Mr. Brunser has been identified as a very senior CIA official and someone with great knowledge of the inner working of the thoroughly corrupt Bush Administration. His column has become very popular with our many readers. It has obviously become equally unpopular with not only Porter Goss’ band of  Trained Dwarves but the White House as well. Many enemies, much honor.

Critical Situation in the Caribbean: The USA Against the World

Dear Reader:

Here is some more on oil-rich Venezuela, to follow up on what I wrote for you a week or so ago. If you did not read that, you should go back and look at it – it will provide the background for what follows. Today, I am going to break from my normal rules, and give you information that is not public knowledge. The final section of this report – Conclusions – will place the Venezuelan situation in a global context. You may not think Venezuela is important to the USA, but as the source, until now, of 15% of our oil, and as the emerging leader of a coalition of South American nations in opposition to the United States, (remember Brazil has 160 million people, and immense untapped natural resources, and also virtually all the produce and fruit you buy in your local supermarket during the winter comes from Chile, and the Panama Canal is absolutely vital to US commerce,) Venezuela is going to feature more and more in our news, and may even soon be the focus of a US attempt at military invasion and seizure of its oil fields. Naturally, this would not sit well with Mexico, which would see itself as the natural next victim of US ambitions, and we would end up losing Mexico’s oil in addition to Venezuela’s, (which we have already for all practical purposes lost to the Chinese. Read on.)

Please be aware that, as reported in the Mexican media, Mexico is already moving troops north to the US border, in response to the “Minuteman” armed citizen militia in Arizona, which is attempting to capture Mexicans crossing into the USA. Whatever side you take on this issue, the character of the Southern United States and its security situation is changing rapidly and drastically – more than 50% of the babies born in California (all of them automatically entitled to US citizenship) are now born to Latino mothers. Thirty years from now, we may see the breakup of an enfeebled, economically devastated United States, as the former Mexican states of Arizona, New Mexico, California, and Texas secede back to Mexico, from which we stole them, and New York, New England, the Great Lakes States, Washington and Oregon break away and join Canada, which by that time is going to be an economic superpower. (When oil goes over $60 a barrel, which is inevitable given Chinese demand, the Alberta tar sands – 26,000 square miles of them – will be an economically viable source of oil, and Canada will be the Saudi Arabia of the North. China has already signed contracts in Canada for this future oil production.) If this in fact happens, the remaining United States will basically be the former Southern Confederate slave states, governed by a Republican Christian theocracy.

What we have in the area south of Brownville, Texas, is a growing critical mass. Outraged by the very presence of Hugo Chavez, liberal President of Venezuela, the organs of the United States, including the Central Intelligence Agency and its front organizations, the American media (on command), the Department of State, various U.S. military agencies to include the DIA, the Coast Guard, the U.S. Navy, the U.S. Air Force, the USMC, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the DHS and the NSG have all been monitoring the growing crisis in Venezuela that is also being linked to so-called “left-wing” activism in Mexico. At the urgings of the White House, these agencies are working on a joint program for both containment of Chavez and his eventual removal from power.

These plans are being placed in jeopardy by the extensive and very alarming leaking of top-secret information, which is now endemic in Washington. (The US intelligence agencies, including my own, are still staffed by many patriotic liberal Americans, who believe the only way open to them to counter the juggernaut of Republican destruction of our Constitution and American way of life is to leak secret information to those who can use it, as I am doing here today on TBR News.) The problem, according to official sources, is that not only is Venezuela in the hands of a man viewed by official Washington as a radical leftist and friend of Fidel Castro, a man who visited cordially with Saddam Hussein before the Iraq invasion, but Chavez is a man who is alleged to be playing with fire by selling badly-needed oil not to the United States but to the PRC, and is emerging as a leader of a bloc of independently-minded socialist South American nations, and who is viewed as a serious geo-political rival inside the Beltway.

Further, Chavez has openly defied the United States and dismissed its growing diplomatic pressure coupled with veiled threats of military action, by purchasing not only the 100,000 Kalashnikov rifles that have been fussed over by the tame US media, but also a number of top-of-the-line Russian MiG-29 military aircraft  (See article below, “Venezuela’s Military Options”) and worse, Russian anti-ship missiles of the Onyx class, that are deadly in that current US military technology can neither interdict nor deflect them from their targets. [These have been sold to Venezuela deliberately by the Russians, as part of a program of retaliation for the American interference in their affairs. This interference includes the expansion of NATO up to the borders of Russia; the theft by armed force of some $200 billion of Russia’s state assets, by a group of Jewish oligarchs supported by the US and Israel; verbal and logistical support for Chechen terrorists, and granting of informal secret asylum by the US to those responsible for planning the Beslan school massacre; the subversion of the recent election in the Ukraine; shrill criticism of Russia in any international forum open to President Bush, and many more actions by the US.] Moreover, the MiG-29’s are being repainted dark blue, which indicates that the expected use of these planes is for below-radar sea-level operations. The Venezuelan aircrews are being trained in tactical maneuvers and in maintenance procedures, by Russians in Cuba. It is believed that the targets of Venezuela’s MiGs, in the event of an armed attack by the US, would be not only the attacking US ships, but also US oil-drilling platforms and pipelines in the Gulf of Mexico, US oil refineries and chemical manufacturing plants on the Gulf coasts of Texas, Alabama and Louisiana, US Route 1 connecting Florida to the naval station at Key West, and most devastatingly, the Panama Canal. It is worth going back and re-reading this list of targets slowly, and pondering the consequences of these actions to the US population in those states. The reasons for these plans is, as quoted in the following article:  “A statement released on March 8 and signed by almost 400 Venezuelan journalists accused the US government and media of a campaign to prepare the ground for a US military attack on oil-rich Venezuela.” Like much of the rest of the world, following the invasion of Iraq which was preceded and followed by an endless barrage of lies, and threats against Iran and Syria, Venezuela now views George Bush as a borderline-insane “loose cannon,” and the United States as the major threat to world peace, not to be trusted in the slightest degree. The more the US protests its benign intentions towards them, the more suspicious other countries of the world become. The US is viewed abroad as one would view a ravening pit-bull: one hopes for one’s life that its chain is secure.

And with good reason: Acting on specific orders from the White House, the CIA has made at least three attempts to remove Chavez by instigating internal revolts against him through its front organizations, and in at least one overt incident, to attempt to assassinate the Venezuelan leader with a bomb in a “plane accident,” similar to the CIA assassination of President Omar Torrijos of Panama, under President Reagan.

In its normally inept manner, the CIA had already given advance warning of this intent by planning to shoot down Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's aircraft in late September, when he was en route to address the United Nations in New York. Fortunately for Chavez and his country, Venezuelan Intelligence received advance warning from a certain non-Mexican foreign intelligence agency operating in Mexico, (I know which it is, but am not going to tell you, as it is an agency which operates in an ethical manner,) and blocked the President's flight. The CIA shoot-down was to be followed 14 hours later by "phase 2", an attack on the Presidential barracks while the country was still in shock about President Chavez's 'accidental death', thus capturing Venezuelan oil and handing it to America on a plate.

Of course the CIA should have cancelled "Phase 2" the minute it knew that the Presidential aircraft had not taken off from Caracas for New York, but sadly the CIA planners forgot, and the Presidential barracks attack force was swiftly overwhelmed by a very alert Venezuelan military. Unfortunately for Washington, many of its most secret plans are certainly not secret and have ended up in the hands of a number of foreign intelligence agencies, to include those of the PRC, the Russian Republic, Cuba, Mexico and Venezuela.

In support of these views, we will present a number of articles, some from unspecific sources for obvious reasons, for your information. We will end with an overview of how Venezuela fits into the increasingly dire economic and security outlook of the USA in relation to the rest of the world.  Let us start with a current overview of the Venezuelan situation:

Ever since he was first elected as Venezuela's president in 1998, Hugo Chávez has been fond of anti-American rhetoric. American officials long ignored this, preferring to watch what the Venezuelan did rather than what he said. Since Mr Chávez trounced his opponents in a recall referendum last August, not only has he turned up the volume of his “anti-imperialist” pronouncements, but some of his words are turning into deeds. As a result, some in Washington are starting to become alarmed about Mr Chávez and the wider regional implications of his leftist-nationalist “revolution”.

Mr. Chavez, a former army officer and paratrooper, recently declared himself to be a Fidelista, a follower, that is, of Cuba's communist president, Fidel Castro, his closest ally. Chavez has built 1,800 free medical clinics for Venezuela’s poor, which are being staffed by 7,000 doctors supplied by Cuba. He has ordered Venezuela's armed forces to draw up a new Cuban-style strategy in which the top priority has become preparing to fight a war of resistance against a hypothetical invasion by the United States, now seen as the principal adversary. To this end, Mr. Chavez has recently ordered a doubling of the army's reserve, to more than 100,000 troops under his personal command. “Popular defense units” of 50 to 500 civilians are to be set up in workplaces and on farms. In the event of an actual US invasion, therefore, an Iraq-style popular resistance insurgency is primed and ready to swing into action. Moreover, Venezuela’s terrain is jungle and mountain, more like Vietnam than the flat, open desert of Iraq, except that it is several times larger than Vietnam.

At the same time, the president is shopping for arms. In recent months, he has bought from Russia 40 Mi35 helicopters and 100,000 Kalashnikov rifles. He is negotiating for up to 24 Brazilian Super-Tucano ground-attack planes and four Spanish naval corvettes. The United States has protested to Russia over its arms sales, and wonders out loud what they are for. So do the armed forces in Colombia, the Americans' closest ally in the region, with which Venezuela shares a disputed border. The answer, say Venezuelan officials, is partly to replace outdated equipment, and partly to do what both the United States and Colombia have been pressing for: to defend the border against incursions by Colombian leftist guerrillas, rightist paramilitaries and drug-traffickers.

A senior Colombian official asks what will happen to the Venezuelan army's existing rifles. He fears that these, and perhaps some of the ammunition for the new Kalashnikovs, will find their way to the FARC guerrillas in their country, who are ideological soul mates of Mr. Chavez.

