The Hispanosphere was interviewed by news website Sputnik International on Thursday January 31, about the latest attempted coup d'etat in Venezuela. Here is the original transcript.
What do you know about the ongoing coup attempt in Venezuela? Who is Juan Guaido, and what is his relationship to US intelligence services? Who is backing the coup and what's going on there?
Like a lot of wealthy Latin Americans, Juan Guaidó went to university in the US. He studied “governance”, which is about telling people how to run their country.
Guaidó appeared on the political scene in Venezuela just after that, about 2007. For years before that the opposition had been taking money from the National Endowment for Democracy, which sounds like a charity but is really part of the US State Department. If you know the history of the NED, it took over the CIA's old job of channelling money to opposition and regime-change forces in other countries.
Guaidó is from the Popular Will party, part of the big opposition MUD coalition. That party has 14 seats in the National Assembly, the parliament, so it's only the third biggest party in the MUD. Its leader Leopoldo López is in jail since 2015 for inciting violent insurrection in the 2014 Guarimba riots. They killed 43 people including an MP for the ruling United Socialist Party and his girlfriend who were murdered in their flat.
In the second Guarimba in 2017, a few Popular Will members were arrested with guns and explosives and lists of targets in their possession. One of them was Yon Goicoechea, who was given the Milton Freedman prize in the US for “advancing liberty” in 2008.
Guaidó was elected National Assembly speaker on January 5. He replaced a member of another MUD party. That was part of a shift in the MUD back towards this position of violent regime change, after a short period in 2017-2018 when it was negotiating with the government and taking part in elections.
What's important to point out is that Guaidó wasn't even the MUD candidate in the presidential election last May. That was Henri Falcón from the Progressive Advance party. And a it's been reported, Guaidó spoke to US Vice-President Mike Pence the day before he declared himself president.
What is life in Venezuela on the ground like? How have sanctions affected daily life? What can you tell us about the Venezuelan people and their admiration for Chavez and Maduro?
The last time I was in Venezuela was in September 2017, not long after the second Guarimba riots had fizzled out after four months. About 125 people were killed in that, and the rioters blocked the roads and burnt food warehouses to make the whole supply situation worse. But when I got there I found the supermarkets and cafés and restaurants and pharmacies open. I brought back two bottles of Venezuelan rum that I got in a local off-license. There was no shortage of that!
What people told me was that hyperinflation soon makes their wages and savings worthless, and there's a severe shortage of banknotes, even after the government issued new ones. Black market money-changers buy them all up for US dollars, and then they disappear. Pallets full of them have been found in warehouses in Colombia and Brazil, even in Europe. One explanation is that they're being bleached and used to print counterfeit notes on.
When the MUD won the National Assembly election by a landslide in 2015, their vote only went up by a couple of hundred thousand. They won because the PSUV vote went down by about 2 million. But since then the PSUV has managed to re-mobilise its base and win elections again.
Since Chávez' death six years ago, he has a kind of aura of sainthood around him. His image is on murals everywhere. Outside Venezuela you see people who were in love with Chávez, the peasant warrior poet, now turning against Maduro, the tough working-class bus driver.
Following the nationwide 23 January 'protests', where do you see the conflict between the US-backed National Assembly and Maduro government? What's the ratio of support to opposition for Maduro?
My contacts in Venezuela say the opposition demo in Caracas yesterday (January
30) was a total flop, much smaller than pro-government rallies. Last week Guaidó was begging the armed forces to overthrow the government and install him as president. That's his only hope, short of the US invading the country.
What do you know about the UK government refusing to repatriate Venezuelan gold? Why have they refused to do so? Has this happened to other countries?
The British government's decision to confiscate $1.2 billion in Venezuelan bullion held by the Bank of England is frankly an undeclared act of war, as are all sanctions. But it's not the first time this has happened. Since the NATO war on Libya in 2011, tens of billions of Libyan state oil revenue has been held in a Maltese account, waiting for whatever of the three or four governments the west decides to back to claim it.
Could Maduro do anything to end the history of violent US-backed coups? Is there a long-term solution to the conflict?
The first point to make is that giving in to the West's demand to re-run last year's presidential election isn't going to end the sanctions unless the opposition wins, when they lost by a landslide last May. Venezuela is the land of elections. They've had at least one a year since Hugo Chávez took office in 1999. The opposition and their western allies only recognise the results when they win.
You know, the Western liberal idea of democracy is that “everything must change so everything can stay the same”, in other words no party should stay in power long enough to change anything. Their measure of democracy in the former colonies is when the national liberation movement loses and all their developmental gains are reversed.
In his interview on Sputnik this week, President Maduro said the latest Russian arms were on their way to Venezuela right now. That, plus a loyal armed forces and citizens militia, are the best guarantees against a coup or an invasion.
The encouraging sign at the moment is that the Lima Group, the 11 Latin American countries plus Canada trying to force Maduro to go, said this week it's against military intervention, publicly at least. The Spanish foreign minister said the same thing yesterday.
The people in the US government who are pushing this coup attempt along, Mike Pence, Mike Pompeo, John Bolton and Marco Rubio, are the sort to argue for an invasion, like Iraq or Afghanistan, if the Venezuelan army doesn't join the coup. But Donald Trump is trying to get the troops out of Syria and Afghanistan. Does he just want to send them off to invade another country, that might resist for years?
Maduro accused Colombia yesterday of playing host to a Bay of Pigs-style invasion force of pro-opposition army deserters, but you know how the Bay of Pigs ended.
One irony in this is that, at least until the latest sanctions this week are implemented, US oil companies operate in Venezuela and the US imports Venezuelan oil. So Washington's aim may not be to “grab the oil” but to prevent Venezuela developing its economy away from oil, which so far it hasn't done anyway. Latin America is largely a captive market for US goods, and Washington presumably wants to keep it that way.
