Mapa Oficial de la Republica Bolivariana de Venezuela
Anglo-American Diplomacy and the Reopening of the Guyana-Venezuela Boundary Controversy, 1961-1966
Cedric L. Joseph
Anglo-American Diplomacy and the Reopening of the Guyana-Venezuela Boundary Controversy, 1961-1966
Tomado de:
Book Review…Review of Cedric Joseph’s Anglo-American Diplomacy
http://www.stabroeknews.com/2009/guyana-review/12/01/book-review-review-of-cedric-joseph%e2%80%99s-anglo-american-diplomacy/
By Stabroek staff December 1, 2009 in Guyana Review
Cedric L. Joseph’s Anglo-American Diplomacy and the Reopening of the Guyana-Venezuela Boundary Controversy, 1961-1966 (Trafford Publishing, 2008) ISBN: 9781425134716, ppxvi+522, ill. and maps
[obtainable from http://www.trafford.com/]
Despite its problems Guyana has been blessed with many fine historians and a Foreign Service of high quality. This book, by an author who is a fine historian and diplomat, throws much light on the two threats to the territorial integrity of Guyana: the Venezuelan and Surinamese claims. Cedric Joseph’s experience and expertise as an academic (the author of important articles and the 1998 monograph with the same title as this book) and as a diplomat who later was the Head of the Presidential Secretariat combine to produce a work of great lucidity, intelligence and intellectual rigour.
The borders of the Americas were made after 1492 by armed conflict and grandiose claims- Spain and Portugal even divided the New World of the Americas by a grand treaty, the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494. The overall effect of this was the division in Latin America between the Spanish- and Portuguese –speaking regions. This took no account of the prior claims of the original inhabitants or those of other European powers- both disputed these claims. The original inhabitants lost conclusively (“conclusively” may be too strong a term given recent developments in the Americas) but what is significant is that the other European powers were hardly more successful. This lack of success is more remarkable given the declining power of Spain and Portugal (which became an economic colony of Britain at the start of the eighteenth century) and the growing power of the Netherlands, France and England. The Dutch ruled Brazil for a while in the 17th century; elsewhere Spanish rule was only challenged successfully in marginal territories on the mainland like British Honduras and the Guianas and in those regions north of what are now the most southerly regions of the USA and in the Caribbean archipelago (though even here Spain held on to most of the largest islands). The Spanish mainland empire was divided into vice-royalties within the boundaries of which a number of countries achieved their independence: as a consequence border disputes were and are many. The boundaries of the vice-royalties were not themselves marked with any precision.
The unsettled border between British Guiana and Venezuela became of importance to the British at the time of the gold rush of the 1840s. At that time Venezuela failed to respond to British overtures; when gold and diamonds became important in the late nineteenth century the Venezuelans started to pay attention. Joseph fills in the detail of this history admirably clearly and begins his careful and detailed study with the opening of the dispute in the 1890s. This might have well been decided by the stronger (Britain) had it not been for the vocally belligerent support of the U.S.A. for Venezuela. It is unlikely that Britain and the U.S.A. would have come to blows on this issue but the self-confidence of an Imperial power near the peak of its strength and influence did not play well with its ex-colony. Joseph quite rightly points out the hypocrisy of the U.S.A. in its anti-imperial protestations just when it was about to launch its own imperial war against Spain. Britain agreed to arbitration as did Venezuela- the tribunal consisted of five members, two British nominees, two Venezuelan and a neutral chairman. The last was a Russian and the Venezuelans opted to be represented by Americans (their subsequent complaints of not being represented are one of the more bizarre aspects of the affair). Their legal representatives were an American and a Mexican. The decision confirmed the present border. The matter might have rested there had it not been for the Mexican who declared that the British had bullied everyone (this did not surface until the 1940s). Doubtless the Venezuelans felt that British power had prevailed and popular sentiment along those lines was widespread, but until 1961 the matter did not become a major diplomatic issue.
The story Joseph tells in great detail (and it needs to be detailed) is one of odd bungling by the British. At first resolute in refusing to reopen a matter that had been settled legally and accepted by both parties they let Venezuela reopen the issue. It is not clear, even from Joseph’s account, whether this was simply an individual’s failure. What is clear is that neither the U.K. nor the U.S.A. were prepared to place their national interests in the Venezuelan economy and the political stability of that country above those of the legal soundness of the original award and, need one add, the national interests of an insignificant and increasingly troublesome colony like British Guiana. Oddly enough the Soviet Union had been surprised at Britain’s allowing the matter to be reopened (had the U.K. taken the Soviet Union seriously on this matter it would have been at least one benefit of our being caught up in the Cold War). Most Latin American countries did not support Venezuela because of their own history of border disputes. The Governors of British Guiana, Grey and Luyt, were aware of the dangers and eventually so was the then government of B.G. The government which took office in 1964 and led the country to independence signed the Geneva Agreement of 1966. This in a sense brought the Anglo-American diplomacy, that contributed so greatly to the mess, to a close but as Joseph reminds us the years since then have not resolved the matter.
