U.S.
Interests, Plots,
And Intrigues In Nepal
By Li Onesto
25 April, 2006
Countercurrents.org
On
April 21, as demonstrations continued to escalate in the streets of
Nepal, King Gyanendra delivered a televised speech in which he said
he called for elections and asked the political parties to recommend
a Prime Minister. This was immediately rejected by those who have been
demanding an end to the monarchy and people continued to demonstrate
in the streets.
Gyanendra's speech came after
16 straight days of demonstrations involving hundreds of thousands of
people, in Kathmandu and around the country. The police had shot and
killed at least 11 people and wounded hundreds.
Over a year ago, on February
1, 2005, King Gyanendra grabbed absolute power and dissolved the parliament.
This was a desperate move in response to the government's inability
to crush the People's War led by the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist).
The CPN(M) began their armed struggle against the government in 1996
and now control some 80 percent of the countryside. Gyanendra's Royal
Nepalese Army-backed by political, financial, and military support from
the United States, India, and the UK-has waged a brutal counterinsurgency.
But the People's War continued to grow and expand, and the king became
increasingly isolated and determined to defend his autocratic and brutal
rule. This is what set the stage for the current demonstrations--which
started with a four-day strike called by an alliance of seven parliamentary
parties.
The U.S. and India have been
very upset by Gyanendra's refusal to share power with the parliamentary
parties. And it appears they were directly behind the king's speech.
Just two hours before the
king's address, U.S. ambassador James Moriarty, told the press that
the king had no choice but to give in to the opposition parties' demands
for a return to democratic rule.
The day before, Special Envoy
from India Karan Singh returned home after visiting Gyanendra for two
days and told reporters, "I do not want to preempt or predict what
the announcement may be, but we are hoping that there will be some major
step in reinstating democracy. I think it will defuse the crisis."
In response to the king's
speech, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice admitted that the U.S.
is working "very closely with the Indian government" to resolve
the crisis in Nepal.
All this maneuvering is not
about bringing democracy to Nepal. It's about trying to ensure that
the "resolution of the current crisis " will be in the interest
of the U.S. and India and will not lead to any gains by the Maoists.
U.S. Interests and
Sinister Plans
The position of the United
States with regard to the Maoist People's War in Nepal has been forcefully
and adamantly that "they cannot be allowed to win." James
Moriarty, the U.S. ambassador to Nepal, has repeatedly urged the king
and parliamentary parties to work together in order to defeat the People's
War. And he has harshly criticized the parties for working with the
Maoists.
A few days before King Gyanendra's
speech, the International Crisis Group issued a "policy briefing"
titled, "Nepal's Crisis: Mobilising International Influence."
The International Crisis
Group (ICG) is basically an imperialist think tank. In the name of "working
to prevent conflict worldwide" it analyzes the situation in different
countries (usually poor, Third World countries)" and comes up with
plans for various levels of political and military intervention by the
United States and other powerful countries.
The ICG has been closely
following developments in Nepal over the last several years and has
issued several papers about the situation. What is striking about this
latest briefing is that it makes very concrete and detailed suggestions
for how the U.S., India, the UK, and other countries should directly
intervene.
The ICG starts by arguing
for the formation of a "Contact Group" made up of India, the
U.S., and UK which will come up with "strategy and tactics to maximize
international influence in assisting Nepal's escape from its worsening
conflict." One focus of this Contact Group is to threaten the Maoists
that "if they obstruct progress towards a peace process or fail
to respect the understanding they have entered into with OHCHR (Office
of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights), donors and
the mainstream political parties, Contact Group members will coordinate
efforts to apprehend senior leaders and interdict any cross-border movements."
