<div dir="ltr">
<div class="gmail-top-anchor"></div>
<div id="gmail-toolbar" class="gmail-toolbar-container">
</div><div class="gmail-container" lang="en" dir="ltr">
<div class="gmail-header gmail-reader-header gmail-reader-show-element">
<a class="gmail-domain gmail-reader-domain" href="https://geopoliticaleconomy.substack.com/p/trump-colombia-gustavo-petro-colonialism?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=457596&post_id=155837833&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=lvppb&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email">geopoliticaleconomy.substack.com</a>
<div class="gmail-domain-border"></div>
<h1 class="gmail-reader-title">Trump attacks Colombia, and it pushes back: 'We are not a colony'!</h1>
<div class="gmail-credits gmail-reader-credits">Ben Norton</div>
<div class="gmail-meta-data">
<div class="gmail-reader-estimated-time" dir="ltr">January 27, 2025<br></div>
</div>
</div>
<hr>
<div class="gmail-content">
<div class="gmail-moz-reader-content gmail-reader-show-element"><div id="gmail-readability-page-1" class="gmail-page"><div dir="auto"><div><a target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4c8b1fbe-2450-4b1c-9ad4-103ae389e663_1920x1080.jpeg" rel=""><div><span><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_2400,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4c8b1fbe-2450-4b1c-9ad4-103ae389e663_1920x1080.jpeg" width="394" height="222" alt="" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" style="margin-right: 25px;"></span></div></a></div><p>Donald Trump has kicked off his second administration with a very aggressive foreign policy.</p><p><span>Trump is threatening trade restrictions and sanctions on countries around the world, including 100% tariffs on </span><a href="https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2025/01/19/brics-expands-population-nigeria-africa/" rel="">BRICS countries, which now represent 55% of the world population</a><span>.</span></p><p><span>The </span><a href="https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2025/01/23/trump-expand-us-territory-manifest-destiny/" rel="">US president wants to colonize Greenland</a><span>. He also vowed to take over the Panama Canal.</span></p><p>Invoking "Manifest Destiny", Trump is even attacking Canada and Mexico, the two largest trading partners of the United States.</p><p>When
Trump selected neoconservative hawk Marco Rubio as his secretary of
state, it was a sign that he would be focusing his attention on Latin
America, seeking to impose US hegemony in the region -- and in
particular to prevent China from having close relations with Latin
America.</p><div id="gmail-youtube2-ZZ8YZEecJgE"><p></p></div><p>During
Trump's first administration, Rubio called for the US military to
invade Venezuela, to overthrow the government of President Nicolás
Maduro.</p><p>Rubio likewise wants to impose even heavier sanctions on
Cuba, Nicaragua, and other independent leftist governments in Latin
America.</p><p>In the first week that Trump returned to the White House, one of the nations that he targeted was Colombia.</p><p><span>Historically,
Colombia had been one of the closest US allies in the region.
Venezuela's revolutionary President Hugo Chávez famously dubbed Colombia
"the Israel of Latin America". He argued that, just as </span><a href="https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2023/11/12/why-us-support-israel-geopolitics-michael-hudson/" rel="">Israel serves as an extension of US hegemony</a><span>
in West Asia, acting as an "unsinkable aircraft carrier" for the US
empire, Colombia plays the same role in Latin America, as a base of
operations that Washington has used to try to destabilize other
countries in the region.</span></p><p><span>Colombia's right-wing, pro-US President Juan Manuel Santos said he was proud that his country was </span><a href="https://www.haaretz.com/2013-06-16/ty-article/.premium/proud-to-be-the-israel-of-latin-america/0000017f-f7a0-d318-afff-f7e337760000" rel="">called "the Israel of Latin America”</a><span>.</span></p><p>However,
the geopolitical situation changed quite dramatically in 2022, when the
people of Colombia elected their first ever left-wing president,
Gustavo Petro.</p><p>Ever since he came to office, the US government has meddled in Colombia's internal affairs and sought to destabilize him.</p><p><span>Marco
Rubio has waged a kind of political war against Petro, fixating on his
past as a guerrilla in a revolutionary leftist organization, claiming
that he "has </span><a href="https://x.com/SenMarcoRubio/status/1791144373163270448" rel="">put Colombia’s security and stability at risk</a><span>”.</span></p><p>Rubio
has aggressively aimed to cut off Latin America's relations with China,