What do you know about the ongoing coup attempt in Venezuela? Who is Juan Guaido, and what is his relationship to US intelligence services? Who is backing the coup and what's going on there?
Like a lot of wealthy Latin Americans, Juan Guaidó went to university in the US. He studied “governance”, which is about telling people how to run their country.
Guaidó appeared on the political scene in Venezuela just after that, about 2007. For years before that the opposition had been taking money from the National Endowment for Democracy, which sounds like a charity but is really part of the US State Department. If you know the history of the NED, it took over the CIA's old job of channelling money to opposition and regime-change forces in other countries.
Guaidó is from the Popular Will party, part of the big opposition MUD coalition. That party has 14 seats in the National Assembly, the parliament, so it's only the third biggest party in the MUD. Its leader Leopoldo López is in jail since 2015 for inciting violent insurrection in the 2014 Guarimba riots. They killed 43 people including an MP for the ruling United Socialist Party and his girlfriend who were murdered in their flat.
In the second Guarimba in 2017, a few Popular Will members were arrested with guns and explosives and lists of targets in their possession. One of them was Yon Goicoechea, who was given the Milton Freedman prize in the US for “advancing liberty” in 2008.
Guaidó was elected National Assembly speaker on January 5. He replaced a member of another MUD party. That was part of a shift in the MUD back towards this position of violent regime change, after a short period in 2017-2018 when it was negotiating with the government and taking part in elections.
What's important to point out is that Guaidó wasn't even the MUD candidate in the presidential election last May. That was Henri Falcón from the Progressive Advance party. And a it's been reported, Guaidó spoke to US Vice-President Mike Pence the day before he declared himself president.
What is life in Venezuela on the ground like? How have sanctions affected daily life? What can you tell us about the Venezuelan people and their admiration for Chavez and Maduro?
The last time I was in Venezuela was in September 2017, not long after the second Guarimba riots had fizzled out after four months. About 125 people were killed in that, and the rioters blocked the roads and burnt food warehouses to make the whole supply situation worse. But when I got there I found the supermarkets and cafés and restaurants and pharmacies open. I brought back two bottles of Venezuelan rum that I got in a local off-license. There was no shortage of that!
What people told me was that hyperinflation soon makes their wages and savings worthless, and there's a severe shortage of banknotes, even after the government issued new ones. Black market money-changers buy them all up for US dollars, and then they disappear. Pallets full of them have been found in warehouses in Colombia and Brazil, even in Europe. One explanation is that they're being bleached and used to print counterfeit notes on.
When the MUD won the National Assembly election by a landslide in 2015, their vote only went up by a couple of hundred thousand. They won because the PSUV vote went down by about 2 million. But since then the PSUV has managed to re-mobilise its base and win elections again.
Since Chávez' death six years ago, he has a kind of aura of sainthood around him. His image is on murals everywhere. Outside Venezuela you see people who were in love with Chávez, the peasant warrior poet, now turning against Maduro, the tough working-class bus driver.
Following the nationwide 23 January 'protests', where do you see the conflict between the US-backed National Assembly and Maduro government? What's the ratio of support to opposition for Maduro?
My contacts in Venezuela say the opposition demo in Caracas yesterday (January
30) was a total flop, much smaller than pro-government rallies. Last week Guaidó was begging the armed forces to overthrow the government and install him as president. That's his only hope, short of the US invading the country.
What do you know about the UK government refusing to repatriate Venezuelan gold? Why have they refused to do so? Has this happened to other countries?
The British government's decision to confiscate $1.2 billion in Venezuelan bullion held by the Bank of England is frankly an undeclared act of war, as are all sanctions. But it's not the first time this has happened. Since the NATO war on Libya in 2011, tens of billions of Libyan state oil revenue has been held in a Maltese account, waiting for whatever of the three or four governments the west decides to back to claim it.
Could Maduro do anything to end the history of violent US-backed coups? Is there a long-term solution to the conflict?
The first point to make is that giving in to the West's demand to re-run last year's presidential election isn't going to end the sanctions unless the opposition wins, when they lost by a landslide last May. Venezuela is the land of elections. They've had at least one a year since Hugo Chávez took office in 1999. The opposition and their western allies only recognise the results when they win.
You know, the Western liberal idea of democracy is that “everything must change so everything can stay the same”, in other words no party should stay in power long enough to change anything. Their measure of democracy in the former colonies is when the national liberation movement loses and all their developmental gains are reversed.
In his interview on Sputnik this week, President Maduro said the latest Russian arms were on their way to Venezuela right now. That, plus a loyal armed forces and citizens militia, are the best guarantees against a coup or an invasion.
The encouraging sign at the moment is that the Lima Group, the 11 Latin American countries plus Canada trying to force Maduro to go, said this week it's against military intervention, publicly at least. The Spanish foreign minister said the same thing yesterday.
The people in the US government who are pushing this coup attempt along, Mike Pence, Mike Pompeo, John Bolton and Marco Rubio, are the sort to argue for an invasion, like Iraq or Afghanistan, if the Venezuelan army doesn't join the coup. But Donald Trump is trying to get the troops out of Syria and Afghanistan. Does he just want to send them off to invade another country, that might resist for years?
Maduro accused Colombia yesterday of playing host to a Bay of Pigs-style invasion force of pro-opposition army deserters, but you know how the Bay of Pigs ended.
One irony in this is that, at least until the latest sanctions this week are implemented, US oil companies operate in Venezuela and the US imports Venezuelan oil. So Washington's aim may not be to “grab the oil” but to prevent Venezuela developing its economy away from oil, which so far it hasn't done anyway. Latin America is largely a captive market for US goods, and Washington presumably wants to keep it that way.