The long chapter on the border dispute with Surinam is the best introduction I know to the history of that dispute and the diplomacy surrounding it in the 1960s. This dispute nearly ended in armed conflict and had unexpected consequences. The unexpected consequences were, of course, at the other end of the Corentyne and involved maritime boundaries. The resolution of that dispute can be followed in Shridath Ramphal Triumph for UNCLOS: The Guyana-Suriname Maritime Arbitration, A Compilation & Commentary (Hansib, 2008). It is to be hoped that some government of Surinam years in the future will not follow the Venezuelan example and try to overturn the decision of an arbitration.
There are some interesting implications of these border disputes. The most serious is to do with Venezuela’s attempt to overturn an award decided by an international tribunal: the effects of this on international law are profound though in practice they would be tempered by political realities. Were the findings of 1899 to be set aside the result might prove worse for Venezuela as the mouth of the Orinoco and the Cuyuni basin could go to Guyana; what it would do is immediately cause a border conflict with Brazil as the 1930s settlement of the Brazil-Guyana border involved territory in the extreme south-west of Guyana that originally was claimed by Venezuela. On the other hand Surinamese claims on the real source of the Corentyne might lead to another possible source well within present Surinam being identified; far from gaining a triangle of land Surinam might lose one.
One obvious lesson of this book is that small insignificant powers should remember that Great Powers have permanent interests and not permanent allies or friends. Joseph might have made this point more forcefully. The fact that Guyana while still a colony got involved in the Cold War (which nearly became the hottest of all wars with the Cuban Missile Crisis) seems to me on the evidence presented here to have minimal bearing on the revival of the Venezuelan territorial claim or even on British or American attitudes from 1961 onwards. To put it another way, had the politics of British Guiana followed more closely the political trends that existed in Jamaica, Trinidad and Barbados Venezuela would still have pushed its claim and been favoured, if not supported, by the U.S.A. and the U.K., the latter having made calculations of its own economic interests and the opinions of its major ally with whom it believes and continues to believe it has a “Special Relationship”. This is why Guyana’s relations with Brazil were and continue to be important.
One general reflection: ex-colonies are boringly similar. The Americans, a century after independence, could not resist tweaking the Lion’s tail in 1895 when the Venezuelans rekindled the dispute and could not stomach Imperial Britain’s perceived arrogance then and after 1899. The relationships between ex-colonies and ex-imperial powers fit an all-too-familiar pattern and the size and importance of the ex-colony do not appear to matter. The vogue for Post-Colonial Studies in academic circles has always seemed to me misplaced: Post Imperial Studies concentrating on the ex-imperial powers (far fewer in number) in decline and after their loss of empire would be much more fruitful. Much that needed to be said about ex-colonies was said by Seymour Martin Lipset as early as 1963 in his The First New Nation: The United States in Historical and Comparative Perspective. Cool heads and learning from the experience of others and ourselves (the land boundaries with Venezuela and Surinam are still in dispute) rather than being trapped in resentments are needed.
One specific reflection: these borders, like all modern borders, except insular ones, in the Americas and those elsewhere in the world have little to do with the borders of the original inhabitants of the land- even a cursory perusal of any good historical atlas would confirm this. This was the point that D. Graham Burnett was making in his Masters of All They Surveyed : Exploration, Geography, And A British El Dorado (University of Chicago Press, 2000). Joseph’s ire is excited by Burnett’s loose writing about Guyana’s “imperial perspective” (I think he meant that Guyanese adopted the imperial British perspective towards Amerindians) though by writing of Venezuela’s “ colonial ambitions” Joseph himself may be guilty of the same sin since Venezuela was claiming what it wants to believe are the imperial borders it inherited from Spain. Joseph is right to criticise Burnett for loose writing on the mechanics of the dispute, including the role of surveyors. Here post-modern theorising, one of the great obstacles to understanding the world, seems to be the culprit. Burnett is even more deserving of Joseph’s criticism for ill-informed comments about Guyana’s foreign policy. The fact that these are supported by reference to Eusi Kwayana leads to a final reflection on our writing about our recent history. Too often this seems to depend on referring to the writings by politicians and people choose their gurus according to political affiliation without subjecting these statements to rigorous tests (historians need to be even warier of evidence that supports than of evidence that contradicts their own interpretations). Appeals to authority are not acceptable in intellectual life, however much they may be in other spheres of human activity.
