Armageddon rapidly approaches in Venezuela |
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By William Butler Salazar |
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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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