A second issue on which Venezuela's stance is changing is oil. The United States has long been the main market for Venezuela's oil exports. Now Mr. Chavez is negotiating trade and investment deals with Russia, Brazil, Iran and China. The next step, some in Washington worry, will be that Venezuela will start diverting its oil from the United States to China. That is not an immediate possibility: China lacks refineries to process Venezuela's heavy crude. But it may happen in the medium term. Mr. Chavez has signaled a desire to sell Citgo, a state-owned Venezuelan company that refines and retails the country's oil in the United States. Even so, Venezuela's foreign minister stressed this week that his country will “always be a reliable supplier to the United States”.

A third controversy is Mr. Chavez’s tightening grip at home. Since the referendum, the opposition has all but disappeared as a coherent force. The chavista majority in the legislature has appointed an expanded—and avowedly “revolutionary”—supreme court, which in turn has named a new electoral authority, with a 4-1 pro-government majority.

These developments have produced differing reactions across the Americas. In recent weeks, the United States has unleashed a barrage of criticism of Mr. Chavez. Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state, called his government a “negative force” in the region and some aspects of his rule “very deeply troubling”.

For half a century, American policy in Latin America has been dominated by the desire to prevent a “second Cuba”. Some officials in Washington fear that is what is now emerging in Venezuela. They also worry that Venezuela may be soft on “narco-terrorism”, and trying to export its “revolution” to the rest of the region. As a result, they want to isolate Mr. Chavez.

But George Bush is finding it hard to persuade the rest of Latin America to do this. Last week, Colombia's president, Álvaro Uribe, met Mr. Chavez, putting a diplomatic face on a bitter dispute following the abduction in Caracas and subsequent arrest in Colombia of a senior FARC leader. However temporary, this rapprochement, brokered in part by Mr. Castro and backed by Brazil, Chile and Peru, ended up making the United States, rather than Venezuela, look isolated. One day later, Brazil's president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, visited Caracas to seal a “strategic alliance”, signing two dozen trade and investment accords. Lula even praised Venezuelan democracy, to the dismay of the remnants of the opposition, which insists that the referendum was rigged.

Should the region be worried, as America argues? The Colombian official, noting Mr. Chavez’s speeches about recreating the “greater Colombia” that in the 1820s briefly united the two countries under his hero, Simón Bolívar, is convinced that Venezuela, despite its repeated denials, is helping the FARC.

Brazil, whose president represents a more moderate brand of leftism than Mr. Chavez’s, takes a more relaxed view. According to a senior Brazilian diplomat in Brasília, the referendum removed any doubts about Mr. Chavez’s democratic legitimacy. Brazil does not see any danger of an arms race—indeed, nobody objects to the mooted sale of Super-Tucanos. Some Brazilians see dealing with Venezuela as a way of reducing the risk of intervention by the United States, whose presence in Colombia they dislike. The diplomat notes that Brazil has sealed similar “strategic alliances” with Argentina and Peru. Brazil's dialogue with Venezuela has the blessing of Washington.

The prevailing attitude in Latin America is that Mr. Chavez has not yet crossed the line between democracy and authoritarianism—and that he is unlikely to do so unless he feels cornered by the United States. According to this view, Mr Chávez's “revolution”, paid for by oil wealth, would be hard to imitate elsewhere. So, it is argued, there is more to be gained by engaging Mr. Chavez in a democratic South America than by isolating him.

Certainly, Mr. Chavez’s intentions are sufficiently ambiguous to warrant close scrutiny by South America's democrats. The United States this week dismissed claims by Mr. Chavez and Mr. Castro that it is planning to assassinate the Venezuelan leader. Any attempt to execute “regime change” in Venezuela—such as the failed coup in 2002, which the United States did not condemn—would be rejected in the region as the ousting of an elected leader. But whatever the neighbors say, rising tension between the United States and Venezuela will be a dominant theme in the region for the foreseeable future.

Venezuela, Frustrated by the U.S., Turns to Containment

http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/articles.php?artno=1410

April 1, 2005

By: Pánfilo Narváez de Soto - Foreign Affairs Studies Bulletin

After years of vitriolic rhetoric on the part of United States leaders, the government of Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez has decided on a policy of containment of the U.S. "We recognize the U.S. government as having been elected through a fairly democratic process, despite unanswered questions as to the validity of the last two presidential elections," said a high-ranking Venezuelan foreign ministry spokesperson, speaking on background, "and we look forward to having the U.S. play a constructive and mature role in the development of the Americas."

Venezuelan political and military experts have long been dismayed by the fiery populist language of U.S. president George W. Bush, a man not known for subtlety of analysis. Using concepts of class struggle and religious fundamentalism, Bush in his first term of office brought about a sharp division of his nation into separate and competing blocks of "red" and "blue" states, generating a wide arc of instability stretching from the East to the West coast, and reaching as far as Hawaii in the Pacific and Puerto Rico in the Caribbean.

The experts concur that Mr. Bush has championed policies that favor the rich--whom Mr. Bush refers to as "our base"--for electoral as well as ideological reasons. They also point to a growing lack of democratic rights within the U.S., justified by Mr. Bush on the grounds of national security. "It's true that Bush adroitly works through apparently democratic processes, aided by Washington gray eminence Karl Rove and a compliant Congress and Supreme Court, but the content of what he does is profoundly undemocratic. We are concerned about the direction of the country," pointed out political scientist Edgardo López Matas, of the Caracas-based think tank Venezuelan State Enterprise Institute.

Military leaders, on their part, express their concern about the unrestrained arms buildup by the Bush administration, noting that ideologists within the latter openly discuss their plans for world domination based on overwhelming military superiority. A study produced by members of the Venezuelan Defense Advisory Council has questioned the need for large-scale U.S. increases in the production of equipment such as small arms, personnel carriers, military communications gear, and helicopters, pointing out that these are likely to be distributed around the region, provoking a dangerous arms race, as well as ending up with illegal groups, threatening elected governments in the Southern Hemisphere.

Bush´s close ties to the right-wing government of Álvaro Uribe in Colombia, in particular, are troublesome to President Chávez. Bush sends money, arms, and advisors to Colombia´s radical government, and the alliance between the two governments is stronger now than ever. This worries Venezuelan Army Commanding General Ismael Badwell, who told Miami´s Channel 23 that "together the United States and Colombia are a destabilizing force in the region". "Venezuela will not sit idly while the alliance of Bush and Uribe tries to destabilize Latin American democracies," he added.

Mr. Bush's foreign economic policies have also raised concerns, in particular his nettlesome insistence on grouping all regional countries into a free-trade area to be led and controlled by the U.S. Editorials in Venezuelan papers have decried U.S. "bullying" of smaller countries in Central America into unfavorable trade agreements tending to facilitate U.S. penetration of the services sectors of those countries, as well as of the more traditional agricultural and manufacturing markets.

Samuel Sosa, Venezuelan Assistant Minister of Foreign Relations for North America, signaled a disdain for Mr. Bush as recently as December of last year, when he said of Mr. Bush that "he does not play well with others," and called for Mr. Bush to "grow up."

Venezuela has not, however, sponsored a coup in the U.S., nor has it in general shown signs of attempting to overthrow the Bush government. That may be because the U.S. is a major purchaser of Venezuelan oil, and Venezuela's state-owned oil corporation operates the large network of CITGO gas stations in the U.S. Mr. Bush has warned that if Venezuela attempts to kill him or attacks the U.S. the latter will not "buy not a penny of oil from Venezuela." For all of Mr. Chavez' exasperation with the antics of Mr. Bush and his fervent followers, Mr. Chavez has settled on a policy of containment of the U.S., rather than of regime change.

In support of that goal, he called last week on all Latin American countries to pressure Mr. Bush into more-civilized behavior, using the OAS and other multinational organizations as well as bi-lateral diplomatic channels. A foreign ministry spokesperson, declining to be named, said that "we are trying to find a way to let him know that he (Bush) was not elected king and emperor."

At the same time, the multi-party Venezuelan National Endowment for Popular Democracy (NEPD) has announced that it proposes to continue to fund democratic forces in the U.S. that will work as part of civil society to combat Mr. Bush, within the parameters of democratic institution-building. The charter of the NPED call for it to provide funds and technical assistance in countries where the government denies the democratic will of the majority.

The NPED has been interested especially in helping to break the hold of the big media corporations on news and opinions, in the manner in which the Bush government has trumped scientific studies with ideological positions, and in the lack of effective political participation by the people of the U.S. About half of the electorate does not bother to vote, and, as surveys have shown, a similar proportion considers as true assertions--for example, having to do with the war in Iraq--that even high-ranking officers of the Bush government no longer assert as fact.

A statement released on March 8 and signed by almost 400 Venezuelan journalists accused the US government and media of a campaign to prepare the ground for a US military attack on oil-rich Venezuela.

According to translation of the statement posted at the Venezuela Analysis website, it begins by declaring: “As it was done in the past to Guatemala, the Dominican Republic, Chile, Grenada, and Haiti, the government of the United States today targets the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela with all its media and propaganda power. In those brother nations, such campaigns served as the preamble for an armed invasion by the main global military power.”

The journalists claim the aim of the current US campaign of “lies, distortion, and manipulation” is the “overthrow President Hugo Chavez Frias' democratic government”.

In February, the Venezuelan government publicly accused the US government of plotting to assassinate Chavez. Tensions were further heightened when the Venezuelan government announced it had detected the secret presence of “US Marines, along with military planes and amphibious vehicles” on the Caribbean island of Curacao, just 75 kilometres from the Venezuelan mainland, according to an Associated Press report on March 1.

The announcement, by Venezuelan Navy Commander Armando Laguna, sent a wave of panic in Venezuela about an “imminent US invasion”, according to a March 1 Venezuela Analysis report.

National Assembly deputy William Lara claimed the US military presence was part of "a plan to intimidate and provoke by the US".

Venezuela Analysis reported on March 5 that the US ambassador to Venezuela, William Brownfield, had expressed regret at the “lack of communication” over the incident. The Vheadline website reported on March 8 that the Curacao government had categorically stated that it would not allow the island to be the base for any attack on Venezuela.

Venezuela's accusations against Washington were given added credibility when Venezuelan Vice-President Jose Rangel told the media that former US ambassador to Venezuela Charles Shapiro had informed him of a potential plot to kill Chavez.

