Click here for news of the war on Venezuela posted after April 30, 2002

Posted April 30, 2002

The good dictators
(Gary Younge, The Guardian, April 29, 2002)
Two weeks ago, the democratically elected leader of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, was ousted in a coup that lasted only 48 hours. Where a populist president once stood, the head of a private business lobby briefly became head of state. . . . Throughout the ordeal America, which has roamed the globe since September 11 declaring its determination to protect "democracy and civilisation" at the barrel of a gun, lost its tongue. . . . The lesson is clear, if double-edged. America supports democracy when democracy supports America. But when there is no democracy, dictatorships will do just as well - and at times even better. The sticking point is not whether citizens of all nations have the right to choose their leaders, but whether leaders, freely elected or not, of any nation have the right to choose a course which runs against whatever the US perceives its interests to be at a given moment. . . . Those who eschew the popular will and embrace America receive very different treatment. Take Pakistan. Three years ago General Pervez Musharraf seized power in a military coup and became an international pariah. Last September he redeemed himself by supporting the war on Afghanistan. Since then aid has poured in, sanctions have been scrapped and debt has been rescheduled. On Thursday he further ingratiated himself by giving the US military permission to follow al-Qaida into Pakistan territory. . . . America is no more interested in establishing democracy in Iraq than it is in preserving it in Venezuela. The crucial factors, in both cases, are that they are oil-rich, non-compliant states. Its talk of democracy and human rights, in this context, is yet more moral camouflage for yet another immoral war.

American navy 'helped Venezuelan coup'
(Duncan Campbell, The Guardian, April 29, 2002)
The United States had been considering a coup to overthrow the elected Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez, since last June, a former US intelligence officer claimed yesterday. . . . It is also alleged that the US navy aided the abortive coup which took place in Venezuela on April 11 with intelligence from its vessels in the Caribbean. Evidence is also emerging of US financial backing for key participants in the coup. . . . American military attaches had been in touch with members of the Venezuelan military to examine the possibility of a coup. . . . Mr Madsen also said that the navy helped with communications jamming support to the Venezuelan military, focusing on communications to and from the diplomatic missions in Caracas belonging to Cuba, Libya, Iran and Iraq - the four countries which had expressed support for Mr Chavez. . . . In Caracas, a congressman has accused the US ambassador to Venezuela, Charles Shapiro, and two US embassy military attaches of involvement in the coup. . . . And referring to Mr Shapiro, Mr Rondon said: "We saw him leaving Miraflores palace, all smiles and embraces, with the dictator Pedro Carmona Estanga [who was installed by the military for a day] ... [His] satisfaction was obvious. Shapiro's participation in the coup d'état in Venezuela is evident." . . . In the past year, the United States has channeled hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants to US and Venezuelan groups opposed to Mr Chavez, including the labour group whose protests sparked off the coup. The funds were provided by the National Endowment for Democracy, a nonprofit agency created and financed by the US Congress.

Posted April 24, 2002

White House and Oil Companies Implicated in Venezuelan Coup Attempt
[Editor's Note: The following three paragraphs were found in an article ostensibly about the resignation of Bush's top confident, Karen Hughes.]

Karen Hughes Hits the Road
(William Rivers Pitt, t r u t h o u t | April 23, 2002)

The recent coup attempt in Venezuela also looms large. It appears to have been motivated by a desire within that nation's petroleum business community to wrest full control of that nation's prodigious oil profits away from President Hugo Chavez, who was siphoning funds away from them and towards a variety of progressive policies. Chavez's friendly relations with Cuba and Iraq, along with the rise in oil prices since Venezuela assumed the presidency of OPEC, also likely played a major role in the attempt to remove him.

In the days since the coup attempt, led by Venezuelan business leader Pedro Carmona and a number of high-ranking officers in the Venezuelan military, reports have surfaced that indicate significant American involvement in Chavez's aborted overthrow. A number of these officers have spoken of an American military official - U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel James Rodgers, aide to the U.S. military attaché in Caracas - who was present with the coup leaders at Fort Tiuna in Caracas, where the operation was planned. Rodgers, it has been reported, was with these leaders at Fort Tiuna when the coup leaders brought Chavez there to be held after he was deposed. These officers interpreted Rodgers' presence at Tiuna as a green light from the United States to overthrow Chavez.