which has become the largest trading partner of South America, and the
number one trading partner of Latin America as a whole, excluding
Mexico.</p><p><span>In 2023, Petro visited Beijing, where Colombia and
China elevated their relations to the level of a “strategic
partnership”. Rubio wrote in outrage on Twitter that "Petro’s new
'Strategic Partnership' with the Chinese Communist Party will </span><a href="https://x.com/SenMarcoRubio/status/1717541604041400699" rel="">leave Colombia hostage</a><span> to their authoritarian grip".</span></p><p>Rubio
was especially furious when Colombia cut off its diplomatic relations
with Israel, with Petro comparing Benjamin Netanyahu to Adolf Hitler and
accusing Israel of genocide in Gaza.</p><p><span>Angrily denouncing "</span><a href="https://x.com/SenMarcoRubio/status/1785762616280805831" rel="">President Petro’s anti-Israel rhetoric</a><span> and shameful stance", Rubio claimed, "As a far-left Marxist, Petro continues to serve as a </span><a href="https://x.com/SenMarcoRubio/status/1711809352850374941" rel="">spokesperson for criminal thugs</a><span>, who are viciously killing innocent Israelis".</span></p><p><span>The </span><a href="https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2022/02/08/matt-gaetz-monroe-doctrine-argentina-threat-china/" rel="">Trump administration has revived the colonialist Monroe Doctrine</a><span>,
essentially claiming that Latin America is the imperial "backyard" of
the United States. Washington wants to prevent the region from having an
independent foreign policy.</span></p><p>On 26 January, Trump announced
that he would impose sanctions on Colombia, along with initial tariffs
of 25%, which would increase to 50% in the following week.</p><p>Trump
wrote that he would levy "Visa Sanctions on all Party Members, Family
Members, and Supporters of the Colombian Government".</p><p><span>This attack came after </span><a href="https://x.com/petrogustavo/status/1883434963057729650" rel="">Petro condemned the Trump administration</a><span> for brutalizing immigrants and deporting them to Latin America on </span><a href="https://x.com/ICNDigital/status/1883522867951710334/" rel="">military planes in inhumane conditions</a><span>, with handcuffs on their hands and feet.</span></p><p>"We
have never refused to accept migrants and we have tried to stop
migration", Petro explained. "The stupid [US] blockade of Venezuela was
what unleashed millions of migrants into the US".</p><p><span>"But do not demand that I accept deportees from the US, handcuffed and on military aircraft", the Colombian president added. "</span><a href="https://x.com/petrogustavo/status/1883630564064080339" rel="">We are not a colony</a><span> of anyone".</span></p><p><span>Petro responded to Trump's 25% tariffs on Colombian goods by announcing that </span><a href="https://x.com/petrogustavo/status/1883627992150073761" rel="">Colombia would retaliate with 25% tariffs on US goods</a><span>.</span></p><p>"US
products whose price will rise in the national economy should be
replaced by national production", he said, adding that "the government
will help in this goal".</p><p><span>Right-wing politicians in Colombia, like former presidential candidate </span><a href="https://x.com/FicoGutierrez/status/1883600728339681692" rel="">Fico Gutiérrez</a><span>, denounced Petro and obsequiously expressed support for Trump and the United States.</span></p><p>"It doesn't surprise me that they kneel [before the US]", Petro shot back at Gutiérrez.</p><p><span>Petro declared, "Let's fight so that poor families in Antioquia </span><a href="https://x.com/petrogustavo/status/1883673839152115816" rel="">do not offer their young daughters to the gringos</a><span>. It is a matter of national and personal dignity".</span></p><p>Meanwhile,
as the US government was attacking Colombia, China's ambassador to the
South American nation, Zhu Jingyang, emphasized that Beijing supported
it and defended its sovereignty.</p><p><span>"We are at the </span><a href="https://x.com/zhu_jingyang/status/1883610027568902589" rel="">best moment of our diplomatic relations between China and Colombia</a><span>, which are turning 45 years old", said Ambassador Zhu.</span></p><div><a target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F10a751dd-e202-4949-bc7c-ce63924ca73a_1280x720.jpeg" rel=""><div><span><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F10a751dd-e202-4949-bc7c-ce63924ca73a_1280x720.jpeg" width="394" height="222" alt="petro xi china colombia" title="petro xi china colombia" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" style="margin-right: 25px;"></span></div></a>Colombia's President Gustavo Petro with China's President Xi Jinping in October 2023</div><p><span>In response to Donald Trump's threats, Colombian President </span><a href="https://x.com/petrogustavo/status/1883624818811236502" rel="">Gustavo Petro published a scathing yet poetic open letter on Twitter</a><span>. The following is an English language translation produced by Geopolitical Economy Report:</span></p><blockquote><p>Trump,