According to a March 9 Vheadline report, current US ambassador Brownfield confirmed that Shapiro had informed the Venezuelan government that US officials had information of a potential assassination attempt. Brownfield denied that the US government was party to the plot.

However, during a visit to India in early March, Chavez publicly reiterated his accusation that the US was plotting to assassinate him, declaring that “if something happens to me, there is only one person responsible for it, and his name is George W. Bush”.

Oil threat

According to a March 5 South Asia Media website report, Chavez repeated his threat to cease selling Venezuelan oil to the US in the event of any US or US-backed attack on Venezuela.

While Washington has been hostile to the Venezuelan government ever since Chavez's election in December 1998, a public campaign by both government officials and the US media has been underway since Condoleezza Rice became US secretary of state in January.

Referring to Chavez in a January 26 speech to a US Senate foreign relations committee, Rice said that Bush administration was “very concerned about a democratically elected leader who governs in an illiberal way”.

This was the start of a ceaseless campaign against the Venezuelan government waged by US officials and the US media. Highlights have included the director of the CIA, Peter Goss, publicly targeting Venezuela as the leading Latin America nation the US is concerned about and a TV documentary run by Fox News in early February under the title The Iron Fist of Hugo Chavez.

The essence of the campaign has been to demonise Chavez, who has won nine national elections in six years, by claiming that he is moving to establish a dictatorship and using Venezuela's oil wealth to support “terrorists” in Colombia and “destabilising” Bolivia.

The Chavez government denies providing material assistance to any armed groups in Colombia or to any of the groups inside Bolivia that are organising ongoing protests against the neoliberal policies of the Bolivian government. The US government has provided no concrete evidence to support its charges.

Nonetheless, the US State Department, in its annual human rights report, released in February, accused the Venezuelan government of having a “poor” human rights record. The report singled out alleged harassment of political opponents and charged that Chavez government officials had “increased their control over the judicial system”.

Rangel denounced the report as “more lies, more falsifications, more hypocrisy” and declared that the US had “no moral authority” to criticise Venezuela. He accused Washington of being the biggest violator of human rights in the world, singling out the “murder” of civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan and the violation of human rights in the US-operated “concentration camp” at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

The US human rights group Washington Office on Latin America also criticised the report for singling out Venezuela for alleged breaches of human rights while letting pro-US regimes like Colombia off the hook. Despite an increase in Colombia of politically motivated murders, the State Department report claimed the human rights situation there has improved.

US corporate interests

Behind Washington's propaganda campaign against Chavez, however, is not any concern about the growth of “tyranny” in Venezuela, but rather concern over the threat posed by the Chavez government to the profits of US corporations. Chavez is leading a popular process known as the “Bolivarian revolution” that is challenging US domination in the region and redistributing wealth and political power to the 80% of Venezuelans who live in poverty.

Venezuela supplies up to 15% of US oil imports and the US purchases up to 60% of Venezuela's oil output. A key goal of the Chavez government has been ensuring full government control over Venezuela's oil industry in order to use its earnings to eradicate poverty. This has put Venezuela at odds with US oil corporations, and therefore at odds with the US government.

In November, Chavez announced that his government would begin to enforce the law passed in 2001 that calls for a dramatic increase in the royalties foreign corporations pay to the Venezuelan government for the extraction of oil inside Venezuela. ExxonMobil has denounced the increase and is considering mounting a legal challenge, according to a February 28 Venezuela Analysis report.

In December, Venezuela signed an agreement with China that includes plans for Venezuela to sell large amounts of oil to China. Although China does not currently have the refining capacity to deal with Venezuela's high-sulphur oil, the agreement sparked concern among US commentators about the potential for Venezuela to either cease or significantly decrease its oil sales to the US.

This concern was further fuelled when, on February 3, Chavez publicly stated his displeasure at what he considered was Venezuelan oil “subsidising Mr Bush”. Although Venezuela has repeatedly insisted it does not intend to cease oil sales to the US, Chavez is clearly looking to diversify Venezuela's oil markets and reduce its dependency on selling oil to the US.

The Venezuelan government has also begun cracking down on corporate tax evasion, fining and temporarily closing down businesses that fail to obey the law. McDonald's and Coca-Cola have been two high-profile targets of the campaign, forced to shut down their operations in Venezuela this year for two days for failing to have their books in order.

The anti-tax evasion campaign has netted the Venezuelan government a 50% increase in tax revenue, which the government is using to fund a 24% increase in the minimum wage.

On top of this, since winning an August 15 referendum on continuing his presidency, Chavez has been pushing for a significant deepening of the Venezuelan revolutionary process. In an article posted on March 8 on the Seven Oaks magazine website, Derrick O'Keefe commented: “There is no doubt that the United States government understands the significance of the current direction of the process in Venezuela. An oil-rich country with a radical, anti-imperialist government which has received repeated, indisputable democratic mandates and now advocates for socialism, the government in Caracas poses the gravest ‘threat of a good example' since the Cuban Revolution of 1959.”

The combination of Washington's isolation in Latin America and its need for Venezuelan oil is likely to keep at bay the threat of a direct military attack by the US, but it is also clear the Bush administration is preparing the ground for an attack of some sort against the Chavez government.

Of the 21 largest known/producing oil fields on the planet; 4 are in the Americas (Brazil, Venezuela, Mexico, and Alaska), 3 are in former Soviet Union Republics, and 14 are in the Middle East (6 in Saudi Arabia, 4 in Iran, 2 in Iraq, 1 in Kuwait, and 1 in Abu Dhabi).  In 1996, the US was still the world’s largest oil producer ... but not anymore. Since 1996, the growth of American oil consumption has far outstripped American production and requires more and more of the world’s oil production and reserves, but the character of the oil’s origins to quench that thirst changes.

In 2004, the three largest oil suppliers (to the US market) are Canada, Mexico, and Venezuela -- in that order. Saudi Arabia was 4th and Nigeria and Iraq a distant 5th and 6th respectively.

Considerations of proximate location, distribution network, and strength of the US dollar relative to the

Canadian dollar are co-factors in that seller-buyer relationship; but the constraints of Canadian oil production capabilities and the huge thirst for it in the US market gives new meaning to the phrase "drink Canada dry!"

The US/Mexican oil connection has escalated in the past fifteen years. It gives Mexico the potential for a great deal of leverage. I wonder how much our need for Mexican oil has impacted the US decision process regarding illegal alien amnesty, the "openness" of our shared border, the mid 1990s bailout/intervention on behalf of the Peso, and the adoption of NAFTA -- remember that "great sucking sound" described by H. Ross Perot. Was that from job loss, or oil?

The significance of the US/Venezuela oil connection is also worthy of note. The proximity of this source of imported oil to our Gulf of Mexico oil portals gives them major "ace in the hole" status.

Is there any wonder behind Washington D.C.’s recent concerns (and the US press coverage) regarding Venezuela’s general strike and the stability of the Chavez government and his support and ties to Castro in Cuba?

The significance of US imports of Nigerian oil were a real surprise to me ... about 9% of our oil imports have been coming from Nigeria in recent years. Oil-rich Nigeria has been hobbled by political instability, corruption, deficient infrastructure, poor economic management and HIV/AIDS. It is Africa's most populous country and has more than 250 ethnic groups. The April 2003 elections marked the first civilian transfer of power in Nigeria's history.

Venezuela to boost oil production to 4 million barrels per day

March 18, 2005

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said Thursday his country would attempt to boost oil production from 3 million to 4 million barrels per day within the medium term.

"In the medium term we are aiming at 4 million barrels,'' said Chavez, without providing any details regarding the period of time over which production would be increased or how it would be boosted.

Chavez said that any production increases would respect quotas set by the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries.

Venezuela's oil production dropped from over 3 million barrels of crude oil per day to under 100,000 barrels a day during a devastating 2002-2003 strike that failed in its goal to oust Chavez.

Industry analysts often argue that Venezuela is still pumping less oil than before the strike.

They put the country's current output at about 2.7 million barrels per day.

Speaking to the state-run television channel, Chavez said OPEC's decision Wednesday to increase output would not prevent prices from topping US$50 per barrel.

The cartel tried to ease market jitters by raising its production quota by a half-million barrels a day and saying an additional quota hike might be forthcoming.

But the boost had little impact on the market and crude futures soared to US$ 57 per barrel on Thursday on the New York Mercantile Exchange, with worries about products supplies largely driving prices.

Chavez said the developed nations that consume much of the world's oil should realize that cheap crude oil is a thing of the past, a reference to increasing exploration and development costs.

Venezuela, the world's fifth largest oil exporter, a founding member of OPEC and a top crude supplier to the United States.

Oil provides a third of Venezuela's US$100 billion gross domestic product, 80 percent of export earnings and about 40 percent of government income. - AP

Venezuela’s Military Options

Venezuela`s MiG 29 Fulcrums

On April 2, 2004, Petroleumworld published the story "Venezuela´s oil revenue to buy MIG 29 Fulcrums", on June 26, 04 in Petroleumworld en Español, published "Los MIG 29 Fulcrums"

Well it seem that the Russian MIGs are ready to be picked up.

A UPI story presents a complete analysis on the subject:

Analysis: Venezuela eyes Russian MiGs

Venezuela plans to acquire 50 of Russia's most advanced warplanes, according to U.S., European and Latin American military intelligence officials who are concerned about regional ambitions harbored by President Hugo Chavez.

Chavez's plans to use oil revenues to upgrade his military were reported last May by CNN, which quoted Pentagon sources as saying that Venezuela would spend an estimated $5 billion to obtain sophisticated hardware.

United Press International has details of agreements being negotiated with Russian defense contractors for a large number of super jet fighters fitted with state-of-the-art weaponry. In letters addressed last year to the director general of Russian Aeronautic Corp., Nicolai F. Nikitin, the Venezuelan air force requested the "latest version" of the MiG 29 SMT equipped with high-tech weaponry, including radar-guided missiles and 2,000-pound bombs.

"The plane must have the capacity to carry no less than 4 tons of bombs," says the document signed by the Venezuelan air force commander, Maj. Gen. Regulo Anselini Espin, a copy of which has been obtained by UPI. Venezuelan generals have told European diplomatic officials that they need the MiGs to protect the Panama Canal. When asked against whom, the air chiefs wouldn't specify.

