The Devil's Excrement

President
Chavez continued raising the specter of an external enemy Friday. This strategy
of inducing fear and nationalistic feelings in the population is typical of
autocratic regimes that want to hide the failure of their accomplishments. In
this case, the Chavez administration has raised the fear of a US invasion
which is seldom mentioned explicitly but is referred to as the “asymmetrical
war”. The subject is brought up almost daily and is accompanied by the daily
mention of the military reserve, which has quickly grown from an already exaggerated
half a million men to two million in less than two weeks. The whole thing is
not only typical of autocrats, but it shows the military framework of Chavez’
mind.

This is a
folly that will cost money and effort and bring nothing to the Venezuelan
population but grief and wasted resources. Chavez’ folly is embarking Venezuela in a
terrible path attempting to create fears that exist only in Chavez’ mind. But
as usual, it will be the people, those same “people” that Chavez regularly
claims to love and care for that will pay and suffer for all of it.

On Friday Chavez
announced that in the next few months there would be joint military exercises
between the armed forces and the civil population. About the only good thing he
said was that Otaiza was wrong in calling for the hate of the US, but Otauza
is still holding his post. Here, in his own words, Chavez defines the asymmetric
war and the folly he is embarking this poor country on:

“ Never in
100 years, that we recall, the thesis that is being considered that leads us to
think in military maneuvers that are not only military, but are
civilian-military has occured. The participation of the people in the defense of the
country, and in the promotion of the country, is essential in the asymmetric war
we are starting to focus on here”

“The
asymmetric war, in short, can be described as a war strategy that a contender under
inferior conditions uses to confront an enemy whose military forces openly surpass
their own, not only quantitatively but technologically. The asymmetry supposes
the application of non conventional tactics, like guerrilla war and terrorism,
with the purpose of wearing down the adversary: it is considered that the US
Army is involved in an asymmetrical conflict with the Iraqi resistance.”

“In an
eventual conflict, there will be various steps of defense; the first one will
be the structured armed forces, the second one, the organized reserve, and the
last, all of the people, in a sequence of retreats to the plains, the barrios, and
the mountains. With this the potential enemies that would think of invading Venezuela to appropriate
its oil richness “would leave with their tail between their legs.”

There you have it, direct from the madman’s mouth.

This entry was posted on April 10, 2005 at 10:59 am and is filed under Venezuela.