Misión Verdad
Opponents show a shotgun they snatched from police during a demonstration in Caracas, May 3, 2017 (Photo: Carlos García Rawlins / Reuters)
With the beginning of 2023 also came the warning that the country could experience an escalation of demonstrations with the potential to evolve into a scenario of pressure and conflict over the Bolivarian Government via union agendas.
Such scenario was announced by the Wilson Center report analyzed in depth through this rostrum, when in January protest points began to be formed by sectors of the national teaching profession regarding the salary issue and the economic conditions of the country in general, together with other groups and “civil society” actors, including NGOs, trade unions and related organizations.
In what it describes as a roadmap for reassembling the U.S. strategy on Venezuela, the Wilson Center admits that there must be a combination of “pressure and concessions”, in the understanding that the latter implies sitting down with the Venezuelan government to negotiate conditions for a “transition”, a favorite political adage of a certain opposition sector identified with the actions and rhetoric for a “regime change”.
The pressure, in this case, and according to the track record of recent years, is associated with street mobilization under an organized violent aegis (as in 2014 and 2017) accompanied by foreign measures in the economic, financial and commercial fields. It is already a classic move in the US hybrid warfare strategy manual.
Although the events of January and part of February did not escalate to a national destabilizing situation, pressure mechanisms were being developed which, with undisclosed objectives and purposes, and although incipient and still somewhat disintegrated in the street, cannot be discarded as elements in terms of conflict.
A similar scenario was announced by President Nicolás Maduro in consecutive days, in which he has warned of “a plan” again “to lead us to violence, to the time of intolerance, of confrontation, of useless conflict, of division among Venezuelans and we will not allow it”, through his program Con Maduro+ on Monday, July 3 and in an act of promotion of generals, admirals and military personnel of the Bolivarian National Armed Forces (FANB) on Tuesday, July 4.
While it is true that the three main think tanks (Atlantic Council, Center for Strategic and International Studies and Wilson Center) that focus on Venezuela and have ascendancy in White House decision admit the failure of the “maximum pressure” campaign launched during Donald Trump’s administration, all agree that a line of pressure on the Venezuelan government must be maintained, perhaps in order to refloat US interests whenever these are violated when the political situation reaches a stalemate. As is currently the case, and has been for months.
Taking into consideration the recommendations of the aforementioned think tanks, the scenario that the President has denounced could be led -again- by the United States.
CIVIL SOCIETY” AS AN OPPORTUNITY
In September 2022, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) presented a report detailing its plan for “support to the democratic transition” in Venezuela.It refers to “three areas to promote opposition unity and press for improved electoral conditions”, assuring support to the “interim government” (which collapsed last January), but also stating that it would support the initiative of primary elections for the subsequent participation of the opposition in the 2024 presidential elections.
In this way, USAID openly admitted that it would support the formation of an anti-Chavismo candidate to run in elections that it describes as “not free” and expressed its intention to finance media and NGOs, in the name of “civil society”.But non-governmental organizations also serve as vehicles for the manufacture and organization of a critical mass for the conflictive scenarios that have been insinuated since last January. All this under the assumption that the classic political parties have lost ascendancy in the population and do not function as assets of convocation and clash against state institutions.
Since last year, the NGO movement has been growing in terms of calls and dissemination.Both the U.S. government and the European Union have been directly involved in street actions, festivals and cultural demonstrations led by NGOs, in a sort of connivance and coexistence of interests crossed by trade union agendas.
With NGOs, any conflict agenda has a support that translates into the support of operators in the field, the media accompaniment of the perpetrators and the constant feeding of the criminalizing dossier against the state. Its “non-governmental” character places it in opposition to official institutions, but it is also a distinctive feature as a recipient of foreign funding. In fact, earlier this year, Mision Verdad reported and analyzed the fact that the United States approved the largest amount of financial funds for NGOs in Venezuela, using these entities as a screen behind which its interventionism operates.
In short, “civil society” as a political and investment opportunity.