A few minor caveats are necessary as the editing process seems to have failed occasionally. The text seems to suggest that Devil’s Creek, the informal boundary between Berbice and Surinam, was a branch of the Corentyne (p.204): the footnote (p.273) correctly identifies this now disappeared waterway as about eighty miles west of the Corentyne. The first two paragraphs on page 448 read like the beginning of a treaty, perhaps the inevitable result of a scholar familiar with treaties and Latin syntax. The largest caveat is something beyond the control of the author: the map on page ii is not clear enough to show the extent of the Venezuelan and Surinamese territorial claims, though the reproduction on page 410 of a Venezuelan map showing the “zona de reclamación” makes up for that failure. Chapter Six might have become Chapter Three as it explains Venezuelan perspectives both before and, more importantly, after 1899 and leads naturally into Chapter Three, “Decolonization and Reopening”.
These are, however, minor matters. This is a fine achievement by a fine scholar- perhaps we can induce him to write a history of Guyana’s diplomatic relations in the first decades after independence, while some of the major and minor players are still alive. That so many people who served in the early years are still involved is a tribute to the high quality of our foreign service.
PETER D. FRASER 19th November 2009
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How can Mr Chavez lecture the world on American Imperialism when his government bullies its small neighbour? - Dear Editor, Judging the Venezuelan President, Hugo Chavez, who insulted the Guyanese President by n
Venezuelan reports of clandestine meetings on border controversy untrue - Guyana's ambassador to Venezuela Dr Odeen Ishmael has dismissed as "totally untrue" an allegation in
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Nota del Editor del Blog:
Reproducimos una nueva reseña de la obra “Anglo-American Diplomacy and the Reopening of the Guyana-Venezuela Boundary Controversy, 1961-1966”, publicada en el diario Stabroeknews de Georgetown (la anterior se publico por el citado diario y fue reproducida en esté blog el domingo 15 de marzo de 2009). En la serie Bibliografía este importante libro editado en la República Cooperativa de Guyana, sobre una versión respecto de la reclamación de los territorios ubicados al oeste del río Esequibo conocido como Guayana Esequiba o Zona en Reclamación por Venezuela entre 1961-1966.
Señalamos en esa oportunidad: una primera observación al título de la misma sobre la fecha, o periodo de 1961 hasta las 12 de la noche de mayo de 1966, sobre que el territorio de lo que hoy conforma la República de Guyana oficialmente era British Guina o la Colonia de la Guyana Británica o inglesa con la debida reserva de los territorios al oeste del río Esequibo considerados venezolanos al no reconocerse la sentencia del Tribunal Arbitral de Paris de 1899, por nula e irrita.
Los EE UU no se enfrentaron a sus aliados británicos en defensa de Venezuela todo lo contrario no la apoyaron o permanecieron indiferentes. Prueba de ello fue en la X Conferencia Interamericana de Caracas o la “Conferencia Anti Comunista de Caracas“en 1954. Ante la cual el Gobierno Estadounidense o la administración del Presidente Dwight David Eisenhower, se opuso a que Venezuela presentara su posición oficial referente a la contención de la Guayana Esequiba, para evitar romper la unidad en la lucha anticomunista en occidente por una reclamación territorial a su aliada la Gran Bretaña. Lo que indudablemente retraso las acciones a nivel internacional por la reivindicación de esos territorios por parte de Venezuela.
Por otro lado la Nación Venezolana en la década de 1960 y aun antes exigió y acepto que la colonia de la Guyana Británica fuera parte de las negociaciones iníciales, y posteriores sobre la reclamación de los territorios ubicados al oeste del río Esequibo conocidos como la Guayana Esequiba. Contrario a lo sucedido en el Tribunal Arbitral de París de 1899, donde simplemente fuimos meros observadores de cómo se nos despojaban 159.500 Km2 de territorios.
