 Yeah, we're back for a live on Jake Fidel. This is ThinkTech. More specifically, this is history is here to help. And we are joined today by an old friend. We know him through Project Expedite Justice, Nicholas Sussman, Iran. And he's from Colombia. And we're going to talk to him about the troubles in Latin America. When I say Latin America, I mean everything south of the American border. That's all Latin America. Welcome to the show, Nicholas. It's just nice to see you. Thank you, Jay. And thank you, everyone. It's great to be here. So yeah, you know, I mean, this question is raised by what's happening at the border. And the slings and arrows that Joe Biden is incurring on what's happening at the border. We need to look at the border. We need to look south of the border. We need to figure out why all these people want to come across the border. What makes them want to do that? How we can fashion, how can we fashion a better relationship diplomatically, economically, and of course, in terms of immigration? Because it seems like, as with the infrastructure, these issues have not been top of mind over the past generation. And we're paying the price for that. So you essentially live in Colombia. And I just like to know your thoughts about what has been happening in terms of the evolution of the American relationship with Latin America. Right. So I think the relationship between the US and Latin America has been a longstanding one and has been an important one. I would say that for almost every country in Latin America, its relationship to the US is one of the main constraints every government has, either because they are close partners and they need to keep that relationship that way, that would be the case of Colombia, for example, that has been a longstanding partner since time immemorial. I would say even since our independence we've been close partners to the US. Or even with the rise of new governments, left-side governments that establish their relationship in opposition and many of their policies in opposition to the US. So I wouldn't say it's minor, right? And therefore anything that happens in Washington is going to have an impact on Latin America because we're close partners, we cooperate economically, and we depend highly on what's going on with the US. And there I'm speaking mostly about Colombia, for example, that relies a lot on the US for a lot of aspects. So of course anything that happens there is important. And then coming a bit down to the day-to-day citizen, the US has always been a place of a Virginia, right? A place to go to when things are not going good in your country, either because the political situation is bad or because just the economical and the opportunities you have are not good. And the US is the place to go to because there's this story true to some extent that it's a land of opportunity, but there are things to do and there's an undeniable factor that I would say. And it's the exchange rate between currencies that allow people to earn higher wages in the US, even if it's what you would call low-paying wages and send money back home. So your work is worth more and it's going to help your family. And that happens in many, many countries. Yeah, I don't understand exactly what's happening in terms of the continued efforts to migrate across the border, documents or no documents, resistance by Homeland Security or not. You know, the well-informed Latin American will know that, say, in the Trump administration and to a certain extent in the Biden administration, he or she not welcome here. We were going isolationists. A lot of people in this country are racist. They don't want them here and the border is dangerous. The border is difficult. The immigration service is not friendly. There's no Statue of Liberty being held out right now for anybody from south of the border. But they keep coming. And conditions, you know, I guess conditions south of the border in a number of those countries are not swell and they're dangerous and the economies are failing and governments are becoming authoritarian. And gee, you know, but they keep coming. And I don't understand why they keep coming with all the troubles. To me, it's just logic, I guess, that leads me to believe that things are getting worse down there and they're still willing to take these greater risks. And, you know, the US may not look as sweet as it did a few years ago and they still come. What's the process? You know, I know it's country by country, of course, and you can speak of one country at a time. But what is driving people to make these risky crossings now? Yeah, I think you hit the point very accurately there, Jay, because it's precisely that. This is not like a collective decision. Every person going and traveling makes an individual decision to go to the US looking for opportunity. And the explanation is as simple as you say, things at home are worse. Individually speaking, there are no jobs. The security is not promising. You're facing difficulties. And you think that it's worth taking the risk of going to the US in these conditions, right? Because we're speaking of people who are trying to get into the US in very difficult conditions and facing a lot of dangers, right? Because they think that even taking the risk is better than what they could be facing at home. In terms of jobs, in terms of security, in terms of jobs and security, it does not matter. And there's a lot of stories of success. If you ask any family in Latin America, I would say, of course, with the differentiation from country to country, everyone has a cousin, a friend, a neighbor who was facing difficulties, went to the US, undocumented, and that being succeeded in some