Chavez preps for US invasion

[robbie380]

oh this guy is pretty funny. but its not a bad political strategy so he can maintain power and popular support...

at the same time its sad that our reputation has become this bad that people are readily willing to accept it.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060519/...nvasion_usa_dc

Venezuela stages mock foreign invasion
By Ana Isabel Martinez

PUNTO FIJO, Venezuela (Reuters) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has for years predicted that a foreign army would attack the South American nation to snatch its vast oil reserves. A simulation conducted this week showed how it might happen.

A naval landing craft made landfall on the shores of Western Falcon state carrying troops and over a dozen camouflaged tanks. The "invading" army then took over the massive Paraguana Refining Complex, a key asset of the world's No. 5 crude exporter.

The "occupation" is part of a military exercise to train troops and communities to repel a foreign invader.

The Chavez government said it is preparing citizens to fight a guerrilla war to repel a possible Iraq-style invasion by U.S. troops. The Bush administration insists the invasion paranoia is nothing more than leftist saber-rattling, but for Chavez supporters the threat is real.

"They've already invaded us, now the invading forces are controlling certain strategic objectives," said Rear Admiral Zahin Quintana, a squadron commander, after disembarking from a warship as part of the exercise. "Now begins the resistance by our troops together with our people."

The tanks began circulating through the streets, and units of mock invading soldiers launched smoke bombs to clear the way. But local residents, organized and trained by military authorities, resisted the assault by blocking roads with rusting cars and burning tires.

"We're willing to go anywhere to defend our homeland," said Rosmery Trujillo, a participant in the operation, told state television. "This country will never again be put under the boot of the North, thanks to our President Chavez."

The simulated attack is part of a military operation called "Operation Patriot 2006" being carried out this week.

PREPARING FOR A FIGHT

Venezuela's government has created community organizations called "Local Defense Councils" that would provide support during a potential invasion by hiding weapons deposits, relaying messages or sabotaging water and power services.

Quintana said the mock attack involved nine warships, three combat planes and four helicopters -- two of which are Russian-made models Chavez started acquiring after the U.S. thwarted his attempts to acquire American technology.

On Friday, the mock invasion force is scheduled to be repelled by Venezuelans trained to defend the nation's strategic assets including oil terminals, fuel filling stations and tanker trucks.

Chavez, a former paratrooper turned populist politician, is locked in a heated war of words with Washington. The State Department describes him as a threat to democracy in the region, and this week said it would no longer sell weapons or military equipment to the South American nation.

Chavez describes the United States as a decadent empire accustomed to having sway in Latin America, and has called Bush everything from "assassin" to "donkey."

Despite U.S. criticism, Chavez is expected to easily win a reelection bid this December as massive social spending and the widely popular anti-American discourse have kept his approval ratings high.

Critics in Venezuela say Chavez is squandering record oil wealth on improvised social programs and creating an artificial conflict with the United States.

But with oil prices surging and anti-American sentiment high, many Venezuelans see the invasion threat as a reality.

"If oil goes to $100 per barrel?" said one high ranking officer. "Who knows? Anything could happen."

[HayesStreet]

If Bush had stayed out the whole coup business Chavez would still be saying the same thing, but I don't think he'd be getting as much traction. However, the unfortunate truth is that leaders like Chavez don't go away until they crash and burn the whole country.

[Saint Louis]

Originally Posted by HayesStreet If Bush had stayed out the whole coup business Chavez would still be saying the same thing, but I don't think he'd be getting as much traction. However, the unfortunate truth is that leaders like Chavez don't go away until they crash and burn the whole country.

Chavez is a bit paranoid, but then again he makes a living mouthing off at Washington. I guess as long as he keeps enough people happy, he'll stay in power. I seriously doubt Chavez is the do gooder he makes himself out to be, but his political strategy has been pretty successful so far.

[glynch]

HayesStreet]If Bush had stayed out the whole coup business Chavez would still be saying the same thing, but I don't think he'd be getting as much traction.

Good to see you acknowlege the US coup business. Of course, given the long history, there is good reason for Chavez to say this.

However, the unfortunate truth is that leaders like Chavez don't go away until they crash and burn the whole country

I dispute your assertion, but I am sure it is sincere.

[JuanValdez]

I would have liked to have been able to say Chavez is crazy for thinking we'd invade his country.

[losttexan]

Originally Posted by HayesStreet However, the unfortunate truth is that leaders like Chavez don't go away until they crash and burn the whole country.

Castro?

He's trying to stay in power. Republicans are currently doing this with gay marriage. Big deal, we do military exercises on possible scenarios which are more unlikely than this.