BREEDING GROUND
The Venezuelan economy reported ups and downs again in the first semester of 2023, a scenario that could be politically exploited to manage social discontent. The material bases for a new scenario of conflict would be laid.The blockade continues to be the conditioning axis of the current state of the economy, with difficulties to receive financing from foreign capitals and to carry out fundamental imports to the national industrial park. The United States continues to have the upper hand in this sector; therefore, the dialogue and negotiation table in Mexico was of utmost importance for the purpose of increasing the volume of cash for social and purely economic purposes.
The White House, thus, reinforces the discomfort and discontent with the decision of not having complied with the second partial agreement signed at the end of 2022 between the government and the United Democratic Platform and instrumentalizes it to strengthen the challenging conditions in the economic section.
The infrastructure problems in the public services, in the salary issue and regarding the supply of gasoline and diesel throughout the country are intimately associated to the breach of the agreements negotiated at the end of last year, which after all is related to the application (and overcompliance) of the coercive measures emanating from the US capital.
These are 3.2 billion that were planned to be spent in different areas of the national life, when the priority is to attend to the most determining social and economic impacts on the Venezuelan population as a consequence of the expansive and generalized use of the illegal “sanctions”: economic and salary limitations, difficulties in the access to food, reduction in the availability of vaccines and other supplies in public health centers, as well as failures in the educational, hospital and electric infrastructures.
The president of the National Assembly and head of the governmental delegation for the dialogue in Mexico, Deputy Jorge Rodriguez, commented last June that more than one billion dollars would have been destined to the National Electric System, in addition to other projects related to the list of consequences listed in the previous paragraph.
The United States does not relinquish of the reins of the blockade and the opposition that represents it is subordinated to the needs and interests of the foreigner, among them to continue feeding the unrest in Venezuela. The scenario denounced by President Maduro has a direct link with the conditions imposed, a breeding ground for a possible escalation.
THE INTERNATIONAL ARENA
With the deployment of tours, trips and agreements signed by President Nicolás Maduro and the main Venezuelan officials in Eurasia, Africa and Latin America, a new moment of relevance for our country in the international concert is confirmed.
Venezuela’s role in the world dynamics is elevated by its crucial role within the energy equation, as an OPEC member and a major player in the Western Hemisphere. The Treasury Department’s issuance of licenses to the Venezuelan oil industry has a direct impact on Venezuela’s position to stabilize the oil market on this side of the world.
But, at the same time, the measures taken by the Euro-Atlantic axis as a reaction to the war in Ukraine to limit the scope of Russian energy in the Western markets has resulted in a revival of Venezuela’s international role, which President Maduro has been able to take advantage of, thus raising the stakes and contributing to the stabilization of the market without the need for a framework of dialogue and negotiation between the parties, swelling the coffers of the state, in the absence of the fulfillment of the agreements signed in Mexico.
The fact that the profile of President Maduro, and Venezuela in general, is growing in the international arena should not be an element that particularly pleases the political decision makers in the White House, so a new agenda of conflict would be ideal for the country to enter into a destabilization dynamic that would put the brakes on the Venezuelan ascendancy abroad.
An escalation of pressures and conflicts on the ground would undoubtedly place the focus on the internal situation, at a favorable moment for the government due to its presence in forums, meetings and high-level summits in different parts of the world.
Although President Maduro’s actions on the global stage were determined in order to overcome the difficulties of the blockade, a sector of the American establishment seeks ways to reinforce the mandate of “sanctions” and revive the “maximum pressure” campaign carried out by the Donald Trump administration.
A litter of Republican Party senators introduced a bill last March, led by Idaho representative Jim Risch, called Venezuelan Democracy Act, with which it is intended to condition the parameters to manage the architecture of “sanctions” towards a context of greater pressure and imposition of an unfavorable situation for the country, against the grain of the current dynamics of the White House around the issuance of licenses in the energy field.
An escalation towards a conflict in the streets of Venezuela could be explained by all these variables that restrict the possibility of a national scenario of stability and development. The game remains deadlocked with the United States and the opposition, opening a channel for another possible scenario of political violence, denounced consecutively by the President.
Translation by Internationalist 360°
INTERNATIONALIST 360° 