The U.S. is gearing up its rhetoric against Venezuela again as Condaleeza Rice barnstorms through Latin America -- and there are subtle indications that the U.S. may be ready to increase Colombia's role in undermining the government of Hugo Chavez.
Our old friend
Juan Forero wrote in Tuesday's New York Times that:
"As President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela veers toward greater confrontation with Washington, the Bush administration is weighing a tougher approach, including funneling more money to foundations and business and political groups opposed to his leftist government, American officials say."
But, he notes:
"A main problem for the United States is that Washington has little, if any, influence over Caracas. The high price of oil has left Venezuela with no need for the loans or other aid that the United States could use as leverage.
"Nor does the Bush administration have much support in Latin America, where left-leaning leaders now govern two-thirds of the continent."
Colombia appears to be the United States' one ally against Chavez -- and the U.S. is showing signs of a desire to use Colombia as a proxy to contain or topple Venezuela's government. Hector Mondragon noted in a commentary three years ago that the bill passed by the U.S. Congress authorizing the transfer of U.S. military aid to Colombia from the "war on drugs" to the "war on terror" also allowed the use of U.S. military aid to combat "any other threat to Colombia's security." At the time Mondragon suggested that this was an allusion to Venezuela.
On Tuesday, just before Condoleezza Rice arrived in Colombia, the Colombian defense ministry leaked a report on Venezuela's growing military strength to the international press, according to Reuters' Hugh Bronstein. The memo claims that "It is an undeniable fact that the rearming of Venezuela deepens the military imbalance in the Andean region," -- words that seem designed to bolster a claim that Venezuela is a threat to Colombia.
Later, in a separate article Bronstein reported that "Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Wednesday that Washington wants arms sales to Venezuela to be monitored due to concerns they could be transferred to Marxist rebels in neighboring Colombia."
It is difficult to imagine that the Colombian military, tied up in an endless war with the FARC, would have the resources to go to war against Venzuela. Difficult -- but not impossible, especially if the U.S. were to promise Uribe that a war with Venezuela could be used as a pretext to generate a massive increase in U.S. military aid, and possibly some commitment of U.S. troops. And with U.S. Special Forces already in Arauca, so close to the Venezuelan border, it might not be too difficult to state a "Gulf of Tonkin" type event to justify an increased U.S. commitment.
Now, more than ever, we need to be vigilant in watching exactly what the U.S. says and does in the Andean region.
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Proxy wars can be trumped by a wild card
Submitted April 28, 2005 - 8:06 pm by Bill ConroyThe strategy of using a proxy country to advance anti-democratic interests in Latin America is a vexing problem, because it has so successfully been employed in the past to undercut popular movements.
What Venezuela and like-minded countries in the region need is a South American Treaty Organization, patterned after NATO.
The international community must accept this. Latin American countries have common regional security interests that are best defended by a coalition of nations, where an attack on one is deemed an attack on all.
That way, superpowers would be greatly inhibited from fighting wars through proxy nations, as the proxy nation would not only risk war with the country being targeted by the superpower, but also confront a military campaign that has to take into account a regional alliance of nations.
Imagine such an organization, composed of countries like Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay and maybe one day the entire continent, then north to Central America, Mexico and even the Caribbean.
Such an organization need not be a threat to the United States, but may actually prove to be a stabilizing force for the region, as militant power plays by rogue players would face concerted reaction by an alliance of nations. Likewise, misguided foreign policy influenced by unaccountable special interests in Washington would be held in check by the reality that a challenge to one nation in the region is a challenge to all.
Clearly, the formation of such an alliance would face numerous obstacles – both from within the region and from abroad – but mere talk of such a group in the works might promote a greater focus on other matters of common regional interests, such as the promotion of democratic movements, reducing the harm of the war on drugs and advancing the common economic interests of South American nations.
This is not a new idea, to be sure, and clearly some organizations already exist to promote regional cooperation. Such an alliance also could be perverted to become an oppressive force against indigenous movements within nations. But as things stand now, similar perversions already exist – brought on by both corrupt leadership from within the region and from the pecuniary and hegemonic interests of superpowers abroad.
But if true participatory democracy has any hope of developing organically in South America, it must have the means to protect itself from manipulation by foreign and corrupt interests. Venezuela should not have to worry about an attack from Colombia, because, in the final analysis, such a war would benefit neither country, and most certainly would be a destructive force for democracy and the lives of the people.
If power will not yield to the interests of the people, then it must be confronted with power that is acting on behalf of the people. That power can be exercised by going to the streets, in nonviolent civil disobedience, as we are seeing in Mexico now, or through the power of the vote as we saw in Venezuela last year. But in the final analysis, when power will not listen to reason or the voice of democracy, and insists on turning to battlefield tactics, in that arena, the only thing a tank understands is another tank.
Clearly, a military alliance of South American nations would never be a match for a superpower, but that is not its purpose. The porcupine is no match for the lion, either, but the smart lion avoids the porcupine because the pain it can inflict is not worth the meal it yields.
This isn’t about winning a war; it’s about preventing one, and just as important, it’s about stemming the ability of one nation to suck the life out of another sovereign nation through a brutal policy of proxy fascism.
For that reason alone, it makes sense to erase the battlefield trump card held by any one nation by changing the rules of the game to put into play the wild card of regional solidarity. A military alliance of nations on that front, structured not as an aggressor machine, but as a peace-keeping force, is the only way, as I see it, to balance the table in a world where, all too often, the voice of the people can’t be heard over the din of the guns.