Por otro lado de acuerdo con la amplia documentación existente en los EE UU, demuestra que esta no tomo posición a favor de la reclamación de los territorios ubicados al oeste del río Esequibo. Las exigencias venezolanas llevó al Departamento de Estado de USA, a petición del director de los Asuntos de Venezuela y Colombia, Daniel Morgolies, quien "...era partidario que los Estados Unidos se mantuvieran fuera de la controversia y dejase a las partes la búsqueda de una solución amistosa...", recomendó efectuar un estudio jurídico a través de su Consultoría Jurídica sobre la contención limítrofe por la Guayana Esequiba dictaminando su consultor Jurídico el Dr. Jeromy Henry Silber: "...la no injerencia en el diferendo...", y ante la insistencia del Gobierno venezolano posteriormente en contraposición a la postura anterior. El Secretario de Estado Suplente, Adams, en forma irrespetuosa y de falta de tacto diplomático, en nota del 28-02 de 1965 al gobierno venezolano señaló: "...Me parece ridículo que el Canciller venezolano esté solicitando nuestros buenos oficios ante el Reino Unido y al mismo tiempo nos amenace con chantajearnos con supuestos descubrimientos de un fraude cometido por un norteamericano hace 66 años... No debemos aceptar que esas supuestas pruebas requieran una repuesta sustantiva por parte nuestra...".
Argumentos estos que permitieron a los EE.UU. desligarse formalmente de la controversia limítrofe, asumiendo una actitud de no intervención en el caso venezolano, la cual ha mantenido a lo largo de los años, e incluso se opuso al movimiento separatista del Rupununi, impidiendo su apoyo por parte de Venezuela cuando el embajador Bernbaum de los Estados Unidos en Venezuela, el 26 de diciembre de 1968, por instrucciones de Washington entregó a la Cancillería Venezolana un nota que señalaba que "...el Gobierno norteamericano estaba sumamente interesado en el mantenimiento del orden en Guyana, que conocía los sentimientos pacifistas muy arraigados del Gobierno venezolano y que por esa razón no creía en ninguna acción violenta de parte de de Venezuela. Que el Gobierno de los Estados Unidos también estaba sumamente preocupado porque en caso de que tuvieran lugar los acontecimientos violentos en la Guayana Esequiba y el Gobierno de Guyana llevara el asunto a las Naciones Unidas, los Estados Unidos se verían en el caso de votar junto con la Unión Soviética en contra de un país amigo. Se repetiría así el caso de Suez de tan ingrata recordación para el Gobierno norteamericano...".
Con lo cual queda perfectamente demostrado que el Gobierno estadounidense nunca apoyó, ni en la década de los sesenta, ni en las siguientes cuatro décadas, al Gobierno Venezolano. Todo lo contrario, a partir de los setenta hasta la presente ha permanecido indiferente, o al menos se ha mantenido neutral, frente a la Nación Venezolana en su justa reclamación por la Guayana Esequiba.
Para ampliar la información ver por favor:
1. El Esequibo y la verdad documentalhttp://lilianafasciani.blogspot.com/2007/02/el-esequibo-y-la-verdad-%20documental.html
2. RECHAZO A LAS DECLARACIONES DEL CANCILLER S. R. INSANALLY ANTE SU DESCONOCIMIENTO DE LA REIVINDICACIÓN DE LA GUAYANA ESEQUIBA POR LA NACIÓN VENEZOLANA
http://lilianafasciani.blogspot.com/2007/08/rechazo-las-declaraciones-del-canciller.html
3. LA GUAYANA ESEQUIBA RECLAMACION Y DESCOLONIZACION
http://lilianafasciani.blogspot.com/2007/04/la-guayana-esequiba-reclamacin-y.html
Nota del editor del blog: Al referenciarse a la República Cooperativa de Guyana se deben de tener en cuenta los 159.500Km2, de territorios ubicados al oeste del río Esequibo conocidos con el nombre de Guayana Esequiba o Zona en Reclamación sujetos al Acuerdo de Ginebra del 17 de febrero de 1966.
Territorios estos sobre los cuales el gobierno Venezolano en representación de la Nación venezolana se reservo sus derechos sobre los territorios de la Guayana Esequiba en su nota del 26 de mayo de 1966 al reconocerse al nuevo Estado de Guyana .
“...por lo tanto, Venezuela reconoce como territorio del nuevo Estado, el que se sitúa al este de la margen derecha del río Esequibo y reitera ante la comunidad internacional, que se reserva expresamente sus derechos de soberanía territorial sobre la zona que se encuentra en la margen izquierda del precitado río; en consecuencia, el territorio de la Guayana Esequiba sobre el cual Venezuela se reserva expresamente sus derechos soberanos, limita al Este con el nuevo Estado de Guyana, a través de la línea del río Esequibo, tomando éste desde su nacimiento hasta su desembocadura en el Océano Atlántico...”