The ICG recognizes there
is widespread hatred among the Nepalese people for Indian domination
and takes this into account, saying: "India knows that it can only
achieve its policy goals in Nepal unilaterally at a great cost. Working
within a multilateral framework would allow the same goals to be reached
without the risk of appearing to be overtly interventionist." And
the briefing goes on to spell out what kind of intervention is necessary:
"The Contact Group should lead planning for a small international
mission with 100 to 200 members but not including troops from India
or the U.S. (given the extreme political sensitivity of deploying their
forces in Nepal). Such a mission would require helicopters in order
to investigate quickly any local incident or ceasefire violation."
The viewpoint of the ICG
is not identical to the position of the U.S. State Department. But the
ICG suggestions do seem to be in line with and serve the basic stance
of the U.S. that "the Maoists in Nepal must not be allowed to win."
And the ICG plan for dealing with the current crisis does reflect the
geostrategic concerns and interests of the United States, India, and
other foreign powers involved in Nepal.
The U.S. has been quite open
and blatant about its intervention in Nepal. And to this, we have to
ask, what the hell right does the United States and India have to impose
their will on Nepal, to intervene, to try and put a lid on the struggle
of the people and crush the Maoist people's war? The U.S. has a whole
history -- whether it's Vietnam, Indonesia, or Chile, or Iraq -- where
it has been behind bloody coups and other "regime changes"
with
thousands and hundreds of thousands killed in order to safeguard U.S.
interests.
The U.S. Assistant Secretary
of Central and South Asian Affairs, Richard Boucher, recently said:
"We need to work as much as we can to pressure the King to restore
democracy, to encourage the parties to stay together and to come up
with a workable, functioning democracy. And to be able to expunge the
Maoists from Nepali society. I think it's very much the attitude of
governments in the region including India." He revealed that U.S.
"diplomats are in touch with everybody in Kathmandu, all the players,
the political parties and the King." And said that the U.S. is
"coordinating with other countries who are represented" in
Nepal.
Taking such statements seriously,
it is instructive to look at how this recent ICG papermay indicate about
what the U.S. is up to in Nepal, and the real possibility of even more
direct intervention by the U.S. in some form or another.
What the U.S. Hates
and Fears
When the U.S. ambassador
to Nepal says the parliamentary parties must not work with the Maoists,
when the United States vilifies the CPN(M) and says "they cannot
be allowed to win," when Richard Boucher says the political parties
should come up with a functioning democracy and "expunge the Maoists
from Nepali society," -- what is it the U.S. is so adamantly against?
What the U.S. cannot accept
is a revolution that takes up arms in order to overthrow a regime that
serves U.S. interests. What the U.S. cannot allow is a revolution which
aims to fundamentally change the current economic, political, and social
relations under which the masses of Nepalese people are oppressed. And
what the U.S. must seek to crush is a revolution that aims to put an
end to all the economic and political relationships under
which Nepal is dominated and oppressed within the world imperialist
system.
In 1996, when the Communist
Party of Nepal (Maoist) initiated armed struggle against the government,
they set out on the path of a New Democratic Revolution -- which aims
to overthrow any regime that represents feudalism and big capitalist
forces aligned with and serving foreign and imperialist domination.
They set out to carry out a revolution aimed at uprooting semi-feudalism
in the countryside and kicking out foreign capitalism. And with such
goals, the CPN(M) has been carrying out new democratic tasks in the
base areas under their control. Redistribution of land is a central
part of getting rid of inequalities in the countryside. Developing collective
forms of owning and working the land is an essential part of breaking
free of foreign domination. And criticizing and doing away with feudal
traditions, culture, and thinking are crucial to the building of a new
revolutionary way of running society.
These revolutionary changes
being carried out in the Maoist base areas are a concrete expression
of the New Democratic Revolution. This revolution, which is widely supported
by the people, remains as the only way to liberate the masses of people
in Nepal--and is exactly what the United States is so threatened by
and determined to stop.
Li Onesto
is the author of Dispatches from the People's War in Nepal and writer
for Revolution newspaper
Read more on nepal at http://revcom.us/s/nepal.htm
and lionesto.net