Officials from the Organization of American States, the powerful political and economic alliance between North and South America, has publicly accused a number of influential Bush administration members of actively assisting the coup. Otto Reich, an anti-Castro Cuban and former U.S. ambassador to Venezuela in 1986 who serves as Bush's main policy advisor for Latin America, is accused by OAS of meeting several times with the coup leaders in recent months. John Negroponte, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations who was ambassador to Honduras during Iran/Contra, is accused by OAS of having been informed of "some movement in Venezuela on Chavez" as early as the New Year. OAS also names Eliot Abrams, member of Bush's National Security Council and best known for his criminal involvement in the Iran/Contra affair, as being deeply complicit.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has made plans to begin an investigation into the Bush administration's involvement in the Venezuelan coup, and names of Rodgers, Reich, Negroponte and Abrams will likely play a central role.

Posted April 21, 2002

Film-maker describes the overthrow and return of Chavez
(Michael McCaughan, The Irish Times, April 21, 2002)
"I arrived in the centre of town just as the shooting started," says Kim. "I filmed a while then took cover in a doorway. Whoever was firing aimed directly at the crowd, which was pro-Chavez. I filmed two dead bodies, both of them beside the podium set up to rally Chavistas to defend the presidential palace. . . . "A woman working in the vice-president's office identified the bodies as a legal secretary and an archivist, both working inside the building. A 10-year-old girl was then taken away, fatally injured. . . . A tearful Environmental Minister, Ms Analisa Osorio, emerged in the early hours of Friday, announcing the end of an era. 'He's under arrest,' she said. Chavez emerged, barely visible with all the bodyguards and junta soldiers jostling both to protect and arrest him. "The atmosphere turned ugly. . . . "The media kept repeating footage of the swearing-in ceremony of the interim president [Pedro Carmona] which was followed by images of empty streets, everything in perfect tranquillity. We were about to book a ticket to Panama when a well-dressed passer-by told us to get off the streets. 'The Chavistas are coming' he said. It was Saturday afternoon. . . . Reports came in from around the country, barracks by barracks, like a Eurovision song contest jury, that the military was rebelling against the coup. . . . Then came the news that Chavez had been freed and was taking a helicopter to Miraflores. The crowds went wild. . . . "Then he was there, striding toward the palace, mobbed by supporters. It was like a dream, it's still hard to believe it really happened."

Posted April 19, 2002

DRCNet Interview: Jeremy Bigwood on Colombia's Borders
[Editor's Note: Bigwood has done extensive research on chemical herbicides, including mycoherbicides in the context of coca eradication programs. DRCNet spoke with Bigwood about the meeting between Colombia, Ecuador and the United States, to establish a "buffer zone" along the Colombia-Ecuador border and about instability on Colombia's eastern border with Venezuela.]

There is a dispute over the width of the buffer zone -- Ecuador wants a 10 kilometer buffer, but Colombia offered three. . . . The Ecuadorians are concerned about fish, soil toxicity, and damage to insect life. Many rivers from Colombia flow into Ecuador, so they're mainly worried about water toxicity. They're also concerned about contaminants from sprayed areas near the border leaching into the ground water. The government of Ecuador really believes that its future depends on the country's biodiversity. . . . [The U.S.] agreed there was toxicity to aquatic life. They can't argue with the scientific evidence that shows some danger to the environment. . . . There is turmoil in another country bordering Colombia. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez last weekend was first ousted by a military coup with civilian support, then returned to power two days later by a counter-coup with civilian support. . . . What happens in Venezuela is very important for Colombia. Venezuela is right next door. Chavez does not favor Plan Colombia or the Colombian government, and both the Colombian and the US governments were very pleased when it looked like the coup would succeed. . . . what happened in Venezuela was very similar to the coup in Chile in 1973 -- except this time it didn't work. The US government was doing exactly the same thing: blaming Chavez as they blamed Allende for bringing it on themselves, but now we see these prior contacts at the [U.S.] Embassy. . . . the American cronies that the US was going to put in were so bad, so corrupt, that even the anti-Chavez people thought they would be as bad or worse . . . It's clear that the US was behind this or helping it.

