HomeARC ML 1641
WORLD CURRENTS!--NO.12: GRENADA! DFO 1641 10/83
1. SPEAKING OF WARS, THE U.S. HAS A LITTLE WAR GOING ON IN GRENADA RIGHT NOW! After all, if you're going to have a war, you might as well have one that you're pretty sure to win! (Techi: What's Grenada?) It's a little tiny island in the Caribbean Sea over near the United States of America, down South right near Trinidad, & that's right near South America & Venezuela. Do you want to go around & show them, David, where Grenada is on the map? I'll bet there's some other people here who probably don't know where it is. We need a nice wall map for current events lectures.
2. WELL, THE BACKGROUND IS THAT IT WAS ONE OF THOSE LITTLE BRITISH ISLANDS, part of the British Empire in the happy imperial days of yore when Great Britain was a great empire & the sun never set on the British flag, etc. The British & the French & the Dutch & the Spanish & the Americans were constantly fighting over these little tiny islands out there in the Caribbean.
3. SOME OF THESE ISLANDS USED TO CHANGE HANDS EVERY FEW MONTHS, & IT DEPENDED ON WHOSE SHIP SAILED INTO THE HARBOUR AS TO WHICH FLAG THEY STARTED RAISING! They literally did that! Some of them kept a stock of flags so if a French ship sailed in they'd just pull up the French flag immediately so they wouldn't get all shot up & have to be conquered or subdued. They just quickly flew the flag. Or if an English ship sailed in they hoisted the British flag. Dutch ship, French ship, Spanish ship, whatever it was, they hoisted their flag, because it was a game of survival.
4. SO GRENADA IS ONE OF THOSE LITTLE TINY ISLANDS, ONLY 133 SQUARE MILES. It's probably about the size of Malta, very small & a little hilly & mountainous.--Which is why they're having such a hard time building that huge air strip that the U.S. claims would be big enough to accommodate big bombers. And obviously the Russians & the Cubans were quite interested in it & it was always suspected that they were helping them build it. I'm getting ahead of the story though.
5. AFTER THE EXPLORATION DAYS & THE CONQUEST DAYS & THE CONQUISTADOR DAYS & all those great old-fashioned adventurous & murderous days of the conquests of the various empires, everything pretty well settled down as to whose islands were whose, & "You leave my islands alone & we'll leave your islands alone!" Even when I was young they were kind of sleepy little towns & islands that didn't do much but live off fish & coconuts & bootleg liquor.--That was a big business because nobody had Prohibition but the U.S., & it didn't have any important islands except Puerto Rico & the Virgins.
6. (TECHI: WHAT'S BOOTLEG LIQUOR?) Bootleg liquor is illegal liquor, liquor that's against the law & was made by moonshiners up in the hills where they used to wear a kind of boots. They got their nickname from living out in the woods & they called them bootleggers. Later, of course, the same name was applied to any illegal liquor coming in, & most of it was coming into the U.S. from these British & various other islands of the Caribbean. But the British islands were the closest, the Bahamas & particularly Bimini. For example, Grand Bahama Island was only 30 miles off West Palm Beach, Florida & Bimini was only about 25 miles off Miami. The islands weren't very big & considering how much liquor they stocked there it's a wonder they didn't sink!
7. WELL, NOW YOU UNDERSTAND WHY IT TAKES ME A LITTLE TIME TO MAKE THESE TALKS SOMETIMES, BECAUSE YOU HAVE TO EXPLAIN TO CHILDREN AS YOU GO ALONG. I believe in stopping to answer their questions--I bet the Lord did that! He said, "Suffer the little children to come unto Me & forbid them not, for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven." (Mt.19:14.) So there must have been a lot of them running around. Their Mamas & Daddies were there, so what could they do with the kids but bring'm?
8. SO THIS IS THE HISTORY OF GRENADA, A LITTLE ISLAND OF ONLY 133 SQUARE MILES. That's less than 12 by 12, right? If I remember my 12-times tables correctly, 12 times 12 is 144. So that's a little more than 11 by 11, & that's not very big.--When it takes an airstrip for these huge big bombers something like 5 kilometers or close to three miles, some of them, for them to get off the ground! And to find a flat place on that island was a little difficult, that's why it's taken them so long.
9. BESIDES, IF YOU SEE THE WAY THE CARIBBEAN NATIVES MOVE, THEY'RE PRETTY SLOW!--Like those natives of South Africa I watched build a restroom once. I could have built that whole restroom myself & I'll bet it wouldn't have taken me a week to lay all those bricks! It wasn't any bigger than half of this table! But there were ten guys standing out there--I watched them through my binoculars--& usually only one or two guys laying bricks in slow motion. He'd take it off the pile with both hands, slap a little mud on, & I'll bet it took him five minutes to lay every brick!--And with only two of them working & about ten guys standing there just watching!
10. THEY WERE ALL SUPPOSED TO BE WORKERS, I KNEW THAT, BECAUSE THEY WERE ALL IN UNIFORM, but of course about three straw bosses were standing there telling the other guys what to do, & most of them standing there doing nothing but smoking & talking & watching. The guys who were doing the actual building & laying the bricks must have been at the bottom of the totem pole!--Like in a chicken yard, everybody else was over'm. So they're the only ones that had to do any work.
11. SO GRENADA WAS JUST ONE OF THOSE LITTLE SLEEPY ISLES, ONE THAT THE BRITISH HAPPENED TO CONQUER, & ALL THESE EUROPEAN CONQUERORS LOADED THEM DOWN WITH AFRICAN SLAVES. The original natives on those islands were Indians who at first welcomed the explorers & arrivals peacefully & were very kind to them & generous & gave them water & food, etc., like Columbus when he landed & all that. The natives were very friendly until the Europeans began to mistreat'm, & then they began to fight'm, of course, & slaughter & kill each other until finally the poor Indians who refused to submit & refused to become slaves, they just slaughtered them & killed them all off!