Venezuelan defense officials tell UPI that they are turning to new defense partners because of deteriorating military relations with the United States and the supply of military pilots from Cuba, if necessary. More than half of Venezuela's 22 F-16s are currently grounded due lack of maintenance and spare parts. But Colombia and other neighboring countries fear that the new arms would enable Chavez to impose his geopolitical and ideological agenda.

The MiG purchase order asks for various types of offensive air-to-surface missiles, including anti- radar Kh-31A, Kh-31P and Kh-29T "for use against ships." Radar-guided KAB-500 KR bombs as well as RVV-AE, R-27 T1, R27 R1, R27 ER1 and R-73E air-to- air systems are also specified in the inventory, as are multifunctional Zhuk-M cockpit radars for "over the horizon" combat operations.

"The total quantity of airplanes provided is of 40 single-seat planes and 10 twin-seat planes," Venezuelan air force documents state. Defense analysts point out that two-seat MiGs are normally used for deep, surgical bombing missions.

Ten aircraft are due to be delivered within 18 months of signing the contract, which also involves setting up a MiG 29 maintenance center in Venezuela, according to air force officials who outline plans for long-term supply and maintenance. "Future deliveries will be made with the participation of the specialists of the Venezuelan air force in the joint assembly of the planes and their test flights following their assembly on Venezuelan territory," say letters of intent with Russia.

Several MiGs already are in Venezuela, according to Colombian defense officials who have shown UPI photographs of the planes being prepared for flight testing at the Libertador air base in Maracaibo. A U.S. intelligence source also claims that MiGs have been spotted flying near the Caribbean island of Curcao.

Members of Venezuela's military say handpicked pilots are undergoing flight training in Cuba, which has six MiG 29s. Cuba is the only country in Latin America, except Peru, to be equipped with the advanced Russian model. Fidel Castro offers various types of security assistance to Venezuela in exchange for oil.

Russian and Cuban military officials enjoy warm relations with the Venezuelan Defense ministry, according to American and EU diplomatic sources who believe that Russia is prepared to sell the full MiG package. The sources say that Russia's defense attache, air force Col. Oleg Krajotin, holds regular meetings with Venezuelan Defense Minister Garcia Carneiro.

Venezuelan contracts are also being drawn up for Russian Mi-17 heavy-lift helicopters as well as radar systems from China, according to U.S. intelligence reports.

The arms give Chavez the military muscle to project regional leadership following his presidency's reaffirmation through a national referendum held last Aug. 15. He also is strengthening ties with Iran.

"This is battle not only for Venezuela but for all of Latin America and the Third World," Chavez told a cheering crowd of followers when he kicked off his referendum campaign last July. He warned about worldwide retaliation against American interests if the United States intervened against Venezuela's " irreversible revolutionary process" and called on all Latin Americans to unite against the "empire from the north."

Domestic political opponents accuse Chavez of using fraud to win last month's referendum. The Organization of American States is investigating the allegations.

Speaking before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last month, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage conditioned improved American relations with Venezuela on a "toning down of anti-American rhetoric" and a "modification of policies prejudicial to U.S. interests".

Chavez has granted American oil companies important offshore oil drilling concessions. But his foreign minister was in Tehran just two weeks ago to arrange a state visit, which would be Chavez's second official trip to Iran since 2001. He also enjoyed close relations with Saddam Hussein before the Iraqi regime was toppled by a U.S. invasion.

Colombian officials fear that a Venezuelan military buildup might embolden Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces (FARC) guerrillas who hailed Chavez's referendum victory as "a stimulus for liberation movements in all of Latin America".

"FARC forms part of our Bolivarian Revolutionary Army," says Ileana Ibarra, a local leader of the Circulos Bolivarianos in Caracas. "We are forming the Great Colombia" she says, referring to a project for integrating both countries that was proposed in the 19th century by Venezuela's independence hero, Simon Bolivar.

Colombia has received billions of dollars in U.S. military assistance for counterinsurgency operations, including a fleet a of Blackhawk helicopters. But Colombia has nothing to match the MiG 29s, which would give Venezuela "the largest and most potent air force in Latin America," according former Colombian air force chief, Gen. Nestor Ramirez.

The Colombian government alleges that Venezuelan aircraft have flown incursions to support leftist FARC guerrilla units along border areas. Chavez, in turn, accuses Colombian right-wing paramilitary groups of conspiring with domestic opponents to destabilize his government.

Other longstanding territorial disputes have caused Bogota to raise a protest against Caracas this week. According to the news agency EFE, the Colombian government has complained that Venezuelan offshore concessions just granted to international oil companies infringe on Colombian territorial waters.

"We are heading toward a war with Colombia," said a Venezuelan military intelligence officer who claims that contingency plans are being drawn up for a potential conflict with the neighboring country.

Venezuela also is backing Bolivia's historical claims on Chilean Pacific ocean ports. At a meeting of Latin American presidents held last year, Chavez called for the return of a stretch of coastline annexed by Chile during a war in 1879. He just gave 11 armed T-34 jet trainers to the Bolivian air force and has offered to train its combat pilots.

Bolivia's main leftist opposition leader, Evo Morales, who is a close friend of Chavez, has been heading a campaign to block gas exports to Chile. U.S. intelligence sources maintain that Venezuela's ruling Revolutionary Movement channeled $15 million to Bolivian leftist organizations that toppled a pro-U.S. government last year.

United Press International

CARACAS, Venezuela, Sep 14, 2004

Hugo Chavez Accuses U.S. of Spending Over $1 Million To Help Oust Him

 March 4th, 2004

Newly publicized documents show how the National Endowment for Democracy has given over $1 million in projects related to an anti-Chavez referendum and opposition groups.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is accusing the United States of spending over $1 million in helping his opponents attempt to oust him from power.

In a recent speech Chavez said "The government of Washington is using the money of its people to support - not only opposition activities - but acts of conspiracy."

Chavez cited recently made public documents that detail how the U.S.-funded National Endowment for Democracy has backed anti-Chavez projects and recall referendums in Venezuela. The documents were obtained by investigative journalist Jeremy Bigwood through the Freedom of Information Act and have been posted on the site venezuelafoia.info run by the Venezuelan Solidarity Committee. According to the Miami Herald all of the money is going to opposition groups determined to unseat Chavez.

One recipient was Sumate which organized the recall petition against Chavez. Documents show Sumate received just over $50,000 from the National Endowment for Democracy, which is a private agency funded entirely by the U.S. government.

The State Department issued a statement two weeks categorically denying Chavez's accusations. The U.S. government has also denied it played a role in the 2002 coup.

In the summer of 2002, the State Department's Inspector General's office also released a report that determined the National Endowment for Democracy or the U.S. government did not nothing to encourage the coup.

But the report did state the NED, the Pentagon and other US assistance programs "provided training, institution building and other support to individuals and organizations understood to be actively involved in the brief ouster of the Chavez government."

In Venezuela, the National Endowment for Democracy tripled its funding from about $250,000 to nearly $900,000 between 2000 and 2001 as opposition to Chavez intensified.

The National Endowment for Democracy- An Analysis and History

A CIA operational front revealed

How many Americans could identify the National Endowment for Democracy?  An organization which often does exactly the opposite of what its name implies.  The NED was set up in the early 1980s under President Reagan in the wake of all the negative revelations about the CIA in the second half of the 1970s.  The latter was a remarkable period.  Spurred by Watergate – the Church committee of the Senate, the Pike committee of the House, and the Rockefeller Commission, created by the president, were all busy investigating the CIA.  Seemingly every other day there was a new headline about the discovery of some awful thing, even criminal conduct, the CIA had been mixed up in for years.  The Agency was getting an exceedingly bad name, and it was causing the powers-that-be much embarrassment.

Something had to be done.  What was done was not to stop doing these awful things.  Of course not.  What was done was to shift many of these awful things to a new organization, with a nice sounding name -- The National Endowment for Democracy.  The idea was that the NED would do somewhat overtly what the CIA had been doing covertly for decades, and thus, hopefully, eliminate the stigma associated with CIA covert activities.

It was a masterpiece.  Of politics, of public relations, and of cynicism.

Thus it was that in 1983, the National Endowment for Democracy was set up to "support democratic institutions throughout the world through private, nongovernmental efforts". Notice the "nongovernmental" -- part of the image, part of the myth.  In actuality, virtually every penny of its funding comes from the federal government, as is clearly indicated in the financial statement in each issue of its annual report.   NED likes to refer to itself as an NGO (Non-governmental organization) because this helps to maintain a certain credibility abroad that an official US government agency might not have.  But NGO is the wrong category.  NED is a GO.

Allen Weinstein, who helped draft the legislation establishing NED, was quite candid when he said in 1991: "A lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA." In effect, the CIA has been laundering money through NED.

The Endowment has four principal initial recipients of funds: the International Republican Institute; the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs; an affiliate of the AFL-CIO (such as the American Center for International Labor Solidarity); and an affiliate of the Chamber of Commerce (such as the Center for International Private Enterprise). These institutions then disburse funds to other institutions in the US and all over the world, which then often disburse funds to yet other organizations.

In a multitude of ways, NED meddles in the internal affairs of foreign countries by supplying funds, technical know-how, training, educational materials, computers, faxes, copiers, automobiles, and so on, to selected political groups, civic organizations, labor unions, dissident movements, student groups, book publishers, newspapers, other media, etc.  NED programs generally impart the basic philosophy that working people and other citizens are best served under a system of free enterprise, class cooperation, collective bargaining, minimal government intervention in the economy, and opposition to socialism in any shape or form.  A free-market economy is equated with democracy, reform, and growth; and the merits of foreign investment are emphasized.

From 1994 to 1996, NED awarded 15 grants, totaling more than $2,500,000, to the American Institute for Free Labor Development, an organization used by the CIA for decades to subvert progressive labor unions.  AIFLD's work within Third World unions typically involved a considerable educational effort very similar to the basic NED philosophy described above.  The description of one of the 1996 NED grants to AIFLD includes as one its objectives: "build union-management cooperation".  Like many things that NED says, this sounds innocuous, if not positive, but these in fact are ideological code words meaning "keep the labor agitation down ... don't rock the status-quo boat".  The relationship between NED and AIFLD very well captures the CIA origins of the Endowment.