way, right? And that goes around. And the immigration difficulties are not recent. You know, I've been listening to this since forever, right? Since I was very small. And of course, situations vary a bit. And maybe who holds the office in the White House changed. But overall, the US is pretty stable in its approach to migration, I would say. In this cases, and people are willing to take the risk and know there's ways to do it. And the cost of opportunity is what they consider and they just travel. And that just lets you imagine how bad things are going home and how desperate are these people. And I think that's something that you should consider. Like someone, some secretary or a Homeland Security or whatever agency telling them, like migration policies have not changed, don't come here. It's not going to do any solution because people know that this is going to be difficult and they're willing to take the risk. And the situation at home is as bad that they're willing to take the risk regardless, right? So what is happening at home that it makes these people so desperate to seek sanctuary, to make them so worried that they see it as a life-threatening risk to stay there? What is the process? I know, again, all the countries are not the same. You have to look at them one by one. But in general, there seems to be a decline, am I right? And what are the factors in play? Right, so I would say the main factor in most countries is the economical factors. I tell you, it's, usually it's an individual decision, right? It's someone who says things are going bad. I'm in a crisis. I don't have a job. I'm short on money. I'm going to go through the US. The thing is that this is not one person thinking this. You have inequality. You have poverty. You have structural problems that most of the country says. So the people decide to go there. I would say that's the main factor, economic instability and the promise of better opportunities just because of the fact of earning money and dollars. I would say that's the first thing. But you know, it's a different regression. Maybe it's, you have to look under the economics for a moment and say, why is that? These countries have resources. They have people. They could be doing better. The government's not aware, not caring of these countries to develop industries and an economy. Why don't they have decent economies? Now, why doesn't the government take care of them in some way to provide some kind of economic activity or entitlement, you know, some kind of social safety net that will help them? Why is there such a disconnect? Right. So the thing is complicated and it goes to history. The thing is that Latin America since forever has been seen as a prime material producer and the way of development usually has been through the intervention of foreign companies, right? So as the countries to some extent lack the knowledge, lack the infrastructure, lack the capacity to set up industries and a lot of things, the way to do it is providing conditions to bring foreign investment that is going to bring money. And to some extent bring development, but development is tricky because it could be development for the country to some extent, but it's development that is not reflected in an improvement of conditions for the people. So that's a problem. That's the first problem. So basically, foreign companies come, extract resources or set up, I don't know, factories or services companies because it's cheap to do it, but then the earnings and the income and the, it are not staying in the country, they're staying out. And as the governments need those companies to come and invest, the conditions in which they do it are not the best for the country, but are the ones that they can offer to be attractive to them, right? Because it's a competition for cheap labor and for cheap raw material, right? So if I don't know, one country does not do it, then the next one will do it. And if it's not in Latin America, they would look at other encouraged region in the world that is willing to do it. So that's a problem with the economic model. That's one thing. And the other thing is that it depends highly on the elites that control the country, right? And usually these are elites coming from wealthy sectors of society who share this model of developments and think that country development is going to reflect on the improvement of conditions of the population. And that correlation is not a reality, it's not a necessary correlation unless you set in place public policies, social welfare, and there's not enough money to do it. And if you do it, that will make setting up corporations, factories, and so on, more expensive, right? So it's a sort of vicious cycle where you have to keep your conditions cheap in order to bring foreign investment, but then foreign investment is not going to help you. Develop your country or at least develop your people because those are two different things that have to be separated because one is not the result of the other. Yes, I think foreign investment is an important thing to look at. The way to bootstrap a country into a better economy is to have foreign investment, especially if it has no capital as a current time. I'm reminded of a deal reported a few years ago where China wanted to get some resources out of Brazil, namely iron ore. So they came in there and invested a lot of money into a steel factory, and that was very successful, but they had their way. They had their way. They cut the deal on their own terms. At the end of the day, what they were doing is just taking all the iron ore cheap and creating steel or moving the ore offshore. Bottom line is they were better negotiators and the