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Note: This column was submitted on
December 9, 2002 but has not been published to date due to a
misunderstanding.
Civil disobedience by all sectors throughout Venezuela escalates. Work
stoppage, ordered by Ortega, the overall union head, is almost total. Oil
production has been greatly reduced. Export of oil and metals down the
Orinoco River is almost nil. Gasoline supplies to the public is near zero.
On hand fuel supplies for generation of electric power will last from 14 to
30 days depending on the fuel. The dead and injured mount. President Chavez
does not intend to yield. Armageddon quickly approaches.
Carlos Ortega, head of the Venezuelan Confederation of Workers, instilled
with infinite patience and wisdom, fully aware that he is up against heavily
armed criminals, has worked quietly during the past two months garnishing
grass roots support for a total work stoppage. Most workers have been
ordered just to stay home and not participate in demonstrations. Ortega
intends to bring the nation to a total stop. Ortega intends to take the
nation’s dollar income to near nothing.
President Chavez and his government of thugs will not yield
power. As revolutions go, this one is for the books. The rebels, and I mean
real genuine rebels such as the Colombian Revolutionary Army, the Cuban
Revolutionary Council, and the Bolivarian Revolutionary Groups all side with
the established government! These groups are all heavily armed, licensed to
kill, and ordered to insure Chavez hangs on to power no matter what the
cost.
The Castro/Chavez/CNN team will join to create this new
drama. Facts will be warped alike the April 11, 2002 “Coup”. Unanimously,
the world press continues to press forward the absurd lie that the
Venezuelan Army deposed Chavez for two days. Chavez left his office with two
Army cohorts and hid out within a nearby military establishment. Cleverly,
Chavez gave the opposition 36 hours to carry on their charade, then crushed
them like cucarachas, without firing a shot.
Under Secretary of State for western hemisphere affairs, Otto
Reich together with his ambassador to Caracas, Charles Shapiro, both old
Latin American hands, have their hands tightly tied. This is not the moment,
politically, for the US to intervene in the internal affairs of a Latin
American country headed by a legitimately elected president.
The opposition is armed with but casseroles, pots and pans. The government
has proven on several occasions that they are able and very willing to take
innocent lives. In the latest event, thirty unarmed citizens were shot
December 6 in Caracas, fourteen of these women and girls. Fingered as the
assassins: members of the government’s task force. As the work stoppages
further burrow into Chavez’s control over the situation, Chavez will be
forced to declare his version of Martial Law. He will send his Army and his
goons out to enforce his orders. The opposition, well identified and unable
to gather arms on short notice, face a hopeless situation.
The armed forces have been circumcised from top to bottom. All flag officers
not considered “revolutionary” have been relieved of duty. Other officers
not pertaining to Chavez’s revolutionary ex-coup group, have been replaced.
In the past two years, the ranks have been filled with new recruits
indoctrinated by cadre imported from Cuba and are poised to defend Chavez.
The
Secretary General of the OAS, Cesar Gaviria, won first prize for lame duck
diplomacy when he declared during his recent visit to Caracas that he did
not dare face Chavez with the grim reality that his regime had to go because
he “couldn’t take Chavez’s violent bursts of outrage”. And now the OAS is
being prepped to become a pawn in Chavez’s game plan. With the backing of
Chavez’s new-found buddy, President Toledo of Peru, the OAS will be urged to
invoke Article 17 of their charter which provides for a member nation who
considers their “Legitimate exercise of power” at risk, to request
assistance. When the resolution is presented, members of the Forum of Sao
Paolo coalition will vote with Chavez. How many other nations follow them
will be a prime indicator for the future of Latin America. Should this
resolution pass, Cuban forces, those now inside Venezuela plus those poised
to fly in, will leap into the open.
Thousands of Cuban intelligence agents have had two years to pinpoint
members of the opposition. A pre-Bay of Pigs game plan is in place. Once the
word is given, most likely emanating in Havana, the opposition will be
rounded up, just like in Cuba during April, 1961, when thousands of
engineers, businessmen, doctors, professionals and all those uncommitted to
the Castro revolution were herded into city prisons and when these
overflowed, into city theatres and kept there until the 2300 invaders at
Playa Giron were overwhelmed by 250,000 Cuban troops.
In Venezuela the opposition, armed only with their
casseroles, will be brutally forced into their homes, or shot. Air travel
out of Venezuela will be left wide open. All those against Chavez will be
allowed to flee, though they will be forced to leave behind, alike the
millions of us who fled Cuba, all of their assets, belongings, treasured
mementos and pleasant memories..
Once the opposition is conquered, the country will be
restarted with help from the Forum of Sao Paolo. Cuban, Brazilian, Peruvian,
Ecuatorian and other leftist sympathizers will be invited to save the
nation. In due time, oil production will again resume. Those caught in the
middle, in opposition but unable or unwilling to leave, will become serfs.
Chavez will have total control. Fidel will have his fuel life-line
guaranteed for many years.
The Revolution will have met its goal. Another peoples become
slaves to an irrational master. Painfully, very painfully they will pay for
the sins inherited from those who had once badly governed their bountiful
and beautiful nation.
William Butler
Salazar is an engineer, author, and ocean navigator.
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