12. THEY HAD SOME SALT MINES DOWN THERE IN SOME OF THOSE PLACES, the Spanish had in Cuba at least, & about the last of the Indians died out in those mines. So except for some of their mixed progeny who may have survived, the Indians are all gone & mostly all that is left on nearly all those islands are the Black slaves from Black Africa, & of course quite a mix as well.
13. THEY'VE GOT A SORT OF A COMMON LANGUAGE BETWEEN ALL THOSE ISLANDS THAT THEY USED TO CALL PIDGIN ENGLISH. It's a kind of a sing-song mixture of English, Dutch, French, Spanish & their native tongue, & they sing it so it sounds like Chinese really. When I first went out there I could hardly understand a word of it, but you gradually begin to recognise a few sounds & a few English words & you begin to figure it out.
14. SO THAT'S THE BACKGROUND--A LITTLE SLEEPY CARIBBEAN SOUTH SEA ISLAND WITH NOT MUCH GOING ON & not worth very much except for the coconuts & the copra, & in some large islands like Cuba, sugar & salt. Of course, they were always looking for gold but they really never found any in the islands, they're poor people. Sugar grew mostly on the larger islands like Cuba. (Family: Did they have bauxite?) They might have, but they didn't even know what bauxite was in those days! Bauxite was something discovered almost virtually in my day or not much before, because they didn't know what aluminum was either. Bauxite's what they get aluminum from, isn't it? Aluminum was pretty new about the turn of the century & they began turning out all these cooking utensils in all this poisonous aluminum because it was easy to work with--soft, cheap & light.
15. BUT MOST OF THEM GREW COCONUTS & SUGAR, A FEW VEGETABLES & THINGS LIKE THAT. (Family: The book says rum.) You know what rum comes from, don't you? You don't grow rum! What does rum come from, anybody know? Let's keep the encyclopedias quiet for a minute, my two encyclopedia brains here! (Family: Sugar.) Yes. Rum is made from fermented sugar, really, sugar liquor, & it's probably the most prevalent liquor in the Caribbean--or at least was originally because they had so much sugar. They grow a few vegetables & odds & ends & have very few animals, mostly what the Europeans brought.
16. MOST OF THOSE LITTLE ISLANDS ARE NOTHING BUT CORAL ATOLLS that have a thin little layer of decomposed vegetation soil on the surface. Even in Miami you only had to dig down one foot through the sand & you struck coral rock, & a lot of places it was already outcropping right on the surface. So they didn't have much soil & it was very sandy soil, they couldn't grow an awful lot of different kinds of crops, but it seems like sugar does very well in that loose sandy soil.
17. FLORIDA HAS THOUSANDS OF ACRES OF SUGAR OUT AROUND THE BORDERS OF THE EVERGLADES & we used to go out there & buy our sugar from the sugar mill. We had to drive about 30 miles out into the Everglades to the sugar mill, the only place you could get raw sugar, & we could buy it by the 100-pound sack dirt-cheap. The Americans, of course, didn't like raw sugar & they only ate the white sugar. The raw sugar was just kind of like a by-product or something that most people didn't buy.
18. WELL ANYHOW, THE CARIBBEAN ISLANDS ARE MOSTLY POOR, MOSTLY BLACK & MIXED WITH VARIOUS EUROPEAN NATIONALITIES IN CHARGE OF THEM.--UNTIL FINALLY THEY BEGAN TO ABANDON THEIR EMPIRES. First of all after World War 1, the winning empires made the other side abandon their empires. Then after World War 2, both sides made both sides abandon their empires because it was the popular thing to do, to insist that nobody should have an empire & nobody should have colonies. It was kind of against the New World ethics. Are you sure you want to hear this? (Family: Yes!) Well, it's sort of a digest for you, anyhow. It would take you a lot longer to try to bone-up on this in your history.
19. SO BRITAIN ABANDONED ITS EMPIRE & ITS PEOPLE & I'VE ALREADY WRITTEN SEVERAL THINGS ABOUT THAT. When Britain rejected the Lord & abandoned God for Darwin & evolution instead of God & the Bible, the Lord forsook her. She lost her power, her empire & just about lost everything including the Lord.--Especially all the little poor colonies like those islands which were no good to her any more since she had no big armies & navies to fight big wars & needed no strategic bases. They were just a drag on her because they were poverty-stricken people & didn't provide enough of an income of raw materials to make it worthwhile, so she just dumped'm, set virtually all of them free, so-called independent.
20. AND RIGHT AWAY AS SHE DID THAT, IT WAS COMMON SCANDAL THAT EVEN IN THE BAHAMAS RIGHT NEXT DOOR TO MIAMI THE MAFIA TOOK OVER! They had Cuba first which was the largest of all the Caribbean islands & a very beautiful island, a lot like Hawaii with mountains, good soil & well-watered streams. I used to say Cuba had the best of everything--the beautiful sub-Tropical climate of Miami & Florida, & the gorgeous mountains like California & Hawaii. It was the Hawaii of the Caribbean in a way, & you know the story of Cuba. The big islands were kept a lot longer by the Spanish, & the U.S. began to take them over after the Spanish-American War about the late 1800s.
21. SO ANYHOW, THAT'S ONE REASON THE U.N. IS SO PACKED WITH SO MANY DELEGATES NOWADAYS. The U.N. started out with something like 50 countries altogether, most of them European & American, etc., right after World War 2. Then they began admitting every little new independent country--which was every new little tiny island, every little plot of ground practically! Some of the most ridiculous little countries you ever heard of that were nothing but little islands or cities or whatever before, now they've each one got a representative in the U.N., with just as much representation as the great empires of the U.S., Britain, Russia, etc.
