Otto Reich: Chavez Obstacle to U.S. Investment

“We didn't start this. If there is going to be change, it has to come from the other side.”

“[Leaders should be] concerned that [Chavez] is giving all of Latin America a bad name. The region badly needs foreign investment, and it doesn't help to have him running around with a red beret and incendiary rhetoric.”

Otto Reich, former director of Reagan’s [propaganda] Office of Public Diplomacy for Latin American and the Caribbean, and lobbyist for corporations such as Lockheed Martin and British American Tobacco.

Pamela Constable, “For Venezuela, U.S., a (Very) Little Civility,” Washington Post, 2/10/06.

“A Comptroller General report later concluded that Reich, who bullied and defamed reporters whose coverage was critical of U.S. policy in Central America, had ‘engaged in prohibited, covert propaganda activities designed to influence the media and the public.’”

Center for Public Integrity, Narcotics and Ecnomics Drive U.S. Policy in Latin American.

… In Latin America, there are countries that are suffering leadership crises.

… Some have suggested that the democratic and free market model has failed in certain Latin American states. That is a misinterpretation of events.

… The practice of liberal government and market economics is the surest way to a civil society.

… The prospect of increasing capital investment is an enormous incentive for reform.

… [Brazilian Foreign Minister Lafer] eloquently argued that Brazil had nothing to fear from trade negotiations with the United States ... and everything to gain. I believe that is true also because we are not looking for markets to exploit.

Otto Reich, remarks at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, 18 July 2002.

The president and the secretary have given me the mandate and responsibility to boldy and creatively pursue this administration’s highest priorities in the [Latin Ameican].

…Those countires … that have stayed the course on reform – maintaining fiscal discipline, liberalizing trade regimes, privatizing inefficient state industries, deregulating internal markets, and investing in their own people [sic] – are weathering the economic downturn better than most.

…no credible alternatives [are] on the horizon.

…President Bush and Secretary Powell have a positive vision for the future of Cuba. …if you all sat in on a meeting, as I have, with the president or the secretary of State and foreign heads of state, or foreign ministers, and saw them operate, you would sleep well at night. …we are not the world’s policeman.

…Latin Americans understand … that they are the architects of their own problems and solutions....

The resources of [Argentina] were not utilized properly. In many cases, they were squandered. In many cases, they were stolen. We didn’t do it. We contributed. My conscience is completely clear, as far as Argentina.

…I’m very proud of what we did 20 years ago and 15 years ago in Central American, of everything we did in Central American, because the result today is that they have peace.

Otto Reich, remarks at the Willard Intercontinental Hotel, Washington, DC, 12 March 2002.