government of Brazil could be had. And so you need some strong negotiators if you're gonna negotiate with other countries or companies outside who might be interested in investing in you. And that's really hamstrings a lot of the possible developments, I think, in Latin America. And I don't know what can be done to fix that. It seems to me that's a key thing. You have the people, you have the resources, and all you have to do is put the investment into it and bingo, you change the direction of the country. Instead of moving down, it moves up. What's missing? Yeah, I think there it's part of the, I would say the production model and not only locally, but globally, right? So again, you need foreign investments and which would be the correct way to do it. You do this, but you're not as radical and you're not trying to cut costs at expense of the people or of the country, right? I understand that you have to make a business and you have to make earnings, but you have to have in mind that there are some conditions that should be respected, right? So it does not respect that to some extent by the companies and even the governments that house these companies in their terms of business responsibility, business regulation, human rights standards. I don't know. There are many ways to get hold of companies that ask them to be ethical because many of the things they do in our countries would not be accepted at their own countries, right? That is why they do it outside. So that is one way to handle it. The other way to handle it is that the Latin American governments too, because it's a region we're speaking about start regulating that and controlling that. But again, that is going to bring the result of less investment, right? And you need that money to do the thing. So the negotiations at the end are very unfair, right? Because it's choosing between an unfair deal or no deal at all. That's the decision they face many times. And it could be Russia, but it can be the US, right? They decide who are they selling their labor to. If they're not more close to China or Russia, they're going to do it. And that happens with Brazil. That happened with Venezuela, for example. But in the case of Colombia, it happens with the US, right? And when it comes to doing money, this ideological preferences being right side or left side, do not matter. When you're talking money, you're trying to make a profit. Tushay. So let's talk history from there. After all, we're here to look at history and see what we can learn and how it could be helpful. And I always go back to the Monroe Doctrine, 1820, I think it was, where the president Monroe said, to everyone outside of this continent, he said, you leave South America, Latin America alone. It's ours. And to me, inherent in that is, that's a statement of power. He was reflecting power, expressing power to the world and making Latin America belong to the United States in some sort of territorial way. But inherent in that, Nicholas, don't you think there was a kind of promise of noblesse oblige? Yes, we're running the continent here, but we'll also help you and we wanna have good relations. And my own view of it is that we have failed in the inherent promise of noblesse oblige. So we stated our claim, but we haven't performed our obligations. Do you agree with that? Yeah, yeah, I agree with that. I think, yeah, that was a situation actually. So let's go history again. So the US got its independence in 1776, right? So a bit ahead of the rest of the continent, right? The independence process, and I can be mistaken here and begin around the 1800s, right? Mostly around 1810 to 1820, more or less, right? Mostly from Spain, some from France, but mostly from Spain, right? In Portugal. In Portugal, absolutely, exactly. So yeah, what was the thing? What happened with a lot of these independences is that these independences were not truly about being independent, right? They were triggered because the local elites in Latin America were not allowed to participate in the issues that were going on in Spain, in Portugal or in France, right? Usually these were people who were born in Latin America from parents from Spain and so on. And at least Spain and Portugal, I am not that familiar with the French, had a very clear differentiation of who got to participate and who got to decide on some things and who didn't based on who you were and who you were born from, right? So basically the independence was not driven because of the need of everyone being free. It was basically driven by the need of these local elites who have control and power, right? And that is a problem. And these were elites educated in Europe under European model who knew the process of the US and so on. And they wanted to do a lot of things, but they needed allies, right? Because they had vast huge territories hard to govern with diverse populations and they didn't want to have anything to do with their former colonial power, right? So they tried to look for allies there and in every aspect, right? In every aspect. And what many of these countries thought was, okay, a good way to go there if we don't want to defend from other European powers is look up, let's go to the US. They have like 30 or so years of experience and they're doing more or less fine. And that is why also Monroe saw like, this is like fertile territory for us to expand their influence, right? Because we're also a young nation, but we're ahead of them and we need to get power. And of course, they offered development and but that has been the model of the US to be very honest about it is that we help you, we offer development, but the expense that you do and develop in the way we tell you to do it. And