22. OF COURSE, RUSSIA OUTSMARTED'M! If the United States had done what Russia did, it would have declared every one of its States independent & every single State of the United States would have had a representative in the U.N.--50 States! That's what Russia did, she took all of her provinces--this S.S.R. & that S.S.R.--called them the U.S.S.R. & claimed a whole bunch of those little outfits were separate countries who could send their representatives to the U.N.--And then all of her Satellite States in the East European countries.
23. SO THIS SORT OF PRESENTED A DILEMMA FOR THE ORIGINAL FOUNDERS OF THE U.N. WHO THOUGHT THEY HAD THE WORLD UNDER CONTROL NOW BECAUSE THEY WERE IN THE MAJORITY. But it wasn't very long after they admitted every little island & every little Tom, Dick & Harry & every little plot of ground in Africa to the U.N. that now the so-called Western nations & Northern industrial nations are out-numbered about 3 or 4 to 1, maybe more than that!
24. THEY DON'T HAVE A CHANCE WHEN IT COMES TO VOTING IN THE U.N., that's why the Superpowers reserved their veto in the Security Council to make sure if they didn't like the decisions that were made they could just nullify'm. The only thing that can override the Security Council, which is the main Central Committee of the U.N., is the General Assembly of all the nations. But it was so hamstrung & given so few powers that even if it makes decisions that cannot be overridden or vetoed, which it can, it can't enforce'm, it has so little power.
25. SO EVERY ONE OF THOSE LITTLE TINY CARIBBEAN ISLANDS & FORMER COLONIES BECAME NATIONS, INDEPENDENT COUNTRIES--Dominica, Grenada, every little island became a new country & sent a delegate to the U.N. Even little plots of land like Chad--well, it's pretty big but has hardly anybody in it & mostly barren desert, & so poor that their delegates & representatives in New York & Washington have been starving & the local neighbours have had to feed'm! Of course, that's nothing new to the Chadians, they starve at home. So that's the U.N., a really interesting body where at last all the little tiny countries tell the big ones where to get off!
26. SO GRENADA WAS ONE OF THE BRITISH ISLANDS, GIVEN ITS INDEPENDENCE BY BRITAIN IN 1974, & AT FIRST IT HAD A PRO-BRITISH GOVERNOR. In fact, this is surprising!--As Britain has done with most of the Commonwealth nations, the Queen still retains what is known as a Governor General, really a strange governmental setup. Remember what so surprisingly occurred a few years ago in Australia when Whitlam was elected by the people to be the Prime Minister of Australia? He was that huge big fellow with blond hair--elected by the people, mind you--& going so Socialist & so radical & changing everything. So what happened? (Family: The Governor General dissolved the government & called on the opposition.)--Just dissolved the government, kicked out Whitlam & the Queen appointed a new Prime Minister to Australia!--Malcolm Fraser.
27. UP TO THAT POINT THE AUSTRALIANS THOUGHT THEY WERE INDEPENDENT! But somehow in their Constitution they'd left that in, that the Governor General who obeyed only the Queen & was the Queen's representative there in Australia had the power that if things didn't go to the Home government's fancy, they could kick'm out! Even the Australians themselves didn't know that was possible until this happened. Whitlam was a friend of ours, & a lot of his men, & we were going great guns under them. Then Fraser came into power, an ultra-hardhat-conservative-reactionary, & they began bearing down on us & fighting us & we've had a tough time from then on. He's been Prime Minister almost ever since, hasn't he?--Until this latest Socialist, Hawke, got elected early this year.
28. BUT IMAGINE, BY USING THE GOVERNOR GENERAL THEY COULD JUST KICK OUT WHATEVER GOVERNMENT THAT WAS THERE, so the British Empire through the Monarchy retained a measure of control over those countries, accepted by their Constitutions. It was supposed to be a safety measure that in case democracy or independence got out of hand & didn't really go the way the British wanted it to go, the Queen still had some power to step in & change things.
29. WELL, THE U.S. DOES THE SAME THING! Any country that the U.S. has proclaimed to be independent or is supposed to be independent, as long as things go the way the U.S. likes it, okay. But it was a common practice in the early part of the century & the last part of the preceding century that if things in any of those little Banana Republics & islands of the Caribbean or countries of Latin America didn't go just the way the United States wanted them to go, they'd send in the Marines!--And they did it time & time again, almost countless times. But you don't have to go that far back, Eisenhower sent'm into Lebanon in 1958.
30. AFTER WORLD WAR 2, LEBANON WAS AGAIN MADE A COUNTRY FOR THE FIRST TIME IN CENTURIES--it hadn't been an independent country for hundreds of years, ever since the Arabs had taken it over first, then the Turks, & after World War 1 it was given to the French as a so-called League of Nations Mandate. That's why they speak French there today, the French were there ever since World War 1. It became the pleasure resort & the banking center of the Mideast, etc., & it was very well-run by the French. The last time they had any semblance of order at all was when the French were there, & that's why the French are so interested now & why they've got a larger number of troops there than the U.S.! The U.S. only had 1500 Marines & the French had about 2000, because it was really a French colony.
31. BUT FINALLY AFTER WORLD WAR 2, EVERYBODY WAS MADE TO GIVE UP THEIR COLONIES & THE FRENCH HAD TO GIVE UP LEBANON.--And Lebanon has been one Hell of a mess ever since with so many factions fighting each other & practically everybody in the country, including little boys, carrying guns, & all the other surrounding powers happily willing to supply them in order to hope that their side wins. But they never have, hardly anybody, until the Israelis marched in, & you can see what happened to them.