NED has funded centrist and rightist labor organizations to help them oppose those unions which were too militantly pro-worker.   This has taken place in France, Portugal and Spain amongst many other places.  In France, during the 1983-4 period, NED supported  a "trade union-like organization for professors and students" to counter "left-wing organizations of professors".  To this end it  funded a series of seminars and the publication of posters, books  and pamphlets such as "Subversion and the Theology of Revolution"  and "Neutralism or Liberty".  ("Neutralism" here refers to being  unaligned in the cold war.)

NED describes one of its 1997-98 programs thusly: "To identify barriers to private sector development at the local and federal levels in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and to push for legislative change ... [and] to develop strategies for private sector growth."  Critics of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic have been supported by NED grants for years.

In short, NED's programs are in sync with the basic needs and objectives of the New World Order's economic globalization, just as the programs have for years been on the same wavelength as US foreign policy.

Because of a controversy in 1984 -- when NED funds were used to aid a Panamanian presidential candidate backed by Manuel Noriega and the CIA -- Congress enacted a law prohibiting the use of NED funds "to finance the campaigns of candidates for public office."  But the ways to circumvent the spirit of such a prohibition are not difficult to come up with; as with American elections, there's "hard money" and there's "soft money".

As described in the "Elections" and "Interventions" chapters, NED successfully manipulated elections in Nicaragua in 1990 and Mongolia in 1996, helped to overthrow democratically elected governments in Bulgaria in 1990 and Albania in 1991 and 1992, and was busy working in Haiti in the late 1990s on behalf of right wing groups who were united in their opposition to former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his progressive ideology.{8} NED has made its weight felt in the electoral- political process in numerous other countries.

NED would have the world believe that it's only teaching the ABCs of democracy and elections to people who don't know them, but in all five countries named above there had already been free and fair elections held.  The problem, from NED's point of view, is that the elections had been won by political parties not on NED's favorites list.

The Endowment maintains that it's engaged in "opposition building" and "encouraging pluralism".  "We support people who otherwise do not have a voice in their political system," said Louisa Coan, a NED program officer.  But NED hasn't provided aid to foster progressive or leftist opposition in Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, or Eastern Europe -- or, for that matter, in the United States -- even though these groups are hard pressed for funds and to make themselves heard.  Cuban dissident groups and media are heavily supported however.

NED's reports carry on endlessly about "democracy", but at best it's a modest measure of mechanical political democracy they have in mind, not economic democracy; nothing that aims to threaten the powers-that-be or the way-things-are, unless of course it's in a place like Cuba.

The Endowment played an important role in the Iran-Contra affair of the 1980s, funding key components of Oliver North's shadowy "Project Democracy" network, which privatized US foreign policy, waged war, ran arms and drugs, and engaged in other equally charming activities.  At one point in 1987, a White House spokesman stated that those at NED "run Project Democracy".  This was an exaggeration; it would have been more correct to say that NED was the public arm of Project Democracy, while North ran the covert end of things.  In any event, the statement caused much less of a stir than if -- as in an earlier period -- it had been revealed that it was the CIA which was behind such an unscrupulous operation.

NED also mounted a multi-level campaign to fight the leftist insurgency in the Philippines in the mid-1980s, funding a host of private organizations, including unions and the media.  This was a replica of a typical CIA operation of pre-NED days. And between 1990 and 1992, the Endowment donated a quarter-million dollars of taxpayers' money to the Cuban-American National Foundation, the ultra-fanatic anti-Castro Miami group.  The CANF, in turn, financed Luis Posada Carriles, one of the most prolific and pitiless terrorists of modern times, who was involved in the blowing up of a Cuban airplane in 1976, which killed 73 people.  In 1997, he was involved in a series of bomb explosions in Havana hotels.

The NED, like the CIA before it, calls what it does supporting democracy.  The governments and movements whom the NED targets call it destabilization.

On November 8, 2004, National Endowment for Democracy (“NED”) President Carl Gershman made a historical visit to Venezuela with a very peculiar purpose. Gershman traveled to the South American nation to request President Chávez influence the outcome of a legal case brought against NED direct grantee Súmate, currently in the hands of the independent Attorney General’s office. But much to Gershman’s surprise, no meetings had been authorized with the Venezuelan President or cabinet members and therefore, he was unable to exert the weight of the United States-backed NED over the popular head of state. Gershman did meet with Attorney General Isaías Rodriguez and President of the Venezuelan Supreme Court, Ivan Rincón. However, both legal chiefs were unwilling to succumb to NED pressure and instead, made very clear that Venezuela’s judiciary is independent of the executive and that international influence will not interfere with or impede due process of law.

The case brought against NED-grantee Súmate has caused uproar in the ranks of the U.S. State Department and the quasi-governmental NED, which receives all of its financing from the U.S. Congress and is obligated to report annually on its activities and use of funds. On occasion, such as in Venezuela, the State Department issues “special funds” to the NED to finance its activities in nations of key interest. In April 2002, just days after the failed coup d’etat against Venezuela President Hugo Chávez, the State Department gave the NED a $1 million grant entitled “Special Venezuela Funds”, which was distributed to many of the very same groups that had just led and participated in the coup. In fact, since President Chávez’s election to that nation’s highest office in 1998, the NED has consistently funded just one sector in Venezuela: the opposition to President Chávez. Once George W. Bush assumed the U.S. presidency in 2000, funding to opposition groups in Venezuela was quadrupled. Those organizations receiving NED funding, such as the Confederación de Trabajadores Venezolanos (CTV), the Asamblea de Educación, Primero Justicia, Fedecámaras, CEDICE, Súmate and others have used the millions in U.S. taxpayer dollars to lead a coup against President Chávez, devastate Venezuela’s economy through a 64-day long illegal strike and later lead a failed recall referendum attempt. All of the NED-funded initiatives have shared just one goal: remove President Chávez from power, be it through legal or illegal means.

The case against Súmate was brought earlier this year by the Attorney General’s office alleging violation of Article 132 of the Penal Code, which makes it a crime to “conspire to destroy the government” and to “solicit international intervention in international politics” or to “incite civil war or defame the President or diplomatic representatives in the foreign press.” The Attorney General alleges that Súmate committed a crime by soliciting financing from the NED, an arm of the U.S. Government, in order to campaign for and lead a recall referendum against President Chávez. Furthermore, the Chief Prosecutor alleges that Súmate violated the Constitution by usurping functions of the Electoral Power through its creation of a parallel Electoral Registry and database that it used to collect and count signatures during stages of the referendum process. Though charges have been filed with the court, and an arraignment hearing to set a trial date and determine bail has yet to occur.

Due to a massive campaign in defense of Súmate that has been launched by the U.S. State Department, the case has experienced interesting delays. Gershman’s visit came one week after the arraignment hearing had been postponed from November 2nd to November 24th, as a result of the resignation of one of the defendant’s attorneys. Subsequently, the case experienced another development after U.S. Ambassador to Venezuela, William Brownfield, visited Supreme Court President Ivan Rincon and requested he intervene to prevent the case from proceeding. Although Rincon was clear in his respect for due process and the jurisdiction of the Attorney General, a separate power, one of the other justices in the Penal Chamber of the Supreme Court decided to review the case for “clarity” and “merit” before allowing it to continue.

But Gershman’s visit, the first visit by the NED president to a foreign nation to defend the organization’s interests, was an apparent “last chance” offer to the Venezuelan government to stop the case or face the wrath of the U.S. government. Even presidential candidate John Kerry got on the Súmate defense bandwagon in the days prior to the U.S. elections, criticizing Chávez for “political persecution” and accusing him of heading towards a dictatorship. Other Súmate defenders include U.S. Congress members Christopher Cox and Gregory Meeks, both on the NED Board of Directors, and Senator John McCain and former Secretary of State Madeline Albright, who chair the NED core grantee organizations, the International Republican Institute and the National Democratic Institute, respectively. The aforementioned have all authored letters defending NED’s work in Venezuela and defending its grantees, despite their notorious unconstitutional behavior during the coup and the strike.

Though NED representatives and spokespersons have time and again claimed their work in Venezuela as “impartial” and only “promoting democracy”, Gershman’s declarations to the Venezuelan press showed otherwise. After being snubbed by the Executive, Gershman angrily declared to the Venezuelan media that “Venezuela is neither a democracy nor a dictatorship but rather something in between”. In the same breath, Gershman claimed that in Venezuela, the NED “only finances democratic groups,” which must imply that groups involved in coup d’etats fit within the NED’s view of democracy. He also tried to make a weak comparison between the Venezuelan government and the Chilean dictator Augustus Pinochet by claiming, “In the eighties, we were attacked by the Pinochet government, which didn’t like the fact that we supported the groups that moved forward the democratic transition in Chile.”

Gershman’s comparison between the Pinochet dictatorship and Venezuela under Chávez, along with his outright denial of Venezuela’s democracy, despite the nine electoral processes in the past five years that have reaffirmed Chávez’ overwhelming popular support, evidence the NED’s biased position against the Venezuelan Government.  How could Gershman expect a warm welcome from the Venezuelan Government after making such declarations? Furthermore, Gershman’s statements merely reaffirmed that the NED’s purpose in Venezuela is to remove President Chávez from power. The NED-grantees were the ones chosen by the U.S. government to “lead the democratic transition” post-Chávez, just like in Chile. This has been was evidenced through NED-funded projects in Venezuela to create “alternative government agendas” and “transition government plans” for post-Chávez Venezuela. But there is one major difference here: Chile under Pinochet was a dictatorship, one in fact imposed by the U.S. government. Venezuela under Chávez is the most participatory and popularly-support democratic government in Venezuela’s history. In fact, Chávez just won a recall referendum promoted by the opposition with 60% of the vote, a landslide victory that demonstrated the massive support of his presidency to the world.

But the NED and the U.S. government just don’t appear to care about the majority that supports President Chávez, or the nine democratic electoral processes that have reaffirmed his administration, or the fact that more Venezuelans today participate in the governance of the nation than ever before. Instead of rectifying or apologizing for such blatantly offensive and biased statements, NED President Carl Gershman followed through on his threats to the Venezuelan Government to increase international pressure in defense of the Súmate case and to attempt to convert Chávez into an international “pariah” and “human rights abuser.”  Just twenty-four hours after Gershman’s departure from Venezuela, a letter was released from an alleged group of 70 “international democrats” demanding the Venezuelan President intervene in the Súmate action and prevent the Attorney General from proceeding with the case.

