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Latin America's Embrace of Red China

Luis Figueroa - 1/21/2005

It is not by chance that one of the most horrible dinosaurs is called Tyranosaurus. It is also not by chance that the two last dinosaurs and tyrants of communism, Hu Jintao and Fidel Castro embraced themselves in brotherly love 'to advance Socialism.' Hu noted on his visit to Cuba that "The Chinese government expects that Cuba continues with his socialist system", said the president of the People´s Republic; and added that "we hope that the Cuban people advances through the road of building socialism". [1]

After the brotherly hug, Cuba obtained 16 investment agreements that will bring millions of Red China´s dollars in the island´s nickel mining business, [2] probably controlled by Castro or his cronies. Due to Cuba's inability to develop, China is happy to play the role of a sugar daddy that the USSR used to play.

Such perspectives touch the hearts of socialists (and their partners among the business elites and the ruling parties) in small countries like Guatemala. In the biggest economy in Central America there are talks about "building a strategy for China" [3] and "opening commercial relations with the Asian giant". [4] The worst of them all expect that continental China "orders investments in Guatemala and decide to import Guatemalan products". [5]

I am very much in favor of free trade and, therefore, understand that because it is free, it should also be responsible. What worries me as a Guatemalan is my government's expectation of favors from the invaders of Tibet, the perpetrators of Tiananmen Square abuses, as well as the terror of the so-called Great Leap Forward and the so-called Cultural Revolution. [6]

Guatemalan oligarchies cannot distinguish the moral difference between doing private business, and doing business with repressive regimes whose officials can order investments to be made. It is ridiculous that they cannot distinguish between the misery of the regular Chinese people, [7] and the the glowing penthouses of Shangai.

Years ago it was fashionable to discuss "flying capitals" that were feared because they come and go, according to the volatile conditions of the markets. But, are they more unreliable than investments by governments? Isn´t it worst that the new investments depend on the arbitrary decisions of those who have the political power? Socialists feel comfortable investing other people´s money in political adventures, or receiving such capital; but can development be founded over contracts based in government blackmail?

In fact, it cannot. Mary O´Grady of The Wall Street Journal warned that given China´s ideas on freedom, Hu´s approach to the region cannot be good for the Americas and the democracies south of the Rio Grande. To balance things, O´Grady said, the State Department should revise its diplomacy. It needs an agenda defined by American values that promotes growth, strong currencies and open markets. And I would add to that respect for individual rights, legal equality and the rule of law.

In an article titled "The Middle Kingdom in Latin America" she said that the intense approach of the People´s Republic to this region could complicate the American efforts to control illegal immigration, the traffic of drugs and arms, and the money laundering. This is because China is cooperating with those Latin American countries that are not particularly friendly to such efforts. O´Grady warned that some of those countries may be tempted to use the Chinese option to defy the United States.

It is a fact that China is approaching Chavez´s Venezuela, Castro´s Cuba, Kirchner´s Argentina and Da Silva´s Brasil. Those are strategic countries for China, who will welcome Chinese investments in industries strategic for ... China. Now, what about Guatemala and Central America? In its efforts do displace Taiwan from the heart of Central America, China will be generous with the yuan´s diplomacy.

This meditation comes handy because Taiwan, despite being a democracy, is denied a place in the United Nations; while the influence of Red China, a dictatorship, is growing rapidly in a region which is the frontier of the North American free trade zone.

Also in September, but in 1999 during the summit meeting of Central American presidents and the president of Taiwan, the Vice-President of Guatemala, Eduardo Stein (then Minister of Foreign Affairs), said to me that "even when Continental China has never objected the full diplomatic relations that Guatemala has with Taiwan, it has been with the condition that those relations do not imply public and express support of the reinsertion of the Republic of China to the United Nations". [8]

Red China´s friendship and its purposed investments have a price; [9] and it is evident that the Chinese agenda has been in the minds of Guatemalan politicians for a while. It is obvious that the Guatemalan socialists may be happy to pay it in order to defy the United States, and to advance their cause. And it seems that their partners in Guatemala´s business elite and ruling party cannot care less. Now, is that the only price? And what will be the American share?