Posted April 18, 2002

(from Fraser Clark’s UPGRADEmag, April 17, 2002)

venezuela
DID A FEW HUNDRED CYBER ARTIVISTS SAVE CHAVES?!
"That fuggin freedom genie is right out of the bag now" complained Shootem V. First, a US GOVT MILITARY ADVISER. "These info liberationist zippies and their psycho shamanarchist bed partners fuggin announce the coming coup to the world before we can even get the coup organised and the first half billion respect money into peoples' hands. We're having to work without cover!"
"We're losing the information war" admitted Lyiff Ucaine, a presidential self destruction adviser to the crime/religion & marketing investigation inter agency thru put who put you put i never met the woman in my life his lawyer claimed.
"When the fuggin Venezuelan pre-consumer peasant class started revolting against our planned democracy correction we ordinarily would've just mowed down a few thousand, announced a media blackout, put out the good news about the roses, and then opened again for bizness after the blood dried - on the new deal in town.
"But not now, not when a few thousand people all over the fuggin world ALREADY KNOW WHAT YOUR PEOPLE ARE UP TO. WE JUST CAN'T TAKE THAT CHANCE, SOME OF MY OFFICERS ACTUALLY SAID THAT TO ME FER CHRISSAKE!!
"First George gets pulled off Iraq by, well, Real Life I suppose, and now the Chaves Back Delete. That's three New World Order My Asses in South America just when we were wiping out the Colombians like mosquitoes.
"But there's always a new poker game down the road. It's like irony" claimed the American war therapist. The government could lose the entire information war but still win the ... 'confidence' war, belief brand identity, using ... ultra-info(so called "choice" of alternative life realities, in a mugwumposerviceopcenter near u - ed]

Asked what chance he gave the "dinosaur administration" of evolving a trump card to Open Shared Free Info in the info war, the harassed security bureaucrat refused to speculate. The accused's lawyer meanwhile was spouting alternative realties nine tenths to the dozen. Who r YOU going to tune in to?
fraser.

* EDITOR’S NOTE: The UPGRADEmag (the Upgrade Emag, or just the “UP”) is a global edutainment news round-up, ‘broadcast’ weekly to =[10,357]= Trance// New Age// Alternative// Activist// Zippy folks who have been recommended to the Parallel YOUniversity//Megatripolis Dance Dept as “showing signs of life”. Since many recipients choose to forward it to their own lists, we estimate 27,000+ recipients. Further, because of its less ‘specialist’ content, it’s increasingly being posted on a variety of sites worldwide, making a total weekly ‘readership’ of 275,000+.

Parallel YOUniversity, Box 833, London NW6, UK

Posted April 17, 2002

U.S. Met With Leader Of Plot Against Chávez
(Christopher Marquis, New York Times, April 17, 2002)
[Editor's Note from pesco: watch out for the usual lies, but there's some good stuff here]

The Bush administration, under criticism for its role in the ouster of President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, acknowledged today that a senior administration official was in contact with Mr. Chávez's successor on the very day he took over. . . . Mr. Reich's advice to Mr. Carmona on the very day that military officers took Mr. Chávez into custody at an army base suggests an early and urgent administration interest in seeing Mr. Carmona succeed and maintain the appearance of democratic continuity. [Editor's Note: Reich is a Cuban exile and is assistant secretary for Western Hemisphere affairs] . . . Administration officials notified members of Congress on Friday that Mr. Chávez had resigned. The report was erroneous, and he insists that he never relinquished his office. The United States did not condemn the action against Mr. Chávez, a democratically elected leader, until Saturday evening after angry protesters forced Mr. Carmona to resign. . . . Mr. Carmona, who heads Venezuela's largest business association, was one of numerous critics of Mr. Chavez to call on administration officials in recent weeks. Officials from the White House, State Department and Pentagon, among others, were hosts to a stream of Chávez opponents, some of them seeking help in removing him from office. . . . On Capitol Hill, Democrats voiced concern that the administration meetings with anti-Chávez leaders might undercut Washington's credibility as the region's main advocate for democracy. . . . Mr. Reich said the administration had received reports that "foreign paramilitary forces" - suspected to be Cubans - were involved in the bloody suppression of anti-Chávez demonstrators, in which at least 14 people were killed, a Congressional official said today. . . . Mr. Reich, who declined to be interviewed today, offered no evidence for his assertion, the official said.