The letter, whose existence had been leaked to the press more than one week ago, but was kept under the wraps until needed, was obviously Gershman’s attempt to exert international pressure over the Venezuelan Government. But the letter is riddled with misinformation and errors about Venezuela’s legal system and laws and strangely demands respect for democracy while asking the Venezuelan President to violate the Constitutional separation of powers in his nation by intervening in a case under the authority of the Attorney General. The letter requests an abandonment of the law and demands the Súmate directors be granted “above the law” status, just because they are supported by 70 prominent “international democrats” who state to share Súmate’s “view of democracy.” Again, if the NED along with these 70 personalities believe democracy and rule of law can been averted by those who have friends in high places, then Venezuela certainly doesn’t share the same vision.

Although the letter was intended to look like an independent statement by 70 renowned “democrats”, its ties to the NED were all too obvious. In fact, the letter was released to the public by the NED press department and of the 70 signors, more than half are either on the NED Board of Directors or are direct NED grantees.  Clearly, their allegiance is to the hand that feeds them.

The NED visit to Venezuela was also unsuccessful in its efforts to attract pro-Chávez groups to accept financing. NED President Gershman and his sidekick, Christopher Sabatini, thought they could entice pro-Chávez organizations into accepting their funding so they could then justify their claims of non-partisanship. But no such groups were even the slightest interested in establishing a relationship with a U.S. government funded organization that has worked exclusively with coup leaders and other hard line opposition groups in Venezuela. In fact, Christopher Sabatini’s claim in the Venezuelan press that the Boston Group, a coalition of pro-Chávez and opposition-linked Assembly Members in Venezuela and U.S. Congressional representatives, was negotiating with the NED to receive financing was quickly refuted the following day in El Nacional newspaper.  Both opposition and pro-Chávez Assembly Members in the Boston Group declared to the press that they never met with the NED to discuss any potential funding or future financing. Clearly, Sabatini had made a desperate attempt to justify the NED’s work in Venezuela, not realizing that his error would be caught by savvy Venezuelans attuned to the NED’s deceptive ways.

Deception, manipulation, pressure, intimidation, threat and constitutional violations seem to be the NED’s tools for “promoting democracy” around the world. Luckily, Venezuelans are on to the trickery of this heavy-handed organization and are unwilling to cede to its bully tactics.

Chavez Background

Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías (born July 28, 1954) is the President of Venezuela. A former paratroop lieutenant-colonel, he was elected in 1999. During his presidency, Venezuela has seen sweeping changes throughout the country, including a new constitution, many new social programs, and a new, self-proclaimed anti-imperial foreign policy. Chávez and his administration have been met with hostility from some established sectors in Venezuela, like the business federation Fedecámaras and union federation CTV, resulting in a coup d'état, general strike/lockout, and recall referendum, all of which failed to remove him from office. Chávez and his allies have made consistent electoral progress, occupying the vast majority of elected municipal, state, and national posts.

Chávez was born in Sabaneta, Barinas State. His father, Hugo de los Reyes Chávez, was a former regional director of education and a former member of the conservative Social Christian Party, and is currently the governor of Barinas.

In 1975, Chávez graduated from the Venezuelan Academy of Military Sciences with M.S. in military sciences and engineering. He did further graduate work in in political sciences at the Simón Bolívar University in Caracas, but left without a degree.

In 1989, President Carlos Andrés Pérez had presided over unpopular IMF austerity measures that led to protests in 1989, which he brutally suppressed, leaving hundreds dead. On February 4, 1992, Chávez led a failed military coup against President Pérez, in which hundreds were killed. Chávez appeared on television to announce that he and his co-conspirators had not achieved their goals "por ahora" ("for now"). After spending two years in prison, Chavez was pardoned by former President Rafael Caldera and emerged as a politician, organizing a new political party called the Movement for the Fifth Republic.

Chronology of Presidency

Early presidency

Chávez won the presidential election on December 6, 1998 by the largest percent of voters (56.2%) in four decades, though not the highest amount of votes as abstention, now a permanent feature in Venezuelan elections, took its toll. He was running on an anti-corruption and anti-poverty platform, and condemning the two major parties that had dominated Venezuelan politics since 1958 (see: Venezuelan presidential election, 1998). Shortly after taking office on February 2, 1999, Chávez embarked on a series of sweeping changes to the Venezuelan government. He organized a series of elections. The first one, a referendum, authorized calling for a constitutional assembly Venezuelan constitution. A second selected delegates to that Assembly, distinct from his country's legislature. Chávez's initial widespread popularity allowed supporters to win 120 of the 131 though he only gathered about 60% of the votes assembly seats.

In August 1999, the assembly set up a "judicial emergency committee" with the power to remove judges without consulting other branches of government. In the same month, the assembly declared a "legislative emergency." A seven-member committee was created to perform congressional functions, including law-making. The Constitutional Assembly prohibited the Congress from holding meetings of any sort.

The new constitution renamed the country the "Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela", after South American independence hero Simón Bolívar. It increased the presidential term of office to six years, while providing for a new procedure to recall a president. However, it introduced the principle of re-election, which had been banned from Venezuelan 20th century constitutions considering the life-time dicators of the past. It was approved in a nationwide referendum held in December 1999. Elections for the new, unicameral legislature were held in July 2000. During the same election, Chávez stood for re-election. Chávez coalition obtained a commanding 2/3 majority of seats in the new unicameral assembly and Chavez himself was reelected.

In November 2000, he backed a bill through the legislature allowing him to rule by decree for one year. In November 2001, Chávez passed a set of 49 laws by decrees, shortly before the enabling law expired, including the "Hydrocarbons law" (regarding oil) and the "Land law Business federation Fedecámaras vehemently opposed the 49 laws and called for a general business strike on December 10, 2001.

In December 2000, to elections for local officials Chávez tagged a referendum on dissolving Venezuela's labor unions. Though it is unclear what authority was invoked, he attempted to consolidate all Venezuelan labor unions into a single, state-controlled Bolivarian Labor Force. The elections for the leadership of Venezuelan trade union the next year were a political defeat for Chávez and renewed political tensions through the country.

Coup attempt against Chávez

Hugo Chávez, surrounded by resolute supporters, makes a dramatic return to power on April 12, 2002 after the collapse of the first Latin American coup of the 21st century.

On April 9, 2002, Venezuela's largest union federation, the Confederación de Trabajadores de Venezuela (CTV), led by Carlos Ortega Carvajal, called for a two-day general strike. Fedecámaras joined the strike and called on all of its affiliated businesses to close for 48 hours.The strike spread swiftly as larger and larger crowds of protesters packed the streets.

On Thursday April 11, an estimated million people marched to the headquarters of Venezuela's oil company, PDVSA, in defense of its fired management. The organizers decided to re-route the march to Miraflores, the presidential palace, where pro-government demonstrators had set position. After violence erupted between demonstrators, the metropolitan police (controlled by the opposition) and national guard (controlled by Chávez), 17 people were killed and more than a hundred wounded. Doctors who treated the wounded reported that many of them appeared to have been shot from above in a sniper-like fashion.

After commander in chief Lucas Rincon Romero announced to the nation that he had resigned, Chávez was arrested on April 12, 2002, and Fedecámaras president Pedro Carmona was appointed by the military as interim president. His first decree dissolving all established powers was also his last and did not even make it for publication in the official journal. These events generated a widespread uprising and looting on some sectors of Caracas in support of Chávez that was repressed by the Metropolitan Police. Thus ended the briefest de facto government in Venezuela history with the return of Chavez in the night of Saturday to Sunday April 14.

Strike/lockout

For two months from December 2, 2002, the Chávez government was faced with a business strike, led by the oil industry management.

As a consequence, Venezuela stopped exporting a daily average of 2,800,000 barrels (450,000 m³) of oil and derivatives and began to require the import of gasoline for internal use. Chávez was responsible for the replacement of the upper management of the Venezuelan national oil company as well as the dismissal of 18,000 PDVSA employees, Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA), allegedly on grounds of mismanagement and corruption, but supporters of the PDVSA board call the action "politically motivated". A court ruling has deemed the dismissal of these workers illegal and has ordered the immediate return of the entire group to their former posts. Nevertheless, Chávez, PDVSA's CEO Alí Rodríguez, and Minister of Mines Rafael Rodríguez have repeatedly expressed that such ruling will not be enforced.

Movement to remove Chávez in a referendum

In August 2003, opposition leaders began the process to recall Chávez, a procedure first allowed in Venezuela in the 1999 constitution. When the opposition presented the National Electoral Council (CNE) with 3.2 million signatures, the CNE rejected the petition by a vote of 3-0 with 2 members abstaining, ruling that signatures collected before the mid-point of Chávez's term were not valid under Venezuelan law. In November, the opposition conducted another signature drive, again presenting over 3 million signatures.

The recall vote was held on August 15, 2004. Record numbers of voters turned out, and polling hours had to be extended by at least eight hours. 59.25% of the vote was against the recall, for Chávez remaining in office. Election observers Jimmy Carter of the Carter Center and Organization of American States Secretary General César Gaviria endorsed the results of Venezuela's recall referendum. However in the following weeks numerous irregularites as to the voter registry and distribution were revealed. Certain statistical anomalies were claimed. The opposition did not recognize the audit of the election under the conditions that the Carter Center accepted but not the European Union which had refused to survey the election. If it is agreed that Chávez survived the recall effort, the margin of victory is now questioned and as a consequence political peace and reconciliation are not forecoming.

Arrest of alleged paramilitaries

Alleged planned Venezuelan coup in 2004

In May 2004, Venezuelan state TV reported the capture of 126 Colombians accused of being paramilitaries, near properties belonging to Cuban exile Roberto Alonso, one of the leaders of the Venezuelan opposition group Bloque Democrático, and media magnate Gustavo Cisneros, a Cuban-Venezuelan Chávez opponent and one of the alleged architects of the 2002 coup. According to one of the detainees, they would have been offered 500,000 Colombian pesos to work on the farm, before being informed that they would have to prepare for an attack on a National Guard base, with the goal of stealing weapons to potentially arm a 3,000-strong militia.