I don't really like traveling to the US, it's a bit boring, but I
confess that there are some things that are worth it. I like going to
the Black neighborhoods of Washington. There I saw an entire fight in
the US capital between Blacks and Latinos with barricades, which seemed
like nonsense to me, because they should unite.</p><p>I confess that I like Walt Whitman, and Paul Simon, and Noam Chomsky, and Miller.</p><p>I
confess that Sacco and Vanzetti, who have my blood, in the history of
the US, they are memorable and I follow them. They were murdered, for
being labor leaders, with the electric chair, by the fascists who are in
the US, as well as in my country.</p><p>I don't like Trump’s oil; he is
going to end the human species because of greed. Maybe one day, over a
drink of whiskey that I accept, despite my gastritis, we can talk
frankly about this, but it's difficult because you consider me an
inferior race, and I am not, nor is any Colombian.</p><p>So if you know
someone who is stubborn, that's me, period. You can use your economic
strength and your arrogance to try to carry out a coup d’etat, like they
did with [Salvador] Allende. But I die on my own terms; I resisted
torture and I resist you.</p><p>I don't want slave-owners on the side of
Colombia; we already had many and we freed ourselves. What I want on
the side of Colombia are lovers of freedom. If you can't accompany me,
I'll go elsewhere.</p><p>Colombia is the heart of the world, and you
have not understood it. This is the land of the yellow butterflies, of
the beauty of Remedios, but also of the Colonels Aureliano Buendía [a
revolutionary leader in the novel One Hundred Years of Solitude], of
whom I am one, perhaps the last.</p><p>You will kill me, but I will
survive in my people, which came before yours, in the Americas. We are
peoples of the winds, of the mountains, of the Caribbean Sea, and of
freedom.</p><p>You don't like our freedom, fine. I don't shake hands
with white slave-owners. I shake the hands of the white freedom-loving
heirs of [Abraham] Lincoln, and of the black and white peasants of the
USA, before whose graves I cried and prayed on a battlefield, which I
reached, after walking the mountains of Italian Tuscany and after being
saved from Covid. They are the United States, and before them I kneel,
before no one else.</p><p>Overthrow me, President [Trump], and the Americas and humanity will respond.</p><p>Colombia
now stops looking to the north; it looks to the world. Our blood comes
from the blood of the Caliphate of Córdoba, the civilization at that
time; of the Roman Latins of the Mediterranean, the civilization of that
time, who founded the republic; the democracy in Athens. Our blood has
the Black rebels who were turned into slaves by you.</p><p>Colombia is
the first free territory of America, before Washington, of all America.
There I take shelter in its African songs. My land is made of goldsmiths
from the time of the Egyptian pharaohs, and of some of the earliest
artists in the world, in Chiribiquete.</p><p>You will never dominate us. You are opposed by the warrior who rode our lands, shouting freedom, who is named [Simón] Bolívar.</p><p>Our
people are a bit fearful, a bit timid, they are naive and kind, loving;
but they will know how to keep the Panama Canal, which you took from us
with violence. Two hundred heroes from all across Latin America lie in
Bocas del Toro, now Panama, formerly Colombia, whom you murdered.</p><p>I
raise a flag and as [Jorge Eliécer] Gaitán said, even if I am alone, it
will remain hoisted with the Latin American dignity that is the dignity
of America, which your great-grandfather did not know, and mine did;
you, Mr. President, who is an immigrant in the United States.</p><p>Your
blockade does not scare me; because Colombia, in addition to being the
country of beauty, is the heart of the world. I know that you love
beauty as I do; do not disrespect it and it will give you some of its
sweetness.</p><p>COLOMBIA FROM TODAY ON OPENS ITSELF TO THE WHOLE WORLD, WITH OPEN ARMS; WE ARE THE BUILDERS OF FREEDOM, LIFE, AND HUMANITY.</p><p>I am informed that you are putting a 50% tariff on the fruits of our human labor that enter the US. I am doing the same.</p><p>Let our people plant corn that was discovered in Colombia and feed the world.</p></blockquote></div><br></div></div>
</div>
<div>
</div>
<div></div>
</div>
</div>