Former United States ambassador to the United Nations and White House national security advisor John Bolton recently admitted that he helped the Trump administration in the planning of failed coups in other nations.
Bolton delivered the comments following the congressional hearing regarding the attack on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021. The panel's legislators accused former president Donald Trump of encouraging the violence in a last-ditch effort to hold onto power after losing the 2020 election.
Mr. Bolton, however, asserted in a conversation with CNN anchor Jake Tapper that Trump lacked the skills necessary to pull off a "meticulously planned coup d'état." He continued, later stating: "As someone who has helped plan coup d'états, not here but you know in other places, it takes a lot of work and he [Trump] didn't act in that way."
Tapper enquired as to which attempts Bolton was making. However, Bolton remarked, "I'm not going to delve into the specifics”. He went on to describe the attempted and failed Venezuela coup: “It didn't work out well in the end. Not that we had much to do with it, but I witnessed what it took for the opposition to attempt and unseat a president who was chosen illegally, and they failed”
As national security adviser in 2019, Bolton officially backed Venezuela’s Juan Guaido's request for the military to support his drive to depose socialist President Nicolas Maduro, asserting that his reelection was invalid. However, Maduro eventually remained in charge.
However, it is extremely uncommon for American authorities to publicly recognize their part in fomenting upheaval in other nations. Many have seen Bolton's admission as an effort to undermine former president Donald Trump's bid for reelection in 2024.
Over the years, a number of foreign policy experts have questioned Washington's history of foreign interventions, such as the Vietnam War and its invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan this century.
African political scholars have likewise denounced American meddling in a number of African nations. This admission by Bolton merely supports the long-held beliefs of many African nations that are antagonistic to American influence.
Many African governments have accused the United States of secretly planning to unseat them. For instance, the ZANU PF regime in Zimbabwe has employed a variety of tactics to maintain control in an effort to counterbalance American influence in the country.
Most African opposition political parties with close ties to the West have been accused by the ruling parties of being American puppets. However, authoritarian governments across Africa have also utilized this idea of American influence as a propaganda tactic to maintain their hold on power.
In the past 30 years, Africa has seen a number of coups, several of which are thought to have been sponsored by the United States in a bid to advance its strategic interests on the continent. Many Pan-Africanists think that America seeks to build puppet regimes in order to impose its values across the continent and secure vital resources.
Other nations than the United States are also planning coups abroad. China has also come under fire for allegedly supporting coups in secret. For instance, Chinese officials assisted in the November 2017 coup that led to the overthrow of Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe.
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