Venezuelan policy under Chavez

With Chávez's emergence, there have been many social and economic changes in Venezuela. Traditionally, lighter skinned groups have held economic and political sway over this oil-rich nation. The Venezuelan business community, represented by the Venezuelan Federation of Chambers of Commerce (Fedecámaras), strongly opposes Chávez and his policies, and the largest labor federation has joined them.

Oil policy

Venezuela is a major producer of oil products, and oil is vitally important to the Venezuelan economy. Chávez has gained a reputation as a price hawk in OPEC, pushing for stringent enforcement of production quotas and higher target prices. He has also attempted to broaden Venezuela's customer base, striking joint exploration deals with other developing countries, including Argentina, Brazil, India, and China.

Chávez has redirected the focus of PDVSA, the Venezuelan state oil company, bringing it more closely under the direction of the Minister of Energy. He has also attempted to repatriate more oil funds, by raising the percentage of royalties Venezuela receives on joint extraction contracts, and exploring selling some or all of Citgo's assets, a US-based subsidiary of PDVSA.

International relations

Chávez has made Latin American integration one of the centerpieces of his policies. This has come in many forms: the creation or extension of joint institutions like Petrosur, Telesur, and Mercosur; bilateral trade relationships with other Latin American countries, including arms purchases from Brazil, oil-for-expertise trades with Cuba, and a pipeline through Colombia. Venezeula's relationship with its neighbor Colombia has been rocky at times, though; with events like the Rodrigo Granda affair temporarily throwing the relationship into crisis.

Venezuela has had a mostly antagonistic relationship with the United States for many reasons: Chávez's hawkish stance in OPEC, his public friendship and trade relationship with Cuba and Fidel Castro; and his numerous public statements in opposition to U.S. economic and foreign policy. In response to the ouster of Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in February 2004, with U.S. assistance, Chávez called U.S. President George W. Bush a pendejo ("prick") and threatened to cut off all oil exports to the United States if it took any more action against his country. He was also the first democratically-elected president to visit Iraqi President Saddam Hussein since the 1991 Gulf War, on August 11, 2000, and strongly opposed the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The United States has consistently opposed Chávez, though constitutionally elected, recognizing the Carmona government during the 2002 coup, calling Chávez a "negative force" in the region, and requesting support from Venezuela's neighbors in isolating Chavez. On 20 February 2005, Chávez stated that he had reasons to believe that the U.S. had plans to have him assassinated; he said that any attempt would mean that Venezuela would cut off oil to the U.S. This was a claim first made a week before by Fidel Castro

Social programs

Venezuela under Chávez has started numerous social programs: Barrio Adentro, an initiative to provide free health care to poor and underserved areas, Mission Robinson and Mission Sucre to increase literacy and basic education. The literacy programs are centered on learning to read and understand the Venezuelan Constitution and their inherent rights as Venezuelan citizens. These programs have been criticized as inefficient and incomplete by opposition figures but are widely heralded and appreciated by Chávez backers.

Many of these programs involve importing expertise from abroad; Venezuela is providing Cuba with 53,000 barrels (8,000 m³) of below-market-rate oil a day in exchange for the service of hundreds of physicians, teachers, and other professionals.

The Ley de Tierras ("Land Law"), passed by decree in November 2001, created Plan Zamora to enact land reforms in Venezuelan agriculture: taxing unused landholdings, expropriating unused private lands (with compensation), and giving inheritable, unsellable land grants to small farmers and farm collectives. The rationale given for this program was that it would be part of generating "food security" for the country, a net food importer which has seen vast disinvestment in its rural areas since oil wealth was discovered. However, the eventual reach of such reforms is questioned as Venezuela has already near 90% of its population in urban settings. In early 2005 forced seizures were initiated against the law own provisions, dangerously politicizing the process of land redestribution.

Media

All of the five mainstream TV networks and most major mainstream newspapers oppose Chávez, but a small minority of the media is said to support him. Chávez claims the opposition media is controlled by the interests which oppose him, whereas the media accuse him of having intimidated journalists with his pronouncements and of allegedly sending gangs to threaten journalists with physical violence.

In 2005, the Chávez government announced the creation of Telesur, a proposed Latin America-wide television network to compete with CNN en español and Univision.

Labor

Chávez has had a combative relationship with the nation's largest trade union confederation, the CTV, historically aligned with the Acción Democrática party. During December 2000 local elections, Chávez placed a referendum on the ballot to force internal elections within unions. The referendum, condemned by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) as interference in internal union matters, passed by a large margin on very thin turnout. In the ensuing elections, Carlos Ortega declared victory and remained in office, whereas Chavista candidates declared fraud.

The Union Nacional de los Trabajadores (UNT, National Workers' Union) is a pro-Chávez union federation which has been growing during Chávez's presidency, with some pro-Chávez unions disaffiliating with CTV because of their strident anti-Chávez activism and affiliating with the UNT. In 2003, Chávez sent UNT representatives to an ILO meeting, rather than CTV.

On January 19, 2005, Chávez nationalized Venepal, a paper- and cardboard-manufacturing company at the request of its workers. The company had gone bankrupt and participation in the general lockout in 2003 was its final undoing. Workers occupied the factory and restarted production, but following a failed deal with management and amidst management threats to sell off equipment, Chávez ordered the nationalization, extended a line of credit, and ordered that the Venezuelan educational missions (see above) purchase paper products from the company.

Socialism

On 30 January, 2005 at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil, Chavez declared his support for democratic socialism, in his words "a new type of socialism, a humanist one, which puts humans and not machines or the state ahead of everything." He later reiterated this in a February 26 speech at the 4th Summit on the Social Debt held in Caracas.

Personal life

Chávez was married twice and is currently separated from his second wife, Marisabel Rodríguez de Chávez. He has four children, his younger daugther is named Rosines.

Conclusion: The Venezuelan Situation in a Global Context

FINALLY, Dear Reader, we end with a recap and summary of the foregoing, plus some other related geopolitical facts and observations.

If America dares to attack Venezuela, every supertanker approaching the American southern oil terminals will be sunk by Mach 2.9 missiles

Based on received intelligence, it seems likely that the Island of Cuba will soon be used as 'point man' in a grand plan to deny American warships and other vessels safe transit through the Gulf of Mexico.

Quite apart from thoroughly humiliating New York and Washington, such a move will have a far more devastating effect if tankers are denied access to the southern American oil terminals.

Without oil imported through its critical southern oil terminals, and also possibly facing denial of access to underwater oil reserves in the Gulf of Mexico, America will collapse in less than six months.

How this will be brought about is a long and sometimes complicated story, but bear with me and I will try to make the multi-faceted components of this truly multinational operation as clear as I can, in a report normally limited to a mere 3,000 words. To do this we must first circle the globe, picking up seemingly random pieces of the operational jigsaw on the way, until the last piece slips neatly into place less than 200 miles south of Florida Keys.

As you may expect, there is really nothing random about the process at all -- merely the understandable caution and strategic camouflage of a multinational coalition closing in on the most dangerous and brutal nation on Planet Earth since early in the 20th Century. During the last thirty years alone, America's controllers have ordered the calculated murder of more than six million innocents around the world, and the world is not prepared to tolerate another six million innocents being murdered during the next thirty years.

Much has happened during the past few months, so now we have to slip back in time in order to discover the intriguing answers to why Middle East LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas) is now heading east rather than west; why Russia has forged an ironclad coalition with China, India and Brazil, and why they really want the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed El Baradei removed from office. Finally we will have to show the connections between these events and future mayhem in the Gulf of Mexico.

On 10 November 2004, the India Daily reported that, "Russian President Putin is taking a lead role in the most powerful coalition of regional and superpowers in the world. The coalition consists of India, China, Russia and Brazil. This will challenge the superpower supremacy of America." … "He [Putin] wants to establish a long-term Russian footprint in Latin America in order to expand Moscow's geopolitical influence in the region. Brazil is very open to the coalition concept where these large countries support each other in term of trade, economics, international politics and defense."

Just this single strategic move means that the new coalition embraces just over three quarters of the world's total population, eighty percent of its natural resources, and a majority of technical and scientific experts. Nor does it end there, because the coalition automatically includes the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which is presently comprised of China, Russia, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. Dangerously for America, the coalition will soon have another important member, Iran, currently due to enter informally in a few months time through the SCO "back door" because of a mammoth energy deal. We will return to Iran shortly.

Obviously from this perspective, the most disturbing new member of the coalition is Brazil, because New York has long believed and insisted that the whole of Central and South America is under its personal "protection," which is just another way of claiming that they can pillage the place whenever they want to, proved by countless CIA atrocities in almost every American country south of Puerto Rica. Now then, what would happen to this cozy pillaging arrangement if Russia-friendly coalition partner Brazil decided to develop nuclear weapons?

On 16 November 2004, just six days after Vladimir Putin formally introduced Brazil as a member of the new coalition, IAEA inspectors from Geneva visited Rio de Janeiro. Just eight days later on 24 November 2004, Brazilian Energy Minister Eduardo Campos announced that the IAEA had issued Brazil with a permit to commence the experimental stage of uranium enrichment.

Paranoia immediately swept down Wall Street at the speed of light, and within hours the White House was pathetically whining that IAEA chief Mohamed El Baradei should be removed from office. Dark hints by the New York Times that El Baradei had "not been doing enough in Iran", were just a hasty smoke screen. For many years they had a fallback plan in case global conquest became impossible. Code-named "Fortress Americas," the plan relied on the USA being able to conquer both Canada and South America, thereby building themselves an impregnable redoubt in the Western Hemisphere, to provide cover while rebuilding their strength. I wrote two long reports on this top-secret plan, which are linked at the bottom of this page for those who wish to study the details.

With Brazil now a full coalition partner with Russia and China, "Fortress Americas" was already doomed to failure, especially because Vladimir Putin had been economical with the truth when he named the coalition members.

Venezuela had already signed up in secret, but this was kept under wraps for fear of alerting the CIA to what was to come next. As most readers know, Venezuela has massive oil reserves that America relies on heavily, and premature exposure might have led to rash military action against the country, in order to seize the Venezuelan oilfields in the sacred name of "American National Security."