this way, not usual, it's not that selfish, you know, and it's usually a way in which the US has benefited and sometimes it's a way that departs from the US knowledge of the context that is not the same knowledge of the context that countries have of their own reality, right? And that is a problem because then they are asked to do a lot of things that the US things could be better and what could work for their developments, not only the US, but for those countries, but the reality is that it's not true because the conditions are not given for that to work. So I think there's is where it is failing, right? It's imbalanced and sometimes it's decontextualized. Well, you know, it sounds like, you know, some of the commentary about Afghanistan, you can't build a nation state, you know, with your culture on top of somebody else's culture. And I think we were trying to do that more recently, more, more recently. So, you know, why these countries have come up to be unstable, many of them are still completely unstable. The government turns around, the junta comes in as a clue, there's an assassination, there's a jailing, there's an authoritarian leader emerges and squashes the rule of law, seems to keep happening. And of course there are countries that are better than other countries at this, there are countries where you can actually find a middle-class life in South America, but mostly not, I think, and maybe it's because of the economy, but I think part of it is that there's a lack of stability and there's a lack of security. Just one little note, a friend of mine, wanted to go, it was not Columbia, it was nearby Columbia, it was in Central America. He wanted to go mine some kind of mineral and he bought a bunch of D8 tractors, caterpillars took them down there and he went into the woods to mine the mineral and he ran into demands, extortion demands, he ran into violence, he ran into drugs and theft, he couldn't do it. And the government was not able to protect him and he had to give it up. That might have been a valuable experience with a fair number of jobs and all, but the environment of the country wouldn't allow it because the government was not responsible because there was no security and no stability. And I have a feeling there's other places in Latin America where the same thing would happen. And as a result, foreign investment is limited and it perpetuates itself. But what are the reasons why some of these countries are unstable? What are the reasons why so many of them are insecure in terms of personal security? Right, so there I would say it comes, again, you could trace our problems back to colonial times even, right? So most Latin Americans and every cultural economies that have relied even in some sort of feudal model, right, of development. So you have families that since forever have owned the land, have owned the means of production, right? So they are the wealthy families and now they not only own the land, but they own companies or banks or, so all the wealth is concentrated in the same families. Who are the families that at the same time either exercise government or are close to other families that exercise government, right? So all political power, all economical power is concentrated in few families and few groups that since colony and I go back to my previous comment, they didn't care about a country as a project of development for the people, but saw the government and the country as a way to guarantee power and wealth. That's one of the problems, right? And as they have all sorts of power, they're able to keep themselves in power by legal and illegal means because that's something that should also be clarified. And it's that usually many of these elites have close ties to illegal businesses, right? So sometimes it's not only that the government is not capable to address the situation because it just cannot, because there's not strong institutions because the country's hard to govern because illegal groups are very strong is because sometimes they're interested in that, right? And they're also profit from that other aspect. So that is one of the things, right? And there's lots of inequality, right? So that makes things very hard to run because- inequality on what basis? Is it economic, racial? What is it? All of it, all of it, but mostly economical. The thing is that it's intersectional, right? So the people who are racial minorities are also economically impoverished and don't have access to political power. So it's very complicated. They're excluded in many ways. And many of the conflicts can be explained because of that. It's because the spaces to participate in government, to participate in politics are so close that people say, you know, I have no other option than take arms, right? So many of the insurgency you've seen Latin America since forever comes from impoverished communities that seem no access to other ways of doing government and caring for their interests. I'm not saying that it is okay, but I'm saying that they don't have option. And they didn't have anything to do with being left or right because we're laborers, farmers who had absolutely no possibility of caring for themselves, right? So it was not about politics. It was about having access. And then it was capitalized by other groups with political interests. And then it becomes an intersection with illegal businesses and so on because they need funding or they start participating of the political game, of course, because when you have guns, you have power. And when you have power, you start playing the game, right? So it gets much more complicated. Guns are a feature in that. You give guns to the wrong people. That's what happens. Now, can