32. LEBANON IS ALMOST AS BAD AS AFGHANISTAN! Hardly anybody's ever been able to conquer it or keep it conquered since the Arabs & the Turks. The Lord even promised in the Bible that they'd have nothing but trouble & bloodshed & the sword continuously from then on (Ez.28:23), which they have had--for some reason, the Lord knows--& I think we mentioned that before. (See No.961:1-3.)
33. SO THAT'S WHAT'S THE MATTER WITH LEBANON, ANYHOW, & LEBANON HAS BEEN A MESS LIKE AFGHANISTAN & SOME OF THOSE OTHER PLACES. All the various contending powers keep it that way, they like it that way--unless, of course, they can get complete control, which some of them are trying to do. I mean, when even the Israelis back out of a country you know it's a pretty tough nut to crack! This, of course, is why they called in the U.S. & the Marines & the other forces to take over Lebanon in their absence & kissed goodbye & said, "Well, we're going South now, you can take charge of the mess!"--And they retired to the other side of the Awali River, which gave them almost the whole South half or at least two-fifths of Lebanon. And that's what they wanted, but they're having a hard time trying to survive financially even from one little war!
34. BUT BACK TO GRENADA! My first wife said, "Why do you always have to start in Genesis & go clear through to Revelation?" Well, I figure you don't really understand the situation unless you know the background. I started to say it's been a little Banana Republic, although I don't know that they even grow bananas there! What does it say? (Family: It says bananas.) Oh, it is a Banana Republic!--Bananas, sugar, corn & they make rum. They don't grow rum, Honey!
35. ALL THOSE ISLANDS MAKE RUM BECAUSE THEY ALL GROW SUGAR & THEY ALL DRINK RUM! Don't you remember that favourite old pirate song? In "Kidnapped" & "Treasure Island" old Peg-Leg got drunk & he'd be singing: "Yo-ho-ho & a bottle of Rum!"--Because that was the favourite drink of the New World & the Caribbean, easiest to make because they had so much sugar. And it's plenty strong too! Rum is sugar whiskey. That's really what it is, right? Just what is the alcohol rating on Rum, anybody know? (Family: About 40 percent, 80 proof.) Well, it's just like any other whiskey, in other words. But it's a slightly sweet whiskey, it still retained some of that sugar sweetness, & it's the only other whiskey I think I ever liked outside of Vodka. Gin makes me throw up, but I could drink Vodka & Rum quite a bit.--Not too much, you can't drink too much whiskey at all.
36. YOU SEE ALL THESE GUYS DOWNING THESE GREAT BIG CUPS OF WHISKEY IN THE MOVIES--BALONEY! You can't drink it like that! You're doing well if you can down one little jigger of a double down the hatch! All those guys are drinking while they're on the set in the movie is tea, because you just can't drink whiskey like that! That's a lot of movie malarkey chug-a-luggin' a bottle of whiskey! I chug-a-lugged a fifth of Vodka once when I was on the road & mad at my wife because she wouldn't come. I went into this bar & I really didn't have any experience of drinking at all, & I got this fifth of Vodka & started guzzling it down like you would a bottle of water. After all, it looked like water!
37. WELL, I DON'T THINK I EVEN GOT HALFWAY THROUGH IT, THE NEXT THING I KNEW I WOKE UP FLAT ON MY BACK ON THE FLOOR & this great big black face was staring me right in the face! "Is you all right, boss? Is you okay, boss? Oh, that's that Vodka!" This great big huge coloured guy picked me up in his arms--I could have loved him, he was so sweet--& he helped me get to a chair. Then this other guy, a White fellow came along & befriended me & took me in a taxi to my hotel. That was the worst drunk I ever got, & that was about the last of that for quite awhile. Whew! I'm glad it happened on a Friday night because I was really sick that weekend. Well, so much for whiskey. Oh me!--Back to Grenada!
38. I DON'T REALLY REMEMBER TOO MUCH OF THE HISTORICAL DETAILS--you can probably read'm in any World Book--& we don't have time to go into all the details. I can just tell you the modern history which is probably not in that book, & that is what maybe you already know, at least you guys who keep up on the news.
39. IT FIRST OF ALL HAD A PRO-BRITISH PRIME MINISTER, BLACK OR MIXED OR WHATEVER HE WAS, NAMED ERIC GAIRY, WHEN THEY GOT THEIR INDEPENDENCE IN 1974. Well, he's long gone, overthrown by this fellow Bishop in a coup, a so-called Marxist. Really he was a sort of a Moderate Socialist & Maria & I have been watching him for a long time, reading about him & watching him in the news & all, & he seemed to be a real decent fellow. He was considered a real Moderate, although a Marxist-Socialist.
40. OF COURSE WHEN ANY GOVERNMENT ANYWHERE NEAR OR FAR AROUND THE WORLD OR ESPECIALLY NEAR THE U.S. GOES SOCIALIST OR HALFWAY COMMUNIST, IMMEDIATELY THE U.S. DROPS'M LIKE A HOT POTATO & ostracises'm & fights'm & does everything they can to destabilise their government & cut them off economically, & has driven every single one of them straight into the arms of Communist Russia, beginning with Cuba.
41. CASTRO WAS A SOCIALIST, HE WAS NOT A COMMUNIST. His brother Raoul was a radical Communist & there was constant feuding between Castro & Raoul about whether Cuba should be kept moderately Socialist or Communist. So when the U.S. finally cut Cuba off & tried to chop it up as well, then there was no place to go. The U.S. declared an embargo on Cuba, isolated Cuba, & for awhile even cut off medicine, everything, any kind of trade with Cuba, for awhile even blockaded Cuba to try to bring down the government & cause the fall of Castro. So what could they do?--They just turned to Russia for help, & Russia was more than happy to help establish a pro-Russian bastion right at the doorstep of the U.S.A., & you know that history.
