Posted on 09/02/2007 1:51:41 PM PDT by Jeff Head
In a new outburst of antiwestern sabre-rattling, President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela has threatened Britain with “revenge” for the Falklands war of 1982. The belligerent Latin American leftist warned last week that his recent build-up of sophisticated Russian and Iranian weapons would be used to destroy the British fleet if it attempted to return to the South Atlantic.
Speaking on his weekly television show Alo Presidente (Hello, Mr President), Chavez denounced what he described as Britain’s “illegal occupation” of the Falklands and repeated his call for a regional military alliance against Britain and the United States.
“If we had been united in the last war, we could have stopped the old empire,” Chavez said, as he gesticulated to maps showing how Venezuelan aircraft and submarines would intercept British warships. “Today we could sink the British fleet.”
Chavez has often expressed support for Argentina’s claim to the Falklands, but his latest broadside was notable for both its antiBritish vitriol and its unprecedented threats. He declared that British history was “stained with the blood of South America’s indigenous people” and demanded revenge for the “cowardly” sinking of the General Belgrano, the Argentine cruiser.
Western diplomats have long grown used to harangues from Chavez, who announced this weekend that he would negotiate with guerrillas holding dozens of hostages in Colombia, including three US contractors and Ingrid Betancourt, a French-Colombian abducted as she campaigned for president in 2002. But US and British officials have recently become more concerned by his willingness to lavish billions of dollars from Venezuela’s soaring oil income on military capabilities.
(Excerpt) Read more at timesonline.co.uk ...
Incrementalism works in the favor of blowhards. Assert, assert, assert and the blowhard makes baby steps. Before the victim is aware of it, the blowhard is on his border or in his hotel lobby or on the perimeter of his military camp.
Bender2 — I don’t know why you have turned so hostile and abusive toward Jeff, and I don’t see where you have addressed the issue of refueling aircraft once or twice (or more) which can double range, and thus extend Venezuela’s potential interdiction capability completely across the Atlantic. Granted, effective combat radius can be reduced by a number of factors such as amount of armaments carried and loiter time burning fuel, and an aerial refueling effort across the Atlantic would have some serious logistical challenges and potential vulnerabilities to UK counter-action, but why do you not even consider the fact that Venezuela is clearly preparing such a refueling and extended range capability?
“He certainly thinks he’s surrounded by enemies.”
I disagree. Hugo thinks he’s surrounded by wimps who won’t confront him.
There was an expedition against either Buenos Aires or Montevideo around 1803-7, somewhere in there, during the Napoleonic Wars. Bonaparte had put a family member on the Spanish throne and Spanish possessions were viewed as fair game.
The expedition was launched independently of London, from the Cape Colony in South Africa, recently won from the Dutch, also a French ally.
I think there was some kind of grand strategic plan to link up with the Portuguese in Brazil and divvy up Spain’s South American Empire, Portugal being a British ally since the 15th or 16th century.
Alas, after initial success against the Spanish colonial regulars the expedition came to a bad end, bogged down in street fighting against an aroused populace.
Once the British had extricated their forces London laid down the law, no more free lance, free-booting expeditions on local iniative. Not that that stopped such affairs, they continued, but as local border wars on the periphery of empire against native states, no more trans-oceanic campaigns w/out checking with home first!
‘Course if things had turned out differently there would have been awards, titles, honors and loot all ‘round...
I thought I had heard the help included aviation fuel, satellite intel and Sidewinders. No source, just scuttlebutt.
You’re such a badass, Hugo.
But honestly ,Hugo, how can we take someone named Hugo seriously?
I’d be angry at Mom too.
Well, in that case...the Brits Shall Vow Counter-Revenge for Maradona's 'hand-of-God' illegal goal.
Hugo the Killer Whale is smarter than Hugo the D!c#-head-tator
“I disagree. Hugo thinks he’s surrounded by wimps who won’t confront him.”
Bingo, you win the prize. This is exactly what he thinks. And he’s banking on a Dem winning our presidential election, which will guarantee this.
Well, I can still dream can’t I. LOL
The B-2s were used in Serbia, Afghanistan and Iraq, and the money we paid for them is worth it if it deters even one bad guy.
Oh...and that would be the Air Force. Next time you feel like calling us the air scouts, go look at the MOH citations that have gone to AF and Army Air Corps members. I read one a couple of months ago about a B-29 crewman who got his face melted by a magnesium flare. He was hugging it to his body so he could get it out of the aircraft and save his crew.
And we'd love to help you out this time, and not for the oil!
Hugo apparently never go the memo where our ASW forces were tracking most Soviet subs all day long, and our submariners were able to penetrate Soviet waters almost at will.
The U.S. was friendly toward the argentine government of the day. We are not friendly toward Chavez. I'm betting we get in.
Yes, to all three. Source was a British book on the conflict I read a few years back that was written in 1984.
Hugo needs to go prior to him inciting more major problems on our southern flank.
When I heard he got elected, I thought we should have stepped in, forced him out, and held a new election. And no, I'm not big on interfering in the affairs of sovereign nations. It's just that it didn't take a genius to know that this guy was going to be another lunatic Commie dictator in our hemisphere.
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