{"id":183443,"date":"2019-02-08T07:03:19","date_gmt":"2019-02-08T07:03:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=183443"},"modified":"2019-02-11T06:33:36","modified_gmt":"2019-02-11T06:33:36","slug":"weve-seen-the-wests-approach-to-venezuela-before","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=183443","title":{"rendered":"We\u2019ve seen the West\u2019s approach to Venezuela before…"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u2013 in Syria, Egypt and Afghanistan, need I gone on?<\/em><\/h2>\n

Robert Fisk \u2013 The Independent Feb 7, 2019<\/h1>\n

\"Guaido<\/a><\/p>\n

The closest I ever came to Venezuela<\/a>, many years ago, was a transit connection at Caracas airport. I noticed a lot of soldiers in red berets and a clutch of goons, and it reminded me, vaguely, of the Middle East.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now, sitting in the rain squalls of the wintry Levant, I flick through my newspaper clippings of our recent local autocrats \u2013 Saddam, Assad, al-Sisi, Erdogan, Mohammed bin Salman<\/a><\/strong><\/span> (you can fill in the rest for yourself) \u2013 and I think of Nicolas Maduro<\/a><\/strong><\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The comparisons are by no means precise. Indeed, it\u2019s not the nature of the \u201cstrongmen\u201d I\u2019m thinking about. It\u2019s our reaction to all these chaps. And there are two obvious parallels: the way in which we sanction and isolate the hated dictator \u2013 or love him, as the case may be \u2013 and the manner in which we\u00a0not only name the opposition as the rightful heir to the nation, but demand that democracy be delivered to the people whose torture and struggle for freedom we have suddenly discovered.<\/span><\/p>\n

And before I forget it, there\u2019s one other common thread in this story. If you suggest that those who want presidential change in Venezuela may be a little too hasty, and our support for \u2013 let us say \u2013 Juan Guaido<\/a><\/strong><\/span> might be a bit premature if we don\u2019t want to start a civil war, this means you are \u201cpro-Maduro\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Just as those who opposed the 2003 invasion of Iraq<\/a> were \u201cpro-Saddam\u201d, or those who thought the west might pause before it supported the increasingly violent opposition in Syria<\/a>\u00a0were labelled \u201cpro-Assad\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

And those who defended Yasser Arafat \u2013 over a long period a super-terrorist, a super-diplomat and then a super-terrorist again \u2013 against those who would oust him as leader of the Palestinians, were abused as \u201cpro-Arafat\u201d, \u201cpro-Palestinian\u201d, \u201cpro-terrorist\u201d and, inevitably, \u201canti-Semitic\u201d. I recall how George W\u00a0Bush warned us after 9\/11, that \u201cyou are either with us or against us\u201d. The same threat was made to us about Assad.<\/span><\/p>\n

Erdogan has used it in Turkey (less than three years ago<\/a><\/strong><\/span>) and it was a common line in the forgotten 1930s used by none other than Mussolini. And now I quote Trump\u2019s US secretary of state Michael Pompeo on Maduro<\/a><\/strong><\/span>: \u201cNow it is time for every other nation to pick a side \u2026 either you stand with the forces of freedom, or you\u2019re in league with Maduro and his mayhem.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

You get the point. Now is the time for all good people to stand alongside the United States, the EU, the nations of Latin America \u2013 or do you support the Russkies, Chinese, Iranian headbangers, the perfidious Corbyn and (of all people) the Greeks? Talking of the Greeks, European pressure on Alexis Tsipras to conform to the EU\u2019s support for Guaido \u2013 proving that the EU can indeed bully its smaller members \u2013 is a good argument for Brexiteers (though far too complex for them to understand).<\/span><\/p>\n

But first, let\u2019s take a look at our favourite tyrant, in the words of all who oppose him. He\u2019s a powerful dictator, surrounded by generals, suppressing his people, using torture, mass arrests, secret police murders, rigged elections, political prisoners \u2013 so no wonder we gave our support to those who wish to overthrow this brutal man and stage democratic elections.<\/span><\/p>\n

Not a bad precis of our current policy towards the Maduro regime. But I am referring, of course, word-for-word, to the west\u2019s policy towards the Assad regime in Syria. And our support for opposition democracy there wasn\u2019t terribly successful.<\/span><\/p>\n

