Is Edward J. Snowden Aboard This Plane?

By Noam Chomsky

Truthout, August 1, 2013

On July 9, the Organization of American States held a special session to discuss the shocking
behavior of the European states that had refused to allow the government plane carrying
Bolivian President Evo Morales to enter their airspace.

Morales was flying home from a Moscow summit on July 3. In an interview there he had said he
was open to offering political asylum to Edward J. Snowden, the former U.S. spyagency
contractor wanted by Washington on espionage charges, who was in the Moscow airport.

The OAS expressed its solidarity with Morales, condemned actions that violate the basic rules
and principles of international law such as the inviolability of Heads of State, and firmly
called on the European governments France, Italy, Portugal and Spain to explain their actions
and issue apologies.

An emergency meeting of UNASUR the Union of South American Nations denounced the
flagrant violation of international treaties by European powers.

Latin American heads of state weighed in, too. President Dilma Rousseff of Brazil expressed the
countrys indignation and condemnation of the situation imposed on President Evo Morales by
some European countries and warned that this serious lack of respect for the law .
compromises dialogue between the two continents and possible negotiations between them.

Commentators were less reserved. Argentine political scientist Atilio Boron dismissed Europe as
the whore of Babylon, cringing before power.

With virtually identical reservations, two states refused to sign the OAS resolution: the United
States and Canada. Their growing isolation in the hemisphere as Latin America frees itself from
the imperial yoke after 500 years is of historic significance.

Morales plane, reporting technical problems, was permitted to land in Austria. Bolivia charges
that the plane was searched to discover whether Snowden was on board. Austria responds that
there was no formal inspection. Whatever happened followed warnings delivered from
Washington. Beyond that the story is murky.

Washington has made clear that any country that refuses to extradite Snowden will face harsh
punishment. The United States will chase him to the ends of the earth, Sen. Lindsey Graham
warned.
But U.S. government spokespersons assured the world that Snowden will be granted the full
protection of American law referring to those same laws that have kept U.S. Army soldier
Bradley Manning (who released a vast archive of U.S. military and diplomatic documents to
WikiLeaks) in prison for three years, much of it in solitary confinement under humiliating
conditions. Long gone is the archaic notion of a speedy trial before a jury of peers. On July 30 a
military judge found Manning guilty of charges that could lead to a maximum sentence of 136
years.

Like Snowden, Manning committed the crime of revealing to Americans and others what their
government is doing. That is a severe breach of security in the operative meaning of the term,
familiar to anyone who has pored over declassified documents. Typically security means
security of government officials from the prying eyes of the public to whom they are answerable
in theory.

Governments always plead security as an excuse in the Snowden case, security from terrorist
attack. This pretext comes from an administration carrying out a grand international terrorist
campaign with drones and special operations forces that is generating potential terrorists at
every step.

Their indignation knows no bounds at the thought that someone wanted by the United States
should receive asylum in Bolivia, which has an extradition treaty with the U.S. Oddly missing
from the tumult is the fact that extradition works both ways again, in theory.

Last September, the United States rejected Bolivias 2008 petition to extradite former president
Gonzalo Snchez de Lozada Goni to face charges of genocide and crimes against humanity.
It would, however, be an error to compare Bolivias request for extradition with Washingtons,
even if we were to suppose that the cases have comparable merit.

The reason was provided by St. Augustine in his tale about the pirate asked by Alexander the
Great, How dare you molest the sea? The pirate replied, How dare you molest the whole
world? Because I do it with a little ship only, I am called a thief; you, doing it with a great navy,
are called an Emperor.

St. Augustine calls the pirates answer elegant and excellent. But the ancient philosopher, a
bishop in Roman Africa, is only a voice from the global South, easily dismissed. Modern
sophisticates comprehend that the Emperor has rights that little folk like Bolivians cannot aspire
to.

Goni is only one of many that the Emperor chooses not to extradite. Another case is that of Luis
Posada Carriles, described by Peter Kornbluh, an analyst of Latin American terror, as one of the
most dangerous terrorists in recent history.
Posada is wanted by Venezuela and Cuba for his role in the 1976 bombing of a Cubana
commercial airliner, killing 73 people. The CIA and FBI identified him as a suspect. But Cubans
and Venezuelans also lack the prerogatives of the Emperor, who organized and backed the reign
of terror to which Cubans have been subjected since liberation.

The late Orlando Bosch, Posadas partner in terrorism, also benefited from the Emperors
benevolence. The Justice Department and FBI requested that he be deported as a threat to U.S.
security, charging him with dozens of terrorist acts. In 1990, after President George H.W. Bush
overturned the deportation order, Bosch lived the rest of his life happily in Miami, undisturbed
by calls for extradition by Cuba and Costa Rica, two mere pirates.

Another insignificant pirate is Italy, now seeking the extradition of 23 CIA operatives indicted for
kidnapping Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr, an Egyptian cleric in Milan, whom they rendered to
Egypt for torture (he was later found to be innocent). Good luck, Italy.

There are other cases, but the crime of rendition returns us to the matter of Latin American
independence. The Open Society Institute recently released a study called Globalizing Torture:
CIA Secret Detention and Extraordinary Rendition. It reviewed global participation in the crime,
which was very broad, including among European countries.

Latin American scholar Greg Grandin pointed out that one region was absent from the list of
shame: Latin America. That is doubly remarkable. Latin America had long been the reliable
backyard for the United States. If any of the locals sought to raise their heads, they would be
decapitated by terror or military coup. And as it was under U.S. control throughout the latter
half of the last century, Latin America was one of the torture capitals of the world.

Thats no longer the case, as the United States and Canada are being virtually expelled from the
hemisphere.

CHOMSKY.INFO