CHAVEZ TO THE U.S.: "HOW DO I HARM THEE? LET ME COUNT THE WAYS."

- May 20, 2009

The regime of Hugo Chavez in once democratic Venezuela is already in its eleventh year and clearly shows the full traits of a dictatorship: concentration of power in one person; lack of institutional checks and balances; intolerance for, and persecution of, political dissidents; lack of accountability in the management of public assets and elections of doubtful transparency. Not content with imposing his will on the Venezuelan people, he is trying to become the hemispheric leader of an alliance to destroy the United States.  If Chavez were conversant with the poetry of Elizabeth Barret Browning (rather doubtful) he would probably be “counting the ways” in which he is harming the United States. The top ten list of ways:

1. His alliance with Iran’s President Ahmadinejad has opened up Latin America to that fundamentalist country. Chavez has provided Iran, so far, with entry to Venezuela, Bolivia, Nicaragua and Ecuador. Iran is conducting active ideological indoctrination in these countries, disguised as cultural interchange, and is openly promoting anti-U.S. political strategies.
2. His promotion of Islamic terrorism through increasing links with Hizballah and Hamas is sending Islamic terrorists to the U.S. border. The alignment with Iran, mentioned above, and the increasing connections with terrorist Islamic groups, is allowing for the entry of Islamic terrorists into Venezuela, where they are provided with false Venezuelan documents and sent to the Mexico-U.S. border.
3. Cutting off links with the U.S. drug enforcement agencies and turning Venezuela into the main drug distribution center for Andean cocaine going to the U.S. and Europe further complicates U.S. anti-drug efforts in Latin America. The volume of cocaine now moving through Venezuela, with the cooperation and complicity of the Venezuelan authorities, is on the order of 300 tons per year and increasing rapidly.
4. Promoting petroleum production cuts and price increases within OPEC is contributing to the global economic downturn. Chavez leads the group of hawks within OPEC, demanding production cuts to pressure petroleum price increases and asking the organization to abandon the dollar as the currency of choice for their  transactions.
5. His creation of a regional political and economic anti-U.S. block places increasing pressures on an already over-extended list of U.S. foreign policy priorities. Through the use of oil as a political weapon he exercises influence over the small states of the Caribbean, several Central American countries, and even some larger countries in the region. Chavez is close to acquiring political control of the Organization of American States, OAS.   
6. A $6 billion acquisition of sophisticated weapons from Russia and China has altered the balance of military power in the region, increasing the probabilities of a major hemispheric crisis. Chavez has a very unstable personality. He would not think twice about promoting a crisis similar to the Cuban-Russian- U.S. missile confrontation of the 1960’s that took the world to the brink of nuclear war.
7. His financial and political oxygenation of Cuba has extended the life of the Castro dictatorship.  The amount of Venezuelan money illegally given by Chavez to the Castro regime can be estimated at some $12-14 billion, an amount of money comparable to the financial help given to Cuba by the Soviet Union during the 1960’s. This transference of resources has been possible through the supply of about 150 million barrels of oil to Castro’s Cuba during the last five years, plus cash transfers and the financing of housing and road projects on the island. This has extended the life of the Cuban regime for at least a decade. 
8. His alliance with the Colombian terrorist army, FARC, represents a clear act of agression against the poltical stability of the region. The well-documented link between Chavez and the terrorist-drug trafficking organization FARC, guilty of the death and kidnapping of more than one hundred thousand Latin Americans, would be enough basis to name the Venezuelan regime as a supporter of terrorism. Such an alliance is in clear violation of the Declarations and Resolutions, as well as the Charter, of the Organization of American States, of which the U.S is a member country. FARC has acted directly against U.S. nationals and property during the last 15 years.
9. His financing of the extreme left presidential candidacies of Ollanta Humala in Peru, Andres Lopez Obrador in Mexico, the Farabundo Marti Front in El Salvador and the Sandinista Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua is part of a global anti-U.S strategy. The fact that, so far, his success has only been modest does not detract from his openly stated main objective, which is the destruction of what he calls “the evil empire”. 
10. His well-financed campaign of recruiting U.S. organizations and individuals to his cause, either through material rewards or ideological seduction is undermining U.S. society. Organizations that have a grudge against the government of the United States, ideological fellow travelers, academic guns for hire and individuals who are easily seduced by despots and think poorly of U.S. democracy, now form a small but active group of Pro-Chavez Americans who have, for all practical purposes, become Chavez’s agents in this country. 

Gustavo Coronel

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Gustavo Coronel was a founding member of the Board of Directors for Petroleos de Venezuela (PdVSA), 1976-1979. He was elected to the Venezuela's House of Deputies for the State of Carabobo, the most highly industrialized state in Venezuela, however the Congress was dissolved by Hugo Chavez in 1999. Mr. Coronel is a graduate of the University of Tulsa, Central University of Caracas and Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies.

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