42. SO BY CUTTING OFF & DELIBERATELY TRYING TO DEFEAT THESE OTHERWISE FAIRLY MODERATE SOCIALIST GOVERNMENTS, THEY WERE DRIVEN INTO THE ARMS OF THE RUSSIANS. Because of course the U.S.A. could not even stand a Socialist government--that smacks of Communism! As far as they're concerned, there's no difference between Socialism & Communism, Pink or Red, it's all the same colour to them.
43. SO BISHOP SEEMED TO BE A PRETTY NICE FELLOW & REALLY A MAN OF THE PEOPLE & WAS RECOGNISED AS A POPULIST, A VERY POPULAR LEADER. His people loved him & he did everything he could for the poor, just like Castro did, establishing schools, hospitals, clinics & all kinds of projects to try to help the poor. And the people generally just loved him.
44. BUT OF COURSE "HE THAT LIVES BY THE SWORD, DIES BY THE SWORD" (Mt.26:52; Rev.13:10), & HE HAD TAKEN OVER THE COUNTRY IN A MILITARY COUP. I don't think many people were killed, as I recall, when Bishop took over, hardly any bloodshed at all. In fact, when some of his more radical generals, like the guy that recently took over, wanted to just mow'm all down, he refused to do so. He put his enemies & opponents in prison, but he refused to just slaughter'm & execute'm on the spot like this guy did.
45. BY THE WAY, BISHOP WAS A VERY CLOSE PERSONAL FRIEND OF CASTRO & HE WAS TRYING TO HAVE A CASTRO-TYPE OF SOCIALISM IN GRENADA. Well, they couldn't, of course, get any help from the U.S.A.--in fact they got nothing but trouble! So Russia is always there, always very kind & big-hearted when it comes to little countries that want to play ball with them or need their help & tit-for-tat. So into the vacuum Russia steps in like they did in Cuba, Nicaragua, Guyana, Grenada & you could mention almost scores & scores of countries in Black Africa.
46. I NOTICED IN THE RECENT U.N. VOTE THAT ZIMBABWE ALSO CONDEMNED THE U.S. INVASION OF GRENADA. You can see who are friends of Russia by the way they vote in the U.N. I told you Mugabe was a Communist from the beginning, but Britain, the U.S. & everybody said "Oh no no no, he's no Communist!" They didn't want him to win in the first place, but that's another story. That's another country too by the way, in case you got mixed up & I travelled too fast, hop, skip & jump around, Cuba, Zimbabwe, Africa, Caribbean.
47. BUT IF YOU KNOW CHARACTER AT ALL & READ FACES, BISHOP SEEMED LIKE A KIND MAN, REALLY TRYING TO BE A MODERATE, trying to help the people & throwing off the old colonial rulers & the rich oligarchy which rules nearly all Latin American countries--the very very few very very rich who rule over the very very many very very poor--& it was no different on these Islands. So when these Socialist governments take over, like Cuba, Nicaragua & all, they try to do something for the poor, & they have, they've done tremendously.
48. CASTRO HAS TREMENDOUSLY IMPROVED THE PLIGHT OF THE POOR IN CUBA. To hear U.S. propaganda & read U.S. papers you'd never know it, but I was there & I know it. He did a tremendous job & at first everybody was pro-Castro when he first took over, because he took Cuba away from one of the worst tyrants that ever lived, Batista, who was literally run by the Mafia. Cuba belonged to the U.S. Mafia for years after it was made so-called independent. The Mafia just muscled-in & took over. Batista cooperated with them because they helped him with millions & helped support him & ran his brothels & gambling casinos & practically ran Cuba--besides the big U.S. corporations that ran the sugar mills & the sugar plantations & all the utilities & most of the stores & Sears-Roebuck & Woolworths, etc. It was nothing but an American island!
49. SO BISHOP WANTED TO HAVE A CUBAN-TYPE OF CASTROISM, WHICH WAS A MODERATE FORM OF SOCIALISM, TO HELP THE POOR, & HE DID & HE WAS GOING FINE.--Except that since the U.S.A. was fighting him every step of the way he had to get help from Russia of course. Who else was going to help him? Who else is going to help the Socialists or the guys who overthrow these Capitalist & American tyrants & try to help the poor?
50. FOR 50 YEARS THE U.S. BACKED THE SOMOZAS OF NICARAGUA, SOME OF THE WORST, MOST CRUEL TYRANTS IN ALL LATIN AMERICA! One royal family ran Nicaragua, an absolute totalitarian dictatorship, Somoza & his family & his son & I think his grandsons. But finally the U.S. began to see Somoza was getting a little out of hand & a little unpopular--not only in his own country but all around him & almost all over the World--& the rest of the World began to sympathise with the rebels. We're talking about the U.S. & Nicaragua now, skipping around again.
51. SO THE U.S. FINALLY SAW IT WAS FIGHTING A LOSING GAME SUPPORTING SOMOZA & GETTING A BAD REPUTATION--not that it didn't already have a bad reputation--so they finally decided they'd compromise & try to make some kind of deal with the new government, which was supposed to be just Socialist, three priests on the council that ran it, several Moderates, etc., & only one or two Marxists. They thought they could do business with them so they let'm kick out Somoza. Of course he immediately followed his millions of capital to Florida where most of them stash it away just in case they have to run, smart boys!
52. THEY CLAIM BATISTA SENT AT LEAST TWO BILLION DOLLARS TO DAYTONA BEACH where he had a palatial estate & his wife was already there, so when he made his get-away he was well-fixed for the rest of his dirty life. Nearly all those South American dictators do it that way. They have palatial homes & estates in the U.S. all ready for their final flight--which almost always comes--& millions stashed away in the banks or in Switzerland. And when they finally get kicked out, which they usually do--if not by the poor or the people, at least by some other general or some other rich coalition--they flee to the great haven of the rich, the U.S.A.!
