gathered from the top and put in the kahve finjani, a tiny porcelain cup in a metal stand. Coffee is poured in afterwards, resulting in a cup of strong, fragrant and relaxing marvel. A sip of coffee is alternated with a gulp of sherbet - I don't think I ever had a better drink.

Combined with the elevated view of the city center and the flocks of pigeons pirouetting around the roofs, this was the experience that ultimately summed up Sarajevo and this whole vacation for me. Yet the Bosnian adventures continued. Walking around the city and gaping at the listed attractions, we were caught in a dreadful storm. It rolled down the mountain tops in low black clouds, rumbling and growling as a wild animal and then pouring down in ice beads the size of a fingernail.

Latin Bridge before the storm ensued

Me and my friend, we have this weird thing we do on the photos, arms and legs spread around in a semblance of a six-pointed star. We do that once per every new city we visit, and, due to the plan, Latin Bridge was the designated site for Sarajevo. We failed spectacularly though, taking cover from the hailstorm on the tram stop for nearly half an hour.

As the storm subsided and turned into regular heavy rain, we plodded through the streets, knee-deep in murky, chalky, coffee-and-milk colored water, ultimately happy. The traffic was hideous, we missed our train, wet head to toe (I literally poured water out of my shoes) - yet I don't remember a better time from this trip. Besides, we caught the best cevapcici near the bus station - and they were prepared lighting-fast, we were shocked at the speed. Sitting in the bus (finally comfortable) taking us to Mostar, we were languidly enjoying the slack feeling of being prepared for anything coming our way.

Mostar old town and Stari most, view from the minaret of Koski Mehmed Pasina mosque

If you get a chance to walk around Mostar at nighttime, enjoy the lightwork, the cozy streets and the coolness of the evenings near Neretva.

Compared to Sarajevo, Mostar is tiny, one of those exclusively tourist destinations that have one major attraction, a couple of minor sites and plenty of ambiance beckoning huge crowds year after year. In a way, it resembles Kazimierz Dolny but with the whimsical quirk of Turkish and Southern European minutiae framing the singular character of the town.

Naturally, the crowds flock on and around the Old bridge, the main site of Mostar. As for me, the narrow painfully cobbled streets (do try to wear shoes with thicker soles) outcharmed the bridge.

Neretva river and panorama of Mostar from Koski Mehmed Pasina mosque's minaret

There is a choice of cozy hidden gems: the Crooked bridge is less famous but instead drowning in greenery. The beach under the Old bridge gives the ability to dip your feet into Neretva (the water is freezing, we nearly got cramps while hastily taking photos - but it's clear and wonderfully refreshing under the blazing sun). The garden of the Koski Mehmed Pasina mosque offers enchantingly picturesque view of the river and small houses under red roofs, transforming the town into an artist's paradise.

It's also possible to get up the minaret of Koski Mehmed Pasina mosque, an activity I believed to be forbidden for non-muezzins, non-Muslims and (even more so) females. The spinning stairs inside the minaret are entertainingly narrow, the balcony on top offers a grand view. And the mere fact of being in a half-prohibited place was enough to pleasantly tickle the nerves and positively reinforce the experience.

What to see in Sarajevo:

Bljela tabija (White fortress)

Zuta tabija (Yellow fortress)

City Hall

Latin Bridge

Bascarsija

Sebilj

Old Orthodox Church

Cathedral of Jesus' Heart

Orthodox Cathedral

Gazi Husrev Bey' Mosque and Bezistan

Taslihan

Lunar clock

Old Synagogue (Museum of the Jews of Bosnia and Herzegovina)

What to see in Mostar:

Stari most (Old bridge)

Crooked bridge

Koski Mehmed Pasina dzamija

Karadoz-begova dzamija

Mostar Peace Bell tower

What to eat:

cevapi

meat under sac (veal or lamb cooked under special lid)

cufte (meatballs)

duvec (vegetable stew)

drasak (pea stew)

ajvar

somun (flatbread)

ustipci (fried dough balls)

Bosnian coffee (and I cannot stress this enough!)

salep

serbe (sherbet)

ajran (salty yogurt drink)

Fifth Step: Dubrovnik, Croatia

The walls of Dubrovnik, Croatia

Dubrovnik is another historic town heavy on tourists, and for a good reason: it's gorgeous. The beauty of city walls unparalleled, Dubrovnik is truly the pearl of the Adriatic sea. The preservation of the old town is worthy of praise, on par with old Tallinn. But that's it - talking about Croatian people, they're quite the unwelcoming type.