[gwayneco]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article...179115,00.html

Thank you, my foolish friends in the West Hugo Chavez of Venezuela is only the latest dictator-in-waiting to bask in adulation from western 'progressives', says Ian Buruma When the Cuban novelist Reinaldo Arenas managed to escape to the US in 1980, after years of persecution by the Cuban government for being openly homosexual and a dissident, he said: “The difference between the communist and capitalist systems is that, although both give you a kick in the ass, in the communist system you have to applaud, while in the capitalist system you can scream. And I came here to scream.” One of the most vexing things for artists and intellectuals who live under the compulsion to applaud dictators is the spectacle of colleagues from more open societies applauding of their own free will. It adds a peculiarly nasty insult to injury. Stalin was applauded by Sidney and Beatrice Webb. Mao was visited by a constant stream of worshippers from the West, some of whose names can still produce winces of disgust in China. Castro has basked for years in the adulation of such literary stars as Jose Saramago and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Even Pol Pot found favour among several well-known journalists and academics. Last year a number of journalists, writers and showbiz figures, including Harold Pinter, Nadine Gordimer, Harry Belafonte and Tariq Ali, signed a letter claiming that in Cuba “there has not been a single case of disappearance, torture or extra-judicial execution since 1959 . . .” Arenas was arrested in 1973 for “ideological deviation”. He was tortured and locked up in prison cells filled with floodwater and excrement, and threatened with death if he didn’t renounce his own writing. Imagine what it must be like to be treated like this and then read about your fellow writers in the West standing up for your oppressors. None of this is news, and would hardly be worth dredging up if the same thing were not happening once more. Hugo Chavez, the elected strongman of Venezuela, is the latest object of adulation by western “progressives” who return from jaunts in Caracas with stars in their eyes. Chavez is not yet a Castro, let alone a Pol Pot. His fiery populist rhetoric is more in the line of Juan Peron, the Argentinian “caudillo”. Chavez, by the way, rather relishes this pejorative term. Neither quite left, nor quite right, he is a typical macho Latin leader, whose charisma is meant to stand for the empowerment of his people, mostly poor and darker-skinned than the urban elite. Unlike many traditional caudillos, but like Silvio Berlusconi (who cut his coat from the same cloth), Chavez was democratically elected, in 1998, after having tried and failed to take the more traditional strongman’s route to power, by armed force in 1992. Chavez is the Latin American version of a new type of authoritarianism (Thailand’s Thaksin Shinawatra is the Asian version), built on a mixture of showbusiness, intimidation, paranoia, huge wealth, and public handouts to the poor. The ideal is democracy by referendum, stripped of messy party politics or independent courts. As Ali, the ubiquitous applauder of Third World blowhards, put it: “Democracy in Venezuela, under the banner of the Bolivarian revolutionaries, has broken through the corrupt two-party system favoured by the oligarchy and its friends in the West.” But whether the corrupt two-party system will be replaced by a functioning democracy is the question. Ali was lavish in his praise of Venezuela’s new constitution, which allows people to recall the president before he has completed his term of office. “A triumph of the poor against the rich,” he called it. In 2004 Venezuelans exercised their right to do just that by circulating a petition for a referendum. Chavez survived, but soon the names of the petitioners were made public, and anti-Chavistas were denied passports, public welfare and government contracts. In 2004 a law was passed that would ban broadcasting stations on the grounds of security and public order. Chavez, as well as his cabinet ministers, appears on television to denounce journalists who dare to criticise the revolution. Most ominous, though, is the way Chavez has expanded the 20-seat supreme court by adding 12 sympathetic judges. Worse causes have been served by western enthusiasts than the Bolivarist revolution, and worse leaders have been applauded than Chavez. One only needs recall the abject audiences at the court of Saddam Hussein by George Galloway, among others, who flattered the murderous dictator while claiming to represent “the voice of the voiceless”. Even now, such publications as the New Left Review advocate support for a global anti-imperialist movement that would include North Korea, surely the most oppressive regime on earth. The common element of radical Third Worldism is an obsession with American power, as though the US were so intrinsically evil that any enemy of the US must be our friend, from Mao to Kim Jong-il, from Fidel Castro to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. And if our “friends” shower us with flattery, asking us to attend conferences and sit on advisory boards, so much the better. Criticism of American policies and economic practices are necessary and often just, but why do leftists continue to discredit their critical stance by applauding strongmen who oppress and murder their own critics? Is it simply a reverse application of that famous American cold war dictum: “He may be a bastard, but he’s our bastard”? Or is it the fatal attraction to power often felt by writers and artists who feel marginal and impotent in capitalist democracies? The danger of Chavism is not a revival of communism, even though Castro is among its main boosters. Nor should anti-Americanism be our main concern. The US can take care of itself. What needs to be resisted, not just in Latin America, is the new form of populist authoritarianism. That Chavez is applauded by many people, especially the poor, is not necessarily a sign of democracy; many revolutionary leaders are popular, at least in the beginning of their rule, before their promises have ended in misery and bloodshed. The left has a proud tradition of defending political freedoms, at home and abroad. But this tradition is in danger of being lost when western intellectuals indulge in power worship. Applause for autocrats undermines the morale of people who insist on fighting for their freedoms Leftists were largely sympathetic, and rightly so, to critics of Berlusconi and Thaksin, even though neither was a dictator. Both did, of course, support American foreign policy. But when democracy is endangered, the left should be equally hard on rulers who oppose the US. Failure to do so encourages authoritarianism everywhere, including in the West itself, where the frivolous behaviour of a dogmatic left has already allowed neoconservatives to steal all the best lines.