53. SO BISHOP WAS REALLY TRYING TO MORE OR LESS HELP THE POOR & ROB THE RICH. Of course you've got to rob the rich to help the poor because there's only so much money to go around, so much wealth.--A share-the-wealth program in Grenada. And as I say, he was a very good friend of Castro & he was trying to have that kind of Socialism in Grenada. But apparently he was not sympathetic enough with Russia & he had been putting out peace-feelers to the U.S. & trying his best to try to encourage some kind of rapport with the United States, trying to stay independent, in-between in a way, & Castro was actually helping him do this.
54. BUT THIS OTHER GENERAL AUSTIN TOOK OVER, AS FAR AS I'VE GATHERED THE STORY SO FAR, IN A MILITARY COUP, A SHOOTING COUP, & put Bishop & some of his top cabinet members, etc., under what was known as "house arrest." Then the people themselves, mobs of thousands of the people stormed the house & his guards & released him & they all marched to the military headquarters of Grenada where this bunch of thugs, nothing but gangsters with guns, were now running the army & had set up headquarters!--Out & out radical Communists, strictly Russian puppets! The people were thinking that somehow this expression, this demonstration of the masses of thousands of the actual Grenadians themselves would cause these two guys to give up.--His former Finance Minister Coard & this General, Black thug Austin, Head of the Army. Austin was the worst, the other guy was the politician, & those two had connived together to take over the government & ousted Bishop.
55. SOME PEOPLE REALLY ARE INNOCENT & WISHFUL-THINKING PEOPLE, PITIFUL, you know, thinking that they could make such a populist expression of popular opinion & that it would persuade these guys to give up. Instead of that they just mowed'm down, including some of the people! They took Bishop & a number of his Cabinet members, all those marching with him & loyal to him, took'm inside, lined'm up & mowed'm down, slaughtered'm!--Just barbaric, savage, uncivilised slaughter, which of course modern civilised nations are not supposed to do! That's a no no, naughty naughty! Well, they just recently did it in Surinam, they did it in Liberia, they do it all the time & it's nothing new. But you know, big powers don't do things like that. They don't slaughter a handful of top politicians, they go in & slaughter whole countries!
56. SO POOR BISHOP, HE GOT HIS, & SO DID THOSE WHO SUPPORTED HIM, & THESE HARD-LINE HARD-SHELL COMMUNISTS TOOK OVER. Well, a very funny thing happened. Usually the [EDITED: "ACs"] are pretty good at news & they really only distort the news that they want to distort. There was quite a mix-up there for awhile. They don't have their finger in poor pies very much, they like to go where there's money, wealth & power, so those little tiny itty-bitty islands don't interest them very much.--Unless they can make a nice rich resort out of it & make a lot of American dollars!
57. BUT IMMEDIATELY CASTRO CAME OUT & CONDEMNED THIS COUP BECAUSE THEY'D KILLED HIS PERSONAL FRIEND, BISHOP, & THE PEOPLE HE'D HELPED PUT IN POWER. Russia had even warned these people not to pull any foolishness like this or they were going to invite an American invasion, but they went right ahead against Castro & his man & against Russian advice & they did it anyhow.--Just a bunch of gangsters with guns took over the government of this little island with only a hundred thousand people, all Black & all poor, & the only White people down there were the Russians & Cubans.
58. SO THE U.S. INVADED & THE FIRST REPORT WAS THEY TOOK PRISONER ABOUT 50 OR 60 CUBANS & SOMETHING LIKE 30 RUSSIANS. The latest war reports are that many Cubans fought to the death & were slaughtered. The Russians are supposedly in protective captivity. The U.S. doesn't necessarily want a war right now with Russia which it might not win, they'd rather fight a war with a little country like Grenada which they can easily win. After all, they need to win something right now, they're losing in so many places. So they just had to have this war down there to save face, they just couldn't have another defeat right on their doorstep. So that's what happened.
59. THERE WERE ABOUT A THOUSAND AMERICAN STUDENTS DOWN THERE IN WHAT'S SUPPOSED TO BE ONE OF THE BEST MEDICAL COLLEGES IN THE CARIBBEAN, FORMERLY BRITISH. There were about 500-&-some other foreigners there, as I understand mostly British & some French helping with the building of the airport & various other things that poor ignorant Blacks can't do, not even their rulers are that smart. They still have to call on the White people to do the technical things & the smart things.
60. NOW I MAY SHOCK YOU, BUT FRANKLY, THIS WAS ONE INVASION I WAS HEARTILY IN FAVOUR OF!--Having had some experience & known some history & what has happened in some other cases!--Like Haiti when the Haiti rebellion took place, they slaughtered & massacred every single Frenchman left in the country! And that cruel guy that took over in Grenada wouldn't have hesitated to hold those American college kids hostage or massacre'm if it had suited his purpose.
61. SO I DON'T BLAME THE U.S. GOVERNMENT ONE BIT FOR STEPPING IN TO PROTECT ITS CITIZENS IN GRENADA, a thousand college students in that medical school who had already been warned in a 24-hour-a-day curfew lasting six days that they couldn't go out at all 24 hours a day for six days without being shot on sight! People start getting hungry by that time! But that's what they warned'm & that's a pretty serious situation, so the U.S. government just stepped in.
62. THE U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT SENT DOWN THIS MIDDLE-AGED FELLOW & YOUNG WOMAN TO INVESTIGATE THE SITUATION, & THOSE DIPLOMATS, WHAT LIARS! They'd been sent down by the State Department to see the conditions & reconnoitre the safety condition of the American citizens & were interviewed as they were walking through the airport in Barbados to catch a plane back to Washington. They said, "We've been down there & we feel that the situation is secure & there's no real danger to American citizens & everything's okay."--Then he went straight back to Washington & gave them an opposite report! See, he didn't want to give'm any advance warning, & it was smart! Because if he'd started publicising an evil report, that bunch of gangsters would have pounced on those Americans right away & they would have probably had not 50 hostages in Iran, but 1000 hostages in Grenada of all places!