In its normal crude way, the CIA had already given advance warning of this intent by planning to shoot down Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez' aircraft in late September, when he was en route to address the United Nations in New York.

Fortunately for Chavez and his country, Venezuelan Intelligence received advance warning and blocked the President's flight.

The CIA shoot-down was to be followed 14 hours later by "phase 2," an attack on the Presidential barracks while the country was still in shock about President Chavez' 'accidental death', thus capturing Venezuelan oil and handing it to America on a plate.

Of course the CIA should have cancelled "Phase 2" the minute it knew that the Presidential aircraft had not taken off from Caracas for New York, but sadly the CIA planners forgot, and the Presidential barracks attack force was swiftly overwhelmed by a very alert Venezuelan military.

Needless to say, "Phase 2" proved that "Phase 1" was very real and accurate intelligence, in turn proving that they had yet again ordered the murder of a head of state for monetary gain, a long standing tradition on Wall Street.

Within days Russia 'agreed' to provide Venezuela with fifty MIG 29 fighters, because it was obvious that Wall Street would try again later if a deterrent was not put in place, and Chavez could hardly rely on America to send spare parts for his fleet of aging F-16s.

New York was furious of course, but could hardly do anything about it. And besides, what harm could 50 MIG interceptors a thousand miles away do to America? New York had made the fatal error of assuming that the MIGs in question were being delivered exclusively to protect Venezuela against American bombers or troop transports.

In fact, all fifty aircraft are Mig 29 SMTs, the very latest in Russian technology with enhanced attack payload capacity and a Plasma Stealth System. Hardly the aircraft one would choose for a Red Baron dogfight at 15,000 feet, now is it? All Venezuelan Mig 29 SMTs are painted dark blue, which may be part of the stealth system, but more commonly denotes that the aircraft will be used for low level attacks over water. When nosey European diplomatic officials asked Venezuelan Air Force generals why they needed such sophisticated aircraft, the generals responded "To protect the Panama Canal"...

Despite Venezuelan claims that they want to use the Mig 29 SMTs to protect the Panama Canal (which is true to a certain extent), their most obvious use initially appears to be that of defending Venezuela against an American aircraft carrier strike on Caracas, or elsewhere in the country. Yes they can do that, because any U.S. carrier getting close enough to launch its aircraft against Venezuela, can in turn be sunk very swiftly indeed by one or two of the lethal and unstoppable Onyx missiles.

What absolutely no one outside Russia and Venezuela knew until two weeks ago, is that 20 of the fifty Mig 29 SMTs are fully equipped to carry and fire the devastating SS-N-25 [and now SS-N-26] "Onyx", a devastating and completely unstoppable Mach 2.9 ramjet anti-ship cruise missile which skims the waves at twenty feet, before delivering a knock out blow to its maritime target more than 200 kilometers away.

So great is the kinetic energy at the point of impact on the target, that Onyx can sink an American aircraft carrier or supertanker using only a conventional penetrating warhead. Those scientists who might doubt this should calculate the impact energy of 5,500 pounds of missile striking a carrier or tanker at a terminal velocity of 2,460 feet per second. It is understood that Russia is providing Venezuela with a stockpile of forty anti-ship Onyx missiles.

Russia has arranged for the Venezuelan pilots to receive their advanced Mig 29 training in Cuba, which already has six earlier version of the aircraft. So the Cuban instructors are well up to the job, but don't have the latest Mig 29 SMT model that the Venezuelan Air Force has. Well, not until next week anyway. Russia is donating four [Onyx equipped] Mig 29 SMTs to Cuba free of charge, for use in training the Venezuelan pilots and then to add to their own inventory. Agreement has also been reached for joint exercises in the future, using Cuban airspace.

All of a sudden, America will be facing the same deadly threat it faced when arguing with China about the future of Taiwan. Basically, China demonstrated the awesome accuracy and power of its SS-N-22 Sunburn and SS-N-25 Onyx missiles against moving unmanned maritime targets, and the U.S. Fleet swiftly withdrew.

So how is the U.S. Navy going to feel when every dark blue Mig 29 SMT flying off a dirt strip in Cuba is possibly carrying an Onyx missile capable of sinking any American ship within a tactical radius of 600 miles?

It seems beyond doubt that the main message will get through, i.e. that if America dares to attack Venezuela or even little Cuba, every supertanker approaching the American southern oil terminals through the Gulf of Mexico, will be sunk by an invisible Mach 2.9 missile exploding in a white fireball.

Worse still, there is the possibility that some of America's offshore oil platforms in the Gulf might also be destroyed, causing savage blowouts that will burn for ten years or more.

Concurrently on the other side of the world, more pieces of the strategic jigsaw were falling into place, and on 2 December 2004 the Asia Times published "China Rocks the Geopolitical Boat with Iran Oil Deal", which is probably one of the top stories of the century, but it was not repeated by the Australian media.

"A mere two months ago, the news of a China-Kazakhstan pipeline agreement, worth US$3.5 billion, raised some eyebrows in the world press, some hinting that China's economic foreign policy may be on the verge of a new leap forward. A clue to the fact that such anticipation may have totally understated the case was last week's signing of a mega-gas deal between Beijing and Tehran worth $100 billion. Billed as the "deal of the century" by various commentators, this agreement is likely to increase by another $50 to $100 billion, bringing the total close to $200 billion, when a similar oil agreement, currently being negotiated, is inked not too far from now.

"The gas deal entails the annual export of some 10 million tons of Iranian liquefied natural gas (LNG) for a 25-year period, as well as the participation, by China's state oil company, in such projects as exploration and drilling, petrochemical and gas industries, pipelines, services and the like. The export of LNG requires special cargo ships, however, and Iran is currently investing several billion dollars adding to its small LNG-equipped fleet."

Though America officially refers to Iran as part of the "Axis of Evil," this does not stop it importing very large quantities of Iranian LNG through third parties. Now all that will come to a grinding halt, because Iran must naturally focus exclusively on filling its mammoth Chinese commitments. Thus on December 2. 2004, the block on external energy supplies to America started in earnest.

At the same time, Iran effectively came under China's protection, because any American attack on Iran will impact directly on Chinese National Security by severing its energy resources. It is but a small step for Iran from there to full membership of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), and overall protection by the Russian-Chinese Axis.

There is a curious oriental twist here, because the mammoth Iranian LNG contract with China will also have a major negative impact on "Coalition of the Willing" partner Australia. Back in 2002 there was a huge fanfare when the Australian Government trumpeted news of an annual 3.3 million ton LNG export deal to China, due to commence in 2006 and last for 25 years.

Does this sound familiar?

Unfortunately for Australia, the Iranian-Chinese deal was effective the day it was signed in late November 2004, and both countries have admitted that between them they will need to build another 87 LNG tankers just to keep up with their initial supply from the huge Iranian Pars gas field. In the view of this author, the Chinese will default on the Australian deal, which is probably a suitable punishment for the obsequious cretins in Canberra who agreed to "help" them in Iraq.

America is already desperately short of energy, and it can only get worse.

Iraq is producing nothing at all as usual, and the Republican Guard will ensure it stays that way. OPEC will slow down production in January because it actually has to. If the OPEC countries keep pumping at their present outrageous rates to please America, they will eventually destroy their own economies by terminally damaging their producing wells. This leaves the largest single oil producer in the world, Russia, to increase or decrease world oil production to suit its own (or its new coalition's) global agenda.

The New Russia-China-India-Brazil coalition really means business, and it would be wise to remember that after reforms at the United Nations, all four will have permanent seats on the Security Council. But that is after the likely confrontation in the Gulf of Mexico, designed to either make America withdraw completely from the rest of the world and become relatively poor, or face devastating and total economic ruin. It has been suggested to me that the choice will probably be left to the American people, if they can terminate a few dozen fast enough.

Despite Venezuelan claims that they want to use the MIG 29 SMTs to protect the Panama Canal), their most obvious use initially appears to be that of defending Venezuela against an American aircraft carrier strike on Caracas, or elsewhere in the country.

Yes they can do that, because any US carrier getting close enough to launch its aircraft against Venezuela, can in turn be sunk very swiftly indeed by one or two of the lethal and unstoppable Onyx missiles.

U.S. Navy units slated for support of a possible military action against Venezuela are:

Carriers:
USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69)
USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71) -
Essex Expeditionary Strike Group (ESG)
[31st Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) (SOC)]
USS Essex (LHD 2) -
USS Juneau (LPD 10) -
USS Harpers Ferry (LSD 49) -

It seems beyond doubt that the main message will get through, i.e. that if America dares to attack Venezuela or even little Cuba, every supertanker, approaching the American southern oil terminals through the Gulf of Mexico, will be sunk by an invisible Mach 2.9 missile exploding in a white fireball. . So great is the kinetic energy at the point of impact on the target, that Onyx can sink an American aircraft carrier or supertanker using only a conventional penetrating warhead. Those scientists who might doubt this should calculate the impact energy of 5,500 pounds of missile striking a carrier or tanker at a terminal velocity of 2,460 feet per second. It is understood that Russia is providing Venezuela with a stockpile of forty anti-ship Onyx missiles.

Worse still, there is the possibility that some of America's offshore oil platforms in the Gulf might also be destroyed, causing savage blowouts that will burn for ten years or more. There will be those who read this report with cynicism, sneering as always that no one would dare do this to the "only remaining superpower on earth."

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez flew to Beijing on an official visit extending until Monday December 27, a total of five days straight. Evidently the Chinese regard President Chavez as a very important Head of State which is hardly surprising when you understand the reason for his visit. The Chinese, it should be noted, are practicing polite diplomacy which George W. Bush  cannot and does not. The American President has appalled world leaders by his crude, hectoring and bullying approach to vital military and economic problems and the Chinese believe in the old adage that a drop of honey attracts far more flies than a bucket of vinegar.

Until they tried to murder him back in September, Chavez was reasonably happy supplying America with 2.7 million barrels of oil per day ... which is about 80% of Venezuela's total production.

The attempt on his life was one giant step too far though, so Chavez went to Beijing negotiating to sell the entire 2.7 million barrels per day to China instead.

Harry Brunser

Virginia, USA