Book Review…Review of Cedric Joseph’s Anglo-American Diplomacy
http://www.stabroeknews.com/2009/guyana-review/12/01/book-review-review-of-cedric-joseph%e2%80%99s-anglo-american-diplomacy/
By Stabroek staff December 1, 2009 in Guyana Review
Cedric L. Joseph’s Anglo-American Diplomacy and the Reopening of the Guyana-Venezuela Boundary Controversy, 1961-1966 (Trafford Publishing, 2008) ISBN: 9781425134716, ppxvi+522, ill. and maps
[obtainable from http://www.trafford.com/]
Despite its problems Guyana has been blessed with many fine historians and a Foreign Service of high quality. This book, by an author who is a fine historian and diplomat, throws much light on the two threats to the territorial integrity of Guyana: the Venezuelan and Surinamese claims. Cedric Joseph’s experience and expertise as an academic (the author of important articles and the 1998 monograph with the same title as this book) and as a diplomat who later was the Head of the Presidential Secretariat combine to produce a work of great lucidity, intelligence and intellectual rigour.
The borders of the Americas were made after 1492 by armed conflict and grandiose claims- Spain and Portugal even divided the New World of the Americas by a grand treaty, the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494. The overall effect of this was the division in Latin America between the Spanish- and Portuguese –speaking regions. This took no account of the prior claims of the original inhabitants or those of other European powers- both disputed these claims. The original inhabitants lost conclusively (“conclusively” may be too strong a term given recent developments in the Americas) but what is significant is that the other European powers were hardly more successful. This lack of success is more remarkable given the declining power of Spain and Portugal (which became an economic colony of Britain at the start of the eighteenth century) and the growing power of the Netherlands, France and England. The Dutch ruled Brazil for a while in the 17th century; elsewhere Spanish rule was only challenged successfully in marginal territories on the mainland like British Honduras and the Guianas and in those regions north of what are now the most southerly regions of the USA and in the Caribbean archipelago (though even here Spain held on to most of the largest islands). The Spanish mainland empire was divided into vice-royalties within the boundaries of which a number of countries achieved their independence: as a consequence border disputes were and are many. The boundaries of the vice-royalties were not themselves marked with any precision.
The unsettled border between British Guiana and Venezuela became of importance to the British at the time of the gold rush of the 1840s. At that time Venezuela failed to respond to British overtures; when gold and diamonds became important in the late nineteenth century the Venezuelans started to pay attention. Joseph fills in the detail of this history admirably clearly and begins his careful and detailed study with the opening of the dispute in the 1890s. This might have well been decided by the stronger (Britain) had it not been for the vocally belligerent support of the U.S.A. for Venezuela. It is unlikely that Britain and the U.S.A. would have come to blows on this issue but the self-confidence of an Imperial power near the peak of its strength and influence did not play well with its ex-colony. Joseph quite rightly points out the hypocrisy of the U.S.A. in its anti-imperial protestations just when it was about to launch its own imperial war against Spain. Britain agreed to arbitration as did Venezuela- the tribunal consisted of five members, two British nominees, two Venezuelan and a neutral chairman. The last was a Russian and the Venezuelans opted to be represented by Americans (their subsequent complaints of not being represented are one of the more bizarre aspects of the affair). Their legal representatives were an American and a Mexican. The decision confirmed the present border. The matter might have rested there had it not been for the Mexican who declared that the British had bullied everyone (this did not surface until the 1940s). Doubtless the Venezuelans felt that British power had prevailed and popular sentiment along those lines was widespread, but until 1961 the matter did not become a major diplomatic issue.
The story Joseph tells in great detail (and it needs to be detailed) is one of odd bungling by the British. At first resolute in refusing to reopen a matter that had been settled legally and accepted by both parties they let Venezuela reopen the issue. It is not clear, even from Joseph’s account, whether this was simply an individual’s failure. What is clear is that neither the U.K. nor the U.S.A. were prepared to place their national interests in the Venezuelan economy and the political stability of that country above those of the legal soundness of the original award and, need one add, the national interests of an insignificant and increasingly troublesome colony like British Guiana. Oddly enough the Soviet Union had been surprised at Britain’s allowing the matter to be reopened (had the U.K. taken the Soviet Union seriously on this matter it would have been at least one benefit of our being caught up in the Cold War). Most Latin American countries did not support Venezuela because of their own history of border disputes. The Governors of British Guiana, Grey and Luyt, were aware of the dangers and eventually so was the then government of B.G. The government which took office in 1964 and led the country to independence signed the Geneva Agreement of 1966. This in a sense brought the Anglo-American diplomacy, that contributed so greatly to the mess, to a close but as Joseph reminds us the years since then have not resolved the matter.
