Resource Wars: Another Failed Coup in Bolivia

Lithium is the new oil.

Published: 2024-06-28

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La Paz

Another coup d'état has failed in Bolivia. The magnificent land-locked country has a perennial problem: it is sitting in the middle of "Munroe Doctrine" land and on top of the world's largest untapped reserves of lithium.

The previous coup d'etat in 2019 saw the nation's first indigenous president, Evo Morales ejected from power. He fled ultimately to Mexico where he was granted asylum. The US supported Christian extreme-right who were installed into power by Bolivia's military after the coup lasted until the next election in which they were thoroughly defeated by democracy. Repeated efforts to delay the elections had no effect whatsoever.

Morales rose to political power from the people via their socialist party MAS. This naturally puts it in the middle of the US cross-hairs. Morales was a part of the "pink tide" in south America during the 2010s and provided political and practical support to Venezuela during the US repeated coup attempts there.

It has yet to be revealed why it is that the leaders of the three branches of Bolivia's military, who claimed they had the support of the police, were motivated to run this pathetic coup. What inducements were offered and by whom? It is quite likely that some of this will be revealed as criminal trials for the coup leaders have been announced by Bolivia's Attorney General and are supported by former President Evo. No bookmakers are taking bets that the “School of the Americas” “Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation” might have had something to do with it.

The current president Luis Arce, who was Evo's finance minister, showed brave defiance, a political leader literally in the face of the coup leading general, of which any citizen could be proud. The Reuters' article on the coup emphasizes the current economic troubles in Bolivia as a source of instability. It does not take much wondering to find a likely source of that instability for land-locked Munroe Doctrine surrounded Bolivia.

After the previous coup, US golden boy Elon Musk, riding the stardom of his electric vehicle company which cannot do anything without lithium, declared:

We'll coup where we want to. Deal with it.

Dealing with it is exactly that which Bolivia is trying to do. The nation is at the centre of the next tranche of resource wars. China would no doubt love to invest in Bolivia to obtain the lithium at a price agreeable to the Bolivian government. The US will do everything it possibly can to deny China that resource.

Reuters' article on global responses to the pathetic coup shows the US Munroe Doctrine in operation:

EVO MORALES, FORMER PRESIDENT OF BOLIVIA

"This seems to indicate that they prepared the coup d'état ahead. I ask people with a democratic vocation to defend the homeland from some military groups that act against democracy and the people."

JEANINE ANEZ, FORMER PRESIDENT OF BOLIVIA (this is the extreme right wing Christian which the Bolivian military installed after the last coup which failed at the next election)

"I totally repudiate the military's mobilization in the Plaza Murillo, attempting to destroy the constitutional order. The Movement to Socialism (MAS) with Arce and Evo should leave via a vote in 2025."

WHITE HOUSE NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL SPOKESPERSON

"The United States is closely monitoring the situation in Bolivia and urges calm and restraint."

Kaaah-ching.

Postscript

Some may recall that during the US desperate attempt to capture Edward Snowden, Evo Morales' presidential flight from Russia had the airspace of multiple European countries closed to it at the behest of the US. The US thought that Snowden may have been aboard. The presidential flight was forced to land in Austria, where it was searched.

Of course, Snowden was not aboard. The idea got in the US heads because Julian Assange, who knew that he was being spied upon, "leaked" it onto channels he knew they were watching. The US ended up with egg on its face, its "intelligence community" looked stupid and quite a bit of political capital was burnt in the process.

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Sources

Bolivian Leader Replaces Military Chiefs Over Coup Attempt, Jessica Corbett, Consortium News (originally Common Dreams), 2024-06-27

2019 Bolivian political crisis, Wikipedia

‘We Will Coup Whoever We Want’: Elon Musk and the Overthrow of Democracy in Bolivia, VIJAY PRASHAD – ALEJANDRO BEJARANO, CounterPunch, 2020-07-29

Bolivia coup fiasco lays bare a divided country in political, economic crisis, Brendan O'Boyle and Daniel Ramos, Reuters, 2024-06-27

• 'In the heat of the failed coup, flanked by soldiers, Zuniga cited growing frustrations, demanding the government "stop destroying, stop impoverishing our country."'

Global reaction to failed Bolivia coup attempt, [editors], Reuters, 2024-06-26

Snowden case: Story behind the jet grounding, The Local Austria, 2015-05-29

Assange on the Untold Story of the Grounding of Evo Morales’ Plane During Edward Snowden Manhunt, Goodman interviews Assange, DemocracyNow!, 2015-05-28

• MP4

Watch: Glenn Greenwald’s Exclusive Interview With Evo Morales in Mexico City, The Intercept, 2019-12-16

Culture

Happiness Is A Warm Gun, The Beatles.

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