[wnes]

Originally Posted by gwayneco http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article...179115,00.html When the Cuban novelist Reinaldo Arenas managed to escape to the US in 1980, after years of persecution by the Cuban government for being openly homosexual and a dissident, he said: “The difference between the communist and capitalist systems is that, although both give you a kick in the ass, in the communist system you have to applaud, while in the capitalist system you can scream. And I came here to scream.”

Probably not any more, dude.

[HayesStreet]

Originally Posted by Saint Louis Chavez is a bit paranoid, but then again he makes a living mouthing off at Washington. I guess as long as he keeps enough people happy, he'll stay in power. I seriously doubt Chavez is the do gooder he makes himself out to be, but his political strategy has been pretty successful so far.

No argument.

Originally Posted by losttexan Castro?

What about him? Some crash and burn and are kicked out and some develop a strong enough security apparatus to keep themselves in power.

[gwayneco]

Originally Posted by wnes Probably not any more, dude.

Screaming is all the liberals ever do these days.

[rrj_gamz]

Originally Posted by Saint Louis Chavez is a bit paranoid, but then again he makes a living mouthing off at Washington. I guess as long as he keeps enough people happy, he'll stay in power. I seriously doubt Chavez is the do gooder he makes himself out to be, but his political strategy has been pretty successful so far.

I agree...He will do just enough posturing to remain a force in Venezuela...

[wnes]

Originally Posted by gwayneco Screaming is all the liberals ever do these days.

Well, tell it to those gay couples who will be outlaws when the constitutional amendment on marriage passes.

[CreepyFloyd]

Originally Posted by gwayneco http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article...179115,00.html Hugo Chavez of Venezuela is only the latest dictator-in-waiting to bask in adulation from western 'progressives', says Ian Buruma

Hugo Chavez isn't a dictator. He was elected democractically twice I believe and he has greatly improved the overall situation in his country. And he definitely has popular support in his country. The guy is even helping out poor people in other parts of the world:

http://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=1337463

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world...774649,00.html

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/05/14/news/bolivia.php

Since the US supported a coup against him, he would be well within his rights as the country's democratically elected leader, to take some sort of emergency powers to ensure the security of the state. I hope he continues his good job.

[FranchiseBlade]

Originally Posted by CreepyFloyd Hugo Chavez isn't a dictator. He was elected democractically twice I believe and he has greatly improved the overall situation in his country. And he definitely has popular support in his country. The guy is even helping out poor people in other parts of the world: http://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=1337463 http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world...774649,00.html http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/05/14/news/bolivia.php Since the US supported a coup against him, he would be well within his rights as the country's democratically elected leader, to take some sort of emergency powers to ensure the security of the state. I hope he continues his good job.

Actually it is more like 4 times that he was elected. But you are correct. He is far from a dictator.

[HayesStreet]

Originally Posted by FranchiseBlade Actually it is more like 4 times that he was elected. But you are correct. He is far from a dictator.

gwayneco said 'dictator-in-waiting,' not dictator.

[FranchiseBlade]

Originally Posted by HayesStreet gwayneco said 'dictator-in-waiting,' not dictator.

It was from the article, not gwayneco's own words, but I saw that. I just thought it was unclear. I guess I should have waited until there was confusion about it before mentioning it.

But I see your point. There is a difference.

[HayesStreet]

Originally Posted by FranchiseBlade It was from the article, not gwayneco's own words, but I saw that. I just thought it was unclear. I guess I should have waited until there was confusion about it before mentioning it. But I see your point. There is a difference.

The article also says dictator-in-waiting.

[FranchiseBlade]

Originally Posted by HayesStreet The article also says dictator-in-waiting.

That is what I am saying. I believe the article was the only thing that said it. I didn't know that gwayneco himself mentioned it.

[glynch]

Originally Posted by HayesStreet gwayneco said 'dictator-in-waiting,' not dictator.

Well I guess we can similarly say Bush is a dictator in waiting.

Guys like Bush and the neocons cheapen the whole ideal of democracy. If we don't like someone, he is a dictator in waiting and you enthusiastically go along. Dictatorships that do our bidding are democracies in the making or on the road to democracy. The whole world sees through this fascade.


None of the parsing or supposedly precise defintions for you on this one. Doesn't matter how many elections he wins or what percentage of the population support him, he isn't doing the neocon bidding so he is a dictator in waiting.

[tigermission1]

Why are we hanging on every word uttered by Chavez? He's a smart politician, he's doing a little bit of political posturing to reenergize his political supporters at home and position himself as the 'voice against Imperial America' in Latin America. He envisions himself as not just a Venezuelan leader, but the leader of a 'revolution' against America's hegemony in the hemisphere.

His target audience is NOT America, it's everyone else...