To get from Mostar to Dubrovnik, one has to cross the Bosnian-Croatian border tree times. In and out, and in again, and all in just under two hours. And the border guards stamp your passport every time.

The tension of Croatians runs high. From our hostess to most waiters, locals don't seem friendly at all - a surprising fact given the contagious amicability of Bosnians. The prices in Dubrovnik are also considerably higher while coffee is considerably worse (although, to tell the truth, after Bosnia, every cup of coffee I had was so-so at best).

Yet, despite the ranting, Dubrovnik truly is a city with its own character. The first impression was: stairs. The whole Balkan region is like that, built on the hillsides, streets narrow and oftentimes only suited for pedestrians. Dubrovnik is the quintessence of the concept. The hills it is built on are indented with stair-streets, and the road for cars winds and twists, curling in circles through the city like a giant snake. To get from point A to point B, it is easier to clamber up the stairs. Besides, one gets all the best views that way.

Stradun with the belltower of Franciscan monastery, Dubrovnik, Croatia

The old town is enchanting. The narrow streets tightened in the restrains of smooth stone are cool and soothing at sunset. Dark green shutters emphasize the rhythm of the delicate houses. Our early evening in Dubrovnik was drowning in pinkish haze, enchanting and amorous, and the screams of seagulls cluttered up the slowly darkening skies.

The city was built by Venetians, the fact completely obvious to anyone remotely acquainted with architecture. Lacking the tell-tale canals, Dubrovnik instead becomes the labyrinth of tiny streets, a photographer's wet dream at every turn. Stradun, the major street, is full of tourists, day or night, but the back streets are shatteringly quiet as the night falls, almost to the point of feeling haunted.

Panorama of Dubrovnik from city walls: red roofs and Franciscan belltower

The city transforms by the daytime. The blistering sun reflects from the smooth surfaces of the white stone and hits you from all sides: it truly is scorchingly hot. The city walls bring no relief; even the sea breeze is but a short refreshment.

A hat, a bottle of water and a sunscreen are obligatory items on the walls of Dubrovnik anytime from April to October.

But oh the vistas the minute details! Walking around the whole old town and observing how it was built and how it lives from the height of the walls, one is immersed in the history of the relationship between Venetians, this great seapower, and the Balkan region, the focus of their constant conflicts with the Turks. Catching glimpses of inner yards and narrow streets, it is easy to imagine how people lived several centuries ago - as it seems nothing changed much.

The city walls are full of tourists, naturally; a different experience is provided by fort Lovrijenac to the west of the city. Not only it gives a different perspective of Dubrovnik, but is also more spacious as a fortification and is closer to nature (the gorge under its walls lets the imagination run free and create hidden grottoes and caves full of wonders, treasures and sunken ships).

Dubrovnik is surely a city one must visit. If time permits, it's good to have a swim in the Adriatic sea, enjoy the famous Croatian beaches, get up to the fortress on the top of the hill to catch a glimpse of the whole city, and indulge in the rich history. But overstaying your visit is not wise when the much more hospitable Montenegro is just in a couple of hours drive down the coast.

What to see:

old town

St Francis church

Large Onofrio's Fountain

Dominican monastery

crkva Svetog Spasa

Sponza Palace

Orlandov stup

Mala Onofrijeva Fontana

Rector's Palace

St Blaise church

St Ignatius church

Church of the Annunciation

city walls (Bokar, Minceta, Saint John, Buza gate)

Fort Lovrijenac

Lokrum island

Carska tvrdava

What to eat:

raznjici (meat skewers)

zagrebacki odrezak (stuffed veal steak)

lignje (squid)

salata od hobotnice (octopus salad)

crni rizot (cuttlefish risotto)

manestra (soup)

zganci (polenta)

palacinke (crepes)

rozata (creme cake)

Malvazija (dessert wine)

Coming Back to Montenegro

Crkva Svete Klare/Svetog Antuna, Kotor, Montenegro

Planning the trip, it's important to have calm days mixed into the mass of those full of mad activity.

