Venezuela's Military at "High Alert", Embassy Closed - Are They Just Moves to Distract Opponents?

Full Military Mobilization
Embassy with Columbia Closed



History's lessons aren't lost on Hugo Chavez.

Venezuelan strongman and president, Chavez formally ordered the country's armed forces to "high alert" status.

Chavez also ordered the closing of Venezuela's embassy in Colombia and the mobilization of the nation's armed forces to the Columbia border.

At various times when times are tough domestically, authoritarian rulers have distracted domestic opponents and rallied support of wavering populations with external threats--both real and imagined.

And what caused the Venezuelan president to call out the troops?

"We are at a state of alertness. I am putting Venezuela on alert and we will support Ecuador," Chavez told his regular Sunday broadcast Alo Presidente. "Defense minister: move 10 battalions to the Colombia-Venezuela border. Tank battalions, military aircraft: deploy!" he ordered.

So it wasn't trouble at home that caused all this military motion?

Well, whatever it is, it seems that there's been any military challenge from Ciolumbia, a country that is battling narco-lords, guerrillas and problems from the left and right.

But that's Chavez's story and he's sticking to it.

During the same broadcast, Chavez strongly condemned the killing of Luis Edgar Devia, better known by the alias Raul Reyes, who was the de facto foreign minister for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), that nation's largest armed rebel group.

The Colombian army killed Devia in Ecuadorian territory. Ecuador responded with a protest letter sent via diplomatic channels.

Maybe the military's mobilized out of sympathy?

Chavez told the broadcast audience that he had received a phone call from Ecuador's president, Rafael Correa, in which Correa said he had recalled Ecuador's ambassador to Colombia and ordered the mobilization of troops to Ecuador's northern border with Colombia.

As was previously stated, Chavez has been battling opponents of his rollback of Venezuelan democracy. Street demonstrations are common.

But it's nothing a fully-mobilized military can't handle.

by Mondoreb
image: file
Source: Venezuela put military on high alert



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Like an NGO: Rushing Aid To the Bolivian Prostitutes

When the problem is "prostitutes sew their mouths shut", the solution is "RidesAPaleHorse ". The sympathetic sort, RAPH offered the above solution and some kind words.

Maybe these girls should take a tip from the lefties that go on "hunger strikes" here. Makes it a bit easier to eat when no one is looking.

More on the sewing abilities of the world's oldest profession from Reuters:

Prostitutes in the Bolivian city of El Alto sewed their lips together Wednesday as part of a hunger strike to demand that the mayor reopen brothels and bars ordered closed after violent protests by residents last week.

"We are fighting for the right to work and for our families' survival," Lily Cortez, leader of the El Alto Association of Nighttime Workers, told local television.

"Tomorrow we will bury ourselves alive if we are not immediately heard. The mayor will have his conscience to answer to if there are any grave consequences, such as the death of my comrades," she said, surrounded by about 10 prostitutes who had sewn their lips together with thread.

After thinking about it a bit more, RAPH offered additional, if less soothing, words.

Come to think of it........this ain't a bad idea for MOST of the left and....... some on the right.

And then he turned, climbed on his bi-partisan steed and rode off into the sunset. [Cue up the theme from "The Good, The Bad and the Ugly".]

by Mondoreb
[grapic: RidesAPale Horse]



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Ecuador Wants Miami Military Base: Many Issues Here

[image of Miss Ecuador 2004 by ecuador.usa]
by Mondoreb

Gloria Estaban CDs?
Another War on Drugs Outpost?

Ecuador wants a swap: the U.S. base at Manta for a base in Miami. Ecuador wants a military base in Miami? If you're an anti-drug warrior, the news is encouraging. Is the base necessary for U.S. defense? Or is it another outpost in the U.S.'s 2nd-longest running war--The War on Drugs? Is Ecuador making a military or political point?

More from Reuters:

Ecuador's leftist President Rafael Correa said Washington must let him open a military base in Miami if the United States wants to keep using an air base on Ecuador's Pacific coast.

Correa has refused to renew Washington's lease on the Manta air base, set to expire in 2009. U.S. officials say it is vital for counter-narcotics surveillance operations on Pacific drug-running routes.


"We'll renew the base on one condition: that they let us put a base in Miami -- an Ecuadorean base," Correa said in an interview during a trip to Italy.

"If there's no problem having foreign soldiers on a country's soil, surely they'll let us have an Ecuadorean base in the United States."

The U.S. embassy to Ecuador says on its Web site that anti-narcotics flights from Manta gathered information behind more than 60 percent of illegal drug seizures on the high seas of the Eastern Pacific last year.

The failure to renew the lease at Manta would be a blow to U.S. drug interdiction efforts. That should be enough to make anti-drug warriors happy.

Of course, the Ecuadorians are making a political point. And of course, one has to wonder what the base in Miami would add to Ecuadorian security--other than help prevent the import of illegal Gloria Estaban CDs. It's not like Ecuador--not the richest of countries--couldn't use the money from the base rent.

Might Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez be taking up the slack on that point?



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