Venezuela
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I stand to be corrected but has the US ever actually recognized an opposition as the official government as they have now done.
They did it in 1960 when they created a provisional government in Miami headed by Cubans and Jose Miro Cardona, and before the invasion of Bahia de Cochinos. The CIA trained guerrillas in Guatemala
Madura given an ultimatum by Europe. Hold election within 8 days. Or else.
However, one would wonder why other countries ruled by despots have never been issued with such demands before and why Venezuela has been singled out.
If they do that with Venezuela they must do it in the usa , Argentina and Brasil and many others countries in Latin America. The USA thru electoral frauds placed Joaquin Balaguer three times in power and several others usurpers Donald trump is also an usurper who wasn’t elected by the majority he won thru a vestige of the system of slavery and voters suppressions . If we start to hit the walls many roaches are going to come out. The can fool the peoples who don’t know the history of Latin America or those who have spent their whole life reading comics books
The Bank of England stopped Venezuela from taking back its gold, a refusal long before the present crisis over president recognition.
On 5 November, the London headquartered Reuters news agency reported that the Venezuelan state, fearing sanctions, is attempting to repatriate 14 tonnes of gold from the Bank of England in London, but that this gold withdrawal and transport operation has not yet been actioned
Venezuela has been selling its sizeable gold reserves, built up under Hugo Chavez, to try to address the economic crisis plaguing the country. In 2018 it sold about 26 tons, worth close to $900 million, to Turkey. In the past four years, Venezuela’s gold reserves have decreased to about 175 tons from about 400 tons
Pompeo appoints Elliot Abrams as US Special Envoy on Venezuela.
Who is he?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliott_Abrams
He is the US coup orchestrator,
The Observer said that Abrams had advance knowledge of, and “gave a nod to,” the Venezuelan coup attempt of 2002 against Hugo Chávez.
He has experience with the Nicaraguan Contras and the Iran-Contra conspiracy
Amnesty International accused him of covering up atrocities committed by the military forces of U.S.-backed governments, such as those in El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala, and the rebel Contras in Nicaragua.
And the USA wants to hold the funds from the Venezuela oil and transfer it to the new parallel government and take over Gitco.
When others capitalist government nationalize the assets of others capitalists the Western power raise hell, but in this case, they are allowed to take all the assets of Venezuela,
The USA made the life impossible to Mexico when Cardenas nationalized the Mexican oil and all the European and USA assets
The USA wants Cuba to pay for all the US assets that were taken during the revolution, but Haiti continue paying to France for reparation when they were the ones who stole billions of dollars from Haiti
All that money is going to be stolen by the USA, as they did with the money from Libya and Iraq, they are professional thieves.
Richard Wolff asked a good question: How is possible that millions of peoples still believe and support an economic system which does not benefit anyone of them?
Once again, Marcos, where is the legality under international law? For yet another time, the UN and the Security Council, are things to be by-passed. As always Might is Right.
However, our bigger problem is that too many “progressives” view anti-Americanism as the same as anti-capitalism. It is the lingering ideology of anti-imperialism which prevails on the Left and, of course, our position of a plague on both Trump and Maduro is seen as being apologist and is unpopular in liberal circles. We won’t be able to throw off such accusations so we will suffer the slings and arrows of left-wing criticism.
‘ We won’t be able to throw off such accusations so we will suffer the slings and arrows of left-wing criticism.’
If we didn’t suffer left-wing criticisms then we wouldn’t be doing our job and the Party would have no point to it.
Elliot Abrams is a Zionist and a convicted felon pardoned by George bush. He was part of the deal made with Pablo Escobar in Colombia and the Nicaragua contras
The book known as the dark alliance written by Gary webs mentions all those felons including Collin Powell Oliver north negroponte and others gangsters.
Those are the type of people who are going to give lectures on morality and democracy to the Venezuelans, the same old mobsters hired by Ronald Reagan and George bush
Your point is well taken Wez, but isn’t the real issue that in all my political life, ever since the Vietnam war, it has been the very same problem we have encountered. We have not succeeded in presenting the alternative interpretations, either to the left or the right.
If I can broaden the argument to encompass the IS/SWP slogan formulated in the 1950s Korean War, Neither Washington nor Moscow. Are we going to hear a similar slogan Neither Washington nor Caracas? I very much doubt it. It is denigrated as “third-campism”
Other than doing what we always do, is there another strategy we can employ to counter the polarization of views and emphasise the socialist position of plague on both houses?
China and Russia
China is believed to have invested around $70 billion, in the form of loans as well as social projects and maintenance of the country’s oil production infrastructure. Most of those loans are set to be paid back to China in the form of Venezuelan oil. In addition, China and Venezuela have formed several joint ventures involving the production of automobiles, mobile phones and computers, among other goods. These investments and connections make China by far Maduro’s largest creditor.