Herceg Novi was our first in the row of more relaxing experiences, a good choice with its lush green streets cascading down the mountain to the Bay of Kotor and the quaint atmosphere of a pre-tourist season. A comparatively young city, it still bears the scars of Venetian dominion, flaunting the old fortress, dark and grey and heavy over the light touristy air of the coast resort.

According to the newly established tradition, I got a day off the trip to catch up with my friend from work who moved with his family to Herceg Novi couple of years back. The rest of the two days were submerged in a daze of slow breakfasts, warm days that tasted like strawberry and tepid waves licking away the tiredness of the feet.

What to see in Herceg Novi:

Citadella

Forte Mare

Crkva Svetog Jeronima

Church of Holy Archangel Michael

Sahat Kula

Kanli Kula

Kotor old town, view of the Fort of St John

For the next day, we picked our speed up, cramming in Kotor and Tivat, and a circle trip around the Bay of Kotor. I still have my regrets about not being able to make a stop in Perast and pay respects to the famous island Our Lady of the Rocks.

The good thing about Kotor is that, although there are many things to see, they are all clustered together (like old well-preserved towns tend to do) - you only need a day to see it all. The only exception is the Fort of St John - probably the main attraction of Kotor, not counting the old town itself.

The streets of Kotor old town

The popularity of this place is primarily based on three things: its age (including historic and militaristic value starting from VI century), the magnificent views it gives from the top over the Bay of Kotor, and its sheer size (it's one of the most significant fortifications of this type in Europe, with 4.5 km long walls).

Kotor may lack the posh sumptuousness of Dubrovnik and the green curvy coziness of Mostar. Yet it is definitely its own thing, a small intimately built town in the clutches of grey stone with sultry air of tiny squares with towering churches and cathedrals, with palaces on every step - Kotor feels like a museum.

What to see in Kotor:

Gurdic Gate (South Gate)

St Triphun's Cathedral

The Drago Palace

The Pima Palace

The Buca Palace

The Palace Bizanti

The Sea Gate with the Tower of Town Guards

The Clock Tower

Duke Palace

Arsenal Building

Crkva Svete Klare/Svetog Antuna

Crkva Sv Nikole

Crkva Sv Luke

Crkva Sv Mihaila

Karampana

The Grgurina Palace

Crkva Sv Ana

Svete Marije Koledate

North Gate

Kotor's Castle of San Giovanni

Church of Our Lady of Health

Fort of St John

Dancing Girl Statue with a view of Old Budva

We spent the night in nearby Tivat - not a historic but resort destination, a city full of luxurious hotels and yachts shimmering off the competing degrees of splendor. As the high season didn't start yet, the city was immersed in a sluggish slumber.

Budva, on the other hand, as the major tourist hub of Montenegro, was boiling and lively, offering a bit of everything. UNESCO-protected old town neighbored fashionable boutiques and giant malls. Quay was full of restaurants offering meats and seafoods of all sorts, narrow streets of old town offered cozier cafes and confectioneries. The beaches, both in-town and on the close-by 'Hawaii' island, beckon with warm transparent water and hidden caverns ready for relaxation or exploration.

The old town of Budva is comparatively small. Half a day is enough to explore it - but the best part about it is the many cozy back streets, dead ends and cubbies that tell their small stories and beckon you to rest and observe the world around.

There is a small street that always has cats pooling under one of the windows - obviously a feeding place. An inner yard of Citadela features a cafe under bright white umbrellas - the perfect combination with old stone, deep blue sea and the green vines to create the true Mediterranean feel. One of the buildings has an old library turned posh restaurant with displayed models of the famous ships.

I've found my favorite cozy little place on the thick wall of the old town near Ricardova Glava beach. A small square surrounded by churches used for concerts and often featuring weddings. A quaint corner of the earth that caught my attention as a street musician was lightly plucking guitar strings for a mellow, sweetly sorrowful melody interweaving into the song of the wind. I go back in my memories to that place - hot crude stone behind my back, sun and seagulls over my head, and fresh warm breeze in my face.