The long chapter on the border dispute with Surinam is the best introduction I know to the history of that dispute and the diplomacy surrounding it in the 1960s. This dispute nearly ended in armed conflict and had unexpected consequences. The unexpected consequences were, of course, at the other end of the Corentyne and involved maritime boundaries. The resolution of that dispute can be followed in Shridath Ramphal Triumph for UNCLOS: The Guyana-Suriname Maritime Arbitration, A Compilation & Commentary (Hansib, 2008). It is to be hoped that some government of Surinam years in the future will not follow the Venezuelan example and try to overturn the decision of an arbitration.
There are some interesting implications of these border disputes. The most serious is to do with Venezuela’s attempt to overturn an award decided by an international tribunal: the effects of this on international law are profound though in practice they would be tempered by political realities. Were the findings of 1899 to be set aside the result might prove worse for Venezuela as the mouth of the Orinoco and the Cuyuni basin could go to Guyana; what it would do is immediately cause a border conflict with Brazil as the 1930s settlement of the Brazil-Guyana border involved territory in the extreme south-west of Guyana that originally was claimed by Venezuela. On the other hand Surinamese claims on the real source of the Corentyne might lead to another possible source well within present Surinam being identified; far from gaining a triangle of land Surinam might lose one.
One obvious lesson of this book is that small insignificant powers should remember that Great Powers have permanent interests and not permanent allies or friends. Joseph might have made this point more forcefully. The fact that Guyana while still a colony got involved in the Cold War (which nearly became the hottest of all wars with the Cuban Missile Crisis) seems to me on the evidence presented here to have minimal bearing on the revival of the Venezuelan territorial claim or even on British or American attitudes from 1961 onwards. To put it another way, had the politics of British Guiana followed more closely the political trends that existed in Jamaica, Trinidad and Barbados Venezuela would still have pushed its claim and been favoured, if not supported, by the U.S.A. and the U.K., the latter having made calculations of its own economic interests and the opinions of its major ally with whom it believes and continues to believe it has a “Special Relationship”. This is why Guyana’s relations with Brazil were and continue to be important.
One general reflection: ex-colonies are boringly similar. The Americans, a century after independence, could not resist tweaking the Lion’s tail in 1895 when the Venezuelans rekindled the dispute and could not stomach Imperial Britain’s perceived arrogance then and after 1899. The relationships between ex-colonies and ex-imperial powers fit an all-too-familiar pattern and the size and importance of the ex-colony do not appear to matter. The vogue for Post-Colonial Studies in academic circles has always seemed to me misplaced: Post Imperial Studies concentrating on the ex-imperial powers (far fewer in number) in decline and after their loss of empire would be much more fruitful. Much that needed to be said about ex-colonies was said by Seymour Martin Lipset as early as 1963 in his The First New Nation: The United States in Historical and Comparative Perspective. Cool heads and learning from the experience of others and ourselves (the land boundaries with Venezuela and Surinam are still in dispute) rather than being trapped in resentments are needed.
One specific reflection: these borders, like all modern borders, except insular ones, in the Americas and those elsewhere in the world have little to do with the borders of the original inhabitants of the land- even a cursory perusal of any good historical atlas would confirm this. This was the point that D. Graham Burnett was making in his Masters of All They Surveyed : Exploration, Geography, And A British El Dorado (University of Chicago Press, 2000). Joseph’s ire is excited by Burnett’s loose writing about Guyana’s “imperial perspective” (I think he meant that Guyanese adopted the imperial British perspective towards Amerindians) though by writing of Venezuela’s “ colonial ambitions” Joseph himself may be guilty of the same sin since Venezuela was claiming what it wants to believe are the imperial borders it inherited from Spain. Joseph is right to criticise Burnett for loose writing on the mechanics of the dispute, including the role of surveyors. Here post-modern theorising, one of the great obstacles to understanding the world, seems to be the culprit. Burnett is even more deserving of Joseph’s criticism for ill-informed comments about Guyana’s foreign policy. The fact that these are supported by reference to Eusi Kwayana leads to a final reflection on our writing about our recent history. Too often this seems to depend on referring to the writings by politicians and people choose their gurus according to political affiliation without subjecting these statements to rigorous tests (historians need to be even warier of evidence that supports than of evidence that contradicts their own interpretations). Appeals to authority are not acceptable in intellectual life, however much they may be in other spheres of human activity.
