Along with their alliance with Sudan and their push into central Africa and their proposed alliance with Russia, Iran is now attempting to expand its influence in the Western Hemisphere.
As most of you know, especially regular members of Joshua's Army, Hugo Chavez in Venezuela is not our friend and is very close to Ahmadinejad and Iran.
Now,it appears we have another Latin America country to add to Tehran's list of allies, Bolivia.
The country is currently ruled by coca farmer turned leftist dictator Evo Morales, who is an ally of Chavez, hates the US and just returned from a trip to Iran to discuss closer energy and political ties with Ahmadinejad and the Mullahs.
While he was there, an agreement between the Iran and Bolivia was apparently signed, but the details are secret.However, Ahmadinejad, said Iran was "interested in expanding relations with Bolivia in all fields."
Aside from coca, Bolivia has South America's second-largest proven natural gas reserves, most of which goes to neighboring customers like Brazil and Argentina which depends heavily on Bolivian gas. But production is spotty because of antiquated facilities and because Morales nationalized Bolivia's energy sector, always a recipe for chaos. Doubtless the Iranians will try to help them there....and don't be surprised if the Russians get involved.
A sign of how serious this is was a call by Morales for US Ambassador to Bolivia Phillip Goldberg to be expelled from the country for supposedly `conspiring with revolutionary groups."
The excuse for this was an attack on the main gas pipeline by Bolivian separatists who dislike Morales' leftist style of government as well as his ethnic origin, which is Aymara Indian. Like most of Latin America, there's tension in Bolivia between people of predominantly indian origin and Bolivians of more pronounced European ancestry, who tend to be more prosperous and better educated in general.
Another interesting factor; the US has been leaning on Bolivia to curtail its coca production, much of which finds its way north after its processed into what I'll genteelly call Inca marching powder. The Bolivians, not pleased at US interference in their major cash crop have resisted, and as a matter of fact Ambassador Goldberg got the news that he was being kicked out while he was in a meeting with Bolivian Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca, discussing Bolivia's request that U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration personnel get out of the Chaparecoca growing region.
It occurs to me that Bolivia has another tasty item to offer Iran aside from trade, energy control in the region and penetration into the Western Hemisphere. All that coca gets smuggled north into America through our porous southern border, and there's already a lot of evidence that Iranian proxy Hezbollah has contracted with Latino gangs like MS 13 and the Zetas to smuggle personnel into the US.
If cocaine can get in and Hezbollah people can get in, something much more lethal may be able to make the trip north as well...like anthrax,or even a small nuclear device.
Iran is planning a military attack on the United States main land. The Government officials who are spending most of their waking hours trying to stop an American or Israeli attack on Iran are trying to stop the wrong thing. What they need to be doing is trying to stop Iran from attacking America.
ReplyDeleteSadly, as it stands right now, neither major candidate seems at all serious about securing the borders or reforming our immigration laws. We would get more marginal utility for our national security needs and closely monitoring those people who are most likely to commit terrorist acts than we ever would have by invading Iraq or Afghanistan. Any one who does not support securing these borders, is fundamentally unserious about national security and ideally should be rejected for public office.