“If Venezuela collapses …, China faces a large risk of diplomatic and financial blowback. Opposition politicians are well aware that China propped up … Maduro rule. A new Venezuelan government could well refuse to honor the Maduro-era obligations entirely and look to Washington for support instead.”
Russia is believed to have lent and invested around $17 billion in Venezuela over the past 20 years, significantly less than China. However, Russia — through state-run companies such as Rosneft — has gained significant ownership stakes in at least five major Venezuelan oil fields along with several decades worth of the future outputs of Venezuelan-held natural gas fields in the Caribbean. In addition, and most significantly from the U.S. perspective, in 2017 Venezuela offered 49.9 percent of Citgo — its wholly owned U.S. subsidiary — along with three Gulf Coast refineries and its pipeline network as collateral to Rosneft for $1.5 billion.
Rosneft’s interests in Venezuela are so great that its executive chairman, Igor Sechin, stated in 2017 that “we will never leave and no one will be able to kick us out of there.” Yet, as Leonid Bershidsky recently wrote in Bloomberg, “If Maduro falls and a U.S.-backed government takes his place, it’s highly likely that the Russian projects will be suspended and Venezuela’s debts won’t be repaid.”A new U.S.-backed government in Venezuela endangers the billions of dollars in loans that Maduro’s government owes to both countries. Russia and China are aware that their interests in the country are under threat as a direct result of this U.S. push. This greatly increases the likelihood that any escalation from Washington will trigger strong responses from both countries and could quickly devolve into a tit-for-tat that could eventually develop into a major military conflict. Russia and China are unlikely to stand idly by as the U.S. installs a government that could undo their years of investment in the country and refuse to pay back billions in loans. Indeed, Russia has already sent military contractors (mercenaries) into Venezuela.
An attempt at regime change may mean a proxy civil war as in Syria.
We won’t be able to throw off such accusations so we will suffer the slings and arrows of left-wing criticism.
Alan, we have been combating the left for many years
I don’ think China and Russia are going let the USA steal their money and the natural resources that they have available in Venezuela. They have two minerals which are lithium and coltan which China and Russia need badly for their communication industry, aircraft, car industries, and medicine. Russia already has sent several military contractors to protect Maduro, and several weeks ago they sent two long-range bombers to Venezuela. Both empires can do the same thing like in Siria
Alan, you write: “in all my political life, ever since the Vietnam war, it has been the very same problem we have encountered. We have not succeeded in presenting the alternative interpretations, either to the left or the right.(…) Other than doing what we always do, is there another strategy we can employ to counter the polarization of views and emphasise the socialist position of plague on both houses?
We are not alone about this. In fact it was one of the things discussed at the meeting between the ACF and the CWO in Dorking yesterday (see Events section). Suggested reasons as to why people feel compelled to take sides were: learning to do this in school on any issue, sympathy for the underdog, as well as “anti-imperialism” and nationalism when “your” state is involved. No alternative was suggested other that doing what we/they always do: stating the view, through leaflets, posters, meetings, and nowadays social media, that no working class interest is involved justifying the working class taking sides or joining in any war and why.
“Stop the War”, i.e stop the killing and destruction, is not such a bad slogan as such, except that it has been hijacked by those who want the other side to win (though during the Vietnam War these elements were more honest, advancing the slogan “Victory to the Vietcong”). “No War But the Class War” is much better, though harder to get across as it’s not immediately clear outside the so-called “milieu” what is meant by “class war”. “Against All War” (which we have occasionally used) avoids this but suggests pacifism (which at least is right about workers not joining in, if for the wrong reason)..
I also referred to the Right-wing who use the slogans “A Just War” and “humanitarian intervention” so we have to reach out to workers who fall for those concepts, as well.
I know it is not only ourselves that face this problem, after all, prevailing ideas in society are invariably the ruling class’s until we have the effective means to combat them in the battle of ideas.
Maybe we could design a banner that we can hold up when these pro-war supporters stage their marches.
But even so, only a very tiny number actually go on these demonstrations except for the very notable exception of 2003 anti-Iraq invasion one. It was a new experience for me not to have to explain to people I knew or worked with that the war had an economic cause. The war for oil argument couldn’t be defeated by all the government and media pro-war propaganda. Oil was widely recognized as the reason for UK/US involvement. But memories are short.
I don’t think generally there exists an appetite for military action of any sort, any where. It is one reason the emotive appeals to poison gas and civilian atrocities are more and more resorted to in attempts to build up a war fever. So yes, all we can do is keep responding with reasoned explanations of why the working class have no interests in war and should never take sides and maintain the case that it is the capitalists who declare war but the workers who die in them. But even so, every time there is a war or threat of war, I have this deja vu sensation of being there before.
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