By Geraldina Colotti on September 13, 2018
Venezuelans never lose their sense of humor on the subject of a possible military invasion, disguised as “humanitarian intervention” at the borders. The tension, however, is felt especially in Border States such as Táchira. There the opposition is strong and the mafia that controls it is on the warpath following the measures issued by the Venezuelan government to stop the traffic of gasoline to Colombia.
The roar of military planes coming from Colombia shakes the dream of Venezuelans and increases the vigilance of the Bolivarian National Armed Force. This comes just after the security forces of Venezuela experienced an attack with explosive drones against Maduro. There are those who, like the disgusting Secretary General of the OAS, Luis Almagro, are loudly shouting from Miami to Bogotá that the “dictator” has to be overthrown by and all means.
Now, Almagro is in Colombia where he seeks to establish a “specialized” group to face the supposed “humanitarian catastrophe” of the “Venezuelan refugees. Meanwhile in Venezuela the offensive of the extreme right (fragmented but furious because the new economic measures launched by Maduro can derail their destabilizing attempts) are well supported by the sanctions of the United States and the European Union.
As the New York Times recently revealed, some coup plotters from the Venezuelan Armed Forces had traveled to the United States repeatedly asking for support to complete their plans. The United States seems much more likely to subcontract to the more experienced Colombian hit men. The NYT article is followed by an “open letter” from the newspaper’s editorial staff, published September 11, in which they distanced themselves from the coup meetings and suggested they “not forget the lessons” of the past “(e.g., the 1973 coup in Chile).
The possibility of an armed intervention is also being discussed by the “moderate” Venezuelan right, which had agreed to participate in the last round of elections, albeit with a certain stomach ache, supporting the candidate Henry Falcon. This center-right rejects both the projects of the imploded MUD coalition and those of its clones.
For example the center-right columnist Domingo Alberto Rangel examines a possible scenario of armed intervention still “masked by humanitarian intervention,” and considers it too onerous, even for the United States. Rangel questions, what we would gain by reducing Venezuela to a new Somalia, losing the security of the oil that Maduro still guarantees in times of peace.
The governments of Colombia and Brazil – repeats Rangel – know that a similar scenario would be much more destabilizing for them than the current situation. The solution “to our problems,” concludes the columnist, “cannot come from outside but from the construction of a great pro-market movement.” A project that goes in the opposite direction to the economic plan proposed by Maduro which is to “resolve the capital-labor contradiction in favor of the people”.
Without doubt, navigating the rotten waters of capitalist globalization requires an adequate team, but also a compass capable of recognizing the right course. What are the acceptable commitments to achieve the objective? This is one of the points under discussion in Venezuela. This is one of the historical knots when you win in a country, which multiplies when victory is a partial victory like in Venezuela, and when its development is linked to the strengthening of the continental dynamic that has now been strongly challenged by the return of neoliberalism in Latin America.
That two of the Latin American giants, Brazil and Argentina, have gone to the right, counts. It counts at the commercial level, but also at the military level, because the coup plotter Temer in Brazil has allowed joint military exercises in the Amazon, along with Colombia and Peru, three zones bordering Venezuela, and for the first time the United States is included. And for the first time, Lenin Moreno of Ecuador will participate. He has betrayed the citizen revolution, and Moreno’s statement seems grotesque when he says, in front of a school that, “they have achieved their aspirations of pirates.” Yes a pirate indeed under the orders of strong powers. Not only that, he has turned his back on the regional project of Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), and now his government is undermining the trade agreements that have characterized South-South trade. Ecuador will break agreements with PDVSA, the Venezuelan state oil company for a joint refinery in the country.
After Moreno’s change to subordination to the large U.S. multinationals, the attitude of today’s Ecuadorian government against Chevron – which won the court case against them for the environmental disasters caused to the indigenous communities – already promises to be very different from that of Correa, against whom a judicial witch hunt similar to the one against Lula in Brazil has been opened.
The battles being fought in Venezuela have an international meaning, therefore, they acquire a much broader scope than a simple contingent motivation. Firstly on the issue of “humanitarian aid” which is used instrumentally against the Bolivarian revolution with respect to the issue of “refugees”, while a whole different criterion has been adopted by Maduro for the Colombian immigrants welcomed in Venezuela, whose numbers are more than 5 million.
And then, and above all, there is ample evidence of the imperialist double standard, which while erecting walls in the US and in Europe. For example while hiding the scandal of the detention of migrant children in Trump’s prisons; it tries to create a false narrative of migrants on the border with Venezuela. In the meantime, the only state in the world – the Bolivarian government is organizing a real humanitarian corridor to bring back to the homeland its fellow citizens who have been deceived by the propaganda of the hegemonic media, and who have been able to prove firsthand how terrible their lives turned after leaving their country.
But the game in Latin America, is far from being lost. The president of Bolivia, Evo Morales, recently inaugurated in San Benito, central department of Cochabamba, the Parliament building of Unasur. This came after the Unasur building was closed in Ecuador by Lenin Moreno. Evo said that the “great house of South America” is being built, and added “because Latin American integration is not going back”.
Meanwhile, in China, where the President of Venezuela is currently visiting, Nicolás Maduro, weaves the threads of other possible configurations and geopolitical perspectives, based on a relationship between memory and the future.
Source: Resumen Latinoamericano, translation North America bureau