63. SO THE U.S. JUST DECIDED THAT THE SAFEST THING TO DO WAS TO GO DOWN THERE & TAKE IT OVER! They just lost over 200 Marines in Lebanon & they weren't about to lose a thousand Americans in Grenada, which they could have. I mean, those guys are like African savages! They've gone back to the jungle when they get like that, without the Lord & without Christianity & with no Christian ethic or civilisation! They're all going back to the jungle nowadays, returning to savagery. Its national anthem was a Reggae song!--Demonic!
64. MOST OF THOSE ISLANDS ARE ABSOLUTELY FANATICALLY COMPLETELY LOADED WITH DEMONISM, SPIRITISM & ZOMBIISM! And the most prevalent religion of the whole Caribbean, if not most of South America, as anybody knows who knows anything about it, is not Catholicism. The natives of the Caribbean don't even pretend to be Catholics, a lot of them pretend to be Protestants, but actually the basic religion is demonic--zombiism, witchcraft, sorcery & deviltry of all kinds!
65. SO THAT'S WHAT HAPPENED IN GRENADA & THIS WAS ONE CASE WHERE I THINK THE U.S. WAS JUSTIFIED IN MARCHING IN LIKE THE POLICE TO PROTECT ITS CITIZENS.--Even the citizens of Grenada! In fact, it turns out now that the Governor General of Grenada, the Queen's representative, is the one who appealed to the U.S. to come in & save the country.--As well as this union of all the various Caribbean Islands there, which include Jamaica, the biggest, all the way down to Trinidad.
66. THEY HAVE A SORT OF A UNION OF ALL THOSE CARIBBEAN ISLANDS, THE ORGANISATION OF EASTERN CARIBBEAN STATES, whose foreign ministers & heads of state had a meeting themselves in Trinidad & all agreed that something had to be done about the Grenada situation.--That it had just been taken over by a bunch of Communist gangsters is what it amounted to [DELETED] & that the U.S. had better do something about it quick or no telling what would happen to not only its citizens, but to the citizens of Grenada!
67. SO THIS IS ONE TIME WHEN I THINK THE U.S. WAS ACTUALLY JUSTIFIED--ALTHOUGH HOW HONEST IT WAS ABOUT MUSCLING INTO GRENADA TO SAVE ITS CITIZENS & THE PEOPLE, I DON'T KNOW!--It probably was more interested in saving that airstrip from the Russians! But it sure gave them a good justifiable excuse for taking over the island. Then about the most amusing thing about the whole thing--besides the poor old U.S.A. needing some kind of a victory right now, & it might as well pick a little one that they're sure they could win--is the way all of her European allies began to scream!
68. YOU'D EXPECT ALL THE THIRD WORLD NATIONS TO SCREAM, OF COURSE, BECAUSE THEY DON'T WANT THAT TO HAPPEN TO THEM, but all the European allies screamed & dear old Thatcher self-righteously condemned the U.S. for what Britain did even much worse in the Falklands! You say, "Well, the Falklands were British & that's their citizens & they're British citizens," etc. Well, the thousand students at the University in Grenada were Americans! So I think the U.S. had just as much right to march into Grenada & protect its citizens as Britain had to walk into the Falklands & protect its citizens.
69. SO HERE THATCHER, OF ALL PEOPLE, STARTS SCREAMING: "YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE DONE THAT! You should have consulted with us! We advised you not to do it!"--Just blasting the United States for having invaded Grenada.--As well as the other European countries all singing the same song. Now why should they do that? Why should all the Europeans condemn the U.S. for invading Grenada?
70. YOU KNOW WHY BRITAIN DID IT--BECAUSE GRENADA WAS A MEMBER OF THE COMMONWEALTH & Britain was supposed to sort of still be the old Mother Hen sort of looking after her chicks, even though they're independent, & here the U.S. marches in & takes over a formerly British island. In other words Mrs. Thatcher screamed, "That's really our island, or was our island anyhow, what right have you got to be there?"
71. IT WAS SORT OF A REFLECTION ON BRITAIN that Britain was not able to protect her own people or her own Commonwealth members, because a lot of those little countries like Belize & some other countries down there look to Britain for protection. Even though they don't want Britain's rulership, they want her protection. They want all the advantages of independence, plus the advantages of colonial protection!--Sort of a raw deal for the former empires.
72. SO THAT'S THE SITUATION IN GRENADA, & THE BATTLE, AS I LAST HEARD, IS STILL GOING ON. It's amazing how those little rascals are holding out against the U.S. Marine forces! I think they say 3,000 of them have already landed or something. But it's an island of mountains & hills & they can run up in the mountains, so there may be a guerrilla war going on there for God knows how long from now on. They can go back to the hills where they came from. Anyhow, that's the situation there for what it's worth!
73. SO WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO US?--SO WHAT?--A little old tiny island way down South in the Caribbean closer to South America than the U.S. or us or anywhere else. What difference does it make? Well, Beloved, as I told you the other night, things seem to be pretty well synchronised & hotting up all over, & I don't think it was just a coincidence that that super-Communist loyal general decided to take over Grenada right now & secure that airstrip for the Russians!
74. AND DID YOU NOTICE WHAT IT SAID IN THE [DELETED] PAPER? I had to really chuckle over that one! They said, of course, that this was justified due to the fact that this was to prevent the Russians from using Libyan planes to land there on their way to supply arms to Nicaragua.--Libya, you know, that big black monster of Africa! Can you imagine a U.S. President coming out & saying America's Number One Enemy in the World was Libya? I think I'd have been ashamed to admit that!--A little tiny desert country of two million people with a little benevolent dictator being classed by the U.S. as its Number One Enemy! Well, that's because [DELETED] Godahfi is one of the biggest threats to Israel & the Jews, so they get the U.S. to class Libya their Number One Enemy.