A few minor caveats are necessary as the editing process seems to have failed occasionally. The text seems to suggest that Devil’s Creek, the informal boundary between Berbice and Surinam, was a branch of the Corentyne (p.204): the footnote (p.273) correctly identifies this now disappeared waterway as about eighty miles west of the Corentyne. The first two paragraphs on page 448 read like the beginning of a treaty, perhaps the inevitable result of a scholar familiar with treaties and Latin syntax. The largest caveat is something beyond the control of the author: the map on page ii is not clear enough to show the extent of the Venezuelan and Surinamese territorial claims, though the reproduction on page 410 of a Venezuelan map showing the “zona de reclamación” makes up for that failure. Chapter Six might have become Chapter Three as it explains Venezuelan perspectives both before and, more importantly, after 1899 and leads naturally into Chapter Three, “Decolonization and Reopening”.
These are, however, minor matters. This is a fine achievement by a fine scholar- perhaps we can induce him to write a history of Guyana’s diplomatic relations in the first decades after independence, while some of the major and minor players are still alive. That so many people who served in the early years are still involved is a tribute to the high quality of our foreign service.
PETER D. FRASER 19th November 2009
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How can Mr Chavez lecture the world on American Imperialism when his government bullies its small neighbour? - Dear Editor, Judging the Venezuelan President, Hugo Chavez, who insulted the Guyanese President by n
Venezuelan reports of clandestine meetings on border controversy untrue - Guyana's ambassador to Venezuela Dr Odeen Ishmael has dismissed as "totally untrue" an allegation in
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Nota del Editor del Blog:
Reproducimos una nueva reseña de la obra “Anglo-American Diplomacy and the Reopening of the Guyana-Venezuela Boundary Controversy, 1961-1966”, publicada en el diario Stabroeknews de Georgetown (la anterior se publico por el citado diario y fue reproducida en esté blog el domingo 15 de marzo de 2009). En la serie Bibliografía este importante libro editado en la República Cooperativa de Guyana, sobre una versión respecto de la reclamación de los territorios ubicados al oeste del río Esequibo conocido como Guayana Esequiba o Zona en Reclamación por Venezuela entre 1961-1966.
Señalamos en esa oportunidad: una primera observación al título de la misma sobre la fecha, o periodo de 1961 hasta las 12 de la noche de mayo de 1966, sobre que el territorio de lo que hoy conforma la República de Guyana oficialmente era British Guina o la Colonia de la Guyana Británica o inglesa con la debida reserva de los territorios al oeste del río Esequibo considerados venezolanos al no reconocerse la sentencia del Tribunal Arbitral de Paris de 1899, por nula e irrita.
Los EE UU no se enfrentaron a sus aliados británicos en defensa de Venezuela todo lo contrario no la apoyaron o permanecieron indiferentes. Prueba de ello fue en la X Conferencia Interamericana de Caracas o la “Conferencia Anti Comunista de Caracas“en 1954. Ante la cual el Gobierno Estadounidense o la administración del Presidente Dwight David Eisenhower, se opuso a que Venezuela presentara su posición oficial referente a la contención de la Guayana Esequiba, para evitar romper la unidad en la lucha anticomunista en occidente por una reclamación territorial a su aliada la Gran Bretaña. Lo que indudablemente retraso las acciones a nivel internacional por la reivindicación de esos territorios por parte de Venezuela.
Por otro lado la Nación Venezolana en la década de 1960 y aun antes exigió y acepto que la colonia de la Guyana Británica fuera parte de las negociaciones iníciales, y posteriores sobre la reclamación de los territorios ubicados al oeste del río Esequibo conocidos como la Guayana Esequiba. Contrario a lo sucedido en el Tribunal Arbitral de París de 1899, donde simplemente fuimos meros observadores de cómo se nos despojaban 159.500 Km2 de territorios.
