Oil as a Weapon

It's no secret that Hugo Chavez and fidel castro are using each other and their countries' resources to spread the plague of communism and totaliatariasm across Latin America. In this weekend's Sun-Sentinel, Argentinian political analyst and AIPE (Interamerican Economic Press Agency) columnist Alejandro Tagliavini describes the deals Chavez is forging with Venezuela's main resource, oil, with other South American countries, not just to benefit Venezuela, but to encourage the spread of communism across the region.

Keep in mind when you read the translation of the article that this isn't coming from some exiled Venezuelan in the U.S., this is coming from someone familiar with the political scene in South America.

Oil Finances Chávez's Dreams

Alexander A.Tagliavini, for El Sentinel
Posted August 6th, 2005

Buenos Aires (AIPE) · Fidel Castro denounced that the United States is creating a "interventionist military device" for "restraining" the revolutionary movement in Latin America, all because Washington sent 400 soldiers to Paraguay. What must we then think of Cuba which has between 35,000 and 50,000 emissaries in Venezuela, in "physical training, health services, and education programs".

In addition, there's a great number of Cuban military personnel in Venezuela, where Cubans have also taken important administrative positions in almost all the state capitals. At the same time, there's a flow of thousands of Venezuelans towards Cuba. In return for the personnel that Castro sends, Chavez sends 90,000 barrels of oil to the island on credit and at subsidized pricest. But this is barely the beginning of the exchange; Venezuela now finances the failed Cuban Communism that was previously kept afloat by the Soviet Union.

Chávez announced that he wants to invest in South America parts of the $30.338 million of the international reserves of the Central Bank of Venezuela: "We want to invest partly in Uruguay, Argentina, Paraguay, and Brazil", he affirmed while inaugurating a ring of businesses with Uruguay in Caracas. "It can be for purchases", to create "a national food reserve", reminding of the present shortage of supplies that his country is undergoing after the imposition of price controls. "We can buy meat and milk from Uruguay while we recover our production here".

The price controls have caused a shortage of meat, while the milk producers request that their prices be freed of the controls. But the solution for Chávez is easy. He said that his goal is "to begin to provide Venezuelan oil to Uruguay" and "that they pay us with calves". Like a good shepherd, he assured that "we need to recover our flock" and reminded that "we are bringing pregnant calves from Argentina". He also suggested that Uruguay pay with cement. This is how South America returns to trading in the 21st century.

The agreement stipulates that Montevideo will have to pay for the Venezuelan oil by 75 percent in cash (exchangeable by goods and public services) and the remaining 25 percent in 15 years, with two years grace and 2 percent annual interest. Chávez announced that in a few days he will visit Montevideo to meet with president Tabaré Vázquez and reminded that Vasquez is currently acting as the rotating presidency of Mercosur, while he occupies the presidency of the Andean Community. "To him (Vasquez) they gave the hammer and to me the sickle. We must cross them ", laughed Chávez. (Emphasis mine)

Telesur, Petrosur, Petrocaribe, Petroandina, el Banco del Sur, la Universidad del Sur, are all projects with a clear Marxist ideological duty that comprise ALBA, the plan that Chávez jointly formulated with Fidel Castro and that which he describes as an integration which extends beyond the market (Emphasis mine).

There's no doubt that they extend much beyond the market. According to Roger Pardo Maurer, assistant U.S. Undersecretary of Defense, Cuba and Venezuela are attempting to destabilize Latin America in order to install extreme leftist governments, which they may be able to achieve in Bolivia with the rise to power of coca-grower leader Evo Morales. He and center-right ex-president Jorge Quiroga are considered the front-runners in the Bolivian presidential elections at year's end.

Chávez "is financing and providing moral support" to the radical forces in Bolivia that have created chaos. Pardo Maurer also said that Chávez provides the money for the uprising in Bolivia, and Fidel Castro contributes to the organization and direction of the populist movement. "Both are trying to capitalize the formation of a populist Marxist-Socialist state", he said in Washington, during his conference in the Hudson Institute.