Inflating Chávez

Álvaro Vargas Llosa on the Honduras coup:

Although the coup has popular support in Honduras, it has also allowed Mr. Chávez, who is leading the international response, to claim the moral high ground. The coup leaders, who were trying to prevent Mr. Chávez from bringing Honduras into his fold, may end up giving him more strength in the region.

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Across the Spanish-language news media, the recurring image of the last two days has been that of Mr. Chávez and his allies working furiously for Honduran democracy.

I disagree, both in the idea that Chávez is unequivocally leading the international response, and that his is the dominant image in the Spanish media. On the latter point, Mexico may offer an unrepresentative portrait, but Chávez, despite his blustering, has received less attention on the matter than Calderón and much less than Zelaya himself. The El Universal editorial hardly mentioned him, and most of the commentary here has been pretty similar in that regard. Chávez has never appeared on the internet headlines of the major newspapers in regard to Honduras. I don't get as much of my news from TV as I do from print, but it hasn't seemed like he was all over the airwaves, either.

In addition, this tendency to view everything that happens in Latin America first and foremost as a chance to either out-maneuver or be out-maneuvered by Chávez inflates his importance. Leadership of the international response is very much a matter of perception, and nothing adds to the perception of Chávez's centrality more than for his political opponents to be hailing it. I'm not denying Chávez's role both in the buildup and reaction to the coup, but this event is not merely round 27 in the US vs. Chávez. Vargas Llosa's take reminds me of the unfortunate Cold War outlook that consigned the region to being primarily a secondary chess board for the USSR and the US for much of the second half of the last century.

Update: This from today's NY Times article on the international reaction:

While Mr. Chávez continued to portray Washington as the coup’s possible orchestrator, others in Latin America failed to see it that way.

“Obama Leads the Reaction to the Coup in Honduras,” read the front-page headline on Tuesday in Estado de São Paulo, one of the most influential newspapers in Brazil, whose ties to Washington are warm.