Gunboat Diplomacy
Some things never seem to change. Now that the US monopoly on the adjective “American” has seemingly become universally acknowledged (even in many parts of Latin America), it hardly comes as a surprise that US policy in Latin America has not changed for almost two centuries.
As we speak, a small US Navy flotilla is patrolling off the Venezuelan coast. So far it seems a classic case of gunboat diplomacy, a peculiar practice pioneered by the English (when Brittannia still ruled the waves), which was adopted by the US, Germany, France, Italy and The Netherlands and applied with varying success.
Today, we are fortunate enough to be witnessing in real time another case of gunboat diplomacy against Venezuela. Unlike Grenada (1983) and Panama (1989), where gunboat diplomacy morphed into a full-scale invasion, Venezuela is a tough nut to crack. Although some Americans might be able to identify Venezuela on the map, there are even fewer who have any notion of Venezuelan history and politics. Sure enough, relying on the mainstream media will not enlighten them. There might only be a handful of Americans with any knowledge of Venezuelan culture and what Venezuelans can be like, both individually and as a collective. It is doubtful whether any of the latter are to be found among Donald Trump’s advisers.
It should be clear that Venezuelans may be “Latin Americans,” but totally different from Nicaraguans, Salvadoreans or Guatemalans. Nor are they like Mexicans or Cubans, although their Spanish may sound the same as Cuban Spanish.
The last time that gunboat diplomacy yielded tangible results in Venezuela was back in 1908, when the Dutch navy intervened to bring to power Juan Vicente Gómez, then Vice-President, as President Cipriano Castro was leaving for Paris to get medical treatment for syphilis. Acting either as president himself or as a “Grey Eminence” ruling the country through puppets, Gómez remained in power until 1935. It was Gómez who returned the favor from the Dutch by granting extensive benefits to the Shell Oil Company, which at that time was still a Dutch-English firm. This gave Venezuela a place among the select group of the world’s major oil producers. In the early 1930s, Venezuela was the third biggest producer, after the US and the USSR. Thirty years later, in the 1960s, Venezuela was number two, soon to be surpassed by the upcoming Middle Eastern oil producing nations. Today, Venezuela ranks 21st.
Thus, given the fact that world oil production is currently higher than demand, the insistence with which Donald Trump is now trying to impose his will on Venezuela does not primarily appear to be about oil. The only thing is perhaps that many US refineries were built to process the heavy, almost tar-like Venezuelan crude, and that it is expensive and cumbersome to adapt such refineries to oil from other sources. During the past decades, Venezuela has not exactly been the kind of trading partner that Americans like to do business with.
Of course, officially the current US maneuver has ostensibly to do with drug trafficking. Again, this is a silly pretext, because if Venezuela plays any role at all in this field, it can only be a very modest one. Moreover, with Colombia being the world’s leading cocaine producer, boasting two thirds of all the world’s coca acreage (followed by Peru with one quarter and Bolivia with almost ten percent), Venezuela just cannot be considered a real player in this field.
Given the nature of the drug trafficking business, the risks connected with it, but above all the enormous financial and political interests involved, it is risky to make any far reaching statements. However, over the years there have been so many indications and pieces of secondary evidence that it is safe to say that American spy agencies, especially the CIA, play a key role in the entire industry. It is the CIA that oversees and coordinates the production of the raw materials, organizes the drug production process, and the transport of the merchandise to the main markets in North America, Europe and elsewhere. The DEA also plays a key role fighting against drug trafficking, which helps to eliminate unwanted competitors and in the end helps to keep prices sufficiently high for the interested parties to make great profits, all tax-free! Given this interaction, it is safe to say that it is eventually the US deep state that is in charge of the world’s drug trafficking.
Against this background, the charges against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro are as outrageous as they are imaginary and unfounded. As a matter of fact, the US is trying to pull the same trick against Maduro as they did in 1989 against Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega, taken to Miami to be tried for drug trafficking and now rotting in a US jail.
However, it will probably not be as easy to arrest Maduro, because an invasion of Venezuela by US troops seems out of the question for the simple reason that Venezuela is not Panama, which for the US had the advantage of housing some important US military bases (in the Panama Canal Zone). The nearest base to Venezuela that the US could use are the islands of Curacao, Aruba and Bonaire, all three part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Although the Netherlands is a US vassal state and loyal member of NATO, for all sorts of practical and political reasons, it does not seem so easy to establish a US operational base there at short notice.
Other obstacles for a smooth replay of the Panamanian operation are Venezuela’s geography and the size, morale and combat readiness of its armed forces. Whereas Panama (created in 1903 as a result of a US intervention against Colombia of which it was originally a province) is somewhat of a failed state, Venezuela is the heir of the venerable Bolivarian tradition and Venezuelans are a proud and fiercely independent people.
Although Trump’s advisers and perhaps he himself may believe that Maduro is a contemporary version of Noriega, or a Latin American version of Saddam Hussein and that the Venezuelan army will collapse as soon as the Americans show up, they are mistaken. Any US armed intervention in Venezuela is likely to encounter stiff resistance.
Anyone who has ever been to Venezuela and spent some time among Venezuelans will understand they are no pushovers. Take Caracas night life, for instance. Once, when having a drink with a professor from Central University, I was surprised to find out he would always carry an automatic pistol in his belt, something no American or European colleague would ever think of. In Caracas, however, most men in bars would be similarly equipped. And don’t think such weapons are never used. They can be drawn whenever the owner feels he is threatened or insulted.
A high-ranking European diplomat once told me that Venezuelans were tough negotiators, remarking that knives were, so to speak, always on the table, instead of underneath it, as in many other Latin American nations.
In other words, the Venezuelan mentality is proud, tough and combative, and Venezuelans will stand their ground, as they have always done since becoming America’s third independent nation, after the US and Haiti. What’s more, unlike the US, the Venezuelans gained their independence without European support.
Of course, it remains entirely unpredictable how the present standoff will end, and it is always possible that Maduro backs out and tries to placate the tough guy in the White House.
Nevertheless, President Trump better watch out.