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Venezuela's Maduro Averts Military Coup, Arrests Three Air Force Generals
A day after Venezuela formally devalued its currency by way of the new and improved FX central planning system SICAD II, which sent the official value of the Bolivar 89% lower, the government desperately needed a distraction. It got just that when earlier today Socialist par excellence Nicolas Maduro announced that he had narrowly avoided a coup after he arrested three air force generals suspected of plotting an uprising against the leftist government.
Maduro told a meeting of South American foreign ministers that the three generals, who were not identified, had been in contact with the opposition and "were trying to rise up against the legitimately constituted government."
"This group that was captured has direct links with sectors of the opposition and they were saying that this week was the decisive week," Maduro said.
He said the generals had already been summoned before a court martial, adding that the plot was discovered because other officers had come forward to say they were being recruited.
The disclosure comes amid a broadening government crackdown against Maduro's opponents after weeks of street protests that have left at least 34 dead.
On Monday, National Assembly president Diosdado Cabello announced that a prominent opposition deputy, Maria Corina Machado, had lost her seat and parliamentary immunity, and could be arrested at any moment.
Last week, two opposition mayors were arrested, and another prominent opposition leader has been in jailed for a month, accused of inciting violence.
Ironically, while the entire international community was fuming over the "crackdown" on peaceful, if CIA-funded, Ukraine protesters nobody has anything at all to say about the daily beatings and/or murders of civilians protesting Maduro's cabinet. Why? Perhaps because while the west has already alienated Putin and his natural resources, the last thing it can afford is to tell another oil rich country, Venezuela, to take a hike.
As for the local population, it may need greater and more dazzling spectacles than this particular distraction if it is to avoid noticing that its currency just lost 90% of its official value overnight. At least the Caracas stock market continues to put even the US market bubble to shame. Finally, if the socialist paradise fails, one can always use stock certificates as toilet paper, single ply.
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They have an Air Force?
They did....
Maduro will be dead in six months...he's to stupid to figure out he can't keep it all under control when the real shitstorm starts...
I looked up the word "donkey" in the dictionary, and there it was, a full colour photo of Maduro wearing a sombrero.
I'm picturing a jackass too, with "CIA" branded across its rump.
Hey Maduro, dig faster motherfucker.
The HATE in Venzuela is increasing at perhaps an exponential rate. Peru´s main newspaper (picture later) shows that 94% of Peruvians disapprove of Maduro´s policies.
Venezuela is in for a storm of cataclysmic proportions. Our CIA does not even to be there to help provoke, better if they just stay out. Venezuela, corrupt to the core, will take matters into its own hands, Maduro will not escape, unless he has his OWN Air Force General with a warmed up Gulfstream....
Maduro will be toast, or hung like Mussolini.
Maduro narrowly avoided a coup. He says it as though that's a good thing.
If an first, you don't succeed....
The second delfation wave usually hits the hardest. If this falls out the same way as prior Latino populist revolutions, I am going to bet a second coup by 2016.
The bigger question is what does this mean for Ecuador, Argentina, Iran and Cuba. All states that have significant bolivar stockpiles and swaps for their own populism based on cheap “tar sand” bolivar crude.
This being said, Venezuela has all the potential to be a better Brazil someday. They also badly need a total overhaul of the entire country's fixed capital which is on par with the Ukraine and the 'stans for "sov. fixer upper". PVDSA and the municipal gov's have without ethics or foresight ran the entire countrys power, refining and transport grid back to 1940's level capacity.
Question how the heck does an airforce complete a coup?? Do they park fighter jets in front of the parliment building? Don't think they would work well against a tank in that case.
Not according to this article.
The HATE you claim seems to be emanating from the 3% who own 90%
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/mar/20/venezuela-revolt-tr...
Isn't that the only group that matters?
Highly unlikely
Volcker, Greenspan, Bernanke and Yellen are all still alive. Why should this idiot be any different?
Especially if he bundled for Obama (I'm looking at you Corzine!)
Maduro might have a cadre of new 'generals' with strangely russian sounding accents for spanish speakers in six months.
Maduro might be trading oil for Gold or Rubles or Yuan in six months, too.
Things are moving quite rapidly now. Expect asymetry. Expect surprises
IMHO,asymetry -both in business and in warfare, and the judicious well timed exorcise of the element of surprise; are going to be dominant themes in the period we have just entered.
"They have an Air Force?"
Yes, but the hot air baloon is grounded for lack of helium, plus Obama has hoarded all the hot air.
Who is gonna fly the Cessna 172 now? They used to take turns dropping grenades out of the windows on evil capitalists and toilet paper magnates, gonna be a real shitstorm coming there..
Somebody please blow that fuckers head off...