you connect that up to me for me with drugs? Is this process you've just described, you know, the desperation process, the guerrilla process, if you will, how does that connect up to drugs? Right, so drugs actually, and I would speak of the Colombian context because it's the one I know and it's different in different parts of Latin America, starts in the 70s actually with U.S. citizens that saw that we had a ripe land to roam marijuana, right? And Colombia has a very significant problem of infrastructure. We have a complicated geography with mountain ranges going through half of the country and we don't have good roads. It's getting better and now it's better than before, but they're not as good as they should be, right? So laborers have a problem and it's like who's going to buy whatever I grow in my land so I can make a living? And sometimes if they grow potatoes, if they grow foods, if they grow bananas, if they grow whatever, no one is going to go through very few roads to buy that because it's more expensive to get there and buy it. So why is it worth buying growing that is going to be purchased? That's where drugs come in place, right? People are going to go to buy either a go-kup land or marijuana and so on and the land was ripe to do it because we have very good agricultural conditions so whatever you plant is going to grow and then the people who know the business come and say, you know, let's grow this here in far parts of the country where the authorities are not going to reach or we even buy the authorities because the amount of money they can offer is capable of corrupting people, right? So that's where we start. First it was marijuana and then it was cocaine, right? And coca has been around because coca is part of the culture of many indigenous peoples in Latin America, coca, not cocaine. It's a ceremonial plan and since times immemorial it helped them go through the day and they have rituals and so on. And that's no problem. There's a lot of business from coca aside of cocaine and so on. So that's a differentiation that should be made but where you get to the jump to drugs is because laborers are facing all the situation of inequality are facing such a hard decision of who's going to buy my crops that someone comes and says, you know, plant this and every time we're going to buy it and we're going to buy it at prices that are not closely related to the ones you would get for planting something else that they don't have any other option, right? They don't have any other option to do it, right? And first it was external cartels. First it was, if I understand properly so it came from the US but then it come from Mexicans and so on and then the people here said the big cartels of the 80s and 90s said, you know, before we were helping these people I think we can run the business on our own. So they did it. So they did it and so on and the war on drugs does not work because eradication is not going to be fixed unless you offer these other, like the cultivation of drugs is not going to be fixed unless you offer these people an alternative because they're not happy selling this but they have no other option, right? So that's the issue. And regarding the guerrillas and art groups before they also used to take care of the crops of the drug cartels and then they noticed that they could handle the business as well. So it grows and the approach of eradication is not going to solve anything because what has been demonstrated is that if you eradicated in Colombia it's going to increase in Bolivia and then if you tackle it in Bolivia it's going to grow in Ecuador and so on. It's called the balloon effect and it's studied but that has been the approach from the US since forever and the condition giving you a lot of help to these measures, right? That's not optimistic. You know, one thing that I'm thinking about just listening to you is the question of whether somebody in one country in Latin America can simply cross the border into another country that he or she believes would be a better place for him. And I don't know if it's easy to cross the border. I don't know whether people actually do that. If I'm living in Ecuador and I decide that life in Costa Rica is a better time for me can I just head off over there and get into that country and get a better job? Is there any kind of sort of equalization of a rebalance between countries by way of immigration over those borders? So that happens a lot, right? It happens a lot because even if we suffer from the same problems the conditions are not the same and they're countries that are better than others, right? So for example, during the 80s and 90s that Columbia had a very, very hard time. There was a lot of migration to Venezuela. A lot because they were doing good because of the petroleum and so on. And now that Venezuela is doing poorly you have a lot of migration to Colombia from Venezuela. I was watching before the show a video of the situation with Haiti and the Indians before moving to the US we were trying to move into Argentina or Chile who are doing better. And the borders are flexible. The restrictions are not as hard as in the US. So it's easier to cross borders unless a situation comes up and you're being tackled but it's not only about the border it's also about the pushback you get from the population, right? That's also a part. And again, we are societies that face a lot of exclusion of inequality of racism, of elitism, of classism. So that's complicated. And sometimes even if you try to find opportunities in Latin America or own problems make that even if you travel into another country you're going to face the same problems, right? So sometimes it's