After the Counter-Coup in Venwzeula
(Geov Parrish, WorkingForChange.com, April 15, 2002)
The chasm between Venezuela's poor masses and its oligarchs -- in particular, the rich, the generals and the oil companies -- is not going away any time soon. . . . once again the version of events being fed the American public is suspiciously at odds with what the rest of the world knows. . . . if firing on an unarmed crowd is grounds for overthrowing a government, how do we explain U.S. support of Israel, which of late has been firing into Palestinian crowds more or less hourly? . . . the fatal shots came from the snipers, and that most of the dead on Thursday were actually Chavez supporters. . . . That would suggest the whole incident was staged to justify a coup. . . . Among Chavez' worst "sins" of late were instituting land reform and messing with the management of Venezuela's state-run oil company, PDVSA. He had already pissed off Washington not just by his cozying up to various people on the U.S. shit list (Castro, Qaddafi, Saddam, Colombia's FARC rebels), or by opposing free trade, but by managing to get all of OPEC to agree to uniform pricing for the first time in years . . . the significance of the crowds that refused to accept a business-backed military coup cannot be overstated. . . . What was potentially in store for Venezuela was the sort of U.S.-backed terror that plagued the continent through the Cold War; huge crowds of people would have none of it. . . . It is these crowds, and their brethren in Africa and Asia -- not the privileged protesters in Seattle or Quebec or Genoa -- who are leading the global charge against corporate globalization, and who are explicitly linking their issues to democracy and self-determination. As goes Venezuela, so goes much of the world.

Posted April 16, 2002

Online Journalism's Finest Hour - Exposed and Reversed a Coup
(Al Giordano, The Narco News Bulletin, April 15, 2002)
[Editor's Note: The full text of this article provides a detailed analysis of events leading up to the CIA's failed coup attempt in Venezuela and the misrepresentation of these events by mainstream media.]
AP, Reuters, the New York Times, and CNN, the worst offenders in the English-language media among many others, have had to radically adjust their coverage of the events in Venezuela precisely because online journalists worked overtime in recent days to break the information blockade and get the true facts to the international public. . . . the rapid response of independent online journalism - forced the mass media to eat its own dishonest words. . . . Let the banquet begin. . . . The big lie, orchestrated and sung in harmony by the mainstream media, was floated by Forero of the NY Times on March 19th: That Chávez's "autocratic style and left-wing policies have alienated a growing number of people." . . . And what of the other vested interests of the Five TV chains, the national dailies, the Catholic Church, the military brass and the Chamber of Commerce and Industry who mixed themselves up into a Molotov cocktail of a coup? What of the role of the United States? These questions were never asked by the commercial media, much less answered. . . . "Months ago, we warned that the U.S. government had put a plan in march to topple Venezuela's president Hugo Chávez. Working with agents of the CIA and with members of the military group that the Pentagon maintains in Caracas to supervise U.S. arms sales in the region, the strategies from the Potomac joined forces with the opponents of the president. Bankers, businessmen and politicians donated funds to creat the marches and protest that detonated the crisis. Money from the opposition served to influence union elections and the control of the petroleum workers union, the most important in Venezuela…" . . . the CIA headquarters for organizing, distributing said cash, and engineering the attempted coup d'etat, was the office known as the MIL GROUP. . . . the U.S. participation in the failed coup attempt was not only financial, but military. . . . National Security Agency (NSA) supported the coup using personnel attached to the US Southern Command's Joint Interagency Task Force East (JIATF-E) in Key West, Florida . . . CIA and US contract military personnel, ostensibly used for counter-narcotics operations, stood by to provide logistics support for the leading members of the coup. . . . the effort by US tax dollars to prop up Carlos Ortega as head of the oil union was intended, long ago, to provide a "working class" gloss for the Revolt of the Spoiled Brats. The oligarchy could not stand the fact that, for the first time, Venezuela had become a true democracy for the majority of its people who elected Chavez. Nor could it handle the reality that it was now seen by the Venezuelan majority for what it was: an oligarchy. . . . Among the factors that, in retrospect, caused news consumers from throughout the world to turn toward online news sources was that the official reports by Forero, AP, Reuters, CNN and others had become so obviously one-sided. . . . This is not a story about "new technology," but, rather, about people, human beings, journalists, authentic journalists...