It's practically a rule that mustache + bushy eyebrows = South American dictator. I'd hate to see the pit hair on Lady Cristina.
or a Columbian coffee farmer.
www.thepanamadigest.com/2011/09/juan-valdez-is-coming/
I, on the other hand, would love to. And see what I can do about it. ;-)
-Kirk in, Kirk out
Moduro needs to hang on till Russian bases are up and running in Argentina.
"Vlad! I'm glad you are here!"
"Just in time, Maduro. Bath House is getting the best of you. Bath House!!"
"Si, el maricone. (head down) I know, but, but, (looks up) show me how to do The Crimean!"
"It has some difficult steps!"
"I am ready, Vlad!"
"Well, then. "!Musica!!"
"Phew! That was close."
I imagine he is going to have to arrest more than three Generals what with devaluing the currency 89%.
Being a General in general, seems to carry more risk these days. Zero fires them, they defect from Ukraine, and Venezuela arrests them...Generals clearly need a boost in hazardous duty pay. /sarc
I dunno, throwing Air Force generals to a pack of hungry jaguars, hmm, might have some legs.
For the Romans, what did they say, "if you don't have enough bread, how about a circus?" worked for them for hundreds of years.
I liked Juan Valdez better when he grew coffee and walked around with his faithful burro hauling the beans to market for him. This "sociopathic murderous dictator" phase is a distrurbing turn in his life.
"I know you are pinche CIA..."
This Maduro appears a smart guy!
90% devaluation is OK like the Russian 10-20% devaluation. The ordinary people see no change in domestic prices like food and clothing - while all imported stuff is getting more expensive.
Anything produced in these countries is now competitive outside the borders. Of course Oil/ Gas are still sold at market pricess - means US$. With all this both countries are perfectly positioned for the future!
They dont produce much anymore as Chavez has taken over most of the production and ran it into the ground....they cant even keep their oil exploration going....he put his buddies in charge and all they knew how to do was steal...its a long slow death..but coming soon I think...now with the devaluation nothing will be restocked...so starvation is soon to come...
Yeah, my guess is that you are right. It will be of Biblical proportions down there (and I don´t mean Heaven).
The 90% devaluation is only for the Sicad II exchange rate, a minor portion of Venezuela's external trade.
A large portion of the nation's trade is still at the official rate of 6.2 bolivars per dollar, or about 10 to 15 times overvalued.
Maduro has promised (for unfathomable reasons) to defend this absurd exchange rate to the death, and may well get his wish.
Why doesn't he just spy on them, get some dirt on them and use blackmail...it works great here in the USA.
He "fired" three air force generals? Did he replace them with dual citizens? Wait, are we talking about Maduro or Obama?
Maybe it's the same guy!
They just swap a mustache on/off.
Someone stuff a corn dog in his mouth...
How about a .45 instead?
Two sides of the same dog...
Other people's money has officially run out :-)
They killed a beauty pageant and THAT is unforgivable. Do you know how many really pretty woman are out there? And they had to kill one in f****** Venezuela.
How do you kill a beauty pageant?
Cut off the power? Renig on their hotel accommodations?
South American generals conspiring to overthrow the government? No way, José.
I've followed and supported ZH for many years, shaking my head when disbelievers had the temerity to suggest that ZH was an undercover supporter of tptb, the status quo, and the deep state, until now--
This piece on Venezuela is pure crap, snidely condemning the democratically elected Pres & gov. while lauding the CIA backed crony capitalist predator plutocrats who have been trying seize power by overthrowing the democratically elected government since Chavez first came to power.
Earlier this month 29 Organization of American States countries including Brazil, Argentina, Ecuador, Bolivia, Uruguay, El Salvador and Nicaragua emphatically rejected Washington’s depiction of the recent events in Venezuela as a government trying to “repress peaceful protesters” and passed a resolution expressing their solidarity with the government of President Maduro,
For the truth of what's going on in Venezuela (if anyone here really cares) try: http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/03/14/behind-the-lies-about-venezuelas-protests/
also see: http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/22671-obama-administration-faces-diplo...
Except the protests were real....
And almost certainly funded by your tax dollars.
I don't think we have to fund demonstrators if there is no toilet paper.
Now, if the CIA had stolen all the TP going to their country, or blew up their TP factory, you have a point.
The current government is incompetent enough w/o foreign spies.
The spooks are whoring and drinking, sending reports back to HQ that "oh, yeah, we ah blew up their TP factory. Send moar money!"
Revolutions take money. Street protests take money. If you see a million people in the streets there were a battalion on community organizers organizing times, names and places. That takes money. Ockham's razor, follow the money or whatever you want to call it there is almost certainly a little man in a trench coat traveling on max per diem with buckets of cash.
Except the protests were real....
And the protestors are the ones committing the violence - not the Venezuelan government. The "protestors" have shot citizens while they are trying to clear road blocks of debris, decapitated a guy on a motorcycle by stringing up a wire across the street, etc.