Por otro lado de acuerdo con la amplia documentación existente en los EE UU, demuestra que esta no tomo posición a favor de la reclamación de los territorios ubicados al oeste del río Esequibo. Las exigencias venezolanas llevó al Departamento de Estado de USA, a petición del director de los Asuntos de Venezuela y Colombia, Daniel Morgolies, quien "...era partidario que los Estados Unidos se mantuvieran fuera de la controversia y dejase a las partes la búsqueda de una solución amistosa...", recomendó efectuar un estudio jurídico a través de su Consultoría Jurídica sobre la contención limítrofe por la Guayana Esequiba dictaminando su consultor Jurídico el Dr. Jeromy Henry Silber: "...la no injerencia en el diferendo...", y ante la insistencia del Gobierno venezolano posteriormente en contraposición a la postura anterior. El Secretario de Estado Suplente, Adams, en forma irrespetuosa y de falta de tacto diplomático, en nota del 28-02 de 1965 al gobierno venezolano señaló: "...Me parece ridículo que el Canciller venezolano esté solicitando nuestros buenos oficios ante el Reino Unido y al mismo tiempo nos amenace con chantajearnos con supuestos descubrimientos de un fraude cometido por un norteamericano hace 66 años... No debemos aceptar que esas supuestas pruebas requieran una repuesta sustantiva por parte nuestra...".
Argumentos estos que permitieron a los EE.UU. desligarse formalmente de la controversia limítrofe, asumiendo una actitud de no intervención en el caso venezolano, la cual ha mantenido a lo largo de los años, e incluso se opuso al movimiento separatista del Rupununi, impidiendo su apoyo por parte de Venezuela cuando el embajador Bernbaum de los Estados Unidos en Venezuela, el 26 de diciembre de 1968, por instrucciones de Washington entregó a la Cancillería Venezolana un nota que señalaba que "...el Gobierno norteamericano estaba sumamente interesado en el mantenimiento del orden en Guyana, que conocía los sentimientos pacifistas muy arraigados del Gobierno venezolano y que por esa razón no creía en ninguna acción violenta de parte de de Venezuela. Que el Gobierno de los Estados Unidos también estaba sumamente preocupado porque en caso de que tuvieran lugar los acontecimientos violentos en la Guayana Esequiba y el Gobierno de Guyana llevara el asunto a las Naciones Unidas, los Estados Unidos se verían en el caso de votar junto con la Unión Soviética en contra de un país amigo. Se repetiría así el caso de Suez de tan ingrata recordación para el Gobierno norteamericano...".
Con lo cual queda perfectamente demostrado que el Gobierno estadounidense nunca apoyó, ni en la década de los sesenta, ni en las siguientes cuatro décadas, al Gobierno Venezolano. Todo lo contrario, a partir de los setenta hasta la presente ha permanecido indiferente, o al menos se ha mantenido neutral, frente a la Nación Venezolana en su justa reclamación por la Guayana Esequiba.
Para ampliar la información ver por favor:
1. El Esequibo y la verdad documentalhttp://lilianafasciani.blogspot.com/2007/02/el-esequibo-y-la-verdad-%20documental.html
2. RECHAZO A LAS DECLARACIONES DEL CANCILLER S. R. INSANALLY ANTE SU DESCONOCIMIENTO DE LA REIVINDICACIÓN DE LA GUAYANA ESEQUIBA POR LA NACIÓN VENEZOLANA
http://lilianafasciani.blogspot.com/2007/08/rechazo-las-declaraciones-del-canciller.html
3. LA GUAYANA ESEQUIBA RECLAMACION Y DESCOLONIZACION
http://lilianafasciani.blogspot.com/2007/04/la-guayana-esequiba-reclamacin-y.html
Nota del editor del blog: Al referenciarse a la República Cooperativa de Guyana se deben de tener en cuenta los 159.500Km2, de territorios ubicados al oeste del río Esequibo conocidos con el nombre de Guayana Esequiba o Zona en Reclamación sujetos al Acuerdo de Ginebra del 17 de febrero de 1966.
Territorios estos sobre los cuales el gobierno Venezolano en representación de la Nación venezolana se reservo sus derechos sobre los territorios de la Guayana Esequiba en su nota del 26 de mayo de 1966 al reconocerse al nuevo Estado de Guyana .
“...por lo tanto, Venezuela reconoce como territorio del nuevo Estado, el que se sitúa al este de la margen derecha del río Esequibo y reitera ante la comunidad internacional, que se reserva expresamente sus derechos de soberanía territorial sobre la zona que se encuentra en la margen izquierda del precitado río; en consecuencia, el territorio de la Guayana Esequiba sobre el cual Venezuela se reserva expresamente sus derechos soberanos, limita al Este con el nuevo Estado de Guyana, a través de la línea del río Esequibo, tomando éste desde su nacimiento hasta su desembocadura en el Océano Atlántico...”
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