Posted April 15, 2002

(The following came in an email from pescao, who is on the scene. The email was dated
Mon, Apr 15 03:56:42 2002)

the scenes outside Miraflores last night were just breathtaking. watching live on TV (the lefties had taken over and were broadcasting again) i could only imagine the joy these people must be feeling in their hearts. Hugo Returns! thousands and hundreds of thousands, more people than i have ever seen, all embracing, singing, dancing, crying, loving each other as the man, their boy, helicopters back from the Orchila military island to his number 10 downing st, this soldier-turned-peacemaker, their hero of the millennium! then a coupla hours of live chat with the country, sipping an espresso and describing with the tantalising detail how, in his cell in fort tiuna, a guard came up to him and whispered, "el presidente, here is a pen and paper. write what the world must know about" and, patting his pocket and looking up at his friends and allies who immediately produced (at least six) copies of the by now legendary fax that had been received by the state-owned TV channel, he read it out word for word, including the crucial line "I have not resigned the legitimate powers given to me by the people." so the IMF/CIA coup failed, Venezuelan's keep their precious and fragile democracy, and Hugo's bigger than ever
[Full Text of pescao's report]

Real player on-the-scene account of events from NPR

The CIA And The Venezuela Coup
(William Blum, Counterpunch, April 14, 2002)
How do we know that the CIA was behind the coup that overthrew Hugo Chavez?
Same way we know that the sun will rise tomorrow morning. That's what it's always done and there's no reason to think that tomorrow morning will be any different. . . . Consider Chavez's crimes: Branding the US attacks on Afghanistan as "fighting terrorism with terrorism", he demanded an end to "the slaughter of innocents"; holding up photographs of children killed in the American bombing attacks, he said their deaths had "no justification, just as the attacks in New York did not, either." In response, the Bush administration temporarily withdrew its ambassador. . . . And more in the same vein which the Washington aristocracy is unaccustomed to encountering from the servant class. . . . The United States has endeavored to topple numerous governments for a whole lot less. . . . Overthrowing a man such as Hugo Chavez, guilty of such transgressions, was a duty so "natural" for the CIA that the only reason it might not have been intimately involved in the operation would be that the Agency had been secretly disbanded.

Venezuela's Chavez Regains Power
(The Guardian, April 14, 2002)
What began as an internal power struggle at PDVSA snowballed into popular rebellion by the opposition, triggering a national general strike, a massive demonstration that ended in bloodshed and Chavez's brief ouster. . . . The Bush administration, showed no remorse when the Venezuelan military ousted the country's elected president last week . . . In a dizzying sequence of events, Chavez was ousted by his military high command, which claimed he had resigned under pressure after gunmen opened fire on opposition protesters. . . . Interim President Pedro Carmona was sworn in Friday, only to resign a day later amid widespread street protests and rebellions by several military officers who refused to go along with the plan. . . . Never before in modern times has an elected president been overthrown by military commanders, his successor inaugurated, and then the ousted leader returned to power on the wings of a popular uprising. . . . ``It's marvelous, because the Venezuelan people responded to this illegal coup attempt.''

Posted April 13, 2002

sorry not to have written - everything seems quiet here (i hope it stays like that) even tho Chávez hasn't bin seen by the press for a few days now. his supposedly live broadcast on thursday looks more and more like a fake. something weird's going on... if he's already dead there will be real trubble i fear. hopefully i'm wrong.have u read this yet? it is by far the best account i have read. Coup in Venezuela: An Eyewitness Account

Interim head of Venezuela named after Chavez resignation
(CNN.com, April 12, 2002)
The head of Venezuela's largest business association was named leader of an interim government Friday, following the resignation of Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez. . . . The new leader, Pedro Carmona Estanga, is the president of the Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry. . . . Chavez has been detained at the army's general headquarters in Caracas, the nation's capital. . . . Carmona announced an immediate end to the strike, which had sharply cut oil production. . . . The resignations mentioned in the statement left the path open for the army to name a new government. . . . Chavez, 47, took office in 1999 after a sweeping election victory in December 1998. . . . Chavez enjoys wide support from Venezuela's poor, many of whom believe Chavez has addressed issues facing them.

