Shadows of the Weimar Republic: What’s Really Happening in Venezuela? [View all]

[Judi Lynn]

February 18, 2014
Shadows of the Weimar Republic

What’s Really Happening in Venezuela?

by CHRIS GILBERT

Caracas, February 16, 2014.

Venezuela’s traditional “Youth Day” fell on Wednesday of last week, and President Nicolás Maduro’s 10-month-old government had planned a sizable celebration in the city of La Victoria (Aragua State) where exactly 200 years ago to the day the national hero José Félix Ribas led a youth militia against the royalist army. The celebration included new monuments, military marches, a special light show, and performances by the youth orchestra – all in a triumphalist spirit that was understandable given the electoral victories of last year. These victories establish what one analyst calls “an electoral plateau” during the upcoming two years: a period in which, without being distracted by campaigns, the new President and cabinet can concentrate on governing until late 2015.

Yet on that day Maduro made a serious error of judgment. Celebrating in Aragua, he had left his rearguard exposed in Caracas, while at the same time underestimating the opposition’s desperation and willingness to resort to violence. In the capital city, the opposition had organized its own youth march, composed largely of white, middle-class students, drawn from the private universities. Near the end of the day a group of these protesters turned violent, attacking the Attorney General’s offices in the city center with stones, bricks, and Molotov cocktails. When night had fallen, three people lay dead and a great many more were wounded, among the latter a significant number of the new human-rights-trained police.

President Maduro’s response to these events could be called “multilevel,” but perhaps is more accurately described as shotgun-style. He continued with the ceremonies in La Victoria, hesitant to abandon them on short notice. Then, at around 8 pm, he addressed the nation on television – as he would do on the following days – indicating that those responsible for the violent acts were small fascist groups; that there was a coup attempt in process; adding later that the intellectual authors of the violence were the ex-mayor Leopoldo López and to a lesser degree the congresswoman María Corina Machado. Maduro also tried to associate the state’s response to this situation with a new government-organized pacification movement Por La Vida y Por La Paz, that is directed against criminal violence.

The incongruent elements in the President’s message were readily apparent. If the responsible parties are really isolated fascist groups, how can they hope to carry out a successful coup d’état? Again, since the events of Wednesday constitute political violence, why respond to it with a movement that is specifically directed against criminal violence? In fact, it is unlikely that there could be a coup under way in Venezuela in the near future, because the violent groups are too small and do not have the support of the military (as even the Washington Post article of the following day begrudgingly admitted). This raises the question of what the opposition groups, who continued to create disturbances over the weekend, are really trying to achieve.

More:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/02/18/whats-really-happening-in-venezuela/