Reading the article and most of the comments posted so far makes me think the CIA and NGO's have the pedal to the metal on this issue and that, as usual, the gullible and naive believe everything that is regurgitated by CNN, FOX and the rest of the MSM from "government sources". . . . .
The CIA can't make Maduro arrest elected opposition lawmakers, or run a dysfunctional parallel exchange rate scheme, or create 57% inflation.
What Maduro is doing is dictatorial, quite aside from any external meddling.
But plenty of leftists who know absolutely nothing about LatAm are inclined to reflexively defend Maduro, simply because he's an alleged populist.
Redistribution doesn't work when you impoverish a country to the point that there's nothing left to redistribute. Dire shortages of staples are all on price-controlled items.
Econ 101 ... how many times you gonna flunk it, son?
I read the articles and it seemed that the vote was almost as much of a slap at the US constant, worldwide meddling than specifically supporting Maduro. I can respect that. I am also about sick and tired of fascist/corporatist being referred to as right-wing. They are close kissing cousins of communists/socialists.
Can we vote to stay the hell out of everywhere? FFS the US walks around the globe like Buford T Justice on mescaline.
At least he can always depend on the Navy colonels and the Army admirals!
Nothing like a manufactured crisis caused by imagined treacherous counter-revolutionaries to justify a crack-down.
I waiting for his "I am more worried about nukes in Caracas" presser.
These marxist-fascist asshats are really amazing.
They publically run country after country into the ground, literally from fabulous wealth to poverty - over and over and over and over.
And the academics still laud them. And their carbon copies in every country continue to gain more and more power until their own collapse.
It is the exact same racket time and again, and yet people somehow think their country and their asshats will get different results from the same policies.
If humanity is that stupid then it richly deserves its extinction.
Read some Marx, and you will understand why the (yes big A for big a**hole)"Academics" laud those people.
Starvation is the pain of stupidity leaving the body.
Don't interupt it.
89% devaluation??! -Purposefully?
To make what exports cheap to who?
While foodstuffs and staples such as toilet paper become scarce?
Well why aren't we busy doing these things right here in the USA if all our problems can be solved with only the trivial temporaty inconveniences of ranpant hunger and a total lack of 20th century sanitation to endure?
The official exchange rate is 6.2 bolivars per dollar; black market rate about 90 (not a typo).
The Sicad II rate of 55 or 60 is still overvalued compared to the black market rate.
Structurally, Venezuela has few things other than oil to export, even if they dumped the exchange controls and floated the bolivar.
It's called the 'commodity curse,' and another obvious victim is Saudi Arabia.
if the socialist paradise fails ... so what we've seen thus far doesn't count as failure?
No joke.
At least Fidel has maintained a creaking but functioning form in Cuba, but, then, he killed/jailed the opposition and has a strong SS. I would like to see how Castro would have done with Oil.
But, these 'socialist' paradise schemes are worse than crony capitalism, or on par with it.
You know Bath House had the same ideology as Hugo. I bet he misses him.
Maduro needs to get real. Open a market economy, kick out the bad banks and get rid of foreign operatives of all stripes.
I was curious to see why nobody has shot that retard yet. Top google result for venezuela gun laws: "BBC News - Venezuela bans private gun ownership" (June 2012)
At the very least, I give him and big-head props for planning ahead.
Mr Merde's days are numbered. Once the poor start going hungry and join the protests it's game, set and match for the Cubans.
Than it will get interesting when the new government tells China the oil contracts are null and void.
what you don't see in that picture is the fanny pack and sweatpants. they are his recreation clothes.
Neoliberal dictatorship threatens Venezuela
Indications that the US incite a Chile-type coup
http://failedevolution.blogspot.gr/2013/11/neoliberal-dictatorship-threa...
TPTB in the US (Fed, Neocons, MIC) must be getting desperate by now for some Regime Change they "Can Believe In". A la Kiev.
Most of Latin America is ruled by Oligarchs. It's only a question of how much they believe in "sharing" the wealth, i.e. having a 3 or 4-tier society, vs a 2-tier society. Our guys prefer the simplicity and cost-effectiveness of a 2-tier society that's "friendly" to the US corporations, rather than a 2,3 or healthy 4-tier society that is not 'friendly' to us. All else is BS and 'noise'.
I continue to be amazed how many 'libertarians' fall for the false dichotomy of Capitalism vs. Socialism. If the "Kings of Fiat" (CB Elite) are involved, it's ALL Cronyism, you gullible schmucks!
Study now how liberals act under pressure. Expect NDAA detentions and sedition trials here during the colapse.
Whew! That was close.
You see all it takes is one *patriotic pilot* to redirect a couple 1,000 pounders on the Presidential palace and it's lights out. I know I'm not alone in hoping that happens here in good old USA.
http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2014/03/21/obama-wrong-isolate-venezu...