Breaking News Venezuela: Chavez breaks with Colombia over FARC affair

Vcrisis ^ | 14.01.05 | Aleksander Boyd

[alekboyd]

London 14.01.05 | Hugo Chavez, the greatest pariah ever to govern our nation, has just frozen diplomatic and trade relations with Colombia. The embarrassing thing for us decent Venezuelans is the reason for this breakage, i.e. the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

[NorCalRepub]

where on earth is he gonna get his "coke" from now.....??

[Rutles4Ever]

Opium from Afghanistan.

[NorCalRepub]

oh, then he can be a poly drug abuser

[Dog Gone]

Chavez is no genius, and this will do him far more harm than good. I applaud this boneheaded move.

[FormerACLUmember]

When, oh when, is the tyrant Chavez going to assume room temperature?

[AdamSelene235]

where on earth is he gonna get his "coke" from now.....??

Chavez is allied with FARC. He trades drugs from weapons with Farc. There are also reports he is importing bioweapons from Cuba. Chavez is a known supporter of Saddam and Al Queada.

Incidentally, there a drug routes from Venezuela straights into the noses and veins of most American cities. Did I mention he's importing bioweapons??

[Paradox]

Colombia and Venezuela have long been rivals, don't be surprised if some kind of fighting breaks out between the two countries.

[DarkWaters]

Chavez has been looking forward to a fight, he wants Columbia to fall completely whether by invasion or rebels force Uribe out. It doesn't matter to him as long as he stays at the top.

[livius]

I don't think he'd attack Colombia, because that would give us a reason to come to their defense and attack him. He taunts us, but he's still afraid of us; for the moment, at least.

Of course, once he gets pumped up with Chinese weaponry, all bets are off.

[DarkWaters]

Better make that with Russian and Chinese weaponry. Venezuela has recently bought 50 Mig-29SMT's, in the process to buy a number of helicopters, at least 100,000 more rifles. The deal was in the billions so I have to suspect that there is much more, but that is all the details given thus far.

[livius]

Chavez seems to be involved with all of our traditional enemies, and is busy turning former allies into new enemies. He's obviously spending himself blind with weapons purchases.

[DarkWaters]

Chavez seems to be involved with all of our traditional enemies, and is busy turning former allies into new enemies. He's obviously spending himself blind with weapons purchases.

To be honest with you it is more like the opposite. All of our traditional enemies are involved with our soon to be former allies or already former allies. There is a growing effort by both Russia and China to politically isolate us from the rest of the world. This has been going on since the thaw in the cold war(more a proxy war in my opinion)but has picked up speed in the last 7 years or so. What couldn't be done in the bad old days is being done in the 'good times'. Strategy and the tactics of our enemy has radically changed from the old days. We as a country just can't seem to wake up to this. Because of that our southern flank is being ideologically overrun by Marxist/Leninist drivel and the occasional wannabe thug who likes to side with what they see as the winning side. They then in turn will start to arm themselves, to continue the revolution where it has not been successful. Columbia comes to mind since it poses the greatest threat in the region because of its alliance with us and the fact that we have our hands tied militarily in other areas, it may be the opportunity Chavez and Castro are looking for.

To add to this, Chavez has just recently agreed to allow a Chines oil firm to come in and set up shop. They will set up new wells and maintain existing ones. Its only a matter of time till they are fully up to speed and gain even greater control as labor disputes erupt at this point. One of the reasons we depend on Venezuelan crude is because it was a fairly stable and reliable area. By the Chinese coming in, they can increasingly siphon off Venezuelan oil reserves while squeezing us out. Naturally this forces us to find sellers who are in less stable areas, most likely not the best quality crude either. China is in Canada with the tar sand projects and looking for other sources of oil and natural gas. Both of which we depend greatly on Canada for. This will further squeeze us out of the Canadian market. And just look at the relations the both China and Russia have been trying and ever more successfully at that to achieve with Saudi Arabia. Then there are the mine acquisitions taking place by companies in both Russia and China. We are being squeezed by those two at every chance they get and in multiple areas. Chavez at this point is just one more pawn, perhaps a knight on the chess board for these guys.

[livius]

Interesting analysis, and probably very accurate. What do you think would be a good response to this (on our part)?

In my fantasies, I would think it truly wonderful to find some replacement fuel source that would suddenly render oil nearly worthless, because oil always seems to be under parts of the world that are wretchedly primitive and are only a threat to us because of the wealth the oil has brought into their primitive hands. These countries have never produced anything in their entire histories, and it is no virtue of their own that they have this valuable resource there; and they can't even think of any way to spend their wealth other than in wars and violence.

Realistically, however, oil will be necessary to us for a long time to come, which puts us at their mercy - and they know it. I can't imagine what we can do about it, quite frankly, but then I am not very knowledgeable about the oil business.

[DarkWaters]

What do you think would be a good response to this (on our part)?

I wish I could give you a good answer at this point. I have many ideas, but non of them realistic unless the attitudes in this country change to see that we have some serious problems to deal with both domestically and especially in the international arena. To many have run away from the position that we once called leadership. We are not as educated was we used to be and its vital that we are. If we can acknowledge that we have big problems and acknowledge them specifically as a people, then I would say 30% of our problems are solved though I still believe things have progressed to the point where we will get hurt real bad, but not as bad as we will hurt Russia and China in the long run. But this is all a what if at this point. Everything hinges on our ability to admit that things are going against us and increase our knowledge and stop worrying about being entertained 24-7.

[livius]

I'm optimistic that having Condolezza Rice at the State Department will help. She seems to have a good grasp on the enormity of the problem - not only our Islamic enemies, but the fact that Communism has not gone away, simply morphed a bit to accomodate itself to new realities. And it's still our enemy, and the same old countries are still our enemies (of course, with the addition of their alliances with our Islamic enemies, which I think will grow closer and more overt in the future).

But as you say, people won't take this seriously, probably until it's too late and there is no way of controlling it except through war. The changes Bush (through his appointees) is making at State and the CIA will help, but it's still going to mean getting everyone to realize how serious the threat is. With politics as they are, and the apathy of the people as it is, I think this is going to be difficult.