easier, right? Quotes to go to the US that is not going to make you face these problems, maybe others but at least you're earning in dollars and that makes it worth it for some people. Yeah. Well, going back, we only have a minute left here but I want to ask you one last question and I want to return to the historical view of things. So assume there was and there should be a no bless oblige promise of the US to help its neighbor. And not only to help its neighbor for the benefit of its neighbor but for the benefit of the US a better continent serves everyone on the continent, you know? So my question is from a point of view of foreign policy economic policy, immigration policy, health policy what would you recommend to the US now given the troubles in Latin America to make Latin America better, more healthy so to speak and to have a better relationship with it to improve business, tourism, relations in general what should US policy be like? What changes should be made? Well, there I would say two things. Regarding one of the big issues that mediates the relationship between the US and Latin America that is drugs and illegal economic issue I would say the first thing that the US should do is try to address their side of the problem. And that definitely is going to have an impact on our side of the problem, right? But if the approach is all on the Latin American side and the interest of the US is all in the Latin American side instead of targeting consumption, distribution and those type of things in the US who are speaking about drugs that should be one thing like see how these problems have a reflection on your country. That's the first thing. I think that would help a lot, right? Because then you're targeting two sides of the problem but there's someone willing to buy the drugs for example or to hire undocumented immigrants in bad conditions and ignoring some of the guarantees they should give to every worker. People are going to get there and drugs are still going to be transported and trafficked there, so that's one issue. That was I would say the first. You first have to look inside and see how you're responsible for that part of the problem. The other thing I would say is that you have to be open and respectful of the views and the context of other of the Latin American countries. Even if you have good intentions you have to acknowledge that they know the reality best. And sometimes things that you would never agree to could be better for the continent than imposing your views or conditioning the help and the aid through your views because you consider it there better even if they're not. And here I'm being extra optimistic because this is not new and this is not me saying something that has not been set for. But still I think it's worth saying it once again because maybe sometime the message will be heard, right? But that's what I would say, to establish a relationship, allow more parity, you know? Even if we are not equals because politically and economically we're not equal you have to allow for some parity and discussion for things to work out. Otherwise it's just a disbalance and unfair relationship. I always want to ask my last question, the flip side, the dark side of things, the ghost of Christmas future. You know, if we do nothing, if we continue on the path we've been on for at least a couple of generations and essentially turning our back on Latin America in so many ways, what happens? What do you see the evolution to be in that circumstance? Well, just I would say three things are going to happen and they're not good. The first one, this province are just going to keep increasing, right? And the number is growing and it's going to be a bigger problem for the US because you're going to have more and more people going there. And it seems that that's not something that the US government wants to deal with, right? That's the first thing. The second thing is that other stakeholders, Russia, China and so on, are going to take advantage of the gap. And I was reading an article like last week about how the US left aside Latin American infrastructure and how much advantage these other countries took of that gap. With the consequence of the political influence and the political influence you could lose. I think that's not good for the US. I'm not sure that's bad for Latin America but I know it's not good for the US. And the other thing is that the more you allow these problems to grow, not only in the US but at home, the more you're going to give space for authoritarian governments to grow because these governments feed themselves on the satisfaction of sending big messages to the people and of eroding democracy on the promise of a better future, right? And that's what we saw, not only in the US with Trump but that's how you get people like Bolsonaro elected for example. And eroding the democracy in the region is not good for anyone. It's not good for the US, it's not good for the security, it's not good for human rights and it's not good for the people. But if these problems are not tackled in a good way with good support in allowing the countries to develop solutions for their own contexts, what are you going to get is deeper problems that are going to be exploded by people who feed unsatisfaction. Well, well said, well put. I'm in awe of these possibilities and a little afraid. Thank you, Nicholas. Nicholas Susman, an attorney, a member of Project Expedite Justice from Columbia, now in the US. Thank you so much for joining us today. I hope we can continue this conversation with further news of what is happening in Latin America and with Latin America. Thank you so much, Nicholas. Thank you, Jane, always a pleasure. Aloha.