We were not solely responsible for the Syrian civil war<\/a> \u2013 but we were not guiltless since we sent an awful lot of weapons to those trying to overthrow Assad. And last month the notepad of US national security advisor John Bolton appeared to boast a plan to send\u00a05,000 US troops to Colombia<\/a><\/strong><\/span>\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

And now let\u2019s tick the box on another Maduro-lookalike \u2013 at least from the west\u2019s simplistic point of view: the military-backed elected field marshal-president al-Sisi of Egypt, whom we love, admire and protect. Powerful dictator? Yup. Surrounded and supported by generals? You bet, not least because he locked up a rival general before the last election. Suppression? Absolutely \u2013 all in the interest of crushing \u201cterrorism\u201d, of course.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mass arrests? Happily yes, for all the inmates of Egypt\u2019s savage prison system are \u201cterrorists\u201d, at least according to the field marshal-president himself. Secret police murders? Well, even forgetting the young Italian student suspected by his government to have been allegedly tortured and bumped off by one of Sisi\u2019s top Egyptian cops, there\u2019s a roll call of disappeared activists.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rigged elections? No doubt about it, although al-Sisi still maintains that his last triumph at the polls \u2013 a cracking 97 per cent \u2013 was a free and fair election.<\/span><\/p>\n

President Trump sent his \u201csincere congratulations<\/strong><\/span>\u201d<\/a>. Political prisoners? Well, the total is 60,000 and rising<\/a><\/strong><\/span>. Oh yes, and Maduro\u2019s last victory \u2013 a rigged election if ever there was one, of course \u2013 was a mere 67.84 per cent.<\/span><\/p>\n

As the\u00a0late sage of the Sunday Express<\/em>, John Gordon, might have said: it makes you sit up a bit. So, too, I suppose, when we glance a bit further eastwards to Afghanistan, whose Taliban rulers were routed in 2001 by the US, whose post-9\/11 troops and statesmen ushered in a new life of democracy, then corruption, warlordism and civil war.<\/span><\/p>\n

The \u201cdemocracy\u201d bit quickly came unstuck when \u201cloya jurgas\u201d,\u00a0grand councils, turned into tribal playpens and the Americans announced that it would be an exaggeration to think that we could achieve \u201cJeffersonian democracy\u201d in Afghanistan. Too true.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now the Americans are negotiating with the \u201cterrorist\u201d Taliban<\/a> in Qatar so they can get the hell out of the Graveyard of Empires after 17 years of military setbacks, scandals and defeats \u2013 not to mention running a few torture camps which even Maduro would cough to look at.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now all this may not encourage you to walk down memory lane. And I haven\u2019t even listed the sins of Saddam, let alone our continuing and cosy relationship \u2013 amazing as it still seems \u2013 with that Gulf state whose lads strangled, chopped up and secretly buried a US-resident journalist in Turkey.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now just imagine if Maduro, tired of a journalist critic slandering him in Miami, decided to lure him to the Venezuelan embassy in Washington and top the poor guy, slice him up and bury him secretly in Foggy Bottom. Well now, I have a feeling that sanctions might have been applied to Maduro a long time ago. But not to Saudi Arabia, of course, where we are very definitely not advocating democracy.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNow is the time for democracy and prosperity in Venezuela,\u201d quoth John Bolton this week. Oh, yes indeed. Maduro runs an oil-soaked nation yet its people starve. He is an unworthy, foolish and vain man, even if he\u2019s not Saddamite in his crimes. He was rightly described by a colleague as a dreary tyrant. He even looks like the kind of guy who tied ladies to railway lines in silent movies.<\/span><\/p>\n

So good luck to Guaido. Palpably a nice guy, speaks eloquently, wise to stick to aid for the poor and fresh elections rather than dwell on just how exactly Maduro and his military chums are going to be booted out.<\/span><\/p>\n

In other words, good luck \u2013 but watch out. Instead of pleading with those who will not support him \u2013\u00a0the Greeks, for example \u2013 he might take a closer look at who his foreign friends are. And do a quick track record on their more recent crusades for freedom, democracy and the right to life. And by the way, I haven\u2019t even mentioned Libya.<\/span><\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Obvious similarities in way in which the West sanctioned and isolated Assad and Saddam Hussein and the way in which it hailed the opposition as the rightful heir to power<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":138,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[61,58],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-183443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-Commentary","category-Current_Affairs"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/138"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=183443"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183443\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":183466,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183443\/revisions\/183466"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=183443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=183443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=183443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}