This week, the moon’s satellite pays homage to the masterpiece of Plutarch.
For those not familiar with them, Mario Argollo is the current Executive Secretary of the Bolivian Workers’ Center (COB), the trade union confederation that brings together miners, factory workers, and teachers. Donald John Trump, meanwhile, the 47th President of the United States, is perhaps the most polarizing figure of this century.
Argollo competes with Vice President Edman Lara for the title of the most questioned figure in Bolivia today: he has led a conflict against a democratic government, severely punishing for seven weeks the very Bolivian people he claims to represent. Simultaneously, Trump is engaged in an undeclared war against the Islamic Republic of Iran, a geopolitical standoff that has hit hard a population already suffering under the internal repression of its own regime.
The motivations of both men for “going to war” bear unsettling similarities: they seek to force a change of government and stop the development of what they consider “destructive weapons”. In Iran’s case, it is the nuclear threat from a theocratic regime; in Bolivia’s case, the COB seeks to halt the transition of an economic model that, after 20 years of populist management, has resulted in a deep structural crisis.
In their respective offensives, both leaders carry the burden of awkward allies from whom they try, in vain, to distance themselves. Trump has the controversial Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by his side; Argollo is linked to Evo Morales, a former president currently a fugitive from justice on charges of human trafficking, and leader of the cocaleros in the Cochabamba tropics—the epicenter of raw material production for drug trafficking.
Each maneuvers with their own allies and adversaries. Trump has the backing of the Gulf monarchies against the opposition of Russia and China. Argollo, for his part, receives support from the so-called “caviar left”, disconnected from reality and now orphaned from the invaluable “gem” of Zapatero, while facing international rejection from the “Shield of the Americas” (a continental alliance against organized crime).
A common feature of both conflicts is the use of blockades as a political weapon. Trump, beyond military incursions and the “neutralization” (what a euphemism!) of key figures, has stifled the Iranian economy through sanctions and the maritime counter-blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, a vital artery for hydrocarbon trade. The argument is the same: to pressure the regime by paradoxically punishing the very people they claim to want to “liberate.”
Similarly, Argollo has endorsed acts of vandalism and has implacably closed Bolivian highways, in alliance with radical indigenous agrarian unions. His strategy has been to suffocate urban centers—depriving the population of food, medicine, and fuel—under the guise of a social struggle. His “Straits of Hormuz” have been strategic points on major national highways, such as Senkata, Río Seco, Caracollo, Parotani, San Julián, and the Chapare. It is the sad irony of a country that demands more and better roads only to destroy them later, and that complains about fuel shortages and quality while keeping hundreds of tanker trucks stranded in the sun, with the real risk of degrading the gasoline the country so desperately needs.
Faced with the unexpected resistance of the Iranian militia and the Bolivian people, Trump and Argollo now appear to be desperately seeking a negotiated exit. They are trying to save their own political heads, having failed resoundingly in the objectives they set out for themselves when they began their respective conflicts.