The second day was completely dedicated to exploring the beaches of Budva. The beaches of the tourist zone are sandy; the old town has pebbles.

One of the beaches on Hawaii island, Budva

Seeing Ricardova Glava for the first time, the scene catches one off guard: people are bathing in the clear waters of Adriatic sea right under the rough walls of the church dating back to 840 AD built of darkened pebbles and whitened mortar, battered by time and seawinds. The narrow walk from Ricardova Glava to Mogren beaches conceals a set of hidden gems - from Dancing Girl Statue (one of the symbols of Budva) to the rugged, indented mountain walls on one side and the rocky coast on the other, open-air vista of the sea and Hawaii island, leading to the ambitious route over the rocks and boulders to yet another viewpoint of the city.

And then there's the Hawaii island. Boats take turns to drop off locals and tourists alike on the island full of beaches suited for every taste, with cozy lagoons and hidden grottos.

Best to take the boat that makes a detour to Sveti Stefan - the most luxurious island in the vicinity of Budva, completely covered in medieval red-roofed white-stoned houses and requiring a permit just to get in, people roaming from the coast to the town walls during low tides.

What to see in Budva:

old town

Citadela

Ruins of a Roman church

St Jean Baptist church

Church of the Holy Trinity

Church built in 840 AD

Former St Sara church

Poet plaza

Roman grave

Ricardova Glava (beach)

Dancing Girl Statue

Mogren beaches

Hawaii (island of Sv Nikolai)

Crkva Sv Nikolai (Hawaii)

island of Sveti Stefan

Zipline near Durdevica Tara Bridge, Montenegro

Our last day was decided beforehand.

Everyone going to Montenegro advises to take a tour of Tara canyons. True, the nature is absolutely worth seeing - although I'd prefer taking my time at certain places not rushing as the guided tours do.

I don't know if it's typical of this mountainous region, but that day was rainy, getting us wet from time to time. Durmitor actually got me soaked through to my bones - it's usually chilly here, and the rain made its contribution. But the nature is breathtaking - the dark, nearly black pines, the incredible ravines of rugged sharp stones and brash winds, the sweeping rivers of boiling, madly foaming water, the weak bushes clinging to the tiniest cracks and crevices, and gradually fading off to give way to the bare rocks precipitously piercing the high skies.

Zipline across the Durdevica Tara Bridge actually allowed to experience the void first-hand.

Tara canyon, Montenegro

Forget the 'short line is as good as the long one'. No it's not. It's short - meaning that it takes nearly half of your time on the zipline away from you.

The first moment was quite scary due to the push at the back I got from one of the guys who geared me up - but the anxious thoughts of my-god-there's-five-hundred-feet-of-nothing-under-me were almost immediately swept out of my head by the sheer rapture of damn-I'm-flying-and-it's-so-beautiful. That's something to experience by yourself, no one will be able to translate it to you accurately.

The final adventure was as unexpected as it was welcomed. Summer snow is an occurrence I've never yet experienced in my life - that is, before this trip. Hail is not that common but it happens from time to time (there's one in my memory from when I was around 7, where the hails were the size of a child's fist). But the one we encountered on our way back from the Montenegrin black forests was unprecedented - not only it was accompanied by strong wind and showers but also covered the ground in freezing white blanket, the strangest sight among the rich, plentiful wild greens. The trip back was soothing and distressing at once, with the soft rocking of the comfortable bus on the winding mountain roads and the rapid rapping of hail over the roof.

Big Finale

The Hawaii Beach, Budva, Montenegro

Coming back to Kiev, I was firm in my belief: best trips happen when you plan everything yourself, encounter a bunch of weird and fun adventures and meet challenges head-on. This Balkan tour reconciled me with my turbulent self: the bad things, the good things - it's worth saluting everything that comes our way. What's a trip without obstacles; what's a trip that tells you nothing about yourself, people you travel with and world around you? Cheers!

#balkans #budapest #hungary #beograd #serbia #podgorica #ostrog #niksic #montenegro #sarajevo #mostar #bosnia and herzegovina #dubrovnik #croatia #herceg novi #kotor #tivat #budva #tara

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