75. SO THE WARNING FOR US IS THIS: THAT THINGS ARE HOTTING UP ALL OVER & THERE SEEMS TO BE A SYNCHRONISED CAMPAIGN THROUGHOUT THE WORLD RIGHT NOW. It looks to me like Russia who is much better organised & knows what they're doing & where they're going & their goals & plans, etc., is undoubtedly trying to secure positions everywhere in preparation for whatever's coming. Communism is, I absolutely agree, a Worldwide organisation, you know that, & of course the U.S. calls it a Worldwide conspiracy. Well, so is the [EDITED: "AC"] Worldwide conspiracy, probably using both the Russians & the Americans!
76. AND I STILL SAY THAT THERE'S ONLY ONE THING THAT COULD POSSIBLY SAVE THE WORLD FROM WAR, & VERY SOON, SOME KIND OF WAR.--If not Nuclear War, they're going to have war in the Mideast, & they've already got war there & in a lot of places. So there's only one thing that could save the World from worse war & that's the Antichrist & his Peace Pact, or whatever it is.--His "Covenant" mentioned in the Bible. (Dan.9:27)
77. SO WHAT IT MEANS TO US IS THIS: THE TIME IS SHORT & GETTING SHORTER & we had better do the "works of Him that sent us while it's day, for the night is coming"--& now it looks like it's not far away, it's almost getting twilight--when we won't be able to do so much work any more. (Jn.9:4) So we'd better get everything done we can do & get it done fast! You'd better thank the Lord for the peace we have now & the days of Heaven on Earth we have now & all the work we're getting done now, & we'd better get it done fast before the night comes & we can't get much work done any more! PTL?
78. THE WORLD IS HOTTING UP ALL OVER & THEY'RE ALL JOCKEYING FOR POSITION & jockeying for strategic placements & all that sort of thing, getting ready for the War they are preparing for & know will come because they're planning it & going to fight it!--Unless the Antichrist arises first & manages to solve the problems somehow. And he's going to fight five wars--four besides the one we lick him in--& apparently from what we can figure out, three wars before the Atomic War! (See No.1528.) So there could be some pretty good-sized wars & serious wars, probably one to take over the Mideast. Because from the Bible it sounds like he makes several invasions of Israel & finally takes it over completely. The other parts of the World complain about it but apparently can't or don't do anything about it. (Ezek.38:13)
79. IT'S NOT QUITE AS EASY FOR THE U.S. TO MUSCLE-IN ON THE MIDEAST LIKE THEY HAVE ON GRENADA! They haven't even been able to muscle-in in sufficient numbers to control the situation in a little tiny country like Lebanon! And with all the fire power they've got in Israel, they can't even be sure of their foothold & beachhead in the Mideast!--Whereas Russia practically surrounds the Mideast & is only a few miles away & has millions of troops & far superior fire power!
80. (ABOUT TECHI:) SHE'S NOT BOTHERING ME, HONEY, SHE'S JUST BOTHERING YOU! I'm so used to kids, I don't even hardly know she's here. If she distracts you, I'm sorry, but I don't get to spend very much time with her. She's behaving, being a good girl, keeping quiet, not talking or asking questions except words she doesn't understand.
81. SO I DON'T SEE HOW THE U.S., NO MATTER WHAT ALL ITS POWER MAY BE, COULD WIN A CONVENTIONAL WAR IN THE MIDEAST, if they don't escalate to Nuclear Warfare & they manage to keep it cool like they have between Iran & Iraq all this time. You say, "Well, they don't have nuclear power." Well, I think both nuclear powers are afraid to use it & it may be they're afraid enough that they might go ahead & fight a war in the Mideast, & Russia--if not take over--might muscle in a lot further than she is now. She's getting strategically positioned for it right now, that's why she took Afghanistan. So that's the way it is, praise the Lord, & what it means to us is get busy! PTL? So we'd better pray so we can.
82. I COME DOWN EVERY NIGHT DETERMINED NOT TO GIVE YOU A TALK, but I did think you needed to be filled in on the Grenada situation. The World is howling, etc., but they howl lots of times & do nothing about it. And I don't think Russia's quite ready to do anything about it.
83. ANYWAY, PRAISE THE LORD! I'M SURE HE'LL BE WITH US & KEEP US & PROVIDE FOR US & PROTECT US AS LONG AS HE HAS SOME MORE WORK FOR US TO DO. But we had always better be prepared with fleebags packed & ready & with other alternatives in mind, tickets bought & prepared to move on if we have to. And you'd better be praying for peace as the Lord has commanded you to do, so that we can have peace to do our job as long as possible. Amen? Okay! Now you're gonna get peace because Grandpa's gonna quit talking & we're going to pray! PTL? Amen! Hallelujah! TYL! TYJ! Peter, would you lead us in closing prayer? (Peter prays.) As we pray Thy prayer together: (Prays the Lord's Prayer, Ps.19:14 & "Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep.") We're in Thy hands, Lord, & we rest in peace in Thee, knowing You'll take care of us no matter what happens, in Jesus' name, amen.
84. (TO TECHI:) ILY! YOU'RE A VERY PATIENT LITTLE GIRL! You don't complain or get impatient with Grandpa when he talks so long, you even sit here on his lap & love him & be patient with him. If she can put up with me, how much more you should be able to put up with me! If you think you're tired, how do you think I feel?--I was workin'! God bless you all! ILY!--In Jesus' name, amen.--Are you ready?
Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family
Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family