Posted April 11, 2002

a beautiful Venezuelan day turns ugly

(The following came in an email from pescao, who is on the scene. The email was dated
Thu, 11 Apr 2002 22:50:51 -0400)

27 shot dead, 150 wounded. no, not Palestine, this is Venezuela. today in Caracas, on the third day of a national general strike, a massive rally against president Hugo Chávez manifested itself near the central government buildings of Miraflores. although organisers' claim of a million seem far-fetched, and many of the 'weekend-warriors' had gone home by the time the shooting started, there were certainly hundreds of thousands gathered on the streets. made up of mainly white-collar workers and trade-unionists (the majority from PDVSA, the state-owned oil titan whose directors Chávez recently fired), along with assorted characters young and old from the relatively large and sophisticated middle-class, this escalation of an ongoing campaign against Chávez had been planned for yesterday but had been delayed due to heavy rain. protesters marched all morning through the streets to the towers of the PDVSA headquarters, the scene of previous demonstrations, where it was announced that it was time to take their demonstration to Miraflores. waiting there for them were a sizeable number of Chavistas (the tv said five thousand, but from their own live footage it was clearly more than that.) between these two groups who have clashed violently before was a thin green line of nervous-looking national guard (kinda soldier-cops.)

at 4.12pm, after an exchange of stones and teargas between the national guard and some anti-Chávez protesters, presidential guards, snipers dressed in black on rooftops, and some of the Chávista protesters reportedly opened fire at the larger crowd. panic and more violence broke out. the government had ordered a cadena, which meant all national tv and radio had to broadcast only state feed, which at this point was a speech by Chávez supposedly live from inside the buildings (a few hours later it is rumoured that the speech was pre-recorded.) all the stations were breaking this decree by broadcasting live footage of the chaos outside, either instead of his speech, or side-by-side in a split screen with rolling text underneath explaining why they were doing this. by just after 5pm all national stations had been taken off the air, the first time this contentious constitutional power has been used.

high officials in the army, navy and airforce are saying they no longer recognise the government. tanks sent out to protect Chávez were ordered back. the UN are nowhere to be seen (but reassuringly and un-coup-like the sky has been completely helicopter-free all day), and neither are the international media. above the violence of the city it's been a beautiful, fresh day, with whispers of white clouds hanging on the tops of the avilla (the mountainous national park that separates Caracas from the Caribbean), and as dusk comes and goes the street-protests have dissolved and the civilians are cooling down. but with a split military and the president missing (the latest rumour is that he's been arrested and his justice minister has fled to Chile) it doesn't look like this is over yet.

Posted April 10, 2002

Venezuela Begins to Unravel - coup d'etat planned to steal Venezuelan oil
(pescao, DemocraticUnderground.com, April 10,2002, 7:10 p.m. Eastern Time)
[Venezuelan] TV says the lefty president Chávez has got to go, and so he's got to go. or stay. hence yesterday and today's general strike, last night's full-on street demos (for and against) . . . the IMF, for example, have much to gain from this ex-soldier's departure. to them, Chávez' recent doubling of the tax US corporations pay on Venezuelan oil was a declaration of war. . . . a few hours ago top military dissenters made it clear they were demanding Chávez' resignation, and they weren't taking no for an answer. Chávez has made it clear many times that he's not gonna go without a fight . . . if the IMF get their way and Chávez is replaced by a more 'business-friendly' president, get prepared for another Argentina. PDVSA would be the biggest prize of all for the Wall Street boys, if they could privatise (own) it, all their power nightmares would be over, at least for the next coupla years. . . . this feels very much like the end-game. the man himself was going to Costa Rica today for a regional conference, but i imagine he'll stay in Caracas. key allies have been warned to go into safe-houses to avoid being taken hostage. and, uh-oh, now the sun's coming out..